Idiot! Why did you go and cry in front of the mayor's son? Akari wondered, running off to the far side of Waffle Square. All animals eat their weak. All of them. Fish. Dogs. Humans. Why was I so surprised?

"If only I'd been born fully human."

I always told myself this excuse. "If only my head wasn't so sloshy– if only I was like the other villagers– they wouldn't look down on me. It's all because of my kappa side. It's all because of that…" But it doesn't matter. The weak get eaten. Ah, what am I even getting at?

I give into weakness too much. Why did I cry?

"Akari!" her mother's stern words resounded; "Tears are a woman's last-ditch weapon. Don't go using them whenever you're scared."

Once again, the memory of the larger dragonfly– with its thick body and spindly legs clamped down around the smaller one– sprung up in Akari's mind. The munching noise was so discreet, yet deafening, and in moments, the tail end of the smaller dragonfly disappeared completely. This sort of thing was more common than she liked to think. There were a lot of things she didn't like to think about. It was childish.

"I am just like that small dragonfly," Akari said to herself, facing the blindingly bright sea which shone beyond the square's cliff. Wrenching her eyes shut, she remained in her troubled, jumbled thoughts, even when she heard shuffling in the grass behind her.

"Hey! Don't look so glum," Kathy said, her warm hand landing on Akari's shoulder. "Everyone loses their first go at Bug Catch, so don't fret. You know, you're pretty cool for even competing! Most girls can't stand the sight of bugs."

"Oh," Akari replied, not knowing what to say to this. "Thanks…" Though, she added mentally; I can definitely understand where those girls are coming from… Bugs were not to be trusted. Neither were boys.

"Wah, AH–" a girl cried out, accompanied by a loud, clacking racket. "Oh NO–"

Spinning around, Akari recognized a familiar girl in a pink cupcake-shaped dress crawling around on the square's now-wet pavers. A bucket rolled beside her.

"Maya?" Akari muttered.

"Oh… how could you do this?" Maya scolded herself depressingly, the hem of her pink dress soaking through with muddy water. "Dad will be so disappointed! 'Maya, you ruined the table flowers! Can't you do anything right?' Hnn…"

Kathy snorted to herself. "What a klutz," she said, staying where she was as Akari ran past.

"Maya, are you alright?" Akari asked, hurrying over and setting the toppled bucket straight; kneeling down– careful not to spill her OWN water– Akari began plucking up as many scattered flowers as manageable.

"Hah? Akari! Hi, I'm fine, fine," Maya said, looking up and lightly hitting herself on the head– as if punishing herself; "It's just the flowers… They had a bit of an 'oops-a-daisy'!"

"Hehehe," Akari chuckled, delighted by this childish joke.

Kathy's eyes went rolling in their sockets.

"Oh, you're laughing! Everyone says 'Akari is so intense!' All the time! I feel like I really accomplished something! Maybe." Sticking her tongue out, she went back to gathering up her mess. "Uh, thanks for helping. I've got the rest, though! You should be enjoying the festival, not crawling around like me."

Akari picked up a few more flowers anyway. "Maya, wasn't there water in your bucket?"

"Yeah… I spilled it!"

Standing up, Akari drew her watering can from her rucksack and silently refilled the bucket. With the tulips, roses, and yellow moondrop flowers rinsed of grime, they all popped and floated to the top– as if replenished with life itself.

Hurrying up, Maya took the bucket and rocketed to her feet. "Woo-hoo! Thanks a bunch!" she said, nearly sloshing water out again. "Whoops! Ok, I'm going on home with this. Stop by to see me sometime, ok? I'll cook you up something to eat! Er… or I'll sneak you some of my grandma's cooking… See you soon!"

"Later!" Akari waved back.

As Maya bolted across the square and down the stairs– Kathy drifted on over to Akari and laughed.

"Careful. I wouldn't eat anything Maya cooks," Kathy explained; "Her cooking is super nasty!"

"Wha?" Akari blurted, startled by Kathy's bluntness; "Nasty?"

"Yeah, you'll die for sure if you eat it! I guess she failed to inherit Yolanda's miracle~cooking gene… though there IS a big rumor that Maya isn't even Yolanda's real granddaughter. You see… Maya and her mother were brought to the island by Jake. Back then, he had only been gone for a year before returning with them."

