DISCLAIMER: I OWN NOTHING EXCEPT A PART OF THE PLOT!
Chapter 7 – ENEMIES' ENCOUNTER
"OK, now I am going to announce your class placings, alright?" LCL spoke with her poorly pronounced English. Everyone "retaliated".
"OMG! Teacher, NO!"
"Don't announce it!"
"Yeah, it hurts feelings!"
"What should I do?! I almost flunked the exam…"
"Please? Don't announce it, OK?"
"NO!"
"I don't want to hear it!"
While the class was in total chaos, I sat quietly on my chair, without a sound. I was very anxious and my palms were sweating. My instincts told me that it was not because I failed, but it was-
"Well, I have to announce it anyway, rules and regulations, you know. The first in class is number twelve. Congratulations." Oh god. She pronounced "congratulations" like "come get your lotion". She sounded like I was going to get beaten up by everyone, the lotion being the remedy to my would-be-injuries.
"Whoo!" Axel was the first one to cheer and clapped his hands. Everyone else followed suit. I swore my face had kicked tomato's butt off the winner pedestal for the reddest thing in the world. I felt my face heat up. (Well, I dropped many hints here and there. Dear readers, could you guess my class number now?)
But still I had to thank LCL to no end for distracting my classmates' attention. "The second in class is number 37, um, Zexion Illusione." We applauded throughout the announcement, until our hands ached.
I received my report card from my assistant class monitor. I surveyed the paper. My Malay Language was only sixty-nine marks! Darn it LCL! Why did you not spare me that one mark?! If not, I would have at least got an A-. I admit it was my worst subject, I had never scored eighty marks and above like in the old days since I entered middle school, but still… Ugh…
I checked the total marks and total average, after that, I put the report card into my bag and made a mental note to make sure my parents signed their names on it. I always forgot about simple things like that. Just then, Zexion suddenly appeared beside me, catching me off guard just as I turned to his direction. "Whoa! Oh, it's you. You almost scared me to death, man…" I patted at chest to calm the sudden wild heartbeats down due to surprise. He did something out of his character today; he grinned, widely. "What was your total mark? Care to enlighten me?" OK, that was random. He made himself suspicious to me. Nevertheless, I told him the truth, "1067. Why?" (We had a total of twelve subjects, and another "subject" was the conduct/behavioural marks, totalling 1300) "Is that so… Can you spare me one mark? Mine is only 1066…" From what I knew, he had some slipups in the exam that caused him to lose some marks, but not as much as mine… I wore an expression of "are you serious?" and stared at him. Nice one, Zexion, how dare you try to get the decisive one mark from me? Take this! "I'm so sorry, I can't," I blinked my eyes a few times playfully at him and said. He did something even more random; he pouted! "Do not be like that… How about half? That should be fine, yes?" I tried to stifle a laugh as soon as I realised that he was only joking. He could be unpredictable sometimes when he chose to. "Can two kings share a kingdom?" I asked jokingly.
"KKRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNG!"
Recess time! "Terima kasih, kelas." [Translate from Malay: Thank you, class.] "Terima kasih, cikgu." [Translation: Thank you, teacher.]
"You know, Nemix, just relax. It is not every day you are placed first in class. Congratulations!" Zexion returned to his normal behaviour and said to me. He said all those random things just to make me relax and not so tensed up. "Thanks, Zexion, and congratulations to you too. Hey, be sure to get the first place the next time, Professor," I smiled and said, hitting his shoulder playfully. He chuckled and left for the canteen, waving me goodbye.
As usual, I grabbed the broom and started sweeping the floor. Maybe the gods above were fair after all. I had to do all the cleaning duty all by myself with some additional help sometimes, and They decided to award me the first placing. Hmm… Without even realising, I swept faster and faster. Soon, everything was done. I took a piece of cloth and headed to the washroom to get some water. I was not sure if what happened next was a prank, but just then-
"Hey, come and see this! The servant is cleaning up again!" Did you hear that? [Authoress: I guess not… You could not hear typed words.] That detestable tone! I knew the owner of that annoying voice. Once I let the cloth absorb water to its maximum capacity, I spun around and glared at the person. It was her; Fayra Joann (pronounced as "Joanne").
[CUT! Pause! Hold it right there! I, the authoress, am taking over Nemix's part for a bit! *Grabs the microphone* HAHA! How is everyone doing? Back to the subject, this name sounded weird, huh? She claimed that her English father worked for the British government (doubtful) and her Malaysian Chinese mother was a very successful businesswoman and owned a very big and rich company. Now normally, most people like her should have been humble and nice to people. But NO, she was downright snobby, rude and preppy. And she hated Nemix, a lot. Why? A few days ago, Nemix insisted informing Mr. Saïx about her greatest "record"; her hairstyle violated school rules and she insisted wearing high-heels to school, after twenty warnings. Their grudges started long before that, but this was the most recent one. Of course, the demerit was recorded. And her oh-so-"great" aunt, one of the school directors was informed to discipline her niece! How cool was that? Nemix was very amused to see their reactions, and felt very accomplished somehow by pawning a spoiled and prodigal b- I mean… uh… Yeah, you know what I meant, right? Since then, she started to tease and humiliate Nemix frequently, even making the tedious journey from her far away classroom to K2D. Thank you for reading my "speech" (more like a rant). Back to Nemix]
I thought, "Why so much free time today? Not busy enough?" And then I said, "Why do you look as annoying as ever today? If you think this place is meant for so-called servants like me, why come here? You want to join in or what?" After I finished my words, I grabbed the wet cloth and turned to leave for my classroom. I seriously could care less about her, anyway.
