I was manically laughing the whole time I was writing it, cruelzy. I've been planning this for a while. And at least you have the good kind of distress, WriterGreenReads? Could be so much worse! As you will learn in this chapter, it will GET worse!
January 15th, 2021
Arya's POV:
With all the fuss and bother that we'd had to do with reporting the attack before heading home, Rex and I hadn't gotten on the Deathbus until evening, so night had well and truly fallen by the time I tumbled back out of another bus on the same line, panting with my hands on my knees for a few seconds in front of the boys' dorm while it pulled away. The streets were completely deserted, with the only signs of life being streetlamps –lit with electrified candles, which was an interesting way of going about maintaining an aesthetic– and some lights in the buildings around the dorm. Oh, and the dorm itself, of course: plenty of guys still had their lights on.
The dark street was a very picturesque scene for a potential murder, and/or average scenario. Kinda depended on how we both played this, I guess.
There was every chance that Rex hadn't noticed the satchel switch, and even if he had, there was no reason at all for him to go snooping around in my journal. I'd stopped by Misery's rooms to make sure she called the boys' dorm and said I wanted to see Rex before I'd booked it over here, so if he had noticed the switch, his own dorm supervisor would've stopped him from rushing out to try and return my bag to me. All that remained was to get my stuff back, and hopefully forget this whole thing had ever happened, not to mention keep a better guard on my effects in the future.
I wasn't sure what the hell I was going to do if he had opened up my journal. While the beginning third or so mostly fulfilled its purpose as something for me to confide my thoughts in, the rest of it was a mass of very clearly arcane scribbles and notes in languages Rex didn't know. It was hard to imagine an innocent explanation for that, at least in the context of this world.
Still, nothing gained by standing here with his bag over my shoulder. I straightened up again, marching firmly up to the front door –which was, indeed, decidedly less glamorous than ours– and opening it.
Rex was standing on the other side, arms folded. I blinked in surprise, before my eyes tracked downwards, seeing that he had my bag slung over his shoulder as well.
"Uh, so we had a bit of a mix-up on the bus." I said as a beginning, offering him a tentative smile. I bounced the satchel off my shoulder and held it out to him by the strap. "So…switchies?"
It was hard to read his expression, especially after the argument we'd just had. Was he mad at me because we'd been yelling at each other and then I essentially showed up to demand something of him? Was he jumpy because of what I had said about maybe switching off to a different partner? Was he scared because he'd opened my journal and pegged me for a Witch?
The shadows in his eyes were a gulf of ambiguity, and one that didn't bode well regardless of their specific meaning.
Rex unfolded his arms and reached out, taking his satchel back almost gingerly as he handed me mine in turn. Hypersensitive to the nuances of my reclaimed property, I realized that my bag was suspiciously lighter, with a certain absence of a rectangular weight inside it.
"Dude, did you take my book?"
Rex's eyes darted away from me. His fingers tightened on the straps of his bag, and his free hand slowly crept up to his piercing as I began to sweat. Bad, bad sign.
"M-maybe we should have this conversation away from the dorm." Rex said with a noticeable gulp.
Aw, hells bells.
I looked around the boys' dorm courtyard, then grabbed Rex as he made a highly alarmed noise, dragging him down towards an ornamental pond and ramshackle gazebo nearby. Hopefully, the gazebo would hide us from any onlookers, and the water would guarantee the absence of any spiders or snakes that the Gorgon sisters could use to spy on us. It wasn't perfect, but for the sake of secrecy, I could make do.
"Alright," I said as I dumped him on the far side of the gazebo, the both of us hidden between it and the wall. "Talk."
Rex straightened, nervously grasping the wrist I had dragged him by, like he was afraid I'd infected him by touch or something.
"The stuff in that book –that's your handwriting." he said tremulously. "You're writing about magic and magic theories like you know it."