"So you're saying… just because Maya is a bad cook, she's not related to Yolanda OR her dad?"

"Well, yeah!" Kathy nodded importantly. "Geez… That girl's a total bimbo. There's no way she's Jake's. Make sure you don't absorb her lameness, OK? She's literally the island's laughingstock…"

Akari's mouth fell wide open in disbelief. "H-hold on," she said; "Why does any of that matter? Maya is a lovely girl!" She even fed me! Akari thought.

"Lovely girl? Pfft!" Kathy crossed her arms and laughed with a clear and strong voice. "She is always cramming food down her throat! It's so disgusting! You know what she looked like when we were younger? A monster egg! She was so fat– she rolled instead of walking! And her lips evolved… to a size where they could devour whole family platters!" Kathy continued to laugh with abandon– as if she had simultaneously told and heard the greatest joke EVER.

"That's cruel," Akari muttered, her fists clenched so tightly– her gloves cut off their circulation. "How can you laugh? If what you said is true, then, Maya worked very hard. She's a lovely girl now… How can you be so disrespectful?"

Scoffing uncomfortably, Kathy crossed her arms tighter. "It…" She paused. "Of course everything I said is true!" she replied tensely. "What are you being so uptight about? I'm just telling you what I know about her. Everyone jokes like this… Don't take it so personally."

"I will take it personally!" Akari shook her arms to contain herself. "Maya is my important friend!"

Kathy gulped and looked the other way. "Whatever," she retorted, her sharp green eyes flickering with self-consciousness. "I thought you were cool, Akari. I guess I was wrong? …I won't bug you anymore." With a flick of her blonde ponytail– a final act of cool indifference– she stalked off, the heels of her cowboy boots clicking as she went.

Overcome by a deafening noise– the munching noise of ravenous dragonflies– Akari held her ears and retreated. Everyone jokes like that? she thought, knowing this was true. Of course. All people are like that… everywhere. The noise continued– like an earworm, and finally revealed itself to be an overactive part of her imagination. Running back into the grass, hoping to be overwhelmed by the distantly roaring ocean, Akari threw herself at the base of Darren's tree– sharp grass and cold dirt stinging at her legs.

Why was she so surprised?

"Hm. Poor Maya," a familiar, disembodied voice said from above.

"Hoo!" an owl– sounding quite agitated– hooted in response. It was as if this single anonymous comment had ruined its entire day's rest.

If i didn't know any better, I'd think that voice was coming from the sky, Akari thought, looking up. No… wait…. It IS coming from the sky! Or up from the tree, at least, for Luke, the axe-crazy carpenter, was sitting in it with a big, sleepy-eyed owl.

Jumping to her feet, Akari backed a considerable distance away from the tree. Luke doesn't have his axe out, does he? she wondered urgently; Well… he seems a good enough distance away… So it's safe, right?

Akari clearly forgot that Luke could total a tree with just one chop.

Luke– taking her worried attention as friendly concern– continued on. "It's always been like that for Maya," he began, his left leg splayed out and his arms wrapped around his right knee. "So please do some good and treat Maya right." How he managed to balance in that pose was distractingly impressive.

"What do you mean?" Akari asked, watching him cautiously. Any moment, she expected the light to fade from his eyes and an axe to sprout from his hand. But his mention about Maya won her curiosity.

"Most of them are gone or have moved on," Luke said; "But Kathy remains steadfast– as one of the girls who used to bully Maya. If only she would change…"

Girls? Bullies? Gone? Akari wondered, suddenly remembering the contents of her very first argument with Gill. "Really? I never thought that thing would fool anybody," Gill had said to her, belittling her for venturing to the island with just his father's brochure. "This island is nothing like that brochure. It's practically a ghost town…"

But why? Was it once filled with lots of people?