She gestured to her two "bodyguards" to block my path. Ugh, fine, since I had the blackboard left to clean, why not see what she was up to this time? "How can I let you slip away that easily? I had something to tell you, you know," She sauntered to my back in an annoyingly slow pace. I hated her strong perfume… Ugh, it was killing the smell receptors in my nose!
"Spit it out. I haven't got all day to play with you."
"Fine, talk! Why did you steal my possession?"
"What? I am not interested in your so-called possessions. What did you think I have 'stolen'?"
"Quit pretending! What I meant was the first placing in class!"
"*Stifled a laugh* Oh please, which class are you in? What class am I in? What does me placing first in class matter to you?"
"… K2C, so?!"
"That's it, right? I lived a happy life in K2D and placed first in my class. Anything wrong with that?"
"What about your total mark? How much is it?"
"1067, so what?"
"Ha! I scored higher than you!"
"Then what was there for you to quarrel about?"
"You would be promoted to class K3B next year with your results, now that's problematic."
"You were predicted to be in K3B too?"
"Well yeah!"
"Oh, what does that have to do with me?" What a silly thing to rant about…
"K3B is not for the likes of you! Only people that are smart, beautiful, cute and nice like me have the authority to be in there!"
"It seems that your narcissism worsens by every minute."
"What did you say?!"
"Anyways, we still have one more decisive final-year exam. We can only determine who will be in K3B or other classes until then, so quit showing off!"
"Why, you…! Fine! Dare to bet?!"
"I've got the guts, so bring it on!"
"Good! Let's bet on which one of us will be in K3B the next year!"
"And the loser?"
"Transfer to another school immediately!"
"OK, it's on!"
"Hmph! Let's get out of here. I don't want my reputation to be tainted by this annoying servant!"
They left, she rocked her hips while walking. Pfft! Who did they think I was, an idiot? My placing in 8th Grade was 67, if K3A had 40 students, then I would be the 27th in K3B. I just had to give myself a little boost to maintain the placing, and then I would surely win the bet! Stupid, annoying girl, being in class K2C did not mean she was the best in the world! People in K2D were not as dumb as she thought!
Discrimination… I hated it!
"Sorry, but is anyone going to… clean the board?" Who? I spun around- whoa. The Sanitary Warden! Crap… "Ah… I'm working on it, yeah. Working on it… Hehe…"
After all that trouble, I still had lessons to attend. But somehow, the teachers seemed like they were colluded; they all threw tons of homework at us. What the heck! Please let there be no more cases for now, or else I would lose that bet. Organisation XIII, save us all…
The next day was a Saturday, our group was summoned by Zexion to school for a meeting. Venue: The Reading Room. We all had our own extracurricular activities every Saturday, so we had to schedule the meeting at half past noon so everyone could make it. I had Chinese Martial Arts and Chess, both my body and brain were totally exhausted. Zexion was in the English Language Society. Axel and Roxas were in the Struggle team while Demyx was a member of the Music Society and Swimming Club.
Demyx asked first, "Hey Zexy, my pen was in spaz mode because of the 'Emergency Meeting' signal. What's the rush?" Zexion drank some water and said, "Yes, I am in a rush. Roxas, can you log onto Facebook for a bit? This is an emergency."
"Sure, hang on…" Roxas activated his laptop, executed his browser, connected to the search engine and finally arrived at the main page of Facebook. "Whose account?" Roxas turned his head to Zexion and asked. "Mine first. You all can open your accounts after the meeting if you want."
"Eh… Count me out. I don't have an account…" My voice trailed off to a mumble near the end of the sentence. I felt like I was left behind by the world. I did not really trust Facebook, though. There were cases where people's private information was exploited. I did not think it was safe enough. One more thing, I did not have a cell phone and I left my e-mail account to rot after creating it, so when holidays came around, I would seemingly evaporate from existence, except for my family and some close friends…
"… Log in successful, h- What?" Roxas' eyes almost popped out of his eye sockets when he looked at the screen, in surprise. All of us were so curious that we went up before the screen. Imagine five fish balls or buns crammed together. The only notification was:
"The most breaking news of the 21st century! Someone in this school had dirty and naughty intentions! The main character was an 8th Grader, but his partner was unknown. The only thing we knew was that the partner was of the same age from XXX High School. How did the students from different schools meet during school time? Why were they outside of the ladies' washroom? Was there someone behind all this? Look at their faces! How disgusting! How dare he bring another boy into the school to mess around?" From: KeishaToCease Q
Holy Bananas! This post was just too… Below the text was a picture… The background setting was indeed our school, there were two male students standing outside a ladies' washroom near the basketball field. The resolution was poor, and the boys were a bit far from the camera lenses. I could not tell what they were doing… "Why this person again?" I pointed at the name at the end of the text.
