Thanx for the reviews. I makes me happy!
Tetsuya Nomura is so freakin brilliant. I could never steal Kingdom Hearts from him. That means I don't own it. But I do own this! (steals Ansem's black Keyblade and runs away laughing maniacally)
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Chapter 2- I'll Take: Ways to Insult One's Manhood (For 600 Please)
Riku and Sora glanced at each other apprehensively as they climbed inside the tiny passenger space of a shiny red pickup truck. Leon pulled himself into the drivers seat. He didn't even offer them a stony eyed glance before he turned on the ignition, making Sora jumped slightly as the entire vehicle gave a jolt. Riku smiled a little, impressed but unintimidated by the leather clad stoic-man. After all, anyone who could drive a stick-shift got extra points.
Squall sighed exasperatedly as he pulled down the road, like he had something better to be doing.
"So, what's your reason for being so unhappy?" Riku inquired, catching Squall's ice colored eyes in the rear-view mirror. Squall looked away.
"I'm not unhappy," he replied dryly. Riku rolled his eyes, his nature not allowing something to drop that easily. However, whether by accident or that he had the incredible insight into the inner workings of the silver-haired boy, Squall started talking before Riku had the chance.
"As long as we're stuck in here," Squall began. Wow. Squally sure knew how to make you feel cheery. "We might as well go over ground rules. Not mine, since I have a completely different and more extensive list. At Saint Barrett's, you have Saturdays and Sundays off, you can do anything you like as long as you stay with the San Juan Village and get back by curfew, which is eight. Monday through Friday, you have to stay on school campus. Class begins at 7:45 and ends and 4:00-"
Sora groaned out loud. Talk about a long school day.
Squall raised an eyebrow. "You have a problem? We can always send you back."
Sora turned pink shook his head. His mother would fry him alive if he showed up on her doorstep with his bags. He'd find it hard to sayto her 'Oops, sorry Mom. Sent me back before I even got there!"
"Didn't think so. Like I was saying, 'till four, but that's bearable because in general, you won't have much homework. While you're in class, you wear your uniform, but since the school is pretty laid back, you could probably get away with wearing anything in your free time. When you're not in class, you can stay in your dorms, visit the rec. room, etcetera. I'm sure that your class mates can fill you in on anything else you really need to know. Oh one more thing…" He took on a serious tone. "No girls in the dorms past six."
Riku smirked, brushing aside a strand of silvery hair. "Now do I really look like that kind of guy?"
"Nope," Squall replied pushing his sunglasses up the bridge of his nose. "I was actually talking about scrawny over there". Sora blushed madly.
Wait...hey!
"I'd be more afraid of having guys in the same room with you, blondie".
Blood slowly crept onto Riku's face. He crossed his arms in a huff and rolled his eyes like usual, muttering something incoherent that only Sora (who was trained in the art) could catch. "You'd really like that wouldn't you?"
"What was that?"
"SCREW YOU, LEON!"
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After a two-hour drive and a whole lot of Riku and Squall bickering plus Sora reminding himself to shut up, they arrived at their destination, Saint Barrett's. Riku was the first one out of the truck, slamming the door roughly as if to say "good riddance!". Well...sort of. His choice of vocabulary would have been a lot more colorful. Sora followed suit, still a little shocked, not knowing there where that many ways to insult someone's integrity and manhood.
"Mr., uh, Squall-
"Leon."
"Yeah, sorry," Sora replied hastily. "Were are we supposed to go exactly?"
Squall, who was busying himself with their bags simply said, "Take the main stairway all the way up to the headmaster's office. He'll help you get settled and such."
"Right," Riku said," Thanks for nothing…Squall."
"That's Leon rat. And don't you forget it," Squall growled, turning around to hoist one of the bags that Riku had brought every possession he could possibly fit in. Riku smirked, making a very rude gesture with his hand behind the man's back. Then, Riku jogged to catch up with his spiky-haired friend.
Sora was pushing on the front door trying to get it open. Riku stood there more a moment and blinked at the effort his friend was exerting trying to push the door open. "Sora?" Riku asked raising an eye brow. "The door says pull."
"Right…I knew that."
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Riku and Sora cautiously stepped inside. "Wow," Sora said in amazement staring around him. Riku nodded in agreement.
"Wow, this makes our old school look like a pile of chocobo shit. Talk about high class". The entrance to the school was almost like a cathedral. Long stained-glass windows seemed to merge with the arched ceilings that had such delicate moldings that it looked like they'd been carved with toothpicks. There was a gargoyle-like statue that stood in the middle of the room, spewing water from it's mouth into a fountain basin below. Behind this, was a split staircase, part of which looked like it simply led into a the next room while the other spiraled up and looked rather important.
"There it is," Riku said finally, grabbing Sora and leading him up the steps. Riku broke into a sprint, causing his friend to jerk forward, struggling to keep up.
"Common Riku!" Sora puffed, wondering what the rush was for. "We both know you're a better runner than me so just-"
"STOP RIGHT THERE!" said an unfamiliar voice, but carrying a familiar tone. Sora winced. He had been hoping to avoid that reprimanding tone at least one day.
