(Third Person POV)
"WHAT?! YOU'RE KIDDING!"
"OH COME ON! MR. KINCAID, THAT'S NOT FAIR! I DID NOTHING! IT WAS ALL KEITH'S FAULT!"
"HEY, RENA! DON'T JUST RAT ME OUT LIKE THAT!"
"IF IT MEANS I DON'T HAVE TO BE STUCK WITH YOU IN DETENTION FOR SIX HOURS I WILL SO DO IT!"
"TRAITOR!"
"JERK!"
"KNOW-IT-ALL!"
"CONDESCENDING PRICK!"
"SCREW YOU, BLUE EYES!"
"STUPID PRINCE CHARMING!"
"CHILDREN, SILENCE!" Mr. Kincaid growled at the two students at a loud volume, placing his hands on their shoulders and forcibly separating them from each other. "You are BOTH going to detention and right NOW!"
"Aww..." Keith sulked his shoulders just a little bit. "It was just a little prank, Mr. Kincaid, honestly!" Keith held his hands up in defense. "I didn't mean for it to get this out of hand!"
Mr. Kincaid did not look amused as he flashed Keith a piercing glare. "Well, perhaps you should have thought of that before you did this to my classroom." Mr. Kincaid rested his hand on the doorknob and slowly twisted it, pushing the door open for the two students to see.
Both the eighteen and seventeen-year-old sweatdropped at the sight of the destroyed classroom. An ink bomb that Keith had hooked up to the classroom's ceiling fan had exploded prematurely and got out of hand, covering the entire classroom in black Tentacruel ink instead of just Mr. Kincaid's desk, which was the intended target (hence the 'intended' part). Mr. Kincaid had immediately decided it was either Keith or Rena who pulled this prank, and he really didn't care too much to find out which one of them actually did it, so he just decided to punish both of them. Even though he was supposed to be working with Deveraux, that didn't necessarily mean he had to like her. And besides, in Kincaid's mind, he saw this as an oppertunity for the two to bond, so in the end he technically was supporting the mission.
"Here." Mr. Kincaid handed both teens a bucket with water and wash cloths, wearing a twistedly amused smirk across his face. "Have fun cleaning up my classroom for the next several hours. I expect it to be spotless by the time you're done."
Both teens let out a groan of protest before trudging into the ruined classroom. Mr. Kincaid took a seat at his surprisingly untouched desk, half paying attention to the students cleaning up his classroom. And by half paying attention, I mean he wasn't paying attention at all, since he could care less.
Keith started on the desks, while Rena began mopping up the floor. In all of her years of thieving, training, and fighting, she had never come across a punishment that was something like...this.
Rena shot Keith a resentful glare. "This is all your fault," she sneered at him.
"Well sorry for getting you dragged into this, Princess Blue Eyes." Keith threw his immediate sarcasm right in her face, snapping at her ever so slightly.
Both teens clicked their tongues in disgust at the other, dwelling in their bitter moods. Hours passed by slowly, and the ink wasn't getting cleaned up very easily. It mostly just got spread around when the two teens tried to wipe it up, so their cleaning process was slowed down by this tremendously.
"This...is brutal." Rena glared down at the floor she was trying to desperately clean, letting out a harsh sigh.
"Tell me about it." Keith rolled his eyes, scoffing a little.
Keith and Rena exchanged an awkward moment of eye contact before turning away from each other and resuming their bitter hostility towards each other.
Keith grumbled incoherent thoughts inside his mind, violently trying to get the ink off of this one desk. "Why won't this damn stuff come off?!" Keith screamed inside of his mind.
Suddenly, a second wash cloth plopped itself down onto the desk he was trying to clean, and a second pair of hands began helping him clean the desk.
"Here." Rena bitterly started to wash the ink off the desk Keith was struggling to clean. "Let me help you." She had finished cleaning the floor about an hour ago.
Keith just stared at her in complete shock for a moment before immediately jerking his eyes away from her. "...thanks." He didn't understand why she was helping him, since she was only here because of him in the first place. Keith found himself stealing a glance at the girl standing next to him through his red spiky hair that fell in front of his eyes. "Why are you helping me?"
"Because you suck at this." Rena curtly answered his question breathlessly, not even having to think about it for a second.
Keith just sweatdropped. "Aha...hah...yeah..." He awkwardly scratched the back of his head as he compared their progress of cleaning the classroom. "I guess you could say I was never really exposed to this sort of stuff..."