Roxas clicked on the picture to magnify it. Now we could see the picture much better. Indeed, there were two boys, one of the boy's clothes was… horrible! Aside from unrespectable, he looked like he had not bathed for weeks! Right off the bat, I did not think he was not a very nice person or anything of the sort. As for the other male… he wore the prefect's uniform of our school. The face- WHAT?!
"Zexion! That prefect in the picture was you?!" Axel screamed at the top of his voice. Oh, my ears… "*Sigh* I do not know why…" Zexion sighed and said, shaking his head slowly. He must have been the first one to see this, hence the current calmness. "This is obviously taken by a hidden camera; both of you never looked directly into the camera lens," I said.
Roxas hit a few keys and said, "Let's see when the picture was taken… Three days ago." Zexion looked up at us as if he realised something. He said, "Three days ago…? Then it could have been a hidden camera." The other four of us stared at him, confused. What did he mean by "could have been"?
"Three days ago, I caught a trespasser at that place. Perhaps the venue we were at did not make other people feel comfortable…" Demyx asked, "Why did he trespass?" Zexion answered, "He claimed that he had something to hand over to a girl, I reckoned the girl was a student in our school, but he did not tell me her name. The only information he gave was she was from K2C."
K2C?! Not again? Eh, wait a minute, a student from K2C? Oh crap. I asked, "What did he want to give?" "Huh? I took that object from him and returned him shortly after, it felt like a small glass bottle. It was wrapped by a piece of cloth. That was all I knew," Zexion said.
A small glass bottle? Hmm, I inquired again, "Was there anything, like, a strange smell?" I let him recall for a bit… "… Yes, some sort of a very strong perfume! It smelled like roses… I almost had a sneezing fit when inspecting it," he snapped his fingers and said.
"Roses?" I blurted out, as if electrocuted. "Yes. You asked about everything, what was it?" Zexion could sense that something was up, and threw another question back at me. "Holy Bananas, this is nuts! A student from K2C, and this strong rose perfume, why does everything have something to do with that stupid brat?!" I smacked my forehead, saying exasperatedly. "Who did you mean?" Demyx poked my shoulder and asked. "Who else could it be? Of course it was Fayra Joann!" I said scornfully, my eyes twitched a little upon mentioning her name.
Axel clapped his hands in realisation and said, "Oh right! Is she the girl you decided to tell Mr. Saïx about, who held the longest record of rules-violation combo?" I nodded, and I told them everything about yesterday, the confrontation and the bet. Roxas sighed and shook his head. And then he said, "Now you've gone and done it. Now that we had this case regarding this trespasser, how are you going to study to win that bet?" I had nothing to say about this, so I slowly sat down on a chair. I just did not want her to overly underestimate the people in K2D.
"Also, why does this KeishaToCease Q sound so much like K2C to me? That only made it suspicious." I felt irritation bubbling in my veins. "STOP! I found something new! Look here!" Roxas yelled, as if he discovered a new land of god-knows-where. All of us squeezed before the laptop screen again.
Roxas said with confidence, "I seriously doubt this dude's identity. He is not a current student of XXX High School!" I looked closer, only then I spotted a big mistake; the school number. The school number on his uniform was 99XXX! In this country, the first two digits refer to the year of first school enrolment. In this case, the school number indicated that the student entered the school in 1999. "According to my judgment, if that guy was as old as us, the school number would be 08XXX (We were in year 2009 now). If the person who posted this misjudged the age, the school number would be 09XXX, 07XXX, 06XXX or 05XXX, there's no way it's 99XXX!" Good call, 013!
"If the number was 99XXX, now he should be… twenty-three years old," I said. Zexion nodded curtly and said, "Schools would not sell school numbers to strangers, let alone letting them misusing it. 99XXX… It could only mean he had graduated long ago." Axel patted (or more like smacked) Zexion's back and said, "There, there, we know that you're set up." Ow… Zexion could not hold the impact of the "pat" and crashed into the desk.
We dismissed at half past one, and we stayed at home for the rest of the day…
The day after tomorrow! I was hiding in the ladies' washroom near the basketball field. Why? Zexion's orders, of course. I was getting really bored as time ticked past. I did not even have a chance to wander around. But I still had to pity Zexion, though. He was framed by fake news and things would get out of hand if we took no action. Oh well…
"Clop! Clop! Clop!" Hmm? Footsteps? I should hide. I stayed behind the wall with my back against it, and peeked at the basketball field through the gap between the window panes. Suddenly a shadow caught my eyes, so I diverted my sight to the car park near the basketball field. A male stranger? How strange, only teachers were allowed to park their cars there. Was I overthinking?