"What Kathy said is true," Luke said. "Though Maya was always a nice and cheerful girl, she was extremely fat when we were kids. Because of that, people took advantage of her, especially that guy…"

Luke closed his eyes and nodded his head to and fro– as if he were a woodpecker facing the wrong direction. "Yeah, that guy happened to be living at the Sundae Inn with Maya back then," Luke went on; "And believe me when I say this: he was a real big shot! That guy was some kinda boy genius, and all the girls on the island were totally in love with him… He was ice cold. He'd take his frustrations out on Maya daily, calling her a 'stupid pig' and guilting her into being his stooge. Since he was buttering up her legendary grandma for more chef training, he'd constantly cook for Maya to enforce their friendship. In truth, though, he was relying on Maya's epic gourmet skills… because really. That girl may suck at cooking, but her taste-ability exceeds normal human comprehension!"

Akari felt her fists clenching again. In this world, there seemed to be an endless amount of cruelty and injustice. But Maya… she's got a really amazing special talent, doesn't she? Like a character from a cartoon show! Akari thought, suddenly inspired by this idea. That boy was probably super jealous of her skills.

"Some cruel twist of fate, right?" Luke asked. "That guy definitely contributed to Maya's weight problem. And the other girls… they went raving mad with all the 'attention' he gave her! They'd always gang up on her, kick her around, and threaten her. Tch." Luke clicked his tongue in annoyance. "Girl's are freakin' insane."

"No, boys are just as bad!" Akari snapped. "Back home, they even used to–" Stopping, she clasped her hand over her mouth. In her moment of outrage, she had nearly blathered about the boys in her old village who beat her up for being a kappa. "I mean. Boys also have a great tendency for violence," she began unsteadily. "Back home, I was friends with a girl… who knew a girl… who was also my friend, who was often chased and beaten up by a group of boys– just for being ugly!"

"Whoa!" Luke blasted, nearly falling off his branch. "Those wicked cowards! Ganging on a girl! Did you ever save her and teach them all a lesson?" The owl beside him– which had given up on sleep already– was now staring at him with stern yellow eyes, a feathery puffed up chest, and an open beak. Perhaps it also wondered if Akari ever dealt sweet justice on those boys. Or perhaps it wished Luke would shut up and get the hell out of its tree.

"Mm-hm." Akari nodded proudly. "Papa taught me how to fight. I shoved them all down and they never bothered me again. Er, her." She made sure to leave out the part about her father's half-successful kappa sumo wrestling training– and about how she had left the bullies with lifelong spinal injuries.

"Whoa! That's AWESOME. I mean, you just shoved them? And then they flew backwards through a line of trees and the earth cracked open, right? Well, even if none of that other stuff happened, I bet you looked cool. You're a pretty strong guy."

"Thanks, but– I have a long way to grow." Akari looked down and squeezed her right arm. "I have to get much stronger before I can do anything. Before I can fight for the things that are important to me." Those things– like my farm, my life, my friends, and one day… One day, she wished she could go back to Mineral Town and live under the lake with her family– even if the requisite for such that was too high. To find love… For now, it seemed impossible and scary.

Standing up on his branch all the sudden, Luke raised his fists high and got all emotional. "Well don't give up, Akari!" he exclaimed. "I know that strength is in you– I saw it! The burning power of love, courage and friendship, wielded in your intense hammer swing! I want to see more of it… your true power. When we battle again, bring it all out and show me. Crush me with your extreme soul! You'll definitely get stronger."

"Luke," Akari gasped, ruffled by his deranged request, but knowing she couldn't avoid his killing axe forever. From now on, she would definitely have to duel every adversity which came her way. She nodded anxiously. "I'll definitely defeat you," she said. "I'll fight you and every other challenge that arises– with everything I've got. I won't give up." She turned away. "It's what living is all about… I'll become an adult."

"Uwa ha ha!" Luke laughed, crossing his arm cooly– the ties of his flame bandana blowing in the wind as he watched Akari walk away. "It was probably fate," he said to himself at last. "For us to meet like this." Standing knowingly, he looked beyond at the flashing sea's brilliant horizon and grinned forcedly.

In truth, he was terrified of losing his mind and slaughtering Akari.

xXxXxXxXxXxXx

Guts! Miracles! SWEAT, TEARS, blood, and friendship!

Various online Chase Fan Clubs were meticulously studied to ensure that Kathy's Maya hate was realistic. Because I honestly can't hate that silly waitress without really trying