Rena had cleaned the floor and half the walls, and Keith had successfully cleaned off two desks.
Two desks.
"Ah, right." Rena bitterly nodded in understanding. "Because you had maids for that 'sort of stuff.'" She repeated what he had reffered to cleaning as at the end of her sentence.
Keith cringed a little at her harsh tone. "...yeah. I'm not used to getting my hands dirty, I guess, so I don't really know how to..."
Rena stopped cleaning for a second to shoot him a bitter sideways glance. "Well that much was obvious."
Keith awkwardly grinned at her, trying not to die under that deathly glare of hers. If looks could kill... Well, let's just say Rena would have killed him by now if they could.
"Well..." Keith awkwardly got back to cleaning, trying to move the spotlight off of him. "You seem to be doing pretty well with all of this." Keith pointed to the half-cleaned classroom.
Rena stopped scrubbing an ink spot off of the desk just long enough to stare at Keith blankly. "Yeah, well not all of us were born into privilege, and a lot of us had to work hard for everything we got." Rena's hostility was growing with each passing second, but Keith noticed she managed to remain passive-agressive about it.
He could tell that she resented him a little for being born into a rich family, and that she had felt this way since he first told her about his family. He wasn't sure why, but he figured it had something to do with her home life. Her resentment was understandable, of course, so Keith didn't ever take it personally. Although, if this was anyone other than Rena talking to him like this, he probably would've lost his temper and punched them in the face by now.
"Yeah, I know." He stupidly forced out some sort of reply. "I'm guessing you were one of those people?"
Rena finished wiping off the desk and moved over to the next one, and Keith followed her lead by starting to clean it with her. "Yeah, I was, and I still am."
"Hmm." Keith grunted, showing that he understood.
Rena felt his eyes on her, and the tips of her ears grew red with embarrassment under his gaze. "What?" She awkwardly snapped at him, trying to figure out why he was staring at her. She didn't know why, but him staring at her just made Rena feel...uncomfortable.
"Nothing." Keith casually shrugged it off. "Just wondering why you never talk about your family, or your life before you came to this school."
Keith had no idea how big of a nerve he struck with those simple words.
"Probably because it's none of your damn business." Rena angrily snapped at him with fire in her eyes, glaring at him as fiercely as she could. She was so blinded by her anger that she didn't even stop to consider how that might backfire later.
Keith just stared at her in shock, not tearing his eyes from hers. Normally, he probably would've been intimidated by this glare, but it was because he looked into her eyes that he wasn't intimidated by it. Reflected in her angry blue eyes were years of suffering from pain, bottling up hate, having to endure countless rejection, and...a scared little girl not knowing what to do.
Keith didn't see an angry Rena standing before him, he saw a scared little girl version of Rena with tears welling up in her eyes.
"Rena, are you alright?" Keith reached out to rub his thumb over her cheek without giving it much thought, noticing the tears welling up in her eyes.
Rena jerked her face out of Keith's hand, shivering slightly from his touch. "Just peachy." Keith opened his mouth to say something else, but Rena beat him to it. "Just drop it, okay? I don't want to talk about it." She felt her heart beat quicken, and the redness from her ears travelled down to her cheeks and her neck.
Keith worriedly glanced at her before going back to scrubbing the desk. "Alright, I'll drop it..." He paused, then looked at her from the side. "But if you ever want to talk about it, just tell me."
"Fine." Rena scrubbed the ink off the desk even harder, trying to drown out her panicked thoughts by working as hard as she could.
The two worked in complete silence for the next two hours. Keith would occasionally shoot Rena a worried glance, which didn't go unnoticed by the brunette. She felt her face get hot every time she saw him worrying about her. Why the hell was it so hot in this damn classroom?! She didn't understand why she was so angry and fidgety. Well, she had an idea about the anger, but not the whole being fidgety part. She had a hard time staying still, so even after they finished cleaning the classroom and had an hour or so left of detention to serve, she didn't sit still the entire time. Keith's constant eyes on her just kept freaking her out internally, and she had to keep moving around in order to try and calm herself down.
Her initial thoughts about this job were way off and completely wrong. Rena thought befriending these three idiots and conning Keith out of that stupid damn blueprint would be super easy and a big payout since she had a Wailord of a client, but the reality of her situation dawned on her. They weren't idiots, they were...her friends.