"Excuse me, may I know-" … Who was outside the restroom?! Whoa! I jumped slightly and looked at the door next to me- A guy who looked prim and proper? Jeez, he startled me. I tried to calm down and then said, "What?" "May I know where Kingdom Hearts High School's office is?" He asked.
"Oh, it's over there." I pointed at a direction.
"Oh, OK. Thank you."
"It's nothing. By the way, I think I just saw a crow dropping on a new car. I haven't seen that car before. By any chance, is that car yours?"
"What?! My Porsche!"
Porsche?! Holy Bananas, he was one rich dude… He fell for my trap! I just wanted to identify his car without me running around like mad in the car park, who knew he could be so gullible? Also, I wanted to play a prank on him for sneaking up on me like that; I purposely pointed towards to Kingdom Hearts Private High School. Let us see if he would fall for it again. [Authoress: You know, 207, you'd better watch out for retaliation. *Slapped 207's head* 207: Ow…]
He ran out to check on his car, and then he returned, panting. He said, "There's nothing on my car, maybe you have mistaken it." After that, he quickly went off to- the CORRECT school's office! Something was fishy, I should follow him and see. I secretly tracked him down; he really did walk into my school's office correctly!
Oh great, a scumbag (maybe) just asked me a rhetorical question and sneaked up on me in the ladies' washroom. To make it worse, he seemed to know the school compound very well for a stranger like him! My god… I must inform 006! I activated the interphone Mr. Saïx approved for our group. I put the wireless earphone in my ear and said in a hushed tone, "006, 007- I mean, 207 discovered a trespasser. Tango had a blue necktie, glasses and had his hair gelled. He was familiar with the school compound. Over."
006: "207, he seemed to be a new teacher. Facial description, please."
207: "OK, he looked like a typical local, but… his eyes were weird, though."
006: "How weird would that be?"
207: "Er, how should I describe it? … His eyes were grey-blue, could he be mixed-raced?"
006: "Hold on… 013, was he?"
013: "Yeah."
207: "Aw~ No fun… Not even hard enough to guess…"
013: "He's a 'Chindian' (Chinese plus Indian)! Ahem, I'm not finished!"
006: "'Chindian'?! Then why are his eyes grey-blue?"
207: "*Interest regained* Good point!"
222: "Interrupting… It could be contact lenses!"
006: "What do you mean?"
013: "Just confirmed, he had severe myopia, too!"
135: "I had heard about these coloured contact lenses. They have the same function as the normal ones, but they make the iris to bear another artificial colour."
006: "Then he should not be wearing glasses, as described by 207."
207: "May be intended for disguise! No wonder his glasses didn't reflect sunlight earlier. Maybe he wore only an empty frame."
006: "207, keep an eye on him. We still have five minutes before classes begin. I will sign in your attendance on your behalf."
207: "OK… Whatever…"
After a while, my legs were so tired from standing for a long time… What was that kook doing in the office? What took him that long?! I wanted to sit down, but suddenly he came out. What was that on his hands? It was concealed by a piece of cloth… Follow him! I tried to follow him as close as I could, I was only five steps away from him, I… I almost died from the strong perfume! Why- Huh? Scent of roses!
Holy Bananas! I tried to keep up. I arrived at the ladies' washroom near the basketball field, again. I grabbed my GPS device and activated the recording button to gather clues and proof. He stopped and looked around. He said to no one in particular from my view, "Hey? Queen KeishaToCease? Come out, come out, wherever you are!" KeishaToCease?! I was shocked, too shocked.
A cool breeze grazed by. The surroundings cooled down as the clouds blotted out the sun. I did not see any shadow, let alone anyone. But then I heard a girl's voice, "Hey, Darling~ Pass me the stuff~ You look hot today~ *Sounds of what sounded like making out or something you would rather not know*" YIKES! Nauseating! My goose bumps practically erupted and fell all over the place. I looked away from the recording screen, but held it in place to finish my unfortunate task.
"Oh my honey, my sugar~ Let us hope that our love lasts forever like this perfume! Here…" He handed the perfume over. After he pulled his empty hand back, he peeked to the side, and he took the deserted corridor to the foyer.
By now, I swore my heart almost stopped beating. I shivered involuntarily, not because of the weather, but the queasiness! My god. What the hell was with the honey and sugar… YUCK! I felt my body had just paralysed completely for a moment. "… Gu… Guys, I-I have something to show you… I had sent it t-to 013's l-laptop…"
It took me about two minutes to hear what was happening on the other side of the interphone, "HEY! AXEL! Don't puke all over the place!" "Me?! Ugh… You threw up on your laptop!" "207, what the crap? Zexy fainted!"
Not me, it was him! That scumbag!
