High School Blues
The figure looked down at the fallen female elf.
For a moment, something inside him stirred. He felt like he had seen her before, though he couldn't remember where.
Then something strange happened. A tear slid down his cheek.
Confused, he raised a hand and brushed it away. He stared at the tear resting on his fingers, almost as if it belonged to someone else.
He didn't understand why he was crying.
After a moment, he shook his head, stepped over the body, and walked away.
The dark figure stood over the Elven Star. The orb was placed on a golden pedestal with crystal lacing. The lacing continued above the orb and curved in several places. "Finally, no one will ever look down on us again." He reached towards the orb and it raised up into the air. "Wha-?" Then it winked out of existence. "No!" he exclaimed. "Elaista!" He examined the magic where the orb had been. "A portal spell? But to where?"
Two elven guards burst into the room. They looked at the room, then one turned and left. The other one confronted the cloaked figure.
"No time to play," he said. "Assa!" A portal appeared and he stepped through it.
The doors burst open as four other elves rushed into the room in their nightclothes followed by one of the guards. A male, an adult female, and two younger females.
"ALASSE!"
The cry echoed through the chamber.
The royal family rushed toward her, disbelief turning into horror as they saw the body lying before them.
"Did you get them?" the male asked the guard.
"No, Sire!"
"Did you see who it was?"
"No, Sire! It was dark and they were cloaked. I'm sorry. I failed you."
"I'm sure you did your best," one of the younger girls said. "Why don't you take the night off?"
"Elaista!" the adult female exclaimed as the guard left the room. She studied all the magic in the room. "Well, there's a portal over here to the Beyonds. And another portal to..." she gasped. "THE HUMAN WORLD!!!!"
"I must go after it!" the male declared.
"No," the adult female said. "With this new crisis, the elves will need their king for assurance. And he will need his queen for support."
"Then I'll go," the youngest girl said.
"You are too young," the other girl said. "As Crown Princess, it is my duty, obligation, and responsibility."
The king looked unsure. "Fine," he breathed. "So be it. Make all the necessary preparations." Then all of them left but the oldest of the younger girls. She looked at the pedestal with determination in her eyes.
Chapter One: High School Blues
Harumi Osinaka stretched on the track field during gym, her brown hair dancing in the breeze. The track field had a paved track that formed a circle, with grass and equipment in the middle, surrounded by a chain link fence. She reached down and touched her toes on her right foot. "One." She straightened back up and then reached down and touched her toes on her left foot. "One." She then redid the cycle, increasing the count by one each time. A small blue light came swirling down from the overhead sky and landed on her head and sank in.
"Huh?" she asked, scratching her head. "What was that?" She looked around and saw nothing out of the ordinary. Harumi shrugged and went back to what she was doing.
Satomu Furikawa stretched in the back of the art room. He picked up his pencil and looked at his drawing and scratched his bright red hair. It was a giant mecha punching a dragon into space using a giant drill. A blue light floated through the window, landed on his back and vanished. He stopped for a second, looked at the picture and began erasing some. "Let's make the drill BIGGER!!!!!" he exclaimed, drawing excitedly.
Ushio Kaonji was asleep in the library, her pink hair draped around her. "I knew you loved me, Satomu. I love you too. Hmmmmmm....." she murmured.
"Wish I could sleep like that," one kid in the library commented.
"If you were the top brains in school, you could too," another replied as they walked out the door.
A blue light blew past them into the library. It lazed around the room until it landed in Ushio's mouth. She smacked her lips a few times and the light was gone.
Kensui Kusinagi sat at his desk, tapping his pencil against the top surface of the desk. My life is boring, he thought to himself. I'm tired of school. I'm tired of my life. Kensui was 17 years old, had black hair and green eyes. He had a skinny figure and wasn't very athletic. He was a bit of a slacker. Somedays he didn't even come to school. And since he lived on his own, he had no parents to nag him about it. If it wasn't for Harumi Osinaka, he probably would've dropped out by now. He looked across at her. She had brown hair and blue eyes and was around 16 years of age. She wasn't the prettiest girl in school, but that didn't mean she didn't have a few curves here and there that weren't pleasing to look at.
He looked out the window as the teacher droned on and on about World History. Why do I care? It's not like I'm ever going anywhere. Nothing exciting will ever happen to me anyways. He watched as a couple of bullies proceeded to beat the snot out of some freshman geek. Not my problem. He changed his view to the junior high nearby. It looked like a teacher was showing her class the different types of leaves on the nearby trees. To be that young again with hardly any worries. He sighed, turning his attention unwillingly back to the teacher.
What he or the rest of the class couldn't see, was a blue light that drifted across the sky, wobbling on the breeze, like a feather drifting from place to place. It lowered itself towards the school and into his class. It spiraled around the room and floated into his left eye.