Yes, her friends. All three of them were her friends, and not her 'fake' friends like she had convinced herself that was all that they were to her, but real friends. Real, honest friends who cared and worried about her.
Rhythimi was the best girl friend she had always wished she had back at Castelia's orphanage for girls. She had been so lonely in that place, and she always wanted a friend as exciting and cheery as Rhythimi to brighten her spirits. Rhythimi always could tell what Rena was feeling, and she was one of the few who could successfully talk her out of upper-cutting someone for being a bastard. Rhythimi was one of the sole reasons Rena had managed to stay out of so many fights while at this school. Rena felt like she could tell Rhythimi anything. Although she was an evil match-making demon and a crazy love-sick girl, she was still insanely smart and worthy of being called Rena's best friend. Rena decided she would need to tell her that at some point.
Isaac was the best little nerd friend she could ever ask for. He was awkward and shy, and he actually reminded Rena of her childhood self. She had always buried herself in books as a kid to get her mind off of the cruel reality that was her life, drowning herself in knowledge. Because of that, Rena had been strictly logic-based when it came to her thoughts and reasoning, which made her initially come off as emotionally detached and rude. But, Isaac never saw her that way. He welcomed her with open arms, and he even partnered up with her for several experiments and labs, making Rena feel included in something for the first time in her life. They were both intellectuals and crazy smart, which was why they got along so well. Not to mention she admired his relationship with his little sister Melody, who Rena completely adored, even though such an emotion completely went against her nature.
And then there was Keith. Rena had no idea where to even start when it came to the stupid, hot-headed red-head. He was competitive, flirty, and arrogant, but also the one she was closest to at this school, which was pretty ironic given her situation. It was her job to be closest to him, but somewhere along the way, Rena screwed up and actually got pretty close to Keith for real. She didn't have to pretend around him anymore like she did when she first started the job, and she could actually share what she was feeling. She could talk to Keith about anything, and he always had this way of cheering her up. No matter what she said or did, he could always tell when she was upset, and he would force it out of her one way or another. And then of course he always made her feel weird pretty much constantly. He'd worry and care about her, which made her stomach do flip-flops on a daily basis. Rena didn't understand it. It could be something as simple as trying to calm her down by rubbing his thumb over her cheek (like today), and she'd immediately flare up and start burning up with a fever. She didn't understand, and perhaps she never would.
She had told Ice that she was going to go through with the job, but what Ice didn't know was that she had flat out lied to him. Years of practice made her pretty good at lying to people's faces.
"I've got to find some way to get out of this..." Rena muttered to herself, staring down at her feet on the floor. "I should have a decent amount of cash to retire and take care of the two of us..." Her mind flashed to Mightyena, then remembered just how much food that wolf-Pokemon devoured on a daily basis. "Alright, so maybe I'll have to sell my gun-smuggling ring to pull it off, but that should be enough to take care of this whole thing, right?"
She had made her decision.
Keith stared across the room at Rena, noticing she was deep in thought. She seemed worried about something, but he didn't know what. Rena was also muttering things out loud, but he was too far away to hear what she said. He couldn't stop staring at her the whole time, worrying that she was worried about something. He wanted to make her problems his problems, but he wasn't sure why. This was Keith Dazzle for Arceus's sake! He didn't have to worry about anything, or anyone but himself!
And yet, he found himself wanting to.
Mr. Kincaid was so bored out of his mind that he was actually playing trash-ket-ball with his trash can and balled up pieces of paper. After doing this for a few hours, he got bored of it pretty quickly, so the teacher picked up the remote and turned on the TV. He flipped the channels until he found the stock reports, noticing that they currently were having a special insider on Altru Inc.'s stocks at present.
The news reporter excitedly announced the rise in stocks for the company, which broke the silence of the classroom. "This morning, Altru Inc.'s stocks spiked in value tremendously after the President and CEO of the company Blake Hall gave a speech on his new creation: Dream Energy! This new power source is looking to replace both electricity AND oil! Can you believe that?! The company is looking to expand, and they are currently looking for spots across Almia to build their new HQ! Nothing has been decided yet, but they're looking into making Pueltown their main base of operations! Altru Inc.'s 'Dream Energy' is still being researched, but it looks like it will be finalized in the next year give or take..."
The television program immediately caught Rena's attention, snapping her from her thoughts. She remembered hearing a little about Altru Inc, but she didn't know much.
The brunette turned around to look up at the TV screen as she directed her question to Mr. Kincaid. "Mr. Kincaid, what's Altru Inc...?"
