I had actually intended to make this chapter shorter than the others, but it somehow ended up being longer... -_- *sigh*

Anyway, I'm sorry this chapter is a little late. School ends this Thursday for me, so I've had a lot of stuff to do. Plus, I finally decided to try out Omegle last night, and... Well, I'll just say it was a bad idea. I got hooked and spent about 2 hours RPing some FrUK. It was getting really good, and Arthur was getting drunk and Francis was buying flowers for him... And then the other person just disconnected. -_-

Um, so... yeah. Enjoy the chapter.

Over the next two days of school, Ludwig realized that Feliciano apparently didn't quite suffer from trauma: His Italian friend continued flirting with girls whenever he could—and though similar instances of flirting had happened only a couple more times so far, it seemed like there had been much more.

And Ludwig found it extremely aggravating.

He figured that he needed to take the most care when they were walking to and from classes together, since that was the time they had to spare and when girls would be standing by the sides of the hall. So, all the while, Ludwig's hard, frosty blue eyes would flicker over to Feliciano, as though he were a dog, to make sure he didn't wander away. And he'd also spent some of the time trying to remember whether or not his friend had had a habit for doing this sort of thing back before he'd left for Germany.

One thing that definitely hadn't changed was Feliciano's talkativeness. He always had so much to say, and he'd already been reprimanded by teachers a couple times for it. If he wasn't talking, he was either humming or singing. And Ludwig had to admit, at least in the privacy of his own mind, that he had a very nice singing voice.

He might have told his friend that he should join Choir or something if he hadn't known Feliciano would likely urge him to join as well—and if he hadn't had a better idea….

On Wednesday afternoon, when the two of them were leaving Mr. Wang's classroom (in which they'd just continued taking notes about cooking terms) together, Ludwig briefly caught sight of a flyer on the wall that he'd already seen a few times during the week, the news of which having been announced on the morning announcements as well: It was saying that soccer tryouts would take place all through the next week. He hadn't given it much thought before then, but the idea struck him very suddenly, and he took the chance to stop walking for a very brief moment, then continue and place a firm hand on his friend's shoulder.

"Feliciano," he said to the Italian's slightly curious expression, "I tsink ve should tryout for ze soccer team."

For a second, Feliciano was surprised at his friend's rather unexpected suggestion, and he looked over his shoulder at the flyer. Then, hesitating, he frowned and looked back to Ludwig.

"Why?"

"Hm? Vell… I just tsink it vould be a good tsing to do," said Ludwig seriously. "It'll keep us busy, it'll keep us in shape… it'll give us a reputation." Part of his reasoning was also that it was a sport—and boys played sports. But he didn't know how to put that into words in a way that made more sense. "It'll be fun."

Ludwig was looking at him with a set, expectant expression on his face, and Feliciano wasn't completely sure what to do. He had never been on any actual sport team before, and the idea of joining one sort of seemed like a bad idea.

"Um, but… I'm not sure if I'd be very good," he told him in a small voice.

"Zat's stupid—ve've played togezzer over ze summer, and you're really good." The serious tone of his voice was tinged with a bit of frustration to emphasize his honesty, and his brow furrowed slightly. "You don't need sheer strengts to have skill. Besides, isn't your grandfazzer ze coach?"

"Yeah, well… I play well with just you, but I don't really like the idea of being surrounded by so many people in a field. I'd rather not risk getting kicked in the face or anyth—"

"You von't get kicked in ze face. It really von't be zat dangerous." Ludwig sighed inwardly, as he hadn't expected it to be this difficult to convince Feliciano. So now, he felt sort of weird resorting to this… since it almost felt like he was showing some sort of weakness—"…Please?"

Feliciano wasn't entirely convinced of his safety, but he could find no way to say no to his best friend at this point. And really, the prospect of being on the soccer team with him suddenly seemed much more fun. So, with only about a moment's thought, he smiled and said, "Okay then, Ludwig! But are you sure that you'll have no problem with it?"

"Hm?" He frowned, a bit confused. "Vis vhat?"

"Well, you've never liked socializing very much at all, and you seem like you like it even less now that you're back from Germany, and… I thought you might not want to have to cooperate with so many people on a regular basis."

Huh. Honestly, Ludwig was surprised to hear such an intelligent statement come out of Feliciano's mouth—not that he was stupid, but… well, he was pretty simple-minded at times. Feeling his lips start to twitch into a potential smirk, he suppressed it out of habit.

