The Wolfhound
A Beastars Story
CHAPTER 1
Cherryton Academy.
I have heard that name my whole life.
Cherryton Academy.
God, the mere mention of the name is enough to just make me want to lay down and fall asleep forever. Each utterance makes me shrink away, wanting nothing more than to slink into the shadows so that I might not have to think of it.
Even as I climb the hill to its gates, I curse it. The luggage I pull behind me, the only remnants from my life halfway across the world, feels heavier and heavier as my feet drag. My tail seems to grow more rigid with each step, my ragged grey fur standing on edge as I climb higher and higher, the name beating against the edges of my skull like the bang of a drum.
Cherryton Academy.
My new home…
"Good evening, O'Conner – San."
I blinked once, glancing around the well-ordered office, my paws clasped tight against my slacks as my eyes settled on the source of the greeting.
"I'm sorry for keeping you waiting. Plenty of business to attend to as headmaster, after all."
The Siberian Tiger chuckled lightly, extending a paw towards me from my right. I had not even noticed him enter the office; my own thoughts having drowned out all senses of my surrounding. I quickly rose out of the seat, my tall stature dwarfing the headmaster by several inches, and bowed deeply, barely taking notice of his outstretched paw.
"Good evening, Headmaster Gon!" I blurted out, my Irish broad mixing with the Japanese language quite awkwardly.
The refusal of a traditionally western greeting on my part elicited a hearty chuckle from the headmaster.
"Now that I had not expected! I knew you were somewhat versed in Japanese, but this is my first time hearing it spoken by an Irish Carnivore," he remarked amidst his chuckling, his own deftness with the language completely dwarfing mine. "The dialect your people have creates an… interesting combination with my language."
I stood up straight, looking down at the headmaster as my ears drooped slightly, internally cursing myself.
A marvelous first impression.
"I-I hope it doesn't sound too awful, s-sir." I replied sheepishly, aware at how awkward I sounded when speaking the language.
"Non-sense. I take great pride in anyone taking the time to learn our language. It is no easy task, and I must say you are by no means the worst speaker I've heard. Please, take a seat."
Headmaster Gon had briefly returned the bow before moving behind the large, wooden desk that sat in-front of a large window. The entirety of the Academies grounds could be seen from the office, and I felt my eyes drift over to it for a moment, before settling on the headmaster once again as I sat down.
"Now then," Headmaster Gon sighed, sitting upright in his plush, red leather chair. "I trust the flight over was a relaxing one? How long is it? Fifteen hours?"
"Twelve hours, s-sir." I stammered, hunching over in my chair to keep at eye level. "It was fine."
"I can barely manage an hour train ride myself, but you seem to have managed well. Most of our foreign students get lost once they arrive in the city. More than once I've had to send some upperclassmen to hunt them down."
I chuckled softly.
"My father made sure I knew how to get here once I got off my flight."
Headmaster Gon nodded in approval, placing a paw on a manilla folder he had in front of him. He flicked it open, gazing down at it briefly. I caught a glimpse of the contents as well, a flattering picture of myself from junior high stapled to the folder's first paper.
"Your father is an alumnus of Cherryton, correct?" the Headmaster prodded, continuing to look over the folder's contents as I turned my gaze back to him.
"Y-yes sir. Class of 1989. My grandfather came here as well sometime ago…" I said with a nod, certain that this information was already outlined in the folder.
"Both purebred Wolfhounds, correct?"
"Yes sir. As is my mother and grandmother. I… come from a long line of them." I said with a sheepish smile, adjusting my collared shirt slightly.
Headmaster Gon nodded again, glancing up from the folder to look me over. I had always felt felines had an imposing gaze, their eyes calculating and always moving with purpose. I did my best to maintain eye contact with him as he looked me up and down.
"You know, you're the first Irish Wolfhound I have ever met… I'm quite impressed!"
I tugged at my collar lightly as Gon smiled, myself sheepishly returning the smile.