I debated lying, saying it was for a school project or a personal project or some shit like that. Rex probably wouldn't believe me, though: what little research I had managed to accomplish over these past few weeks had told me that, surprise surprise, magical manuscripts to the level I was writing at weren't publicly available. Even if Witches and Sorcerers had inborn magic, apparently the knowledge of how to use it, or even the most basic formulas, were closely guarded by both them and the academy, who were the only ones with access to such materials. And Rex was in class with me, so he knew that what I was writing about wouldn't be homework.
"Why'd you go peeking through my diary, dude?" I asked, folding my arms and rather guiltily trying to guilt-trip him out of whatever he was building up steam for.
"I threw what I thought was my bag at the wall, and it fell out and then fell open when it hit the ground." Rex said, looking both defensive and terrified all at once, like he was trying to explain himself for even accidentally looking at someone else's private property while it also happened to reveal them as a huge criminal.
Ah. Well, that would do it –and at least he hadn't gone paging through my stuff on purpose.
"Wait, nobody else saw that, right?!" I asked, a sudden spike of alarm rushing through me as I realized that Rex, like me, probably had at least one roommate. To my unmitigated relief, though, Rex shook his head.
"No, I was alone." he said, then blinked and took a step away from me. "B-but I told my roommate I'd be meeting with you right now, and to expect me back in an hour, so don't- don't try anything!"
"What, like murder you and ransack your room to get my book back?" I asked sardonically, raising one eyebrow, before promptly regretting that statement as Rex turned dead white. "Dude, I'm joking."
"You're a Witch!" Rex hissed in rebuttal, eyes frantic, and I flinched and looked around, automatically trying to make sure nobody was within hearing distance.
"Dude, shut up!" I hissed back. "Or I will wring your neck!"
Rex took another step back, looking even more alarmed. I was beginning to regret my penchant for verbal hyperbole.
"Okay, look," I snapped, holding up both hands and taking a backwards step of my own. "I'm not gonna –I'm not gonna hurt you or anything, let's just talk this out. You found out I had…stuff, in my journal, but you still waited at the dorms and came out here when I showed up. Why? Shouldn't you be trying to clap me in chains or something?"
Rex swallowed hard, tentatively stepping back to his prior position, mostly hidden from the building by the gazebo.
"I wanted to see if you'd deny it." he muttered, looking at the ground.
"You wouldn't believe me if I did, so why bother?" I said with a deceptively nonchalant shrug, folding my arms across my chest and shifting to stand hipshot. Heck, he wouldn't even believe me if I had told him the truth, so my best bet right now was to let him play out his line and then figure out what to do. "So no, no denials here. What's your game now?"
He tugged at his piercing and looked away, feet shifting in place like he badly wanted to move, but was frozen to the spot.
"I…" Rex began hesitantly, then stopped. He bit his lip, conflict whisking across his features.
I raised an expectant eyebrow.
"Stay my partner!" Rex finally blurted as he jerked his head over to look at me again, face red. I blinked.
Then I blinked again.
"What." I asked blankly.
Rex swallowed hard, his grey eyes darting everywhere nervously, before locking on my face. "S-stay my partner…and I won't turn you in." he stammered after a moment.
What.
For all he knew I was a Witch, what the fuck was he doing with this "I won't turn you in" bullshit? I could be here making plans to blow up the school and turn the skulls of every student in into my blood-filled shotglasses. He was taking a huge risk by letting me continue to operate unseen. Heck, this was the sort of thing that could get him pegged as an accessory for genocide or a traitor to the school, with all the criminal punishments that that entailed.
Shit, had I accidentally shacked up with a plant of Arachne's or something?
I pulled a hand down my face.
"Dude, you do realize how creepy "stay in a relationship with me or else" sounds?" I groaned into my palm, unable to process just what the hell kind of situation I had gotten myself into and defaulting, therefore, into incredulity over his stupid demands and how they had been voiced.
Rex made a panicked noise.
"O-or at least stay my partner until, uh, you can find me a better one!" he said desperately. "You're a Witch, right, you can-"
He made a vague motion with both hands.