"I tsink I'll be able to handle it, actually," he assured him. That was when they reached their bus and started climbing on.

Mathias smacked his hand along with a flyer down on the table without warning the moment he got there, and he was greeted with four sudden head-turns and startled looks. Ignoring them, he said at once, "Alright, peeps, we're all going to join the soccer team this year!"

At that, Berwald continued glaring at him with no change in his expression, Tino's and Emily's expressions became confused, and Lukas frowned, pulling over the flyer to himself so that he could read it. Mathias just kept smirking widely at them.

"You do realize that trying out for the team doesn't ensure you'll join it," said Lukas dully after a few seconds of silence. He was still holding open the book he'd been reading.

But Mathias just took a couple quick steps around the round table to the spot directly behind Lukas, put a firm hand on his shoulder, and bent down so that their heads were at the same level. And he was still grinning, even though the other boy was glaring at him.

"Of course it doesn't, if you've got that kind of attitude," he said in an almost sing-song voice, just before he gave Lukas a relatively quick, but firm kiss on the cheek and a fond look. To which he just frowned more deeply and tried to rub it off. Then, Matthias addressed the rest of them: "Come on, we'll all kick ass if we're on the team together. And from what I've heard, soccer is the huge sport at this school—not football or even basketball, so it'll get us some major reputation points. I say we do it."

"I don't know…," said Emily, looking down at the milk carton in her hand for a second. "I'm not exactly athletic. And it doesn't even matter, anyway, since I'm a girl—and the girls' team doesn't play until Spring."

"Me neither," agreed Tino, feeling brave enough to contradict Mathias because Emily had done it first. He cringed slightly in distaste at the thought of joining any sport team—and he really didn't want to be forced to. He was the smallest out of all his friends, and he considered himself the weakest—or… most delicate. "Plus, I've heard soccer is one of the most demanding sports when it comes to endurance…. Most of us just don't have that."

"Well, if it's endurance we're talking about," Mathias started, smirking again, "then I'm sure Lukas and I will make it super easily."

He gave the boy in his grip a fond, suggestive look, at which Lukas grabbed his tie and pulled. Extremely hard.

"Ack—ghccghcgch!" It had been only a second or so of choking, but that had been really painful. Ugh, he thought his boyfriend's grumpy personality was pretty cute at times, but he figured that he should probably stop wearing ties. And he also stood up immediately, unwilling to have his neck constricted again.

"Well—" His voice was still slightly hoarse, and he had to cough to get it to work properly again. "Well, anyway… now that I think about it, I don't doubt that Tino and his feminine body would be sent away from the tryouts. And Emily is a female. I guess. Even though she has the lack of a rack to be able to pretend to be Lukas. But I've already decided it, and I'm obviously the leader of this friend-group, so we're all at least going to try out."

All of them just were just staring at him at this point, all extremely annoyed with these much too frequently-exhibited sociopathic tendencies of his—which had been going on since they'd all come together as one group of friends about eight years ago. Especially Emily and Tino, whom his purposeful insults had been directed toward, and Berwald, who was feeling the anger that Tino was simply too nice of a person to feel.

"If Tino d'sn't want t' embar'ss h'ms'lf for y'r sake, I d'n't th'nk he has t'," said Berwald somewhat unexpectedly—he usually didn't talk at all. Even with his inherently low voice and speech impediment that he'd had since forever, they could all understand him, as they'd learned to over the years.

Tino looked over at him in pleasant surprise, glad that he was being defended, and the others raised their eyebrows in expectation of the stare-down that was about to ensue: Mathias put both hands on the table in an intimidating matter and narrowed his eyes at the cold ones across from him.

It had been obvious from the start that Berwald held a certain disliking for Mathias (more than the others did, that is), and vice versa. The former simply didn't like being one of the "followers" in the group in spite of his being the tallest out of all of them, and he didn't like the way that the "leader" often treated Tino (who was really the only thing that made being in this circle of friends worth it). So when there were conflicting ideas between them, they usually battled it out silently and then came to a stalemate—or compromise, whichever you wanted to call it.

Something else might have been said if the bell didn't ring right in the middle of their staring contest, slightly startling a couple of them. As though nothing significant had been happening just then, Lukas slid a bookmark into his book, closed it, and got up to leave for Geometry. Then, Emily practically mimicked her twin brother and stood up to sigh, throw away her breakfast tray, and grab her backpack.