"No doubt many of our students may confuse you for a Grey Wolf when they first see you, what with that grey coat and sharp, pointed snout. How tall are you?"
I paused a moment. "One hundred and eighty three centimeters, sir."
Gon nodded once, closing the folder and leaning back in his chair.
"Excellent. Everything seems to be in order then. We are certainly thrilled to have you joining us here. Foreign students are somewhat of a rarity nowadays, as many countries are seeing a rise in schools of the same style. No doubt your parents had many options in the United Kingdom for you, so we are quite grateful your family is continuing to utilize us."
"T-thank you, sir." I said, my tone quite timid as I remained hunched over.
"Now then, seeing as you're coming in at the end of the winter sessions, we won't have any new student orientations for you until three weeks from now. You'll be welcome to attend those when they do happen, but for now we will get you started with your studies." Gon said with a well-rehearsed tone of voice, as if he has given this spiel a dozen times already. "To start, you'll be housed in Canine Dorm 700. You arriving on a Saturday is quite advantageous, as you'll get some time for your dorm mates to show you around the school. They'll be more apt to fill you in on campus activities and the like."
"I'm looking forward to getting started, sir."
No, you're not.
Gon smiled lightly.
"Excellent. We are looking forward to seeing what you will bring to the school, Mr. O'Conner, especially with your involvement with the drama club."
My heart skipped a beat for a moment, my eyes certainly betraying that fact had slipped my mind.
"Ah… right." I said in a meek tone.
"Not to worry, O'Conner – San, the Cherryton High School drama club's reputation has a bad habit of preceding it. Many times, our scouted foreign students, as few as they are, are quite nervous about it." Gon said, his tone reassuring, no doubt having caught on to my reservations.
"D-don't worry, sir. I'm not nervous." I smiled, sitting up straight as I let a hearty, though painfully fake, chuckle escape.
Yes, you are. You're nervous, you're angry. After all, it's their fault you're here.
"That's good to hear." Gon nodded, sitting up from his desk.
I followed suit, returning to my towering stature as my eyes drifted back out to the view just beyond the window. The sun had just begun to set, and a brilliant hue of oranges and pinks danced across the campus grounds. I wanted nothing more than this moment in time to freeze. I wanted it to never let me go, as I knew the moment I would turn around and exit the headmaster's office, I'd be stuck here.
Just a little while longer… please.
I felt Gon's paw clap me on the back as he turned me around, my head craning for one last look out that window, my eyes pleading silently to keep looking.
"If you ever feel yourself getting lonely, or having trouble adjusting to life away from home, my door is open for you." Gon said with a smile as he led me further away from the window.
I heard a door open, a rush of air greeting me as I stepped out in a hallway. My body turned on a whim, the headmaster just barely in my peripheral vision as my eyes lingered on the window.
"Oh! I almost forgot!" Gon said with a chuckle as he reached into his coat pocket, pulling out a thin plastic card, no bigger than your average credit card.
My paws seemed to move by themselves, my eyes still fixated on the ever-dimming sun as it crept behind the rolling ocean waves. In a fluid motion, I held the card in between my two clawed paws, taking the briefest of moments to look down.
"Welcome to Cherryton High School, Daniel O'Conner."
And in an instant, the door closed.
Don't be nervous.
Don't be nervous.
It's just roommates.
My fist gently rapped against the wooden door, eliciting a great deal of commotion from the room beyond.
They're canines, like you. Just be friendly.
The door flung open, an immediate bombardment of scents and smells assaulting my nostrils, along with five grinning faces.
"Oh wow! Told you he'd be tall!" a Border Collie remarked.
"He looks like a wolf!" an Arctic Fox piped up, doing his best to climb over the dog pile at the door.
"Oh great, another long fur. Not like we don't have enough shedding around here…" an equally tall Doberman sighed, adjusting his glasses.
"Hey hey, come on guys, let's not dog pile on him!" a Dhole remarked, his striking red fur standing out the most as he pushed his way to the front of the group.
