Rivalry

"Sugu, I'm home!" Kazuto called out, slipping his shoes off by the door.

Shino glanced around for a moment before shutting the door behind her. So this was his house huh? It looked pretty nice. The floor was covered in mahogany-colored wooden planks that shined slightly, almost like they had just been cleaned. The walls complimented that with their creamy white color that just made the room seem even brighter. Shino could also glimpse the simple, black furniture in the living room from where she was standing. All of it had a nice, cozy effect.

As the bespectacled girl began to slip off her shoes as well, a set of footsteps could be heard pounding down the wooden staircase to the left. Soon, a girl wearing a black skirt and a white button-up arrived at the bottom of the steps. As soon as Shino saw her, she could see the resemblance she had with her older brother. They had the same facial structure and hair color. Suguha Kirigaya had short, black hair that was held back by two silver clips on each side. Her eyes were almost the same color as her brother's, but Shino saw that hers were of a subtly lighter shade.

The younger girl walked over to the two by the door with a cheery smile on her face. "Hi, you must be Asada-senpai. Am I right?"

"Uh, yeah." Shino answered. "I'm Shino Asada, nice to meet you. You're Suguha Kirigaya."

The younger girl nodded in affirmation before Kazuto spoke up.

"Geez, Sugu. I come home and all you have to say is 'hello' to our guest and not your own brother? I'm hurt." The boy smirked teasingly.

Suguha scoffed, though she had a smile of her own on her face. "I see you every day, Onii-chan. It's no big deal. Besides, you were only gone for half an hour."

"Well what if I decided to never come back?"

"Well you're here now aren't you?" Suguha countered. Before Kazuto could say anything more, she moved toward the kitchen, her hands innocently clasped behind her back. "I should probably leave you guys alone now so you can do that project you told me about. It was nice to meet you, senpai!"

It was quiet between the two at the door long after Suguha disappeared through the doorframe.

"Your sister seems nice." Shino commented absently.

"Yep." Kazuto answered, briefly acknowledging in his brain his belief that his sister was better than he deserved.

"Far from you though."

The dark-haired boy blinked as he turned to look at his classmate, briefly wondering if she could read minds. "What?"

As Shino stepped into the hallway, she answered him. "She was kind enough to greet me when we first met. You, on the other hand, ran me over."

"That's not how it happened." The boy muttered to himself before following after her.

They obviously still hadn't cleared the air between them yet, and the long, silent walk on the way to the Kirigaya house hadn't helped at all. It had been uncomfortably silent, and neither of them had directly looked at each other the whole time.

Once in the living room, it didn't take the two of them long to start sorting out the different aspects of their awesome Greek city-state, Spathí.

But it wasn't the smoothest of conversations.

"It should be Athena."

Kazuto blinked at the girl sitting at the table across from him. "Why?"

They were on the subject of what religion their city-state supposedly worshipped. It obviously had to be Greek-mythology-based, but they were mostly trying to decide which god Spathí worshipped in particular.

Shino glared at him from her seat on the floor. "Because she is the goddess of war and strategy. She would be perfect for our project. Spathí is largely military-based."

Onyx eyes blinked again as it was silent for a few beats. "But Spathí is on an island in the middle of the ocean. Poseidon would make more sense."

"Athena would be better."

Kazuto had to hold back a sigh. She seemed pretty adamant about this. "But Athena can't do much. She can't move the ocean at her will or cause earthquakes."

Shino impatiently hit the table with her palm, making Kazuto jump. "Poseidon's a bull-headed god that only cares about the amount of power he has and how many women he can seduce."

Kazuto's eyebrows furrowed slightly. She was definitely exaggerating, but there was something she was neglecting to mention. "Didn't your goddess turn a woman into a spider just because she was furious that a human was better than her at weaving?"

The boy instantly regretted saying anything because Shino's anger flared even more.

"Arachne was arrogant and overstepped her bounds! She deserved what she got." She crossed her arms and Kazuto could feel a drop of sweat forming at the back of his neck. "Besides, how does Poseidon make more sense than Athena? You named the city Spartí, as in a sword."

The boy blinked, realizing that he hadn't thought of that. He had just chosen the name he had because, frankly, he just liked swords. He decided to drop this little argument and concede defeat though, because otherwise, he knew that they would get nowhere if it continued.

"…Fine. We can use Athena."

The bespectacled girl stood up in triumph. "Now that we've settled that, let's start building the model."

Kazuto watched her go into the kitchen toward the dining table were Suguha had helped him lay out materials to build with. Shino really was scary.

Soon after, Kazuto had taken to cut a large circle out of a piece cardboard with a box cutter. They needed it as a decent sized base to build their city on, which was about as big around as the coffee table was wide. They began to build their little city-state, not really saying much to each other. Each of them sort of just took upon themselves tasks that needed to be done without out the real need to discuss it.

A few minutes in, that was obviously a mistake.

"What are you doing, Kirigaya?"

Kazuto blinked in confusion before looking at one of the many buildings he was making out of construction paper. "Making a house."

Shino turned away from the mountain that she was making out of papier-mâché. "Those buildings look like they were thrown together. They don't even look Greek, they look Roman."

The boy's dark eyes looked down at his small group of artworks. He really had no idea what she was talking about.

Shino seemed to read his thoughts in his expression because she explained in exasperation. "The Greeks focused more on columns."

"…This isn't an art project, Asada. I don't think we'll get points docked for this."

"Yeah, we will! Because you can't even make a simple building!"

Kazuto felt anger begin to bubble up inside of him. "They look fine to me."

The girl suddenly reached her hand out. "Give me that, I'll fix it."

The boy pulled his precious work of art away from her clutches. "I said it's fine."

A vein pulsed in the girl's temple. "Just hand it over."

"Why should I?"

"Because I said so!"

Rip.

The two of them froze, looking down at the base that would hold Spartí. The two of them hadn't exactly been staying still when they started fighting over Kazuto's poor little houses, and in the end, Kazuto accidently put his elbow through Shino's mountain.

It was silent for a few seconds as all they did was stare.

"Look what you did!"

Kazuto whipped his head around to look at the girl seething in front of him. "Me? This was your fault too you know!"

Shino just shook her head. "It doesn't really matter anyway. Your work was bad already."

Kazuto really had no idea what that had to do with what just happened. "So you think you can do better?"

The girl looked at him sharply. "As a matter of fact, I think I can!" She said before plopping down and grabbing paper and scissors.

Her partner sat down next to her and angrily grabbed paper and scissors of his own. He was so determined to prove her wrong.

From the hallway, Suguha was leaning against the wall next to the entryway to the living room. She had a small smile on her face as she listened to her brother bicker with his classmate. It was actually really entertaining to witness. They were fighting over the pettiest topic she had ever heard someone fight over.

The young girl peeked around the corner to discreetly watch as Shino and Kazuto continued to quarrel. She was happy to see that he looked livelier than usual today. She could tell that he was still a little downtrodden by his recent break-up with Asuna, and she didn't blame him. They had seemed happy together before. But looking at him now as he competed with this new girl, he seemed like the normal brother that she knew and loved.

Suguha continued to smile as she walked down the hall before she was noticed.

It looked like a little rivalry was good for him.

And oh how it was just beginning.