"…Hm," Mathias finally grunted, relenting only because of the inconvenient timing of the bell. "You guys will all be there to at least watch the tryouts. That's the last time I'm changing the conditions. Mathias out, bitches."

With that and a smug face, he left the vicinity with only Berwald and Tino behind him.

"I'll go if only to make sure he isn't breathing down my neck for the rest of the month," Tino half-groaned, at the same time sighing. "But if I tried out, I'd more likely become the ball than get an actual position."

At the look Tino then gave him, Berwald felt like smiling, but—as always—his face was stuck. So instead, he raised his eyebrows a bit in acknowledgement and stood up to start walking out of the cafeteria with him.

"Alright, before we start with the Ancient River Valley Civilizations, I want you all to read this packet that I'm handing out—oh, don't groan like that, it's not that long. I do want you to write some stuff, too, though: It's about Hammurabi's Code, and so I want you to circle some of the laws you think are particularly unfair and mark whether they show how the society was patriarchal, the social classes, or something else."

Matthew ceased paying any more than vague attention after that, and instead turned his focus back to the girl who was sitting a few rows ahead of him. He'd found himself watching her both of the days before; and he'd been unaware of it beforehand, but he'd realized that he really liked looking at her.

Her name was Yekaterina, as he'd learned on the first day of school, and she had a heavy Russian accent from the very brief moments that he'd heard her speak. She didn't seem to talk much, but at the same time she looked very friendly. He was aware that most people wouldn't say she was attractive other than because of her extremely large breasts (Alfred had even pointed her out once, saying "Hey, check out that butterface"), but he honestly did think she was pretty. And soft-spoken, apparently. A lot like him.

Only the fourth day of school, and Matthew already had a crush. Not that he saw it as a bad thing—he just didn't know what he could possibly do about it. Ever since his first crush on Michelle Mancham (who was one of the only people who'd ever noticed him) a few years back, he'd decided that there was simply no way he could ever be brave enough to ask anyone out, and so he would simply never make an effort. He had accepted that he'd probably be alone forever, just having unrequited crushes on girls, and he was fine with it. But he did find himself fantasizing on gathering up the courage to talk to Yekaterina and becoming friends with her.

Because if anything were to happen, Matthew really wanted to be friends first. He simply wasn't the kind of person to want to get to know a person solely through dates. That just seemed stupid to him.

When the stack of packets about Hammurabi's Code reached his desk, he took one and passed the rest behind him, then started to put it away in his backpack and get ready to leave. For another couple seconds, he looked over to Yekaterina to see her adjusting her headband, and he could just slightly hear her humming to herself.

He sighed, supposing (and hoping) that they'd probably be put together in a group project or something sooner or later.

Kim had just started walking out of the Business classroom and away from her short conversation with Ty when she was suddenly greeted with a new voice on the other side of her, which was at a rather high pitch—

"Hi—you're Kim, right?"

Startled, she snapped her head over to see the boy (who she was pretty sure sat in the computer desk next to her) smiling widely and friendily. Noticing that he had this stupid-looking curl sticking straight up where his hair was parted, she narrowed her eyes. And as she often did, she was already getting a lot of predisposed opinions about him.

"Yeah…," she said warily, annoyed.

"I'm Alfred!" he introduced himself cheerfully, feeling pretty confident that he was on a roll so far. He had noticed, throughout the week, that this girl seemed to not know how to smile, and that she was a generally grumpy person. But she was also very pretty, and she seemed like she could probably be happier if someone was just nice to her. There was also something else drawing him to her, but he couldn't quite place what it was. So he'd decided to be the hero and be her friend.

Alfred then held out his right hand, smiling as warmly as he could manage.

"Yeah, I know," said Kim dully, staring down at his offered hand. Rather than taking it, she frowned and looked away, ignoring it—she didn't want to touch him, even if it was just shaking hands. There was only one person she'd willingly touch in any way, and that was Ty.

"So…" After several seconds, Alfred finally let his hand drop, but otherwise not taking her rejection harshly at all. "What made you want to take Business?"

Really? He was going to do that? What a lame way of trying to make conversation with me…, she thought, groaning inwardly.

"I'm interested in business; why else?"