"I'm sure he could take us." A Coyote said plainly, leaning his head in close, his nose twitching as he sniffed.
I sheepishly rubbed the back of my head, glancing to my right and left as a few other doors in the hall crept open to observe the source of the early evening commotion.
"H-hey there, roomies." I smiled, doing my best to stand up straight, keeping my fangs hidden enough to not bare them openly.
The group of eager canines fell silent for a split second, no doubt in response to my accent's always interesting combination with the Japanese language. To me, the silence seemed to last for an eternity, but they quickly let out a collective "woah".
"That's definitely an Irish accent! So cool…" the Arctic Fox marveled, his smaller stature causing him to crane his neck slightly to look me over.
"Sounded a lot different than I thought it would…" the Border Collie chuckled, scratching his chin some.
"It's because he's speaking Japanese, you dork." The Dhole sighed, shaking his head lightly.
The Doberman poked his head out of the doorframe for a moment, also taking notice of the commotion they were causing, as many of the other students in adjacent dorms were doing the same.
"Alright fellas let's get back in the room before we get another noise complaint." He said in with a reserved, yet authoritative tone. "Here Daniel, we'll get your bags in."
"You have a lot of stuff…" the Coyote stated. "May need to make some room…"
My eyes perked slightly as everyone began to help haul in the three suitcases, duffle bag, and backpack I had dropped in the hallway.
"T-thank you… I didn't expect you all to know my name yet."
The Doberman turned for a moment with a friendly smirk, letting the Coyote move past him.
"It'd have been quite rude for us to not. Come on in and close the door behind you."
I chuckled lightly, returning the smirk with another smile as I stepped across the door's threshold, breathing in the surroundings of the room.
It was well lived in, as to be expected. The entry way was lined with six open air "closets" that were more akin to personal cupboards. Each cupboard, save for the one closest to the door, was filled with coats, shirts, shoes, bookbags and other miscellaneous items belonging to my roommates. It only took me one sniff to identify whose stuff was kept where, and one glance to know that the empty space was mine.
I took the liberty of taking off my down jacket, utilizing a small coat hanger nailed into the side of the empty cupboard to store the jacket.
"Getting comfy already, eh?" the Arctic fox piped up from the main room.
I whipped my head to the left, freezing in place when I realized everyone was staring at me.
"Oh, s-sorry. I figured since this was empty it wa-"
"Don't apologize, bro. We're all canines here." The Dhole chuckled as he lounged in a black bean bag chair.
"Yeah, and no need to lurk in the doorway, come on in! This is your home now too!" the Border Collie exclaimed, leaping up from his bunk and rushing over to me.
I froze again as he rushed me down, his own paw taking hold of mine and pulling me into the main living area of the room.
It was certainly a lot larger than I had thought it would be. The "bunk beds" were more akin to those pods that can be found in some hotels, with sliding privacy screens and quite a bit of room on the interior. The pods were stacked on top of each other to my left and right, perpendicular to the single window of the room. I took a glance behind me, noticing an empty, pod close to the washroom's entrance. My luggage seemed to already be laid out around the empty pod as well, making it quite clear this was my new bed.
"It's not much, but it's home. Bathroom is off to your left, and obviously your bunk is just behind you, below mine." The Doberman explained, sitting on another bean bag chair, a yellow one, that sat in the middle of the room. "We've got a TV behind us and an old game console hooked up if that's your fancy, too. Oh! Crap, you don't even know our names, do you?"
I shook my head once.
"You idiot," the Dhole laughed, smacking the Doberman upside his head lightly. "This moron here is Chase, though we sometimes call him 'short hair'; he thinks his shit don't stink just because he doesn't shed."
Chase, the leanly built Doberman whose black and brown coat seemed to shine ever so slightly under the right light, returned the friendly smack with one of his own.
"And this is 'Ginger', though he may try to tell you his real name is Mav." Chase smirked.
"I'm Tony!" the Border Collie grinned from ear to ear, giving me a friendly slap on the back.