"Ow!" he cried, rubbing his eye.
The teacher misunderstanding Kensui rubbing his eyes as a sign of pride, simply stated, "Mr. Kusinagi, I'm delighted that my lesson brings tears to your eyes, but you don't have to interrupt the entire class to pretend that you have something in your eye, instead of simply being moved by my divine teaching." He turned back to the chalkboard. "Now as I was saying…" He began again as the class chuckled at Kensui.
Kensui rubbed his eyes a few more times and then crossed his arms, grumbling.
"Hey, Kusinagi," a voice called out to him in the hallway, as he felt someone slap him on the back. He turned his head to see his friend, Satomu Furikawa, standing beside him. He had red hair and brown eyes. He looked very athletic. "Rumor's going around saying that you actually started crying in Mr. Fuwizaki's class. What's up with that?"
"I wasn't crying," Kensui growled. "Something got in my eye."
"Sure, man," Satomu said. "That's what they all say."
Kensui turned his head. "Whatever. Believe me or not, I know what happened."
"Whoa! No need to get so defensive and pissed, bud. I believe ya!" Satomu said, slapping him on the back again. "See you after school for Track tryouts?"
"Yeah," Kensui said. "I'll be there. You wouldn't let me say no, remember?"
"Whatever, bud," Satomu said, waving as he walked off. "Later."
"Kensui!" someone said as they latched onto his arm.
"Aren't I the popular one today?" he asked, extremely annoyed. I don't like this much attention. It makes me feel uncomfortable. He looked down to see that it was Harumi attached to his arm.
She playfully punched him in the arm. "Don't be like that," she said, giggling. "We've been going out, for like what, almost six months now?"
"Only because Furikawa wouldn't leave me alone until I asked you out."
"Meanie," she said, punching his arm again and sticking out her tongue. "It's only because he looks out for you, you know? He only wants what's best for you. Being antisocial all the time can't be healthy. Speaking of healthy, why were you crying in class?"
THAT'S IT! THAT'S IT! "FOR THE LAST TIME!" he yelled. All the students in the hall grew quiet and looked at him. "I WAS NOT CRYING! SOMETHING GOT IN MY EYE! THE NEXT PERSON WHO MENTIONS IT WILL KNOW HOW I FEEL AS I PUT MY FIST IN THEIR EYE!"
The students all stared at him, blinking, for a few seconds. Then a few of them laughed and the hallway went back to normal.
"Why do I bother?" he asked, hanging his head dejectedly.
Harumi giggled. "So, will I see you out on the track today, trying out for the track team?"
"Only because I have no choice," he said.
She giggled again. "That Furikawa," she said, cheerfully. "I'll see you there!" She waved, as she ran off to her next class.
I think I'm gonna skip the rest of the day. He headed for the roof. There was a fence surrounding the roof so students wouldn't fall off. There was also a table sitting on the floor of the roof. He dropped his bookbag down on the ground near the table and stepped up on the bench, sitting down on the table. He then swung his feet up on the tabletop and laid down. He watched the clouds drift by as he slowly fell asleep.
"Well, well, well," he heard as he was suddenly yanked off the table. He looked into the eyes of Yusuke Fujio, the school bully. He was also known as the "Bully King". He was 19 years old. He had red hair and green eyes. Rumor was, he'd been held back 2-3 times as a senior. Five of his comrades were standing around the table. "What do we have here?" Yusuke asked, as he breathed into Kensui's face. "Do you know what we do to punks who trespass upon our turf?"
"Treat them to dinner?" Kensui asked jokingly.
"This one's a regular comedian, boss," said one of the guys standing around.
"Gotta pay the bills somehow," Kensui joked. Why am I pushing my luck?
"He ain't funny," Yusuke said. "How about we show him our comedy act?"
The guys all began cheering. Yusuke drew back his fist and let it fly towards Kensui's face.
Just then, the roof door opened, and out walked the principal. Mr. Hikawa was a small man, but rumors say that back in his day, he was the number one fighter in town. He had silver hair, and blue eyes. "What's going on here?" he asked roughly.
"N-n-nothing much, sir," Yusuke stammered. Rumors also say that Yusuke had actually attacked the principal once. He had woken up in the infirmary. "We were just showing our friend Kensui here our comedy act." He looked around at his men. "Right, boys?"
"Right, boss!" they all chimed.
"Right?" Yusuke growled lowly at Kensui.
Mr. Hikawa stepped forward and all the boys backed off. "Let him go, Mr. Fujio."
Yusuke dropped Kensui back onto the table like a sack of potatoes.
"Now, Mr. Kusinagi?"