"Oh yeah, heh, I guess…." Alfred noticed that her expression had only become unhappier since he'd started talking to her, but that didn't faze him. She even started walking faster, as though to get away from him, but he just sped up his own pace as well. "Hey, I think we should be friends. I don't know about you, but I don't really have many, so—"

"Well, I'm not surprised, because you're really annoying," she snapped, looking over again and glaring at him. "So please stop talking to me—I have to go get on the bus, anyway."

Giving a small, angry huff, she continued forward and turned a corner in the hallway, heading out to where the buses were lined up.

Meanwhile, Alfred watched her leave, only somewhat disappointed at how things turned out. He couldn't honestly say he felt hurt at her comment, as he was almost constantly told that he was annoying, and all of this only told him that Kim would be a challenge. Sure, she was already giving off the air of hating him, but he couldn't expect this to be easy, could he?

Still feeling overly-confident, he spun around on his heel to change direction and walk out to the front of the school, where his mom would be waiting in her car for him and Matthew.

Toris was having a relatively quiet lunch on Friday until, a few minutes after he sat down, he saw something pink and blonde sit next to him out of his peripheral vision.

That wasn't to say that the lack of quiet was a bad thing, of course; really, it felt weird if things were too quiet for too long. He needed Feliks to be there and disrupt the peace, if only because he'd been used to it since they first met. Which was why he was glad that they at least had the same lunch period.

"Hey, Toris, you totally won't believe what happened in Fashion Design just before lunch," said Feliks as he sat down, gently hitting his friend's shoulder to get his attention. He was sitting a bit too close to him, especially considering that the rest of the table was completely empty, but neither of them cared.

Swallowing a bite of his salad, Toris turned his head around to see Feliks leaning on his side far over the table, apparently waiting to tell him his story. Only somewhat curious to hear it, he said calmly, "Yeah, I probably won't. What happened?"

"Okay, so we were, like, bored, so some of us were looking through Mr. Garrison's boxes of fabric and stuff…. And out of nowhere, Klara—you know, that really bitchy girl I told you about—just asked him if he was gay. It was super awks, and like, everyone was quiet for a second, and Klara was just, like: no expression. Then Mr. Garrison said that he was, like no big deal or anything. I guess it really isn't, and I thought so too, but that's just, like, a really weird question to ask a teacher, you know?"

"Yeah, it is…," said Toris, now feeling a little awkward himself. He had never met Klara, but from what Feliks had told him over the past couple days, she sounded like the sort of person he would hate. And he was also confused as to why she was in Fashion Design, since she didn't sound like a very girly girl, either. "So… wait, are you, um… the only boy in that class besides the teacher?"

Because honestly, Toris was surprised that his friend hadn't been asked the same question. And he sort of wanted to know what he would have answered to that question….

"Nah, there's a couple other guys," Feliks told him, his mouth full of the chicken sandwich he'd just taken a bite of. "But I think they're only in the class 'cause they were like, just put in there or something. I still think that you should get a schedule change to take the class with me, though, you know…. It's fun."

"Eh, I'm not really all that interested in clothes…," said Toris, a small I-really-doubt-that-would-ever-happen sort of laugh in his voice. You know my wardrobe. I wear whatever fits."

"But we're in highschool now, so style is, like, everything," whined Feliks, pouting a little. He was never really one to try and see anyone else's point of view, not even his best friend's, so it was a little frustrating that Toris didn't want to be like him. "You look good, but you don't, like, have your own style or anything. It's just… meh."

Seemingly absentmindedly, Feliks started messing with Toris's hair, trying to flatten down the frizz a bit and straighten all the flyaway strands that were in his face.

As he was pretty used to this overbearing-ness, Toris couldn't bring himself to be that annoyed, so he just let his friend do what he was doing.

"That's exactly it, though," he said somewhat exasperatedly. "'Meh' is my style."

"Hmph. Well, you could still do something…. I could put, like, a braid in your hair if you want. It'll look totally retro, but not too hipster!"

Since Feliks looked pretty enthusiastic about his sudden idea, Toris held back any protests and sighed. "You're probably going to do it whether I give you permission or not, anyway…."

Proving his assumption, his friend took another bite of his sandwich and then immediately turned in his seat to separate a lock of Toris's hair from the rest and start with the braid.

