Well here's chapter 2. I'm kinda unhappy with parts of it though so i will be most likely posting a revise later, it depends on what reviews i get... Speaking of reviews, how hard is it to give feedback, seriously? If you have the time to read past chapter one than you have time to say something about my writing. Anything, good or bad. I need criticism or I won't get better. So please, review. Thanks.

Also to the people out there who did comment, thank you and I will answer the random questions that came up, even though there were only two.

To Sitting in the Silence: In the original it was Yuka so in this story it is too. I know that the normal Yuka would never do this but as it is an AU, the characters tend to be very different.

To Dog: This actually has nothing to do with my story but my profile. One of my friends pulled a prank on me and changed some things around in my profile which is why they were contradictory, and sorry to disappoint you, but I'm not christian.

So yeah, please review my story, as well as give your feedback so i can change somethings. I actually will listen to you.

~Sunechriei

"Hey."

Out of the corner of my eye I could see the strange girl who had been following me for the past few days. Her name was Hotaru Imai. I ignored her and continued reading my book. We were alone in a cafe that was located in the bookshop near the small park in Central town.

Hearing footsteps I got up and left the table, looking down at my feet. I wondered why she wouldn't just leave me alone. Whether or not I was happy was none of her business. I felt her eyes on me as I walked swiftly out of the store and into the bright light. I continued to avoid that girl for the rest of the day.

"Today is the day you split into your ability classes!" Mr. Narumi announced the next day. I was confused as to what he meant, and was surprised when a deep voice behind me answered my unannounced question.

"You were probably told what ability class you're in on the first day of school."

I turned to face whoever was talking. It was the boy that all the girls fussed over. Natsume Hyuuga. I had to admit, he was hot. Really hot. But he had nothing to do with me.

"Thank you." I said bluntly, standing up. I began to walk out of the room when he called after me.

"Do you have any idea where you are supposed to go?" I stopped in my tracks, irritated that he was still talking to me. No one was left in the room.

"No."

"Well then, how about I show you. What class?"

"I don't need your help, especially since you have no obligation to help me."

"Yes I do. I'm your partner, remember?"

I grimaced, remembering that Mr. Narumi had partnered me with this boy. "I still don't need your help." I replied distantly.

"I'm guessing that since you have the nullification alice, you would be in the special ability class." I heard Natsume come up behind me. I froze when he reached forward and grabbed my hand from behind me. "I happen to know where that class is located. Let me take you there." he nearly whispered. Shivers ran down my spine as I wrenched my hand out of his.

"I told you, I don't need your help."

"If you insist." Natsume walked past me, a grin spread across his face. After he left I ran out of the room and headed in the direction I guessed the class would be. Mr. Narumi had showed me the basic area of the class on my first day, so I headed over there.

It wasn't hard to find the class. It had many insults written over the door, bashing on the special students. It made me laugh that I was in the rejected group of kids.

I reached out my hand to open the door and hesitated. Sure, I was supposed to attend class, but I wondered if it was really necessary. I didn't get along with people, and this whole class was about learning things about yourself and others. I would just be the odd one out, like always.

"You going in, or not?"

I spun around. Behind me was a boy, older than me, tapping his foot impatiently. I didn't know what to say.

"If you're here to attack our door again, you're going to regret it." the boy said, stepping forward, cracking his knuckles. I flinched. The footsteps stopped and I opened my eyes slowly.

"I was kidding you know. I would never hurt a girl." he said, his eyes full of concern. "You must be Mikan?" I nodded slowly. "Sorry. I knew that there was going to be a new girl today, but..." he looked ashamed for threatening me.

I tried to tell him it was okay, but the door behind me burst open before I could say anything.

"Dammit Tsubasa! What is taking you so long! The new girl is going to be here any second!" A paint can flew past me, hitting the boy square in the face. I ducked down, covering my head with my arms.

"Hey, Misaki! I just ran into the new girl so quit acting like a bitch!" Tsubasa, the boy, yelled back. He sat up and pointed at the pitiful figure that was me. I could feel Misaki's eyes on me as I slowly uncovered my face. She watched me for a while before turning back to Tsubasa.

"Well then, why didn't you say so?" She squatted next to me. "Sorry about that. That kid over there is just a brat who is lazy."

"I'm not a kid, I'm almost eighteen..." Tsubasa muttered, standing up.

"Anyway, Mikan, I want to welcome you to the special abilities class." Misaki said kindly, lifting me gently by the arms. I grimaced in pain. The bruises from Sunday still hurt but I tried to hide my pain. Luckily, neither Tsubasa nor Misaki seemed to notice that I was hurt as the showed me the class.