"Ozzi," the Coyote said with a simple nod of his head, gazing down from his top bunk.
"And I'm Pip!" the Arctic Fox finished, leaping off his top bunk triumphantly. "And don't go thinking my nickname is 'pipsqueak' either! I'm just a bit short for my age."
"So the scientists say…" Mav snickered, eliciting a round of chuckles from everyone, including Pip.
I joined in on the chuckling, though stayed somewhat reserved as I took the opportunity to sit down on my new bed. I had to remain somewhat hunched over, my head just barely able brushing the top lip of the pod if I had sat up straight.
"Well, you already know my name, but I'm Daniel, though my… mates called me Danny back home." I said, my tone energetic and friendly in the beginning, but drooping off towards the end.
Stop thinking about home you idiot! Now's not the time to be a sad sack!
"Danny… it suits you," Ozzi said plainly, looking me over once more before picking up a book he had left on his bed.
"'Mates'." Pip said with a chuckle, his eyebrows wriggling as he took to sitting on the floor in front of his bunk. "For a second there I thought you meant the 'more than friend' kind, if you catch my drift."
"Oh, you would think that wouldn't you, you little pervert!" Mav exclaimed, picking Pip off his spot on the floor, catching the smaller carnivore in a headlock. "Try to behave for a bit before letting Danny into your sick little mind will yah?!"
Pip let out a yelp as he squirmed under Mav's grasp. While Mav was small himself, only reaching up to the middle of my chest, he had a good grasp on the much smaller fox. The struggling of Pip, however, proved too much for Mav to handle, and the two of them tumbled out of the bean bag chair, flopping onto the ground.
"T-TONY… BACK ME UP!" Pip squeaked, continuing to struggle as Mav began to noogie the fox.
"I've got ya, little buddy!" Tony roared, leaping from my side to join in on the dog pile, grabbing Mav by his tail.
Boisterous laughter filled room 700 as I sat there watching the playful scuffle. For a moment, I felt myself smile. Not any of the fake, half smiles I had put on throughout the day; it was a genuine smile. However fleeting it was, I kept smiling as I watched the three canines wrestle with each other, barely resisting the urge to join in myself.
"Sorry Danny, they tend to get rowdy on the weekends." Chase sighed; his voice raised just enough to speak over the dog pile next to him.
I perked my ears up, turning over to Chase.
"It's fine, actually. Seems you all are close friends."
Chase smiled, looking over at the dog pile as the three canines began to calm down; the laughter and playful yelps were replaced with panting and heavy breathing.
"Well, it tends to happen when you all have roomed together since junior high… it'll be nice to have all the beds filled again, though."
I blinked a few times, looking down at the bed I sat on. Chase's words bounced around my skull as I gave a light sniff of the air around the bed, noticing that it carried no distinctive scent. It was as if the bed was brand new, like it hadn't been touched in a long time. Turning back to Chase, I noticed his face was downcast, his ears drooped ever so slightly as his eyes were fixated on his paws.
"Yeah, it'll be great to have a full pack! Seeing how lively 701 was all the time was really starting to get on my nerves." Tony exclaimed, shooting up from the dog pile to sit cross legged. "Oh! We may even be able to beat them properly in basketball now! Collot keeps bugging me about it…"
"One step at a time, Tony." Ozzi said, his voice monotoned as he seemed more focused on his book. "Let's get Danny settled in first."
"Ah, good idea there, Ozzi!" Tony exclaimed cheerfully, giving the Coyote a vigorous nod of agreement.
Chase cleared his throat, pushing his glasses up his snout as he glanced away from his paws.
"Ozzi's got a point. Why don't you tell us a bit about yourself, Danny?" He smiled, his gaze settling back on me.
I straightened my back ever so slightly, taking care to not bump my head against the top of the bed.
"Ah… well I'm not really much of the type to brag openly…" I mumbled, rubbing the back of my head instinctively. "Sort of your… standard foreigner I suppose."