"I'm still not going to give up Sociology for Fashion Design, though," said Toris, wanting to make sure Feliks was aware and didn't get his hopes up.

"What do you even do in that class, anyway?"

"It's sort of like psychology, but we're learning about society's affect on how people interact…. There's actually a unit about fashion in society in it, I think."

"That sounds kind of boring. Except for the fashion part. But I guess I'd need to be smart like you to think it was fun…."

After that and a second or so of silence, Feliks finished up the braid.

It was a good Friday so far for Ivan. Or at least, the lunch period was. Natalya had been sent to the principal's office for insubordination earlier during their Psychology class, which meant that he could finally have some time away from her. And it also meant that he finally had a chance to make some friends.

Because Ivan really just wanted to have some friends besides his adoptive-sisters. He loved them, but they were weird. Yekaterina could be a weak crybaby at times, and her boobs attracted too much male attention; Natalya was really overbearing and creepy, and she scared off anyone he tried to talk to. Ivan only had one class with Yekaterina, though, and though she had the same lunch period as him, she was sitting with her newly found friends at some other table.

Meanwhile, Natalya had hardly been letting him out of her sight throughout the week. He'd never thought that he would cherish his time in the school bathroom so much.

So, now that he finally had the chance, Ivan had decided that he was going to get a few people to be his friends. Though he didn't look like it, he really did crave normal human interaction…. If only socially, he really wanted to be like a normal person. And he almost felt sad that it had been so hard for him to make friends until now.

His plan had begun directly after Natalya had marched angrily out of the Psychology classroom: Before it was time for lunch, he'd sought out the weakest-looking kid in the class (since he'd known it would be easy to intimidate him into agreeing if he initially didn't comply) and told him that he was going to be his friend now. Easy enough.

The kid's name was Raivis, and he seemed pretty shaky so far. He wouldn't look Ivan in the eye, and he hadn't responded much to his attempts to make conversation while walking to lunch.

"You know, you shouldn't be so rude," Ivan told him cheerfully, calmly putting a hand on the other boy's head and pushing downward more harshly than he'd intended. And he was blissfully unaware that Raivis was about to cry.

Hm, useless, he thought, realizing that he should get someone slightly less weak, too.

Which was why he and Raivis had sat down at a lunch table seating, at the time, only one person, whom he'd also immediately made his friend. Ivan had never seen this other boy before, but he didn't think that mattered.

"Privyet. You don't look like you haff friends, so you can be my friend now, da?"

Eduard looked up quickly, startled and confused. "W-what? But… I—I actually do have—" He cut himself off, blanching in fear at the other guy's childish, yet creepy, constant smile, as well at his massive size and probable strength. "Um… okay…."

But now, as Ivan was taking his empty lunch tray to the trash can to throw it away, he was thinking that Raivis and Eduard weren't quite enough. Stopping for a moment, he pursed his lips in thought and looked around the cafeteria a little. What caught his eye were two boys sitting with each other at a table not too far away from him; for no reason in particular, he decided he'd go for them and that he was going to take the brunette.

Ivan first looked over his shoulder to check his table, but he quickly decided that Eduard and Raivis probably weren't going to try to escape—and if they did, he'd just get them back again. Then he started toward that other table.

It was only a minute or so after Feliks had finished making the braid in Toris's hair (which he actually sort of liked, now that he had it) that they saw someone else approaching their table. Only Feliks saw him at first, though, so only he felt initial worry. His friend wouldn't have recognized him, anyway. And before he could say any sort of warning, Ivan reached the table and caught Toris's attention.

There was a moment where he and the Russian just stared at each other, one smiling and the other looking curious but otherwise apathetic, and where no one said anything. And then—

"Hey—you." He pointed to Toris, then put a large hand on his shoulder. "You look smart, so I vant you to come vith me." And then Ivan slightly widened his innocent-looking smile, completely unaware of how much innocence he actually lacked.

All Toris could do was continue staring at him, now very confused.

"I—for what?" he asked, frowning.

"So you can be my friend, obviously," Ivan said, leaning further over him and unintentionally becoming more intimidating.

At that, Feliks got angry, and Toris was even more confused—was he being threatened? He really couldn't tell. It did feel that way, though, and he was feeling a very strong urge to get as far away from this guy as possible, and—Oh God, is that a metal pipe in his belt loop?