"-do, uh, fortune…telly…stuff with magic."
"You mean divination?" I asked wearily.
"Yeah! That!" Rex said, face lighting up with a painful kind of hope. "You can find me the right partner! You know, someone who really is compatible and I can go to EAT with."
"And you're willing to let me fly under the radar…for that?" I said with deep disgust. "Dude, how fucking important is one damn partnership to you?"
Rex's expression twisted a little. "You wouldn't get it." he muttered sullenly.
"Try me. Your parents gonna disown your or something if you don't have one?"
Rex's nonplussed blink told me that I'd missed the mark on that one.
"Ugh, anyways. You really think this is going to work?" I asked him, trying to appeal to some kind of rationality here. "Me trying to wield you for practice and stuff is hard enough already, it isn't going to happen if you're scared of me –and don't lie to my face right now and say that you aren't. This is stupid. It's a stupid idea, but no one's gotten hurt here, so you can just…give me my journal back, and we can both forget this ever happened."
"And then you'll stop being my partner tomorrow." Rex said, folding his arms and scowling stubbornly at me. I couldn't deny it.
"So you're okay with a hollow relationship forged by blackmail with someone that can tear you apart for threatening her, just as long as you have a registered partner on the DWMA roster." I groaned in exasperation, pinching my nose. Rex didn't deny it, either. "Jesus Christ, man, what the fuck is up with you."
"You wouldn't get it." Rex repeated, a nervous glint entering his eyes. "I won't tell anyone if you stay my partner until we find a better one for me, a-and then…I'll give your journal back, and I won't tell anyone that you're a Witch afterwards, either."
Hmm. Bull and shit, but there wasn't really anything I could do about that right now.
"You know what? Fuck it. Fine." I said, lifting both hands sharply in a gesture of defeat. "Deal. Keep my journal away from spiders, snakes, and the school nurse until we fix this whole partner thing, and I won't slow-roast you over an open flame."
Rex blinked.
"What?"
"I mean, all school staff, really, but especially the nurse."
"Why the nurse?"
"Because I said so and it's in your best interests to keep me as happy as possible right now. There's only so many places you could've hidden my book before I got here." I snapped, scowling at him and raising a threatening fist. Rex backed down sharpish.
"Sorry."
"You're blackmailing me and you say sorry." I muttered under my breath. "You're a real piece of work, Rex, you know that?"
He shuffled guiltily.
"Ugh, anyways. See you tomorrow, partner." I said, putting sardonic emphasis on the last word as he winced. "Better keep my journal safe."
I grumpily stalked past him without another word, heading out onto the road. I paused at the gate and looked back, seeing that Rex had hurried back to the dorm and was now hyperventilating inside, possibly without even realizing that I could see him through the window.
Eh, good to know I wasn't the only person regretting every decision I'd ever made in the past ten minutes.
***Time Skip***
If our bus rides had been awkward before, then the piercing, deafening silence as Rex and I rode to school the next day took the cake. He handed me a wrapped, prepacked pastry –obviously worried that I'd think he might poison me or something– and otherwise didn't so much as look at me throughout the entire rest of the ride, while I placidly did the same.
Okay, maybe I was pissed beyond belief that I had managed to lose my journal within a mere month of showing up here –and not even to one of the big bads, but to this dweeby nobody– but on the other hand…this wasn't nearly the threat that he thought of it as. I wasn't actually a Witch, ergo I'd have some wiggle room if and when I ever actually got charged for this. My main concern was if his hiding place somehow got sniffed out by Medusa, who could then read out all my notes –thankfully, I had already ripped out all of the important stuff in regards to my notes on the characters and plot, but there was still a lot of magical theorization and formulas in there, and that was probably all it'd take for everything to come crashing down. Magic here had rules, and my magic didn't conform to those rules. She'd be suspicious.
And a suspicious Medusa was absolutely the last thing I needed, in any case, ever.