Descending from the other staircase, a girl about their own age looked livid. She whipped a notepad out of one pocket with one pad while removing a ballpoint pen from behind her ear. By the look on this girl's face one would have assumed that Sora and Riku had just committed all seven deadly sins. Wagging her finger back and forth she said, "Running in the halls is not allowed".
Sora just about died. Riku frowned and tried to move past her, but she stepped in his path.He quirked an eyebrow but then smirked. "And who are you to tell me so, some kind of super-hall moniter?"
She looked at Riku like he was some type of impudent lunatic, shaking her short red hair back and forth. "For your information, I am a SEED: Student, Edu-"
"Yeah, you're a hall monitor, I got it," Riku said before she could get in another word. "Let's haul ass Sora," he said yanking Sora's hand, and resumed sprinting up the stairs.
"Wait!" the girl shrieked. "I have to take down your names!"
"Sorry!" Sora yelled back.. "It won't happen again!" Riku yanked his hand harder.
"You're such a kiss-up Sora."
"Am not!" Sora defended.
"Yes Sora. I'm afraid to say you are."
"I wasn't kissing up I was-"
"Flirting!" Riku shrieked uncharacteristically.
"No!…well yeah, yes I was," Sora admitted, blushing like a schoolgirl. "What is it? That only the great Riku can do so?"
"No…but why her?"
Sora shrugged. "She was cute if you didn't notice."
"Sure," Riku mumbled half-heartedly. "If you like snooty stuck up girls."
"Maybe," Sora said blowing the raspberries at his friend.
Riku's mouth dropped open, but snapped it shut quickly with a small "Hmph!"
"I believe that 'Squall' was right!"
The smart remark instantaneously left Sora's mouth. "What? Me getting the girl or the part about you being gay?"
Sora almost gasped his blatant stupidness and felt his conscience turn his stomach inside out without mercy.
"Riku...I-"
The silver boy have him a half glance through his bangs, but that was short lived. He offered no response to Sora's half muttered apology, his lips pursed in an almost hurt way. Instead, he kept climbing the stairs, in a way that would have suggested that the comment hadn't even registered with him.
Sora felt dirty, and allowed himself to walk a few steps behind his friend. Silent moments like these happened ever so often. He kept hoping for it to end the way they always did. Riku would punch him lightly in the arm, or mess up his hair. Then he would ask why his face was so droopy and offer a quirky, yet award winning grin. It would then all be okay.
Sora only suspected that Riku had more than one kind of smile.
Riku was the only one who really knew that this particular one was reserved for the sole purpose of bringing back the smile on Sora's face.
----
"Riku?" Sora asked, inhaling sharply.
"Yeah?"
"How many more stairs you think?"
Riku gazed off up the staircase."A lot, Sora, a lot."
"More or less than two-hundred?"
"Um…more."
Sora leaned against the wall, panting. "Oh God, what did I do to deserve this?" he moaned. This staircase of doom seemed to stretch on forever like an alternate dimension.
"Shut up Sora," Riku said, "Suck it up. "Although…" Riku paused. "This may be a way for the headmaster to keep kids away." Sora would practically see Riku adding this to his mental list of injustices done of teenagers by school.
Wiping his brow, Sora spotted what seemed to be an end to the endless hall of stairs. "Nevermind, there's the office."
They climbed the remaining stairs and approached a large mahogany door with silver-polished handles and a silver plaque engraved with "Headmaster". Sora was impressed to say the least. The principal's office at Destiny High was merely a sticker with the name "Principal Westlier" surrounded by a door of very old and very peeling paint. But there was something very wrong…
"Riku?"
"Yeah?" he responded.
"I feel…cold," Sora stated.
"Kind of creepy aint it?"
Sora shook his head. "I am not going in there."
"But Sora!" Riku whined in a fair impression of his friend.
"Eh?"
Riku crossed his arms and whispered, "I'm not going!"
Both boys sighed at exactly the same time, as if on cue. Obviously one of them was going to have to go in. "Okay," Sora said. "This guy can't be so bad. We're just nervous."
Riku nodded. "I-I'm not nervous…I just don't like Principal's offices."
Sora snorted facetiously. "I'm sure you don't! Considering that you visited one every other day of your life."
"Damn strait!" Riku exclaimed with some kind of rather disturbing pride. "Okay, so…on the count of three, knock."
Both boys raised their fists or the door-
"One…two…three!"
-and knocked on the door loudly.
Sora fidgeted slightly and Riku sighed, placing his hands on his waist impatiently. "Maybe they didn't hear us?" Sora suggested.
A scuffling sound came from within as something got up to answer the door. The door slowly began to swing open…
Review PLZ!
someone- thanx! Well. Here's the next chapter!
Raven- I appreciate it. Denmark huh? Wow.
DragonRose13- what are you doing here? All you know about Kingdom Hearts is that Squall Leonhart is in it!
Riyoji Jeremishou- thanks! don't worry. It isn't a KH fic without Ansem!
This chapter has been edited, and reposted, due to a certain author's inability to use good grammar. There has been no change in the story plot, so for those of you that have read this chapter before, there really isn't anything different about it, except for the correction of some errors and a couple of lines added.
-Thanx
Smiley-chan