There weren't many people in the class, but they all smiled warmly at me, yelling welcome. I was overwhelmed with joy and shock that they had bothered putting this together for me.

I looked down at my feet, unsure of what to say.

"So, you are as quiet as the rumors say." I heard Tsubasa comment. My face turned red. I had been unaware of the fact that people were gossiping about me. "Well, that doesn't really matter. I can tell you're thankful."

I looked up at him, saw the red circle on his face from the paint can and let out a small giggle. It was just too funny for me.

"Hey she laughed!" someone yelled from inside the class.

"That's awesome. Tsubasa, you got the new girl to laugh. How?"

"Probably with his ridiculous looking face."

I couldn't help myself. I started laughing, along with all the rest of the students. It felt good to laugh again. I couldn't even remember the last time that I had.

"Well, now that we've got you laughing, how about you talk to us?" Tsubasa said. Choruses of yeahs echoed throughout the room and I looked down. It was now or never.

"My name is Mikan Sakura." I began slowly. The entire room was silent, listening to my every word. The attention felt odd. "I have the nullification alice, and I am a special star. I don't really talk that much... but I hope that you will take care of me." I bowed, hoping that I hadn't made a fool of myself.

"Yay! You finally said something!" Tsubasa cheered. I felt his strong arms lift me in the air and spin me around, like my father had once done. I gasped, unsure of what I should do. Everyone was laughing at me.

"P-please put me down!" I stuttered. Tsubasa complied to my wish, setting me down on the ground. I was shaking madly, scared of what was going to happen next. Misaki walked over to me.

"Hey, are you okay?" she asked. I nodded, but it didn't seem to convince her. She looked at Tsubasa and nodded. I wondered what they were doing when Tsubasa reached down and grabbed by wrist.

Pain swelled in my arm and I clenched my teeth. No one was speaking.

"Mikan, why are you so shy?" Tsubasa asked. I shook my head, not wanting him to know. "Please, just tell me. I can tell that there is something wrong, and this is not normal." using his other hand, he pushed up the my sleeve, revealing my bruised arm. Tears welled in my eyes and I continued to shake my head.

People were whispering now. I tried to get away from my upper-upperclassman, but he held on tight.

"Mikan, it's okay." Misaki said softly. "We won't tell anyone why, but it's true, this isn't normal.

The tears had become so bad that I could barely see. It was then that I realized that some people really do care about others. I don't really know why I did it, but I told them.

"M-my m-m-mother. S-sh-she a-a-a-abuses me." I managed to get out. I heard Misaki gasp and Tsubasa let go of my arm. I pulled back from them, expecting them to leave me alone, but instead Misaki hugged me. It was painful at first from all of my injuries, but eventually I was able to relax.

"There must be something we can do! We need to tell someone."

I pulled away. "N-no. You promised." I whispered hoarsely.

"Okay. I'm sorry. We won't tell anyone. Right?" everyone in the class responded, and I felt somewhat relived.

"Thank you."

The rest of that class had gone well. No one mentioned the scene again, instead inviting me to play games, eat some food and talk about random things. It had made me happy.

I lay in my bed that evening, thinking about the day's events. I had a feeling that if Tsubasa and Misaki had figured that something was wrong so quickly, then the other students might have too. It would explain why they had been following me.

Turning over, I decided that I would ask the two tomorrow how they had figured it out.

I was the first one in class the next day. I sat back in the far corner again, reading a new book. No one tried to talk to me this time, and I smirked. I knew this was going to happen. No one ever tried to be friends with me for a long time.

After the class had been filled with students, Mr. Narumi walked in.

"Hello everyone! Welcome to another day in my classroom. Today will be a normal day so please make sure to be ready for classes. Also, Mikan, you don't belong over in that corner. Please come sit next to your partner.

I grimaced but followed suit. I sat next to Natsume, not forgetting what had happened the day before. I still didn't understand why I had felt the way I did, but I ignored him, trying to push that feeling out of my mind.

"Well, then Polka, you going to be civil today?" he asked with a smirk on his face.

I didn't know what he meant by polka until I remembered what underwear I was wearing. I blushed crimson and ignore him. I could tell he wanted a reaction. I had seen many guys do this to girls to see how they would react.

"I guess not."

~%~%~%~%~%~%~

Mikan was crimson as Natsume muttered his question. He knew that she would be embarrassed by this, and he was hoping she would say something, but he didn't get the reaction he was hoping for.