I helped to obtain passes for them to recover in the infirmary, because they were definitely not in the state for lessons. I then left for my class. Rita, who sat in front of me, asked, "Hey, where did all the prefects go? Even Zexion isn't here." I answered, no matter how farfetched it sounded, "Collective food poisoning! Luckily I ate nothing…"
I still had not told the boys something: After I sent that disgusting recording, I headed towards where that scumbag once stood and searched for clues. There was a purse on the grass field. When I picked it up, it felt warm to the touch. The warmth was definitely not because of the sun, since the weather cooled down long ago. That only meant the owner dropped that purse a little while ago. I searched the purse; three thousand Malaysian Ringgits! Holy Bananas! Also, there was a student ID card. It was Fayra! And, of course, the purse emitted a very gagging and strong perfume. I almost suffocated…
After one and a half classes, the boys finally returned. I told them about my discoveries after they settled down. "Hmm… Let us try this: 013, gather the man's information ASAP; 207, keep track of Fayra's activities; the rest of us will keep an eye on him," Zexion said after much contemplation. Just then…
"Class, all rise!" The class monitor announced. "Good afternoon, teacher…" Oh? We were having Mathematics now. Without looking at the front of the classroom, I turned around and took out my books and calculator. When I got ready, Axel slapped my back real hard. Internal injury, man… "Hey Nemix! Look! Mr. Cloud isn't here! It's-" Who what? I looked up from my desk and saw- OH MY GOD! Enemies just had to appear when you least expected them to, did they not? It was that scumbag!
My mouth went wide open. Except for the five of us and some calm and collected people, everyone screamed and shouted. Especially the girls; they went "Fangirlisation"! Holy Bananas! Mr. Cloud! Where were you?! Why were you not in school today?!
"Good afternoon class, Mr. Cloud isn't here, so I will take over for today. Do you all remember where did he stop in the previous lesson?" He asked "politely" and "urbanely", flipping through the pages of the textbook. Ha! He had misunderstood K2D, that idiot. Our class believed in one thing: even for substitution teachers, freedom and relaxation were top priority, so any extra work was unacceptable. Let us see how you would handle that! But…
"Sir! We were at 'Pythagoras' Theorem'! Page XX!"
"Yes yes yes! Sir! We had finished Exercise 6.1, Questions 1(a) to 1(h)!"
"We also skipped Questions 1(i), (j) and (k)!"
"What? Just repeat the whole chapter already!"
Blah… Blah… Blah…
Oh crap! Normally we would not remember where we last left off, the last exercise and any more details. Besides having such improved memory, they even asked the teacher to repeat the whole chapter? What the heck?! Oh come on! The main point of Pythagoras' Theorem was c2 = a2 + b2, utilising two sides of a right-angled triangle to calculate the length of the third side. Was that not all there was to it?!
I simply opened my textbook and pretended to follow the lecture. There was no need to be as disciplined as I always was when dealing with this scumbag. I gave up my usual behaviour. Rita sent a message via a paper strip, "What's wrong with everyone? I'm bored…" I replied, "Beats me, I'm bored too. We'll just talk to each other like this then." So, we sent messages back and forth and talked about nonsense… Oh yeah!
"OK, time for some reinforcement exercise! Let's see… I will write some questions on the blackboard, if you all can get them all correct, then there would be no need for homework today. Is that alright with you all?" He asked, and of course, the whole class except some people answered, "YES!" He was done writing after three minutes. He also wanted volunteers. Not many would ever want to volunteer here. Most of us thought that was equivalent to showing off.
There were ten questions in total. As far as I knew, the only Math genius in our class was Zexion. He could easily wipe them all out in minutes. I decided to retire and relax. I was not in the mood to inundate my mind with too many Math problems today, or rather, to cooperate with this bastard. But, he just had to pick on me. "Oh? You're the one who showed me the way to the office, yes? Why don't you give it a try, too?" W-H-A-T! After spacing out for two seconds, I got up and headed towards the teacher's desk to grab a chalk. Challenge accepted. Even though I believe in NAVY: Never Always Volunteer Yourself!
Zexion and I answered five questions each. Actually, they were not that hard. And thanks to whatever god that was helping us, we got all of them correct. The bell rang and we said our greetings or whatever. When he left the classroom, some girls were pouting. I was pretty sure they would not be like this had they been through what I had been through.
But what really ticked me off was that it was as if he tried to mess with me. He had the nerve to ask me to carry his bags, and I meant three bags! Me alone! Luckily I was used to arrange and carry desks and chairs, so my strength was greater. Otherwise I would have accused him for child abuse! (In Malaysia, a fourteen year-olds was still considered as a child) I carried two small bags in one hand, a big one in the other. I followed him to the teachers' office. Before we could enter, the vice principal wanted to see him, so I was told to go ahead to drop his bags at his table.
You could not imagine what his table was like without reading the following description: the table surface was bombarded with skincare products, most brands being "SK II". The ajar drawer contained a few pornographic comics. There was a mini shelf on his table, there were some textbooks on the shelf, but I saw some cheesy and explicit love novels hidden in between. For the love of Bahamut, what was wrong with this kook?! Was that even allowed?