"Yes sir?" he asked.
"Has everything Mr. Fujio said been true?" Mr. Hikawa asked him directly.
"Of course not, sir. He was about to show me what beef felt like when it was tenderized."
"Really? Why am I not surprised? Mr. Fujio, you're suspended for another week."
"B-b-but…"
"And a call will be placed to your father."
Yusuke's face fell. "Anything but that," he said as he fell to his knees. "I beg you! Anything but that!"
"You should have thought of that before, Mr. Fujio. Have a nice day."
Yusuke got up and walked past Kensui. "You're dead, punk," he said as he passed him by and headed for the door.
"The rest of you, back to class," Mr. Hikawa said. "I come up here again, and any of you are here, the ones I find will be expelled. Am I clear?"
"Yessir!" all the boys said.
Mr. Hikawa followed behind Yusuke.
The boys looked at Kensui. "I hope you enjoyed your life, man," one of them said. "Because the boss is gonna kill you." The boys all chuckled as they left the roof.
After school that day, Kensui and Satomu did their stretches out on the track field.
"Okay! Listen up!" the track coach called. "This being the tryouts, your test for joining will be to run 8 laps around the track without stopping. The ones who cannot do it, better luck next year."
She went over to the starting line. "The track is a quarter mile around from beginning to end. So the test is to run 2 miles, basically," she explained. "Line up!"
The kids all lined up at the starting line. "On your marks! Get set! Go!" The kids all took off at a run.
At the get go, two people collapsed. A few made the first lap and collapsed.
"Kids nowadays," was all the coach could say.
At the end of the tryouts, only 15 kids had made the full eight laps out of the 40 that had shown up with Kensui coming in last.
"Congrats," the coach said. "You barely came in last but you still made the team."
Kensui went to the locker room and changed for the day.
He was walking through the park, when he came upon a girl. She looked to be 17 with blonde hair. She was laying face down. "Oh my gosh!" he yelled as he ran over to make sure she was okay.
"Can you speak?" he asked.
She opened her eyes. "Manke amin?" she murmured, her voice sounding like gentle bells.
"I'm glad you're awake," he said to her, sitting her up.
"Ya lle?" she said, apparently asking a question.
"Do you understand me?" he asked her.
"Lle rangwa amin?" she said. Then she shivered.
He took off his coat and put it around her and her eyes widened.
"Vesta?" she seemed to ask, shocked.
"I'm sorry. I can't understand you," he said. "But it'll be ok."
She smiled and pulled out a ring and handed it to him. "Sinome."
He took it. "What do I do with it?" he asked, looking at it. She made the motions of putting it on her right index finger. He followed her example. There was a bright glow and when the light died down, she had a ring on her right index finger as well. She blushed at him. What's going on? Why is she blushing? Have I done something?
At that moment, Yusuke and his boys appeared down the path behind Kensui, unable to see the girl. Two of the guys came over and yanked Kensui up, dragging him over to Yusuke, not even noticing the girl. "I told you what would happen if we met again, Kusinagi," Yusuke said threatingly. "My old man beat me. Now I'm gonna beat you ten times worse." He drew back his fist and smashed Kensui in the face, making him fly back. "And by ten times worse, I mean dead."
Yusuke started towards Kensui. But suddenly, there was a girl in between them. She had orange hair with red hair on the side of her face hanging down in front of her ears to her chest and red bangs. She had olive skin, purple eyes, and ears that came to a point below the top of her head. Kensui noticed she had a ring on her right index finger.
"Get outta the way, bitch!" Yusuke said. Seeing she wasn't moving, he charged towards her. She dodged to the side faster than the eye could see, grabbed his arm, and flung him over while turning around. Yusuke hit a tree and went down.
The other five guys saw this and charged her. She jumped in the air and kicked while spinning around, taking out two of the boys. She grabbed two more of the boys and slammed them together, then clotheslined the third, punching him to the ground out of the air, all in one motion.
She then faced Kensui and knelt down in front of him. She changed into the girl he had just helped. She pointed at herself. "Mela."
"Mela?" he asked, repeating her.
She nodded, smiling and looking pleased. She then pointed at him.
"M-me? Kensui."
"Canshwi?"
"No. Ken-su-i" he corrected.
"Kenshwi?"
"Almost," he said. "Ken-su-i. Ken as in the doll. Su as in sue somebody. And I as in the letter e. Kensui."
"Kensui?"
"Right," he said. She looked pleased.
Elsewhere, in the world of elves, a male and female elf were in their house eating when bells began ringing around their house.
"Those are…," the female started.
"She didn't…" the male said with eyes widening.
"If that's the case…" the female began.
"It's time to meet our new son-in-law," the male finished.