Okay, now he was scared. And he had no idea what to do. The whole situation was almost more confusing than frightening, but it sort of felt like this guy had very little understanding of the actual concept of friendship…. It was like he was a small child or something—and the scarf and deceivingly sweet smile exemplified that. Even though he was actually one of the tallest people Toris had ever seen.

"But—um…," he stammered nervously, "I don't even know your name." That was the best excuse he could come up with on the spot.

Hm. This kid seemed to be braver than the other two had been…. Ivan was liking him a lot already. There was no way he was going to give it up now, at any rate.

"My name is Ivan," he told him as though it were a random fact rather than an introduction. Figuring that things were set from there, he then gripped the other boy's shoulder harder and started to pull him up, turning his head away in his assumption as well. "You can tell me your name vunce ve're back at my table—"

"What—?—but I don't… I don't want to!" protested Toris—and somehow, all the confusion had gone away. All he needed to understand that there was some Russian, possibly sociopathic kid who wanted him to be his friend and wasn't going to take "no" for an answer. Almost surprisingly, it was Feliks who grabbed his waist and pulled him back down before he could physically struggle himself.

"Hey!" said Feliks angrily, feeling his face grow red as he glared at the Russian bastard. He had Ivan in two of his classes, so he at least sort of knew what the guy was like—and really, he could only define him as a freaking weirdo. Unlike a lot of other people, he wasn't afraid of him, but he still didn't like him. Especially not now. "You can't just, like, take Toris away like that. Check it, he's my friend—so you can go get your own!"

By the strangely curious frown that Ivan then gave him, it seemed that he didn't like Feliks, either.

While Feliks resigned to staring down the Russian, Toris was too busy being strangely touched at his friend's protectiveness for a couple seconds to be afraid of Ivan. He supposed he couldn't be surprised, since they had been sticking up for each other ever since they were little kids, but it was always a nice feeling.

But when he looked back at Ivan's face, he decided that he would have preferred him to actually be scowling or something. This slight frown was just so creepy….

"Vhy not?" he asked, sounding relatively polite but finally having a sort of edge to his voice. "I vant him," he said as though it was a perfectly reasonable argument.

"Huh?" Now Feliks was confused. More confused than he normally was, anyway. "What do you mean, 'why not'? It's… it's, like, not fair!"

Oh…. It was about fairness, then, was it? Well, Ivan could deal with that.

To their surprise, the Russian kid went back to smiling. And they really weren't all that confident they were going to get away so easily, since they could already tell that Ivan was totally insane—not to mention that he was actually carrying around a weapon in his belt.

"Okay, then—I am thinking… ve could arm-wrestle for it, da?" Ivan suggested. "I'll go against vun of you. Vinner gets Toris."

It was somewhat of a relief that they actually had a way out of it now, but not quite enough of a reassurance. Ivan was huge, way bigger and clearly stronger than either of them…. An arm-wrestling competition really wasn't even all that fair of a way to settle it—hell, they shouldn't even have had to settle it in any other way than just telling Ivan to go way, since this whole thing was just wrong… but once again, he was just so much bigger than them. Not even Toris, as the smart one, could see any other way out of it; telling a teacher to make Ivan leave them alone didn't even seem like a viable option.

"Okay, fine," said Feliks quite suddenly, his voice snapping his friend out of his thoughts. Toris looked to him quickly and worriedly, not sure whether or not he should be mad at his friend for being to quick to agree to those terms.

"Feliks, are you sure about this?"he breathed, wanting to grab his collar to shake him, but refraining from doing so even in his panic. "I don't know if I even stand a chance ag—"

"I'll do it." His friend's voice held a lot more confidence than Toris was feeling. But he figured that this bastard could probably smell fear, so he was glad that at least one of them could be tough about it.

Plus, he did feel better about Feliks being the one to do it, since he'd always been the more physically strong one. As feminine as he looked and acted most of the time, he could actually be really tough when he wanted to. In fact, he'd actually been the one to fight off the bullies more often than Toris.

Not that it honestly seemed much more likely that they were going to win.

"Good," said Ivan, walking around to the other side of the table so that he could sit down. He still wasn't much shorter than he'd been standing up. "This'll be fun!"

As Ivan propped his arm up on the table by his elbow, Feliks hesitated to do the same—mostly because of how much smaller he clearly was. When they had both joined their hands and were ready, the larger one looked to Toris, waiting for him to count them down. Instead of doing so immediately, though, he stared desperately into those cold, blue eyes, searching for mercy….