While he was still occupied, I decided to search his bags. Nothing was wrong with the small ones, as for the bigger one… It was a totally different story. There was a small bottle smelling like roses! The content should be the perfume. Also, I found a black plastic bag. Out of sheer curiosity, I opened it and looked inside- HOLY BANANAS! There were boxes of condoms!
I took a specimen of the perfume before my legs turn wobbly due to shock, and I escaped immediately. When I finally got back to K2D, I quickly reported to the boys and I could tell they were very shocked too. Demyx almost choked on the water he drank and Roxas spurted out water, too. After we all managed to calm down, I said, "I suspect that KeishaToCease Q was Fayra all along," I dug out the purse I found earlier. Demyx questioned, "There were no accomplices or underlings?" I thought for a while and answered, "I guess not… I just don't get why there was a 'Q' behind that daft name, but I guess it could be some sort of identity." Axel scratched his head and said, "How?"
Zexion put down his novel and analysed, "It could be like this: in chess notation, 'Q' means Queen. Also, from the recording 207 sent to us earlier today, that guy addressed the other person involved as 'Queen KeishaToCease'. The person had to be a girl, since the pieces Pawn, Knight, Rook, Bishop and King were usually depicted as male." Hmm, he had a point. But then again, there were hundreds of girls in this school, anyone of them could be KeishaToCease Q. But Fayra's purse had been found at the scene… If not her, who could it be?
I suggested, "Anyways, there are three thousand Malaysian Ringgits in the purse, the person will definitely return to the scene for it." Axel took the lead this time, "Why don't we pull this off; one of us can gather information on when they'll meet again and then… Therefore…" After much planning, we continued to concentrate on the next lesson: Miss Larxene's History class.
This time, I was assigned to track them down… again… Ugh! We applied for passes to allow us to be absent for three classes. We had to! That scumbag had condoms with him in school. Who knew what he was up to? I hid behind the twenty-four-Season Drum Practice Room, which was near the parking lot. Roxas and I were keeping an eye on his Porsche. He was inside his car since five minutes ago. What was he doing in there? Sleeping?
It was now or never! I signalled to Roxas who was hiding behind a tall tree via hand gesture. He saw my signal and sneaked to the back of the Porsche. He used some computer programming to lock him inside his own car. Since he seemed to like being in there, we fulfilled his desire.
Meanwhile, Demyx disguised himself as that scumbag. Making use of the specimen I had collected earlier, there should be no flaws. Now, time to imitate like a parrot! Demyx tried his best to imitate that scumbag's voice, "Hello? Queen KeishaToCease? Come out now, my dear!" Ewww… I knew it would be very queasy, but we had to switch on our interphones, I sure hoped we were already immune to this… Must… resist… urge… to… puke…!
No sooner, the "fish" we were waiting for so long had surfaced! "Darling~ Did you bring the stuff?" "Over here," Demyx outstretched his hand and pulled the mysterious person out from their hiding place. It was Fayra Joann! "Hey~ What's with you?" she pouted. URGH! I felt like throwing up right onto her face… "It was really you! It seems that 207 had suspected the correct person all along," said Zexion as he emerged from the shadows.
Only then she realised something was wrong, and she turned around to escape. Luckily Axel reached there on time and blocked her way. "Wh-what! You hooligans! Let me go! I'm just here to get something…" She panicked, as expected. Zexion took out the purse and said, "You were looking for… this, I presume?" Her eyes widened and exclaimed, "So it was you who stole my purse! So much for being a prefect!"
"Watch your words! Fayra Joann!" I yelled at her angrily and quickened my pace towards them. What a professional blamer. That only meant her post on Facebook served to frame people!
Nemix: "Why did you falsely accuse Zexion?"
Fayra: "I did not! Don't simply point your finger at me!"
Nemix: "OK, fine, let's ignore that for now. Then, who is that scumbag to you?"
Fayra: "What scumbag?! He's my… brother!"
Nemix: "Quit lying! I had known you since primary school and we were in the same class for three years there. You are the only child in your family. If he was your brother, why did you address him as intimately as lovers do?" Including making out, no less…
Fayra: "None of your business! I'm English, what's wrong for being less reserved?"
Nemix: "Answer my question! Who is he?!"
A voice came through my interphone, "Guys! The tango cracked my codes, and is heading over to your location! Retreat!" It was Roxas.
I said, "A word of advice: you'd better set aside time to confess everything of this mess to me, and perhaps we could treat you a little leniently. As you might know, Mr. Saïx is not very well-known for his leniency." After that, the boys were already gone. I escaped later too. Had you ever wondered why I chose to leave last? I intended to drop one of my interphones secretly. No one would ever notice it in the bushes…
We hid at the second floor and eavesdropped on their conversation. Well… about 90% of the conversation was categorised as "nauseating". In order to protect the thoughts and minds of the world's future leaders and heroes, I decided not to present that content here. The remaining 10% was the clue: karaoke centre, three days later! Good god… What was he trying to do now?