"Man, you make it sound so lame!" Mav chuckled, climbing off the floor to reclaim his seat on the bean bag chair. "What I wouldn't give to get out of the school once in a while, let alone go live in another country…"
"Yeah come on, spill the beans! What's your home like?" Pip exclaimed, climbing up to the top of Mav's bean bag chair with relative ease.
"W-well… it's a lot less urban than here. We only have two or three major cities, and I rarely visited them." I replied, clasping my paws together as I hunched over slightly. "I lived out in the country with my mother and grandmother. My… father was still around, though he was busy with work… most of the time. But it was nice, lots of wide-open spaces for my sister and I to play in as kids…"
"Ohhh, a sister." Pip said slyly. "Is she sin- GAH"
Before Pip could finish his sentence, Mav had leaned back in the bean bag chair just enough to cause the Arctic Fox to tumble off the top.
"That sounds pretty nice. I had read your country is very green." Kai stated, his tone still plain and affirmative.
"Aren't there a lot of sheep there as well?" Toni asked, shifting around on the floor slightly to a more comfortable position.
I chuckled lightly.
"A fair few…" I replied. "Though they and the other herbivores stayed around the cities… carnivores kept to the countryside."
"Must have been strange to see how integrated our home is, eh?" Chase said, leaning forward in his bean bag chair.
"Oh! Uh… I kind of… didn't really pay attention…" I said meekly.
Tony snickered lightly, scratching at his face.
"How'd you NOT notice?!"
I replied with a meek shrug, emitting a chuckle myself.
"Suppose I was more focused on not getting lost… Wolfhound's are very task oriented."
Ozzi perked his ears up, turning away from his book for the first time I had sat down on my bed. He turned to look down at me, moving just enough to still be laying on his top bunk.
"I have not heard of a… Wolfhound before. You are a 'dog' though, yes? How were you created?"
Why did he have to ask…
My wince at the question must have been obvious, as Chase immediately shot up from the bean bag, waving his paws in a dismissive manner as he approached me.
"Ah-er… come on there Ozzi, you only just met the guy!" He stammered, giving me a pat on the shoulder as he leaned against the bunk.
"But I want to –" Ozzi began before being cut off by Mav, who grabbed a nearby through pillow and chucked it at the Coyote, just barely missing his head.
"Don't mind him, Danny. He's just very… VERY inquisitive sometimes." Mav stated, settling back into his bean bag chair.
"It's alright… reasonable question." I shrugged.
I don't want to answer.
"Sometimes he forgets some dogs don't like being asked questions like that." Chase added with a nod, hoisting himself up to his bed above mine.
"I've never cared about it…" Tony added, still seated on the floor.
"That's because you're a bit of an air head, Tony." Pip stated after he leapt out from behind Mav, landing straight on the previously occupied bean bag chair that Chase had left for the comfort of his bed.
"Oh… right!" Tony laughed, turning around on the floor towards the TV as Pip switched it on.
My eyes watched as everyone seemed to return to their own activities, patting my knees lightly as I looked down at my still unpacked suitcases, and then to my bed's pillow. In the lull of activity, I could not help but let loose a yawn, my mouth stretching wide along with my arms.
"You must be pretty tired, eh Danny?" Chase asked, leaning over the edge of his bed to look down at me as I finished my yawn.
"I haven't yawned since boarding the plane back home…" I replied, scratching my cheek lightly, loose strands of my grey, scraggly fur floating down onto the floor.
"No need to stay awake on our account then." Chase chuckled, giving me a thumbs up before he returned to laying in his bed, the sound of a books page's turning shortly following. "Got a whole three years to get to know you."
I nodded once, a smaller yawn escaping my lips.
"Well… good night." I said, laying down on my bed, preparing to close the privacy curtain of my bunk.
"Good night!" Everyone said in unison.
Three years…
Story begins a few weeks before the beginning of the anime/manga. Expect later chapters to contain spoilers.