So Rex was in an odd position of both "no threat" and "severe threat," which beyond any awkwardness and lingering resentment from the fact that we had had an argument the day before, meant that I was pretty much at a loss for how to talk to him. Not to mention the fact that he looked like he might fall over in a dead faint if I so much as sneezed at him, too –Rex was obviously prepared for some kind of violent and swift retribution, which made the fact that he was still actually going through with all this rather odd.
Honestly, I'd given up understanding this guy. He was meek and eager to please, but he also had the balls –or desperation– to blackmail a Witch, and not only that, blackmail me into a situation that honestly had little to no benefit for him. Remaining officially as his partner, even when we were obviously at odds? What good did that do? It was like putting a bandaid over a broken pipe.
Whatever. I had other stuff to focus on –mainly, getting Rex another partner before Halloween. How to go about that, though? Rex had either conveniently forgotten or didn't know about the whole "some meisters can sense Witches" thing. I remembered that Maka had initially been surprised that Stein could see the soul –and its characteristics– of someone who was still alive, saying that that was a skill reserved for the most talented of meisters, and she also hadn't had a clue what a Witch's Soul Protect was, or how it worked, when initially meeting a disguised Medusa. Maka was a dedicated student and inveterate bookworm, too, so what she didn't know probably couldn't be common knowledge.
I didn't have a Soul Protect, but then again, I also wasn't technically a Witch, so it was easily plausible that my soul didn't ping on anybody's radar, and equally plausible that I wouldn't catch anyone's attention unless I actually used magic. It was just barely possible that my magic was alien enough that even when using it, my soul wouldn't flare up with telltale traces of the arcane, but that was a risk I wasn't willing to take.
Anyways, I was essentially unprotected to the prying metaphorical eyes of someone's Soul Perception, and therefore I was leery of doing anything that would increase my phasmological footprint. From past experience, I knew the fact that I was a magic-user left an unspecified mark on my soul, something that meant demons and Grim Reapers (of a different strain than Lord Death) could peg me on sight as a magician. Magical creatures responded to it, too, that mark or difference in my aura that meant I wielded magical energies in a certain way and was therefore a human worth avoiding, cozening, or attacking.
So even without the benefits of a Soul Perception of my own or a sudden hysterical accusation from another student, I knew that my soul had magic, or was visibly tied to magic in some way. I just didn't know if it'd be something the people here would recognize, since the laws of physics and everything else as I understood it had been twisted so very much out of whack. For all I knew, it was something too subtle to catch unless you were inhuman or a magic-user yourself, or the signs were plastered all over me, but also illegible.
Heck, it was possible that my soul didn't work like the souls here –I mean, with the glowing sphere around my body and the little chibified face and all that. I didn't know what my soul was supposed to look like normally, and I was not adding metaphysical/phasmological studies to my already-lengthy list of things to look up and try to understand before I got out of here. At this point, unless someone grabbed and started shaking me with screams of "Why don't you have a proper soul," I was ignoring that and all my other problems and focusing on one thing at a time. I could afford to do that, this was my grace period.
Unfortunately, my grace period now looked to be taken up by finding a new partner for Rex. Even outside of my lack-of-divination problems, I wasn't sure how to go about it. All the whispers and giggles seemed pretty indicative of the fact that nobody who'd been with the NOT class for a while would want to partner up with Rex, not to mention the fact that, you know, he hadn't gotten a partner from that group in all the five years he'd been here.
So…I was limited to my fellow new students, which presented a unique number of challenges and benefits. On the one hand, they weren't subject to whatever gossipy nonsense the older NOT students were immersed in, but on the other hand, I would essentially be picking blind, since I obviously had no way to assess these people's personalities accurately enough to feel comfortable with pointing Rex in their direction and saying "Go nuts."
He wanted to go to EAT, after all, which meant that he needed a partner capable of fighting, which automatically ruled out a wide swath of the NOT students, who were just here to control their Weapon powers and go home, or attending the DWMA for that sweet sweet social clout. I needed to find someone who was capable of wielding something as unwieldy as Rex's buster sword form, and someone who would click and bond with his soul to the point of being worthy of a Resonance. I also needed to find someone who could put up with Rex's tendency for hasty apologies and nervous fidgeting, not to mention do all of this covertly, as people would have some pretty sharp things to say if they caught me "cheating" on Rex, since we were ostensibly still in a working partnership.