Mr. Kincaid flinched at Rena's voice suddenly disturbing his peace and quiet. "Ah, Miss Deveraux." Mr. Kincaid turned around in his desk chair to look at the curious student before him. "I'm surprised you don't know. Then again, you're not from this region, which is where Altru is strictly based and involved in its business..."
"It's some sort of energy company, right?" Rena asked, making sure she had her facts straight. It's not like she really cared, she was just so bored that she wanted to think about anything but the job right now.
"Correct." Mr. Kincaid seemed amused that she knew that. "Altru is a research facility always looking to find new types of energy sources that can benefit both the environment and economy, hence the 'Dream Energy' they said they were currently developing." Mr. Kincaid shrugged. "The makeup of this new energy source hasn't been released to the public yet, since it's still being developed, but it's supposedly going to replace electricity and oil within the next year or two." Mr. Kincaid concluded. "Which is kind of ironic, since Altru started out as an oil company, and also the very first oil company in Almia."
"Oh, cool." Rena nodded her head, enjoying the distraction that kept herself from pulling her subconcious back into her thoughts.
KNOCK KNOCK!
A sudden knock at the door made both student and the teacher turn their heads to see who it was, and surprisingly, Isaac poked his head inside the classroom.
He simply shook his head at the sight of Keith and Rena in here, not surprised at all that they were serving Saturday detention. He then looked over at Mr. Kincaid, gaining his attention. "Mr. Kincaid? That prototype for that extra credit project you assigned me is complete. I wasn't sure if you wanted to test it now, or..."
Mr. Kincaid immediately shot up from his chair. "Oh, yes! I will definitely test it out right now." He hurriedly walked over to Isaac, nearly forgetting about the two troublemakers he was leaving behind. "Ah, you two." Mr. Kincaid looked at Keith and Rena before stepping out the door. "Don't go anywhere. I should be back within the hour."
SLAM!
Ker-chunk
And with that, both the prissy teacher and boy genius were gone, and Mr. Kincaid made sure to lock the door behind them.
Rena exhaled in relief. "Finally, Hairspray Head is gone."
Keith couldn't help but laugh at that comment. "Yeah, I didn't think he'd ever leave."
Rena immediately looked up at the ceiling and got to work. She spotted an air vent towards the middle of the classroom, and she leapt up onto a desk right below it. This had Keith intrigued, and he got up from where he was sitting and stood next to Rena on the ground.
"What're you doing?" He shot her the weirdest look ever, completely confused.
Rena looked at Keith as if he was stupid or something (which he was). "What does it look like I'm doing? I'm getting us out of here." She slipped a hair pin out of her hair and started to remove the screws from the air vent, letting them fall to the floor beneath her feet.
Keith just laughed at that, then jumped up onto the desk and started helping her out. "You know, Blue Eyes? I think you're easily the strangest girl I've ever met." He shook his head at her.
Rena shot him a sheepish look, sweatdropping a little. "You have no idea..."
The two shared a laugh before Rena leaned back a little too far, nearly losing her balance. Keith immediately wrapped his arm around her waist, staring down at the shorter girl's face with a smirk stretched across his lips. "Don't go falling for me now."
Rena groaned and rolled her eyes at the corny joke. "Wouldn't dream of it."
Keith found his eyes lingering on Rena, still holding her in place in his arms. And that was when the damning realization crashed on him; he finally realized why he cared and worried about her so much while staring into her beautiful blue eyes that were so full of life and mystery. "God, I'm so screwed..." He thought to himself, unconsciously flashing Rena a charming smile.
Rena felt the tips of her ears begin to turn red again, and she immediately removed herself from Keith's arms, standing back up straight and taking off the rather large grate that covered the air vent.
Keith looked up at their escape route, then shot Rena an amused, sideways glance. "You know, detention today wasn't so bad. I actually had a pretty good time."
Rena got ready to climb into the vent, but before she did, she suddenly couldn't resist the urge to stop and flash Keith a genuine smile. "...I did too."
...
I'm absolutely horrible for taking this long to update. I'm sorry! Uh, happy Easter XD...?
*suddenly starts getting pelted with rotten fruit and vegetables*
I SAID I WAS SORRY!
*sweatdrop* Uh, enjoy the chapter filled with FabricationOfLiesShipping fluff and Keith coming to terms XD...?
Read, review, and enjoy!