Chapter 10

A/N: Na, na na, na naaaaaaa na…Hiyo!!!! I am SO tired!!!!!! Isn't that…um…um…I'm not sure if I should say great or terrible…NA!!!! Oh, and thank you, Haine-chan! You really would have gotten me yam fries? ^.^ YAY!!!!!! Oh, and...I HAVE REACHED DOUBLE DIGITS!!!!! MY FIRST STORY WITH DOUBLE DIGITS!!!!!!!! YEAH!!!!! AND I CONVERTED SOMEONE TO RUNOMASQUERADENESS!!!!!! Affect101, you are now...um...well, you are now my protege in the RunoMasquerade-ness...I am truly amazing. *Preens self*

Disclaimer: I, CloneGirl the Amazing and Narcissistic, do not own any rights to Bakugan. At all. Obviously.

There was no way they could do this, not to her favorite class.

"Runo?" Tigrerra asked carefully, as Runo walked in a zombie-like state back home from school. "Milady…are you okay? I know that you are surprised and disappointed by this…"

A high-pitched giggle escaped the girl's lips, and Tigrerra sincerely hoped that Masquerade would learn to be wise and stay away.

* * * * * * * * * * *

No such luck. But at least he seemed to sense that it was better to not arouse Runo's anger too much today, to be judged from the fact that he wasn't anywhere close to her bed, but was instead on the bedside table, as was now usual. He didn't even deliver some sort of snarky comment about the blank look on her face. In fact, he was cringing slightly away, ready to run in case Runo had murder on her mind.

To both his and Tigrerra's surprise, Runo totally ignored the wild haired boy, and instead walked calmly to the side of her bed, fell into it face-down, and screamed into the pillow.

Tigrerra toppled from her mistress' shoulder and clattered to the floor, popping open. "Runo? Runo, are you alright?"

She answered by pounding her fists against the bedframe, her voice only slightly muffled. "I HATE HIM! I HATE HIM, I HATE HIM, I HATE HIM SO MUCH!"

"She isn't talking about me, is she?" Masquerade asked, pulling his legs up from the floor for safety's sake. "Or is she talking about someone else?"

The Haos Bakugan didn't answer him, too busy trying to calm the blue-haired girl down. "Runo, please calm down, this is an overreaction…"

"Calm down?!" Runo pulled her head up from her pillow in order to glare at her Bakugan. "Folman put a trophy case in the gym!"

"…" Masquerade looked at Runo, perplexed. "…Okay, I'm lost. Care to enlighten?"

Runo whipped her head around and glared at him, as though it were his fault she had to go through this new torture. "Folman. The math teacher. Just became became the gym teacher. He's the math and gym teacher," she hissed, her hands squeezing the poor pillow tightly as though imagining them around her narcissistic teacher's neck. "And he put a trophy case in the gym in order to show off. With all his trophies. And a bowling ball trophy."

"A bowling ball, that just makes everything worse," he said dryly, forgetting that he was supposed to try and not make Runo's temper worse than it already was. "The whole 'showing off his trophies' thing is a bit stupid of him, but that's really no reason to go attack poor innocent pillow. Really now."

"No, you don't understand." She spoke as slowly as she was sitting up, still staring at him with a panicked look in her eyes. "He completely changed the class. He made it co-ed."

"…That still doesn't help me much. You have a bunch of rowdy boys in your class? I'm sure you could just scare them into behaving."

"No." Runo shook her head anxiously. "You don't know the reason that he put us together."

"Well, it would be helpful if you told me this oh-so mysterious reason…"

She groaned, falling back into her bed and mumbled something out.

"Sorry, didn't hear that," Masquerade said, putting a hand by his ear. "Could you speak up?"

Her voice came the slightest bit stronger, obscured as it was by the pillow. "He changed the curriculum. We aren't doing basketball anymore."

Masquerade glanced at Tigrerra, looking for some sort of specification. The tiger-like Bakugan offered none. Sighing, he asked, "May I ask what it was changed into?"

"…"

"I think you might have built up the suspense enough," Masquerade remarked, tapping his fingers against the wood of the bedside table. "Come on, spit it out."

"…Dance unit."

Masquerade stared at her, and tried his best not to laugh. "I suppose that this is the part where the bowling ball makes everything worse?"

Runo buried her head deeper in embarrassment. "I…accidentally made it fall on my partner's head, okay? It's not my fault that the stupid case was so freaking huge…it was in my way, okay?!"

"Yeah, I get it now." Masquerade allowed himself a chuckle, soft enough that it escaped Runo's ears in her misery. "Am I to suppose that your dancing skills aren't the best?"

"…Shut up. And…" Again, she raised her head, and looked at Masquerade suspiciously. "And…and don't think that I'm going to ask you to help me with this, you creep!"

Masquerade slid a bit away from her, as she began to remember yesterday's 'conversation'. "Now now, I didn't even offer to…"

"YOU CREEP!" Runo leapt to her feet, grinding her teeth together. "How dare you come back here after what you said yesterday!"