No pressure.
Still, I set to it, because the sooner I could get all of this out of the way, the sooner I could focus on doing my thing, aka getting back home and training to cockblock Medusa at all possible turns. One thing I could definitely do without arousing any suspicion at all was watch the other students, trying to study their visible personalities and see how, with my meta knowledge of anime tropes, any of them might be of help clicking with Rex.
There were some familiar faces as we spun throughout the day –I saw Anya, Tsugumi, and Meme a few times, and after dubious consideration, added either Anya or Meme to the list of possible candidates. After all, Tsugumi was the center of a two-person meister group, and at least, as canon characters, I did know their personalities…though that wasn't exactly helpful.
Anya was a classical anime priss, all blonde hair and European nobility, and her most dominant character trait was the fact she was a tsundere. Her cold and haughty exterior would put Rex into a panic nearly every damn day of the week, and though I might be feeling vindictive towards him right now, I wasn't that cruel.
Meme, on the other hand, was skilled, a good fighter, and had a supportive and upbeat demeanor, but I wasn't sure if she actually wanted to move to EAT, ever, and that was a bit of a problem. Also, I needed to leave either her or Anya with Tsugumi, and to be brutally honest, I didn't like considering the idea of breaking their friendship up solely for my benefit.
I suppose Ao might do…but she was low on the list for the same reason. Ao seemed content to be in NOT, and that automatically disqualified her.
To my surprise, given as I distinctly remembered her fighting with the other EAT students during the battle for BREW, Kim Diehl was in our NOT science class and without her partner Jacqueline. I mean, their shenanigans while hooking up had formed a lot of the subplot of Not!, but I could've sworn that that was all resolved by now. Well, at least her presence here meant that advancement to EAT was easily possible once you found the right partner…
I just had to find the damn partner.
Science class, as we continued working on our unit about explosives, reminded me of Stein, and for a moment I was seized with terrible, evil temptation. Stein was the best meister to have ever graduated from the academy at this point. He was a Genius-category meister, someone who could pick up any Weapon he cared to and master them instantly. True, he had graduated, but he was an extremely skilled teacher despite his eccentricities, and would probably have no problem whipping Rex into shape. I could point Rex in his direction, and Stein would excise all of Rex's insecurities and weaknesses like he was cutting them out of my partner with a scalpel, then wave Rex back to the DWMA in a newly-competent frame of mind.
Two things stopped me.
One, Stein's eccentricities included treating everyone around him as a potential lab rat, and he'd experimented on his own partner while said partner was asleep for years before Maka's mother had caught him. Granted, Spirit was dumb enough not to notice anything strange "aside" from the fact that new scars appeared on his body every night, but Rex's weird tendency to over-serve his partners might mean he'd notice and just not say anything, and I didn't feel comfortable with shoving Rex into that situation.
Two, Stein was insatiably curious and I had no doubt that, if Rex took him as a mentor, Stein would wrangle the secret of my Witchiness out of Rex sooner or later, with an emphasis on sooner. Stein's Soul Perception was acute enough that he could almost read minds, when he cared to, and he was hypersensitive to social cues. He'd notice that Rex was jumpy around me and secretive about why, and then that curiosity would be aroused and Stein would not rest until he pried the reasons out of Rex. And then, in all probability, I'd wake up on his lab table with Stein creaking and twisting the screw through his head above me.
Pity. Shoving Rex at Stein would solve so many problems, if I just turned off my pesky sense of ethics and safety.
