Chapter 2-
"Rina, you need to be more careful," Vash scolded the seated girl.
She replied with a slight sigh, "Sorry, dad… it was an accident! I guess I'm just not the best at riding Thomases…"
Vash chuckled, and gave an expression feigning thought, "I can't imagine where you would get something like that from."
"Probably the same place she got her donut addiction from," teased the girl in the bed.
Vash laughed and placed a hand on the back of his neck, "Rinz, I don't know what you're talking about!"
"I'm sure you don't," replied the platinum blonde with a smirk.
-One Week Later-
"Wait, Rinzei! I'm not ready yet!!"
Rinzei stood by the bedroom door, arms crossed and foot tapping, her impatience as glaring as the twin suns in the sky.
"Rinaza, if you don't hurry up, I'm going to leave you!" Rinzei called back after a moment's glowering, "You are not going to make me late for the first day of school again!"
"Sorry, Rinz! I'll be just one minute, okay!?" came back a whining voice.
Rinzei sighed with aggravation, and made her way into the kitchen to get a drink while she waited. Vash and Meryl were seated at the table, Vash happily munching on a donut and Meryl sipping coffee. When Rinzei came stalking in, Meryl looked up and blinked at the girl.
"Rinzei, shouldn't you be leaving for school?"
Meryl was nagging her; that was something new. Rinzei sighed.
"Yes, Aunt Meryl, I should be, and I know that… but maybe you should tell that to your daughter," was the reply that Rinzei provided.
Meryl sighed and shook her head, then rose from the table as Rinzei took the liberty of pouring herself a glass of juice. Vash finished his donut and took a swallow from a glass of water that sat next to him, and then found he was watching Rinzei as he so often did. He really couldn't help it; she just looked so much like her father. His hair, eye and skin colors weren't the only things she had inherited; she had his nose, and the shape of his face - though more feminine, it was definitely similar - and his build. Of course, he could say the same of Rinaza's resemblance to himself, except for the color of her eyes that she had taken from Meryl, and her height. She had taken to the human side of the family in that area.
In the time that he had been watching after his brother's daughter - nearly her whole life - he had kept a close eye on her personality, each quirk and habit carefully noted. He had to make sure that her appearance was where the similarity ended. However, he found that what he had hoped was not the case. She was every bit as intelligent as her father, and though she really was a kind, caring girl, she had a short fuse and, when angered, could be considered potentially dangerous. Luckily, though, she had taken just fine to her human aunt and half-human cousin, as well as the rest of the humans. He supposed that difference could have something to do with not being beaten by them.
"…Uncle Vash?"
He snapped out of his thoughts, and smiled at his niece. She was blinking at him, puzzled. He'd been staring at her oddly again… it was something he did an awful lot, and it made her extremely tense. But now that the usual cheerful smile had found its way back onto his face, she felt her muscles relax. Before either could speak again, Rinaza was being dragged into the kitchen by her mother and ushered over to her cousin's side. The girls exchanged looks, Rinzei's a little glare of impatience, and Rinaza's a goofily apologetic and embarrassed smile.
"All right, now you two get on your way before you're really late!" Meryl ordered, "And Rina, when you get home, you be ready for a serious talk about responsibility!"
Rinaza cringed at the idea, and her father mirrored the action from the table; great, a lecture. That meant he'd have to be present for it, too. He wondered if maybe he could weasel his way out of it. Across the room, his daughter was wondering the same thing as she followed an irate Rinzei out the side door of their corner home.
Rinaza strolled happily alongside Rinzei, who was nearly stomping as she made her way down the pathway. In fact, she was so busy watching her feet, making sure that she was stomping nice and noticeably for her cousin, that she nearly stomped her way right into the visitor that was humming her merry way up the walk. She probably would have, too, if it weren't for Rina cheerfully greeting the visitor.
"Hello!!" Rina smiled brightly at the brown-haired, blue-eyed woman.
"Hello, Rina!" replied the woman happily, then turned to the other, much more annoyed-appearing girl, "Hello, Rinz!"
"Hi Milly," Rinzei muttered.
