A Day Back At Home!
Melody had gotten up at 8 o'clock and started to work on her studies. The last mission had put her behind, but she wasn't going to let that hold her back. The Mesiter and Weapons exams were going to begin tomorrow and she knew Shi wouldn't be much help on the written portion...she leaned back in her chair as she thought about it. In all reality she should probably go over into Shi's room and wake Shi up. Even if studying for an extra three hours only gave Shi an extra five points...Shi kind of need those five points. Melody stood up and headed to her bedroom door.
Melody passed her neat room. Everything was neatly stacked away on the shelves and absolutely everything was in its own respective space. Her closet was just as organized. Her clothes were organized in type of clothing, color, age, and several other organizational methods. She wasn't OCD she just liked having everything in place.
She approached the door. She first undid the chain lock at the top, taking the chain out of the trench and letting it hang. She then moved onto the bottom lock and listened to it click open as she turned it. Between ordinary teams the two locks she had may have seemed like a bit much, but one day Melody didn't lock her door and woke up to Shi cuddling with her in HER bed. That was one of the days that Melody had sent Shi to the infirmary.
Melody arrived at Shi's bedroom. She gingerly knocked on the door, a zombie-like groan could be heard from the other side of the door. Melody knocked once more on the door, this time harder. The door slowly swung open, revealing Shi's messy bedroom. The floor was covered with clothing had probably been there before they left on the mission and chances are they were for another few months before that. Melody cringed at Shi's unkept room, but quietly crept to Shi's bedside, keeping her eyes on the ground to make sure nothing moved about.
When Melody finally made it to Shi's bedside, she gently nudged Shi, in an effort to wake Shi up. Shi made a small grunt as Shi rolled over onto it's other side. Melody fumed temporarily as she thought about grabbing a bucket of water and dumping it on him. She breathed heavily as she tried to calm down. Melody looked at Shi once more, she frowned temporarily as she nudged him once more this time harder. Shi grunted and made a few pointless hand swats at her. Melody's hand went up to her and she massaged her temples as she continued to think about ways to wake Shi up. Finally, Melody just shrugged and bent down, placing her head next to Shi's ear, "WAKE UP!" screamed Melody.
Shi jumped up from the bad, gripping the bedsheets and wrapping them around it's chest, "wa ha ha ha!" screamed Shi as it pressed itself into the corner. Shi breathed for awhile before speaking up, "what the heck are you doing here?" Shi's hand scrambled around its bedsheets, trying to desperately keep them up.
"Waking you up," muttered Melody as she brushed some of her hair out of her face, "we have a test coming up soon and I think it would be a good idea to study for it. Especially considering the fact that one of us got an 8 out of 50 on the last test. I mean a warrior, like me, shouldn't be worrying about failing her exam."
"Okay, okay...okay," said Shi as it rubbed the back of its head, "fine...just let me eat breakfast first." Shi looked over at the door and motioned towards it, telling Melody to get out.
"Oh, come on, Shi," said Melody as she looked Shi up and down, "I've seen you in your little pajamas before...just drop the blanket and let's go downstairs and get breakfast, okay?" Melody looked at Shi and this time she motioned towards the door, telling her for both of them to leave.
"I understand...and if I was wearing pajamas I would totally agree with you," said Shi once more. Shi then motioned to the door once more, "and I would be very happy with you if you would leave the room once more so I can change, cool?"
"Okay, why aren't you wearing pajamas?"asked Melody looking up at Shi as she grabbed the blanket, preparing to yank it off, whether Shi liked it or not.
"All of my pajamas were dirty," said Shi as it shrugged. It yanked the the sheets out of Melody's hands and wrapped it around itself even tighter this time. "I thought about wearing some of my other clothing, but I couldn't find anything." Shi gestured to its empty closet.
"Yeah," said Melody as she looked down at all of the clothing dotting the floor. "But that doesn't matter either, I've seen you in your underwear before, too. You've walked around downstairs in your underwear before, so come on!" Melody was, at this point, determined to win the argument.
"Again...if I was wearing underwear I would totally agree with you," stated Shi. Melody dropped the blanket, gasped, and jumped back in horror. "See, now you understand."
"WHY THE HECK AREN'T YOU WEARING UNDERWEAR?" shouted Melody glaring at Shi.
"All of them were dirty. You know, I don't see why you are making such a big fuss about this for," said Shi as it gathered the blanket around it once more. "I mean you didn't yell at me for not wearing underwear all the time on the mission."
"You weren't wearing underwear on the mission either?" shouted Melody. She sighed loudly as she shook her head, "I'm going to leave now and go downstairs. I'm going to start getting your breakfast together, come down after you put on some clothing. And that means underwear included!"
A few minutes later, Shi appeared downstairs. Melody looked up, about to greet Shi when she noticed what Shi was wearing. Shi was dressed in a knee-length black skirt and a white button-up shirt with a black leather jacket and red trim. "Why the heck are you wearing MY clothes!" she shouted as she slammed a pitcher of orange juice on the table, she was fuming.
"Don't worry," said Shi as it motioned for Melody to calm down, "I'm wearing underwear."
"Please, please, PLEASE!" shouted Melody as she clasped her hands together, "please tell me that they are your underwear." Melody looked at Shi with big, puppy dog eyes.
"If you don't mind me lying," said Shi as it sat down at the table. Melody collapsed onto the floor, panicking. Shi calmly drank a glass of orange juice, "and I have got to tell you, Melody. You really have a nice selection, I picked one of your G-Strings."