"I guess not" he muttered angrily, sitting back in his chair. Narumi left, leaving the room for the math teacher, Jinno. He stormed in looking as though someone had thrown a trashcan on him.

Natsume hid his laughter.

"Mr. Jinno," a whiny voice said loudly, "I think you should test to see how smart our new student is, after all, she hasn't spoken to us once and I think she may be retarded."

Natsume looked around and spotted the speaker. Luna. The brattiest girl in the entire class. Jinno smirked.

"I agree, Ms. Sakura, please come down and do this problem."

Next to Natsume, Mikan stood silently and made her way to the board. She picked up a piece of chalk and began to solve the difficult equation that had been written on the board. She was done in a few minutes.

The entire class was shocked that she had gotten the answer right. Jinno gave a rare smile.

"Excellent job. You may sit."

Natsume looked over at Luna and laughed inwardly at her reaction. The girl was furious.

Mikan sat down again.

"Well who knew Polka, you're smart after all." Natsume commented slyly. He glanced at her, hoping to get a reaction and was disappointed, again. Mikan was pulling out her textbook, continuing to ignore her partner. Natsume didn't know how much more he could take of this.

He knew that Hotaru was right when she had said Mikan was hiding something from them. Natsume had become even more determined to find out what that secret was.

When the bell for lunch finally rang, Mikan hurried out of the class room. Natsume watched her with interest.

"So, anything?" he heard behind him.

"Nope." he replied, turning to face Hotaru and Ruka. "I couldn't even get a good reaction yesterday." Ruka and Hotaru exchanged glances.

"Well, we should probably head to lunch then." Ruka said slowly. It was obvious that Natsume was angry, and any little thing could set him off when he was like that. Natsume nodded and stood up.

The three walked down the halls towards the cafeteria. By the time they got there, Mikan had already gotten her food and was sitting at the table where the other special ability kids sat.

"That's interesting." Hotaru muttered. "Very interesting. Very interesting indeed."

"Um, Imai, I don't mean to be rude, but what's interesting?" Ruka asked. Hotaru ignored him, heading towards the table that they normally sat at. Next to it was the table that Luna and her group sat.

Natsume listened in on their conversation.

"We should go over there and get Mikan to become our friend, and then as payback, let's spread all of her secrets to the entire student body." Luna said venomously. Natsume shuddered. He would hate to be on the receiving end of Luna's wrath. As stupid as the girl seemed, she had a lot of connections and she could call on them at any moment.

"Let's go then."

~%~%~%~%~%~%~

I still didn't really know what to say around my new friends. They were a very talkative bunch, not like me at all. I did my best though, smiling at their jokes and answering any question they asked. I hadn't quite found the courage to ask Tsubasa or Misaki how they had known about my secret, but I was working on that.

"Uh oh, prep alert." Misaki whispered suddenly. I turned around and saw Luna and some of her friends coming over to our table.

"Hey Mikan, what's up?" Luna asked in a sickly sweet voice. I shuddered. "You should ditch those freaks and come hang out with us."

I'm pretty sure the look on my face was a mixture of confusion and disgust, but I wasn't quite sure.

"Why would she want to go with you?" Misaki asked sweetly. "You are probably just going to use her for some reason and then throw her away once she's useless to you."

"I would never! I just think that she should hang out with her own kind, you know, the students who actually have talent."

Misaki stood up and glared at Luna. I had a strange feeling that they had been friends at one point, though why Misaki would befriend Luna was a mystery to me.

"I won't go with you." I whispered. "I like it here."

Luna was looking at me, disgusted. "You can't be serious. A special star like you shouldn't hang out with these pieces of trash."

I breathed in.

"They are not trash, you are." I said, my voice shaking madly. "I happen to get along with them so please leave."

I had no idea what possessed me to say this, but I was glad I did. Luna huffed angrily and stormed away.

"That. Was. Great!" Tsubasa cheered. I felt relieved. The rest of lunch that day went smoothly. Nothing of any interest happened, and I started to talk more. Finally, I felt at home.

~%~%~%~%~%~%~

Natsume, Ruka and Hotaru were standing by the entrance to the field, talking about the events that had happened at lunch that day. It was P.E, and not a single person was doing what they were supposed to; run laps.

The coach's eyes were bugging as he tried to get his class to do what he wanted them to. It wasn't working.

"So, she talked back to Luna? I wasn't expecting that." Hotaru said. She leaned against the fence, her eyes glued on Mikan.

"Did you not hear Luna talking about it earlier? She was really angry." Ruka replied, shuddering. "I do not envy that girl right now." Natsume and Hotaru nodded in agreement.