Milly blinked and knelt to Rinzei, though she didn't have to kneel very far. Rinzei was tall for a girl, a half a head taller than her cousin, but still not up at Milly's level. And, considering that she'd been fully grown for some time now, she was pretty sure that was how things would stay until the human got old and began shrinking.
"Is something the matter?" asked Milly, concernedly.
"Not anything new," Rinzei replied, a sideways glance spared to Rinaza, "Rina's just making us late for school again, and it's the first day of senior year."
Rina giggled nervously, then nodded and said, "Yeah, Rinzei's right… we should probably get going."
"Oh no," Milly replied, "Well, you two be on your way then! You can't be late for the first day!"
Rinzei nodded with a small smile, "My thoughts exactly," and turned expectantly to Rinaza, "Let's get going."
Rinaza grinned at her cousin, and then turned back to Milly, "See you later, Milly!"
"Bye, Milly!" chimed in Rinzei as the two headed off again.
Milly waved after the girls, "Bye, girls! You have a good day at school now!"
-----
Rinzei walked slowly down the hallway to the first class after lunch, by herself. To her general dismay, she found that the only class she had with her cousin was English. She wasn't surprised; Rinzei was taking mostly advanced placement courses and while she knew her cousin was smart, probably as smart as herself, she also knew Rina just didn't like applying herself. No matter how much Aunt Meryl tried to get her to do so, Rina just seemed to think homework wasn't worth her attention; cute boys, food and any sort of game, however, most certainly were. Rinz allowed herself a little smirk as she thought of her cousin. She was still uneasy being alone, as she was whenever she was in the crowded school without her cousin. It could be that she felt she didn't fit in. Of course she didn't - she wasn't human. It made sense. And then there was the age difference. According to human ages, Rinzei and Rinaza both belonged in elementary school.
Rinaza was a few years older, but, oddly enough, the human-plant hybrid seemed to find a balance between the aging processes of both species, so that the cousins now appeared to be the same age. But, even with appearances aside, they were both far above the mental level of the human age their bodies represented, so here they were, in high school.
Rinzei's thoughts were interrupted by a group of guys approaching her. She groaned, recognizing them instantly. Bullies, of course, that had seen fit to make life difficult for her and her cousin based on their difference in species and… well… a few other points Rinzei didn't care to bring up.
"Hey, freak girl!" one called to Rinzei. She narrowed a single eye, pulling one side of her mouth into a tooth-bearing sneer.
"Where's the other creature?" another piped up.
Now with her mouth pulled into a tight frown, Rinzei replied, narrowing her eyes, "My cousin is on her way to her class, and I am on my way to mine. Now, if you'll get the hell out of my way, I'd like to be going."
The first laughed now, "What're you going to do? Blow me up?"
Rinzei scowled at the first, but then a third chimed in, "Hey, maybe she'll get her genocidal psychopath father to kill us for her!"
Now all three burst into laughter and walked away, leaving Rinzei alone, or so she thought. She stood there, completely still in the hallway. The anger had vanished from her face; her expression now was wounded, her eyebrows drawn together, her mouth turned down unhappily. Her eyes shone slightly, tears welling up in them. Silently, she reached into her pocket and pulled out a pair of dark sunglasses, slipping them over her eyes to hide the flow. They failed to hide the one tear that escaped her eye down her cheek, which she hastily brushed away with a finger. She then casually, silently stalked off towards her class.
Across the hallway, a pair of green eyes watched her in silent concern. Vash stood there, in the doorway to the office, just behind where Rinzei had been confronted a few moments ago, after dropping off a book for Rinaza that the girl had forgotten. Now he stood, frozen, trying not to cry himself, and telling himself repeatedly that running after Rinzei and hugging her tightly in the middle of her high school was a bad idea.
"That's not fair…" he whispered to himself, "It's not fair. Why should she have to suffer for his mistakes?"
He shook his head sadly and then walked the other way down the hallway, towards the door. Neither of them noticed a pair of golden eyes that served as witness to the scene from a shadowed doorway.
"So… that's the one, then," a cold voice muttered.