(-With Ash and Xander-)
Both Ash and Xander were already up. Ash's daily (more like hourly, according to Xander) cleaning regime wasn't exactly something that could be done in complete silence. There would be clinging of pots and pans as Ash rewashed, despite the fact that they washed last night as well, the sound of washboards as Ash hand-washed all of his clothing (he didn't fully trust washing machines to get his clothing just right), and finally there would a miscellaneous orchestra of brooms and mops wiping the floors clean.
During this time Xander often remained in his room. If Xander left his room know, somehow he would ruin the floors by walking on them or dirty the dishes by looking at them again and, basically, force Ash to completely restart all of his work. So early on they decided the best situation was for Xander to stay in his room and let the crazy person...well, be crazy. Meanwhile Xander would be chilling in his room, playing any one of a large selection of games he had acquired using his DWMA allowance or he would think of more ways to mock Ash...like talking about his ducky pajamas.
"DONE," shouted Ash, declaring his current victory over the dirty house. He was currently dressed in big bulky yellow plastic gloves, along with a ridiculous apron with a big red heart on it with the word 'Mom' in it. It was another 'gift' from his mother along with his pajamas. He quickly pulled it off, folded it very neatly and placed it away in an upper cupboard along with the various cooking dishes. He knew that was one of the few places Xander would never look, Xander never cooked...to be fair Ash didn't cook all too much either...they ordered take-out or they'd just eat sandwiches.
Xander grunted in his room...just a few more minutes and he would've finished the Final Attack...the Draco Cantus was giving him a hard time, but due to Ash's panicked cleaning mode Xander had missed breakfast up to this point and the fact that Ash had declared 'Done' mean that Xander could finally leave his room and get some breakfast...probably meant some toaster waffles or if Xander was lucky, and there was some left over, some ramen noodles. Xander swung his feet off of his bed first and headed downstairs.
When Xander got downstairs Ash was back to focusing on the test tomorrow. Xander shrugged it off. He would pass the test and ultimately that's all Xander needed to know. He wouldn't do as well as Ash or Melody...or May and Michael...he'd beat Shi, though. The top five spots were usually reserved for Melody, Ash, a girl called Evalyn Meyrs, Semper Ais, and some other kid whose name escaped Xander at the moment. Xander knew Semper Ais, he was the class president. He was basically in charge of everything for them...and with that Xander willingly admitted the fact that he hated that guy. Xander never met Evalyn Meyrs and...Mystery Kid X. Ash had though...geeks attract other geeks.
Xander quickly poured his cereal and milk while lost in thought. He shouldn't have. While he doing so, his arm accidentally fell forward a little bit more then usual and he ended up pouring a large amount of milk onto the table. Ash's head piqued up. Ash had originally been wrapped up in his world of studying, but his sixth sense was just set on fire. Ash looked at Xander and then at the new milky mess he had made and then back at Xander. "XANDER!"
Xander cringed. Now ordinarily Xander would take this opportunity to mock Ash and then leave while Ash busied himself with cleaning, but he still had to eat so he was stuck here listening to Ash drone on and on. Ash jumped over to Xander's side of the table with a wet washcloth already in hand. Ash frantically began to do circular motions with the washcloth cleaning the table to a nearly perfect shine, "Xander, how many times must I state that when eating you must pay one-hundred percent attention to eating!" Xander shrugged, carelessly. Ash glared down at Xander's cereal bowl. "You are not even using a coaster or a place mat!" Ash swung his hand over lifted Xander's bowl into the air and then slid a place mat delicately underneath the bowl. "How can you not care what kind of state this house is in!"
Once more Xander shrugged. Xander took decent care of his room, it would be borderline clean at the best. Everything shoved into his closet, no neat organizing or frenzied clean state, but the floor would be clean and Xander knew where everything was in case of an emergency. Xander sighed and reclined in his chair with a spoon full of cereal in his mouth as he resigned himself to once again listen to Ash's frantic speak about how important a clean house is. Chances are if Xander had enough money he would've gotten his own place, but Xander decided splitting a place with Ash and then having enough money leftover to buy video games was the best bet.
Ash sighed. "I would love to teach you more about manners and cleaning and etiquette, but I have a test to study for. Especially seeing as someone on this team has to make sure our grade average is enough to be able to skip a mandatory after class session with Lord Death..." Ash sighed as he slumped back into his chair.
Xander smiled as he got up from his chair, now that he was done with eating his cereal. He placed the dirty dish next to the sink and left the kitchen heading for his room. However, he stopped on the stair and looked back at Ash. Ash was at his seat, trying with all of his will to continue to focus on the task at hand and continue to study for the upcoming test, but he couldn't. The dirty dish next to the sink was burrowing into his skin...it was just sitting there...it was the only dirty thing in his vicinity...he HAD to clean it...but he also HAD to study...the dirty dish wins! Ash jumped up from his spot and raced to the sink, immediately fixated on cleaning it to a sparkling shine like once before. However, both he and Xander knew that once Ash had cleaned this dish the rest of the dishes would pale in comparison and seem dirty, forcing Ash to once again clean them as well. It was a cruel cycle.
There you go! Both Melody and Shi's and Xander and Ash's lifestyle while they are not at work! And yes, Melody is going to burn the clothing that Shi is wearing. Next up in Chapter 24 of 'An Unsound Body' I'll be showing you what May and Michael do in preparations for the test...along with a scene from the test.
Also, I have decided to include a fourth team, but I have a special surprise! You will be picking it! Over the next five chapters or so, I will be introducing two to five teams (you know like I did in the first few chapters of this story) and then I will post a poll on my profile asking you to pick which team I should add. (The other teams will still show up throughout the story, so don't worry if your favorite didn't get picked).