But he didn't get it.

It took a few moments for him to resign to it (and the fact that this was officially the worst Friday ever) and say, "…Go."

Both of them immediately started putting forth physical effort, but while Ivan's face was as calm as ever, Feliks's was screwing itself up and going a little red. They were at a standstill for a second, and Toris nearly got his hopes up before—

With seemingly hardly any effort, Ivan slammed Feliks's hand down on the table, and they could have sworn that they heard a small crack. There was a moment of horrible silence.

"Done," said Ivan happily, getting up and moving back around the table. "Now, if you vant to, you can come vith me."

"W-what…?" Toris was hopeful again—was he really going to be allowed to stay? Of course; this must have all just been a joke, it—

"Just kidding, you come vith me because I vin!" And then Ivan let out a childish little laugh, which was considerably creepier than the smile. Before Toris's face could even revert to its horrified look again, the Russian grabbed his shoulder and easily hoisted him all the way up.

"Wait—no—I don't want to!" he pleaded uselessly again as he started to get pulled away, not sure whether or not he wanted to get attention from other people. Would anyone even want to try to stop this insane kid? …Weren't any teachers going to do anything? "Uh… two out of three…?"

"Ah, but that voodn't be fair, vood it?" Another sickeningly childish laugh. Toris honestly wanted to vomit.

Then Feliks started to stand up with his tray, getting an idea—"I'll just, like, come with you, then!"

"Um, no," laughed Ivan, pushing the blonde's head down and forcing him back into his seat. "I don't like you. And you're kind of stupid, so that's useless." At once, he jerked Toris's arm a bit too hard, and he had no choice but to let himself be pulled further away—if he didn't want his arm ripped out of its socket.

No, no, this can't be happening…. It was all just too freaking surreal. This sort of thing just didn't happen, especially not in a highschool….

"Feliks, do something!"

"I… um…" But his friend just stared at him blankly, his expression almost dream-like and not even all that worried like it should have been. It wasn't that Feliks didn't care, though—he just had no idea what to do. He simply couldn't process that his best friend was just being dragged away, that Toris was literally being forced away from him by some insane Russian, who would probably try to make sure they didn't talk to each other again… and the entire thing was suddenly so confusing to him that it felt as though it weren't happening at all.

But… well, he'd lost Toris in a fair game, hadn't he? What was there to do?

Feliks wasn't moving. He was just staring at him. Why? thought Toris hopelessly. …I thought we were friends?

Toris kept protesting in spite of Ivan's iron grip, kept hoping that a teacher would see this and do something—or that his friend would go get a teacher… but nothing of the sort happened. Because of that, he was feeling a really painful mix of betrayal, fear (of Ivan, of course), and anger.

In the next few seconds, he was being forcibly sat down at a table with two other boys sitting on the other side, both of whom seemed to be avoiding looking at Ivan. One of them he recognized from his Sociology class, but he didn't know the other guy. They were also giving sort of apologetic looks to him.

"Were… were you dragged over here too?" Toris asked quietly, still very shaken. It looked like the Russian might have heard him, but he didn't seem to care.

"He was," said the one he recognized (but didn't actually know the name of), pointing to the kid next to him, who was shaking. "I was already sitting here, though. We saw you, just now…. You definitely resisted longer than either of us."

Toris just blinked, unsure whether or not he should consider that a good thing. He then twisted around in his seat, trying to see what Feliks was doing, but he had hardly caught a glimpse of his friend (or… ex-friend…?) when Ivan grabbed the top of his head and turned it back around, at which he let out a soft yelp of surprise.

"Hey, you're my friend now, remember?" he said, now intimidatingly close to his face. "Not his."

Toris nodded slowly, and then Ivan continued to Raivis and Eduard, "This is Toris. Heh, you both should haff seen the look on his face a minute ago. It vos hilarious!"

Fuck yeah, Nordics! :D Seriously, they are so freaking fun to write... Especially Mathias. Gotta love our sociopathic Dane. And also, I'm havng a lot Russia feels after writing this... He's so tragically insane and totally unaware of it. I just love him so much.

So... enough of my thoughts, because I'd like to hear (or read, whatevs) yours. In a review, maybe...? :D

Seriously though, please review. I want to know what you think~!