Anyways, looking at the other students, I could vaguely pick out personality types. Normally, judging people like this would be a ridiculous exercise of prejudice and stereotyping, but this was an anime, and more than that, a shouen one full of the cliches of its class. Twin-tailed, underdeveloped Maka was the bookworm, spiky-haired Blackstar was the loudmouth, buxom short-haired Patty was the childishly manic girl, the formally-dressed Kid was an uptight perfectionist, and so on. Technically, I wasn't being judgy so much as I was identifying the stereotypes the author had deemed fit to create for this world. And anyways, this was an initial personality scan to guide my decision-making later.
I skipped out on the girls with twin braids, as they were usually the deredere type, and thus eternally cheerful and upbeat, but weak or even shy when it came to fighting. The girls with shorter hair and tight abbreviated shirts or sloppy uniforms were probably the spunky sports girl type –I wasn't sure if there was a -dere term for that, but I definitely knew the trope– and they might be worth some serious inspection later. They were generally rough but kind, and Rex definitely needed someone to steer him and keep him grounded. Plus, being a sports-type person at a combat school practically guaranteed that they'd be down for going to EAT.
Guys were kinda harder to tell, since a lot of the anime personality seemed to be stored in the hair or chest size for girls –both less applicable to guys, who generally had the same three hairstyles in different colors and obviously didn't have much in the way of cleavage going on. The larger, more muscly guys with short-cropped hair I automatically crossed off my list, since they were usually bullies. The kids with flashy clothing and even more jewelry than Rex I also crossed off, since they were probably stuck in that horrific chuunibyou phase of life, aka Middle School Syndrome. The guys with prominently spiked hair in weird colors I cautiously put in my mental "maybe" file, since they'd probably be loud and boisterous and involved in combative activities.
Alas, it was hard to pick people out of the NOT class, since most of us had very Plain-Jane features, with brown hair and eyes and all sorts of other dull colors that meant easy animation and lack of prominence in group shots. Only main characters got the kind of vibrant colors and extra accessories that formed a personality, though that rule was mitigated somewhat by a lot of these kids being, you know, real and not cartoon slaves to an animation company's budget. Still…despite my best efforts, there just wasn't as much personality on display with us as there was for the canon cast that I spotted throughout the day.
Accursed anime tropes. Why couldn't they be helpful, for once?
***Time Skip***
Since Rex now had my journal, I had to make my notes on some loose sheets of paper at my desk after Ao and I came back from school, and even then, I had to start on my list after I finished the worksheet about various kinds of incendiary chemicals, a short study guide on the Arthurian Wars (which were apparently a real thing in this world?), and read a chapter in our Social Studies textbook.
Alas, for the school life and the fact that I couldn't magically finish my homework the way I had back at Weston.
Criteria:
Partner must be able and willing to get to EAT.
Partner must be willing to work with Rex.
Partner must not be the type to walk all over him.
Obstacles:
Older NOT students have some kind of gossip-circle going on about Rex. All probably inapplicable.
Cannot set up flyers or blatantly poke around without inviting questions.
Cannot use special abilities to find partner.
Cannot find or introduce new partner before thinking of way to reacquire my journal, as Rex probably won't give it back like he said he would.
Have to find a way to keep Rex quiet about my journal afterwards.
Ideas:
I could maybe keep scanning for visible personality facets, then look up the DWMA student files or get to know said students, then maybe introduce Rex and push them together?
Talk to the school therapist and ask about partnerships?
Ask Rex about his ideal partner? (Prepare for awkward on that one.)
Call Britain and ask him for help?!
I groaned into my palm as I looked at the list. A depressingly large amount of my "ideas" were just me asking someone else for help, and even though I was realistic enough to know that at this point, I really needed help, I still had some withered sprigs of pride that insisted I should be smart enough to figure this out on my own. I'd done so much already, and I'd gotten used to my independence back in Black Butler, where my nearest and only point of support was either a demon-wielding child or my mentor from another world, whom I could only contact in the direst of emergencies.
Whatever. I'd get through this. I'd come to far to back out now just because of weird social entanglements.
Now all I had to do was get through these next few days or weeks with Rex by my side…
2.58 PM, USA Central Time