"I knew that something bad was going to happen when Luna walked over there, but I didn't think it would be this bad..." Natsume muttered. He looked at Mikan as well. She was standing alone by the teacher. It seemed that she was waiting for the rest of the class to start running, but Natsume knew that wasn't going to happen. Only a few teachers in this school could actually control the students. The gym teacher was not one of them.

"What should we do then?" Hotaru asked.

"I don't know. Maybe..."

Hotaru and Natsume turned to look towards Ruka.

"Maybe what?" Natsume prompted.

"Well, maybe if I invited her to my family's beach house for the four day weekend..."

"Ruka, you're an idiot!" Hotaru nearly screamed. Natsume gave her a look a disbelief.

"How?" Ruka asked tentatively.

"Why didn't you mention this before? It's perfect." an evil looked glinted in her eye. She grabbed Ruka's arm and dragged him away.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"We're going to talk to your mom." she stated bluntly. Natsume hid a laugh as Ruka mouthed 'help me' back at him.

"You're on your own!" he called in response, letting out his laughter. The bell rang, ending classes and Natsume walked over to Mikan.

"Looks like you're getting along with your new classmates, well not the ones in your actual class but..." he teased. Mikan glanced at him as she headed inside.

"Is there anything I can help you with?"

"Yeah, I want to know what you're hiding."

Mikan tensed up. "I don't know what you're talking about." she muttered, turning away.

"I know you're hiding something, and I want to know what it is." he stepped closer to Mikan and grabbed her wrist. "You could save me the trouble of finding out, and just tell me you know."

"I still don't know what you want. I'm not hiding anything from you."

"Really?" he questioned, pulling Mikan in towards him until her back rested against body. "Then I guess that being the niece of the famous Kiyoko Sakura isn't a secret then?"

Mikan tried to pull away, put Natsume wrapped one arm around her waist and kept her close.

"How do you know about that?" she asked. Natsume leaned in.

"I have my sources." he whispered. "Now, will you tell me?"

All of a sudden a shooting pain ran up Natsume's leg. He let go of Mikan and she ran away from him.

"That-" he muttered. Mikan had stomped on his foot. A bold move for someone who never talked to anyone. Sighing, Natsume followed Mikan into the school.

~%~%~%~%~%~%~

I raced through the hallways, shaking like mad. Not only did Natsume know that I was keeping something from them, but I had also hurt him! I couldn't believe that I had been so stupid. I finally came to a stop in front of my dorm room, panting.

I fumbled with my key in an attempt to unlock my door. At the time I couldn't tell what emotion was running hotter, fear or lust. I had never been that close to a boy before, and though I had done a good job hiding my embarrassment from Natsume, I could feel my face burning.

Finally, I managed to open my door. I collapsed on my bed, hoping that sleep would come easily to me, but I had no such luck.

I lay there, thinking about what had just happened, unable to get the feeling of Natsume pressed up against me out of my mind. I shuddered at the heat that was still lingering on my body.

I finally managed to fall asleep four hours later.

I wanted to ditch the next day. How I would face Natsume, I didn't know.

Feeling more exhausted than usual, I slipped into the classroom and made my way to my seat. Natsume was already there and I could feel my face heat up. Silently, I sat down and ignored everyone around me. Natsume said nothing as well as his nose was buried in a book of manga.

Homeroom passed quickly with nothing interesting happening. I was able to pull off not speaking for the entire time, though my thoughts drifted to my mom.

She hadn't tried to contact me since Sunday, though I was pretty sure that she would come again this week. After all, she had been pretty serious about me answering her question, not that I understood what she wanted. I gripped the edges of my book tightly at the memory.

My stomach was still in pain from when she had stepped on me, and the new bruises I had obtained were still dark purple. I felt as though I were about to cry.

"Mikan?"

I glanced up, blinking away any tears that were threatening to form. In front of me was the blonde boy that Nastume was always hanging out with. I looked back down at my book.

"Um, well I wanted to invite you to my beach house this weekend. Well I mean, since it's a four day weekend I figured that you might want to come with us..."

I looked over my book at him. I couldn't believe that he was inviting me to come with him but I was hesitant. If Natsume knew that something was up with me, then this boy probably knew as well. Slowly, I shook my head.

"Why not? It would give you a good chance to get to know some of your classmates, well three of them, and you could hang out away from school for a few days."

I kept shaking my head. Who knew what my mother would do if I left to stay at a beach house. Though it would be nice to get away from her for another week. I slammed my book shut at the mention of this.

I saw Ruka jump at the sound of my closing book.

"Please?" he asked again, his voice rising an octave. I looked around me, trying to find an escape.