It was a Friday the next day. I had some very kind-hearted classmates to help me with cleaning duty, so I got a day-off. I was walking towards Class K2L, suddenly an arm shot out and forcefully grabbed my right arm, and the other one covered my mouth! I kept struggling, but they would not budge. They pulled me into a dark classroom and I heard the door being locked.
I decided to play offensive and hit and kicked in every direction, and I finally broke free. I turned around and saw Fayra Joann and her two "bodyguards". The "bodyguards" were whining in pain. Served them right for kidnapping me! "Geez, even if you wanted to confess everything to me, all of that stunt was uncalled for!" I sighed and said.
"I am warning you, don't poke your nose into MY business!"
"Do you think someone who gives you insanely strong perfume as a present every day is a good person?"
"He… He loves me! That's why he gifted me those things! Do you know how much they cost?! Three thousand euros!"
"*Dumbfounded*… What… you…"
"Me what? Envy? Don't ever wish for it. A long time ago, you too were-"
"Oi! Stop the nonsense! It was you who pulled that bloody prank on me-"
"That graduation trip was oh so much fun!"
"Don't change the subject! Leave that kook for good! Or else you're going to regret!"
"Hey… didn't know that you cared so much about him."
"As if! I'm not blind and desperate, geez…"
"Anyways, he is Fayra Joann's man. My man. Don't you ever pry into our business!"
After the words left her mouth, she continued putting up her usual detestable and disgusting "spoiled brat" temperament and waltzed out of the classroom. This was getting crazy. Why did she have to bring up that disgraceful story?! I patted softly at the painful areas of my arm and got out of the classroom. Just then… "207, do you have something not to be divulged when you were in 6th Grade?"
A shiver ran down my spine. W-who was that? I slowly turned over and look at whoever said that. Demyx! "What? Nah, it's nothing…" I did a typical mistake of lying even more, and Demyx noticed that, "Aw, don't play the fool… C'mon, tell me… I won't hurt you, right?"
No, not the puppy dog eyes of doom again! Should I tell him? Hmm… Maybe it was better to tell him anyway, or I would never hear the end of it…
207: "OK fine, I will tell you, but you must not tell anyone about this! Or else you will die, by me!"
135: "OK OK… My lips are sealed!"
207: "Ahem… When I was in 6th Grade, my classmates liked to be part-time matchmakers and paired up random 'couples' for entertainment. Of course, I was one of the victims… How dare they pair me up randomly with a guy when I didn't ask for it! Luckily my mother was one of the teachers in my school, therefore they dared not make too much fun about it."
207: "I kept a low profile about myself, but sometimes the teachers had to put me and him along with some other for group work. And it was all her fault! Fayra Joann! She was the mastermind behind all of those crap! If not for her, I would not have to deal with the rumours!"
207: "The events I just said were just an opening. During the graduation trip, all 6th Grade participants arrived at the Malacca State's A' Famosa Zoo. And some of us got lost. I, some female students and, unfortunately, he were the ones."
207: "We decided to walk to the entrance and wait for the teachers to find us, since wading deeper into the unknown depths of the zoo wasn't going to help. We walked and walked, and I turned around to see everyone except for me and him was gone!"
207: "We had no choice but to keep going. And when we reached the entrance, we waited. Finally, the teachers found us, but I also found the mastermind behind the shenanigan: Fayra, as you guessed it. She told the lost students to hide away whilst we walked. They also originally planned to trick us to go in a room nearby and… I don't want to talk about it, matured content… That wasn't funny. NOT funny at all. Why did she have to pick on me?! Although the second part of her plan failed, as we did not notice their decoy to lure us into the room, my reputation was destroyed by the prank and people couldn't stop making fun of me. I really wish I could punch them in the face and shout at them: I. Do. Not. Like. Him! And no one else! Don't treat me like a useless toy!"
207: "So when I advanced into 7th Grade-"
135: "Eh, wait! 207! Wait a sec-"
207: "Argh, just let me finish! When I advanced into 7th Grade, I wanted to whitewash myself thoroughly, so I avoided and isolated myself from Fayra and her gang of idiots. I wanted to concentrate fully on my studies and retrieve my reputation and confidence."
135: "So that's the thing… Poor you, though."
207: "It was all her fault! ... Oh right, what was it you wanted to tell me?"
135: "Er… It's nothing, it's just that… you didn't turn off your interphone, you know…"
207: "WHAT?! Holy Bananas! Don't tell me they had heard it all?!"
A voice came in through the interphone, "Terribly sorry, 207, your '007 impostor' façade is no longer mysterious. We all heard it, the whole thing…" It was Roxas, again… Ugh… 135, why did you not stop me earlier… [Demyx: I did! You told me to shut up… *ran to a dark corner, bummed and drew circles on the floor* Authoress: Aww, poor Demy, here, I have a cookie… Demyx: *Hugging* Thank you!]