"I had to think of something that you wouldn't agree to," he said carefully, slipping off of the table and edging around the wall slowly. "It's not like I actually…"

With a 'humph', Runo sat back down, throwing her backpack onto the bed and pulling out her textbook and binder, probably the same way she would pull out someone's guts. (A/N: …That was a gross thought…strangely enough, I can imagine Runo doing that…I'm scared of her now.)

Masquerade didn't move from his spot on the far wall, in case this was some sort of tactic to lure him into a false sense of security. Not that Runo was doing a very good job with that, not with how viciously she was opening her books and slamming them on her bed. Somehow, despite the cushion of the mattress, it still made a 'bang' sound.

Ignoring him, she pulled out her pencil and set it to the paper. Instead of making a nice, pretty mark that is most preffered when one is doing their homework, it stabbed straight through the flimsy paper and ended up making a huge rip.

With a little squeal of frustation, Runo snapped the rings of her binder open, which was basically pointless as she just ripped the now-useless paper out anyways. Balling it up, she threw it to the other side of the room, barely missing the blonde intruder.

"Runo," he said apprehensively, "I have a suggestion. Why don't you take ten deep breaths before you have no paper left?"

The evil look in her glare was enough to tell him that he shouldn't have said anything.

"Better idea. Tigrerra can tell you to take ten deep breaths. Tigrerra?"

Tigrerra snarled at him, but still said, rather grudgingly, "I'm afraid that Masquerade is right, milady. You must calm yourself…"

"Calm myself down?! I'm perfectly calm already! I'm FINE, in fact! Do you think that I'm not fine?!" Her last sentence sounded strangely like a threat. Masquerade had the feeling that this was what it was like to be terrified for your life.

"Okay…" The blonde boy raised his hands defensively, thinking that it might be best to just leave before he got his head bitten off.

But where was the fun in that?

For the second time, Runo connected her pencil to the paper. She was successful; no destruction this time. Surprisingly slowly, she began writing, concentration etched deep on her face.

Masquerade frowned, glancing at her elbow, where her textbook lay abandoned. "Am I to guess that you have suddenly developed pyschic powers and no longer need the textbook's assistance?"

Runo raised her head to yell at him again, but the words died on her tongue as she realized that he had a point. She glanced back at her paper.

Bemused, Masquerade watched a look of pure horror creep upon her face, panicked and confused. She ripped out the paper and, like before, bunched it up and threw it away, this time behind her and away from the wild haired boy. It tumbled onto the floor, stopping by the a leg of the bedpost. He wondered briefly what she had written on there.

Without a word, Runo pulled her textbook forward so that she could look at it better. She stared at the page, blinking slowly.

"Need my help?" Masquerade asked, somewhat dryly, taking an experimental half-step forward.

"NO! I can do it myself."

Masquerade quickly stepped back. "Whatever you say, ma'am."

Runo glared at her textbook for the wrong it had done her; she couldn't make heads or tails of the words on the page. She picked it up and looked at it closer, hoping to find some sort of hidden clue within the ink. When that failed her, she tried flipping it upside down. As should be obvious, that attempt proved to be fruitless as well.

"You sure you don't need my help?" he asked slowly.

For a full minute she said nothing, just kept staring stubbornly at the unweilding book, before sighing and flipping it around so that Masquerade could see the questions upon the page. "What does this mean?" she muttered resentfully.

* * * * * * * * * * *

"Runo?" Alice peeked her head through the door, wondering if she would catch a glimpse of the blonde boy who was now her friend's tutor. The thought still frightened her.

However, the only two living beings in the bedroom were Tigrerra and the blue haired girl herself, packing away her school things.

Runo glanced up, her expression tired and grumpy. "Hey Alice," she said in a monotone, zipping up her backpack.

"Runo, you look terrible," Alice remarked in concern, sitting down beside her. "Why don't you go downstairs and get something to eat?"

The girl did look to be the worse for wear, her face strangely pale and listless, and she wondered if Masquerade had any hand in it. Obligingly, Runo stood up and grabbed Tigrerra, and disappeared out the door.

Sighing Alice stood up, spotting a rather large paper ball at one side of the room. With a wry little grin, she walked over to it and picked it up, seeing the rip within the folds of the crinkled paper. She turned around, intending to toss it into the waste basket.

Another, smaller ball of white caught her eye, right by the bedpost. She walked to it and, absentmindedly, unwrinkled it and smoothed it out, glancing down at what it had.

She went still, eyes widening with shock and worry. The single word that was written on it wasn't complete; just a little part. Yet it had been scribed carefully and neatly, with special little embellishments. Like when a lovesick schoolgirl wrote out the name of her crush instead of writing her notes.

Masqu

A/N: …That was an interesting end, na. Finally, the pairing takes more shape…*laughs evilly*…And I have decided that I was totally stupid to have Tigrerra tell the others what was going on. Because that scene could have been more dramatic, if Alice hadn't known what was going on…it's just, I needed something to happen in the movie theater…and I didn't want it to be a DanRuno moment…na. I'll have to live with my mistake…

I wonder if I should have Alice walk in on Masquerade and Runo sometime…