"Let's give up asking her, Nogi." a cold voice said from behind me. I turned and saw the other girl that hung with Natsume. "We should just ask her mother. It would be easi-"

"No!" I yelled standing up. The entire class went silent and stared at me. My eyes were wide with fear and I dug my nails into the desk. "No, she's, she's always busy." I muttered in a quieter voice. "She wouldn't appreciate it if you guys called her."

"Well it's either that or you come with us." Hotaru said in a threatening voice. I gulped and nodded, feeling like I was going to regret this. A grin spread over Hotaru's face. "Excellent. We're leaving tomorrow first thing. Oh and don't bother packing anything, Nogi's mom will have all the stuff you need there. Just come as you are."

I sat down, defeated. There was no way I could get out of this. I looked down at my book and figured I should ask Tsubasa at lunch what I should do about this, though the thought of depending on him made me shiver with resentment. I hated having people do things for me.

I didn't say a word for the rest of the morning and no one seemed to mind. At the lunch bell I scampered out of the room and hurried to the cafeteria.

No one was there when I arrived and I scrambled to the table I had been sitting at everyday. It wasn't long before I was joined by my classmates. They were chatting about the most random things and it made me smile.

"Hey Mikan! Long time no see." Misaki called out to me. "Excited for the four day weekend? I know I am!" she laughed and sat down next to me. I nodded and continued to pick at my lunch in an attempt to figure out how I should bring my dilemma up. I was lucky that Tsubasa as quick to notice my hesitation on things.

"Is something wrong?" he asked, sitting on the other side of me. I placed my utensil on my plate and sighed.

"Well, Ruka Nogi invited me to his beach house this weekend and I kinda was forced to say yes, but..."

"Forced? How?"

"Um, you see Imai threatened to call my mom so..."

"That's so mean! How could they do that to you?"

"Well they don't know about her, but that's not my point. I kinda need your guys' help." I closed my eyes, waiting for them to say that they couldn't or that it would be too much of a bother, but those words didn't come. Instead Misaki and Tsubasa started talking about ways to get me out of this mess, and from across the table I could hear some of the others talking about it as well.

I smiled to myself.

"You guys, I actually think I should go, I just need help hiding my injuries." I explained quietly. Misaki nodded.

"I think I can help you with that. I know some kids who owe me a favor and I can convince them to find you someone with a healing alice."

I thanked her. Tsubasa also chimed in.

"I know some people with invisibility alices. Maybe we can make your bruises invisible."

Many others also had ideas. Eventually we went with Misaki and Tsubasa's ideas.

"Thank you all so much." I said, grateful to have help.

The end of the day was hectic. All of the teachers were assigning random homework pages that we had to do over break and the students were doing their best to ignore the lesson and ditch class. I guessed that this happened every year as the teachers weren't as angry as most others would be.

When school finally ended for the weekend, I glanced over my homework. It seemed to be easy review sheets and I figured that I could do them before I went to bed that night.

I began to walk back to the dorms when Tsubasa came around the corner of the building.

"Oh Mikan, there you are! I have great news. Misaki and I were able to get the alice stones of the people we told you about." Tsubasa held out his hand, revealing two different colored stones lay in the middle of his hand. I was amazed at their beauty, having never seen an alice stone before. "Here, hold out your hand."

I looked up at him and shook my head. I couldn't just take these from him. Could I? I always knew that there was a fine line between taking something as a gift from a friend, and then taking something selfishly. At that point in my life I didn't know the difference.

"Come one Mikan, I got these for you so you could continue to hide the fact that you have an abusive mother, so take them!"

Slowly I reached out my hand and opened it. Tsubasa dropped the light colored stones onto it and closed my hand.

"Use them well, young padawan." he said in a deep voice. I giggled and bowed.

"Thank you. I don't know how to repay you."

"Get better." was all Tsubasa said before he bid me farewell. I opened my hand again and examined the stones. They were very pretty little things but I knew they were powerful. Even with the healing stone in my hand I could feel the cuts and bruises begin to disappear. I closed my eyes and thanked Tsubasa again, even though he wasn't there.

Carefully, I thought about what I wanted, multiple alice stones. I could feel more stones appear in my hand, almost as if by magic. Sighing, I opened my eyes and hand and looked down. There were multiple of the two colored stones sitting in my hand and I smiled.

It had taken me forever to find out how to use my SCE alice, but once I had, it was like a barrier had been lifted. I was now able to make copies of what ever alice stone I held. It was useful, especially at that time.

I hurried back to my room, ready to face the challenges of the next day.