222: "Wow, Nemix, didn't know that you had such a past!"
006: "Nemix, yours was not worse that my dilemma. By now, that rumour had spread widely on Facebook!"
013: "Chill out, Zexion, I had ID'd the account where the rumour first came from, it's Fayra all right! And she is KeishaToCease Q! I have requested for the post and anything related to it to be taken down. It should be underway as we speak."
After that, we met at the Activity Room and discussed about our next move. Ten minutes later, we decided to retake the offensive. Wish us luck!
Two days later, we arrived at the potential crime scene; the karaoke centre. I really did not like this place and anything of the sort. I always had a feeling that there were bad things going on in there. I said in a hushed tone, "013, tango approaching your three, take the picture!"
When everything was set, we sneaked into the karaoke centre, where all hell would break loose (sort of…). We did not have much money with us, so we had to wait for them to enter and stay put for a while. Now it was time to move. "Hey! What are you all doing here?" The lady at the reception counter stopped us. Zexion used his quick wit to save us, "Nothing, but we saw a couple dropped their stuff and we saw them coming this way. They must have entered here not too long ago, so we decided to return it to them."
The lady said, "Was the girl mixed-raced, scantily-dressed with a tall young man?" Wow, good memory you had there. "Yes, where are they?" Zexion took this chance and enquired. The lady flipped through her records. She then said, "Hmm… Room 584." "Thank you." After that, we left. Yikes!
We did it! Now we had to find the freaking room. 580… 581… 582… 583… "… 584." Demyx led the way and we arrived before a wooden door with black window glass on it. I tried peeking through the glass but sighed in frustration. I could not even see a thing! Demyx pulled out a pair of goggles. Axel exasperatedly said, "Mr. Demyx Oceanus, we're not here to swim!" Demyx merely grinned and said, "Of course not! Mr. Xigbar gave this to me as a present. He said he got this from a secret agent when he fought with him, thus getting that eye patch on his face. What was that again? NBA?" Zexion facepalmed and muttered, "It is 'FBI', idiot." "Whatever. This pair of goggles can let us see through these types of glass very clearly," Demyx said while putting on the goggles. He peeked through the black glass.
We had to standby for Demyx's next orders, since he was the one who was peeking. "OK, not much action… They were singing, enjoying themselves… Fayra's singing in soprano, my poor ears… Eh? That man… His hands… OH NOES! MOLESTATION ALERT!" Demyx looked through the glass while making summaries of what he saw, and then out of the blue he screamed in panic. We could not wait anymore, time for action! Weapons free!
The damned door was locked. Out of panic, I unleashed the sideway kick that I had been practicing so hard. "PAK- DONG!" The door flung open and hit the wall hard. Axel was the one who ran in first. He grabbed a remote control from the table and threw it like a ninja throwing star. It hit the man's hand. Nice shot!
Demyx mustered all of his courage and proceeded to grab his hands and said, "We all saw what happened! Why are you attempting to molest her!?" Fayra was utterly shocked, when she regained her senses, she screamed, "WHAT! You hooligans again!" Just then a "miracle" happened; the hands which were in Demyx's firm grip let out a sickening cracking and snapping noise, that scumbag flew to the wall and "BANG!" He collapsed and fell unconscious!
"HOLY KINGDOM HEARTS! DEMYX! You had qigong for training?!" Axel and Roxas yelled together. I closed my ears immediately. Tinnitus… "No way, I didn't… What the heck was wrong with his hand? Why did he fly to the wall? What the hell just happened?" Demyx was totally dumbfounded at the scene before him. He was just as confused as the rest of us.
Fayra's screeches were way worse than their screams, "OH MY GOD! MY HONEY! MY SUGAR! OH MY GOODNESS! *Wailing a little* Ambulance! Hurry! Hurry! Police! Arrest them all!"
After the man was carried into the ambulance, Fayra shrieked furiously, "You! You will not escape this! I will sue you all to death! No one will be spared!"
After the police gathered all the required information and clues, we also left the site at once. "No way, I had no martial arts training, why…?" Demyx was till mumbling to himself incredulously. "We have tons of evidences against them in our hands, even the cops said that it's OK. Chill, dude," Axel tried to calm the blonde. I agreed with him, "Yes, we do. Calm down…"
Really?
I was wrong… so wrong…
~ CHAPTER 7 FIN ~
TO BE CONTINUED
Whew! The crazy, inhumane exam was over! No more high school! YEAH! Haha, sorry for the disappearance for so long! Here goes Chapter 7, kinda long, I know. One more thing: The next year would be very busy for me too. I had to apply for colleges or whatever and I was chosen to attend a military camp, or National Service. I do not know which of the three batches I will be put in, but I would be gone for three months when I was informed to go. Sigh, gimme a break… -_- Oh well, you can rate or comment if you want. Thank you for reading this! Bye and stay tuned!