Ritsuka slumped back into his desk and stared blankly into his textbook as he was waited patiently for the dismissal bell to ring. As usual, he had already finished all of the day's work and was quickly slipping into mind numbing boredom. After a few minutes the bell finally rang and the students began filtering through the doorway with Ritsuka being the last to leave, as he was every day. He then began walking down the hallway in his usual manner until the bubbly pink haired girl caught up to him and began to follow close behind him. The duo walked in a comfortable silence as they did almost every day; everything seemed to be the way it always was, but still, Ritsuka couldn't seem to shake an odd feeling like something was slightly off. He was quick to shrug this feeling however and the duo made their way through the front door of the school building and into the large courtyard. Once outside, Ritsuka caught a glimpse of something reflecting sunlight out of the corner of his eye. He glanced over his shoulder toward the gates of the courtyard and saw a very strange pair of people standing just outside the gate, looking very lost and very out of place. Upon taking another good look, even from the distance, Ritsuka got a very bad feeling from the looks of these two strangers. The small boy then began to grow slightly concerned and calmly glanced back to the pink haired girl at his side.

"Yuiko." The sound of Ritsuka's stern tone quickly snapped the girl away from the conversation she was having with one of their other classmates.

"Yes Ritsuka-kun?"

"Go find Yayoi and have him walk you home now." The taller girl laid down her pink fur covered ears down in a mixture of confusion and sadness before replying.

"Is something the matter Ritsuka-kun?"

"Everything is fine. I just have something I need to look into ok? Just go home and I'll call you later." This caused the girl to perk up once again before giving a large smile and running off toward the other boy that was standing across the courtyard.

After making sure that Yuiko was safely walking home with Yayoi, Ritsuka turned and began cautiously making his way toward the school yard gate to further investigate the strange people standing outside it. He stopped just short of the gate to take a better look at the duo and as he looked closer he could tell that these people were different somehow and they definitely didn't look like they were from anywhere around town. Ritsuka was quick to notice that the taller of the two was a man that looked to be in his twenties, but he looked very odd. He stood, or more accurately leaned, against a wall on the far left of the courtyard wall with his hands berried in his pockets and his head looking around in all directions. His clothes were a very odd style, nothing he had seen before; they were tattered and torn and he didn't have cat ears or a tail, so Ritsuka assumed this man was an adult, although his ears were strange, they were long and came to a point and the top. Ritsuka then saw the glimmer of reflecting sunlight once more and finally found that the source of the glare was from this man's large dangling ear rings that hung down past his chin. This sight in and of itself was enough to make Ritsuka weary but the cold unfeeling nature of this man's expression was what really gave Ritsuka chills down his spine.

Ritsuka then moved his attention to the other person standing in front of the man; he could see that this person appeared to be a younger girl. She was dressed very similar to the man in front of her, except that her clothes were not as torn as his but still pretty ratty. Her ears were also similar to his, only a little bit shorter and no piercings. Her face however, was warm and happy, a little lost, but happy and it was adorned with slightly curly orange locks. She was smiling for what seemed like, no reason at all. But what struck Ritsuka as odd, was that this girl also had no cat ears or tail. She looked Ritsuka's age, or even younger maybe. Ritsuka couldn't imagine how she lost her ears so young. These two were definitely very, very strange.

After observing these strange new comers from a far for a few minutes, Ritsuka finally decided that they could be trouble and he felt the urge to go and investigate even further but it ten occurred to him that he was all alone now. It figured it best to leave the situation alone for the time being until he could get Soubi to come along with him, just in case the strangers turned out to be dangerous. With this new plan in mind, Ritsuka took a deep breath before leaving his hiding spot against the wall and making his way past the duo and towards home. Just as he passed by them however, he saw something move out of the corner of his eye, the flash of movement promptly followed by a sharp pain on the top of his head. The sudden pain caused him to gasp slightly and whip his head around to find that the small girl he was just observing was tugging, not so gently, on one of his furry ears. Ritsuka then turned his whole body around violently to face the girl, causing her release her grip on his ear.

"Ow! That hurts damn it!" Ritsuka yelled as he rubbed the now very sore spot on the top of his head. The orange haired girl didn't even flinch however, but instead simply gave a big grin as she attempted to grab onto one of Ritsuka's ears once again.

"Hey! You got kitty cat ears! How come?!" The girl's voice was very bubbly and playful, reminding Ritsuka far too much of Yuiko. None the less, Ritsuka again attempted to pull away from her but she was able to grab ahold of one of his ears once more much to his displeasure.

"Because I'm only sixteen! I haven't done anything yet. Why else would you think? And could you stop! That hurts!" Ritsuka then yanked away from the girl and turned back to see that she now had her head cocked to the side with an inquisitive expression on her face. She then placed both hand on her hips before turning to her taller counterpart.

"You hear that Onii-chan?" The taller man simply nodded and gave a small sound in reply.

"Mmhmm."

"We really ended up in a weird place huh Kou-chan?"

"Yes. I suppose we did." The man then finally lifted his head slightly as he responded to fully take in the sight of the smaller cat eared boy in front of him.

Ritsuka was becoming more and more curious and confused by the second. It wasn't long however before his curiosity outweighed his initial feeling of caution and he finally decided that it was worth a shot to try and figure out a little more about these strange newcomers.

"So, who are you guys anyway?" Ritsuka's tone had now softened slightly as he rubbed his sore head and fixed his ruffled hair. His question went unanswered for a short moment as the girl looked up to the taller man, as if asking permission to speak, until he nodded silently. Once approval was given, the girl turned to Ritsuka with a wide grin.

"My name is Lirin and this is my brother Ko-" The girls words were suddenly cut off by the man's cold and calm tone.

"I'm Kougaiji." Lirin then cut back in with a smile.

"And who are you?" The girl asked as she gently poked at Ritsuka's ears causing them to twitch at each touch, only making the girl giggle more and more.

"I'm Ritsuka…and I'd very much appreciate it if you stopped doing that already." Ritsuka's tone was no longer annoyed but rather complacent.

"Awww! What a cute little name, for a cute little kitty!" Lirin squealed and she hopped up and down with a smile causing Ritsuka's cheeks to flush red with anger.

"I'm not a kitty! Just because I have ears and a tail doesn't mean I'm an actual cat!" Lirin then did her best to calm herself down but couldn't help to giggle once more before leaning over to whisper to her brother.

"He sure is an angry little kitty." Luckily Ritsuka didn't hear this comment and simply continued speaking.

"And besides, I don't plan on having them much longer!" Once he had realized what he had just said, Ritsuka was relieved to see that both strangers had very confused expressions on their faces, obviously not knowing what he was talking about.

"Whatever silly kitty cat" Lirin said patting his head once more. Ritsuka then did his best to brush off the girl's condescending remarks and was about to address her once more but was stopped before he cold even speak as something popped into his mind.

"Oh no! I almost forgot! I have to get home!" And without even a word, Ritsuka pushed past his two new acquaintances.

With the strange duo now far behind him, Ritsuka let out a lng sigh of relief to be away from them, especially the orange haired girl. As he continued his walk home, Ritsuka did his best to put the odd encounter far from his mind. He knew he had to keep a clear mind and stay relaxed for the special plans that he had for the evening.

TBC