Lina's nose was buried in a book, a really thick book. Actually, it was one of her sister's third year textbooks with all of her highlights and dognotes. It was like a treasure, almost more precious than the elusive Clair Bible manuscripts, at least to Lina.
Luna had come to visit, well, she was already inside Lina's apartment with dinner waiting on the table after that little tiff with the street gang. Nee-chan's disappointment in her grades was heavier than the presence of death. The past several days had been hell as Luna went spartan on her little sister. There wasn't going to be a repeat of last semester.
No, this year she was going to be top of the school, even better than that two-faced stone-skinned son of the principal! Above Lina's head floated a bubble in which she jump-kicked the stiff statue of Zel of the #1 podium and claimed it for herself with the usual rising sun background. Next scene was SD Lina standing on top of a completely beaten SD Zel, holding her sword proudly up in the air whereas Zel's sword lay broken in pieces on the ground.
"No one can beat Lina-chan!" the redhead laughed, nose still in the book, drawing weird stares from everyone around her. "I'll be queen of the high school!!"
"One's sense of reality is always the first to go," Zelgadiss noted calmly, walking on the sidewalk on the other side of the street.
Why is my seat next to his again? Lina asked herself, ignoring the stony presence to her right which was both easy and hard since she couldn't really look in his direction without getting blinded by the ZFC (Zelgadiss Fan Club) and their flash photo opportunities.
Their homeroom teacher was late, what a great impression to make, so the class was still a jumble of chaos. Some of the students who hadn't awakened to the fact that they were third year students now were busy rigging the teacher's desk and chair with all kinds of elementary school pranks.
Using her books as a barricade from both the lovesick and the maturity-deprived, Lina looked out into the courtyard. She had got a window seat and if she stacked the books just right, she could spend an entire class period just staring out of it. Not that there was anything of interest to look at in the morning.
This classroom had a view of the eastern gate, closed and locked now that the school day had officially started. It was rather fun watching students running, leaping, maybe even briefly flying to get into the gate before it was closed at 8:00 am on the dot of the gate monitor's watch. Some people claimed that the gate monitor sometimes adjusted his or her watch a few minutes fast to keep people on their toes.
Well, someone's watch was definitely off, Lina thought as a very late student walked up to the gates. He was dressed in the black uniform of Eastern, like Zel, except even from the third story, she could tell that his jacket was left open and his sleeves were rolled up.
Yes, Lina and Zel still wore the colors of Eastern. She didn't know his reason for it but there was no way Lina was going to wear a pink sailor uniform. She had some... annoying memories about the color pink. Zel probably thought the white uniform would clash with his depressed, everyone-hates-and-despises-me attitude.
But she wasn't discussing their fashion choices but that of the late student. From here it looked like he had aqua-colored hair. Aqua...colored...? Now where had she seen someone with that color of hair recently? The last several days she had been locked inside her apartment with only Nee-chan handling the food. Perhaps it was during the graduation of the fourth year class.
But whoever he was, he was going to get detention. Lina didn't envy him. There was no way he'd be able to get in without getting or drawing the attention of one of the teachers.
The gate exploded.
"What was that??"
"Iyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!" all the girls except for Lina screamed in glass-breaking harmony.
"What did you do?" Lina turned to face Zel's accusing eyes.
"I didn't do anything!" This time, Lina silently added. She was still angry at being suspected without any evidence or even any possible suspicion. "Why do you keep blaming me for everything?!"
"That's right, Zel-kun. It's not very nice to blame an cute innocent girl," Xelloss chirped, his face suddenly joining theirs. He received a simultaneous elbow jab in the face and gut for his troubles. "What are you doing here?" Zel said in slow, measured tones full of ominous tones as he cracked his knuckles, a dark aura of animosity radiating visibly around him. "Don't you have a class to take care of? Sensei."
"But of course!" Xelloss went from their desks to the teacher's podium in two seconds flat. Stepping and setting off all of the pre-set pranks except...they didn't go off to the complete bewilderment of the pranksters. "Good morning, class. I, Xelloss, shall be your homeroom teacher for this school year."
A mixture of groans and swoons arose, the former from the boys, the latter from the members of the XFC (Xelloss Fan Club). Suddenly, a flood of transfer requests to a certain third year classroom flooded the teachers' lounge.
Ignoring the reaction to his announcement, which included faces of dismay from Lina and Zel, Xelloss continued with the morning announcements. "Now then, a new student is coming to our class, one who hasn't attended school for some time so by order of the faculty, you are to be friendly and helpful to him."
"New student, hasn't attended school for awhile, probably just blew up the school gate because he or she was late, now why does this sound so familiar?" Zel wondered aloud sarcastically.
"Hey, I wasn't late on my first day!"
"Nope, but he most certainly is," Xelloss remarked, dragging the student whom Lina had seen at the gate into the classroom. It was like a dog owner dragging his dog to the vet, or maybe a parent dragging his kid to the doctor for a shot, or even a parent dragging his kid to school for the first time. "Stand up straight and introduce yourself now."
"Why? Can't even read my name off of the roll sheet? Some teacher you are if you can't even read," sneered the student, throwing Xelloss's arms off of him. Lina blinked, trying to remember where she heard this arrogant, go-to-hell voice.
Xelloss just leaned over and whispered something into the new student's ear. If it could, the student's hair stood even more on end than before. Some of his defiance left him as his shoulders slouched.
"Valgaav," he said shortly and scowled at the class in general. "The first person to make any kind of horn joke gets the same treatment as that gate."
The school gate was once a rather pleasing arrangement of etched and worked metal. Now it was lump of blackened stuff that should still be metal but could be mistaken for a plain old rock.
Hmmm, Valgaav, now where have I heard that name before?
"Well then, Valgaav-kun, your seat shall be..." Xelloss closed his eye, err well, anyway you get the idea, and randomly let his finger fall on the seating chart. "How lucky! You get a window seat, right behind Lina-chan!"
Lina didn't hear that statement, still trying to figure out whether this 'Valgaav' person was one of the bagboys at the grocery store or maybe a bum in the park. Valgaav on the other hand recognized her immediately.
"Lina? As in Lina Inverse?!" he roared. "I'm going to ki - "
"Kiss her? My my, Lina-chan, I didn't know you already had a boyfriend," Xelloss literally jumped into the conversation and in between the two. "And here you were flirting with Zel-kun all this time. What would people say?"
Well, the ZFC was currently calling foul and Lina's instant death, very quietly of course since they all feared her wrath. Zelgadiss seemed to be in mild shock, but only those who knew him very well could tell. Lina was still not paying attention else she would have punted Xelloss out of the classroom and across the hall for making such an outrageous claim.
"Now then, you are late so you'll have to be punished." Xelloss picked up Valgaav, completely off of the floor mind you, marched over to the classroom door and planted him outside in the hallway. Then he added a bucket full of water in each of the student's hands and a sign saying 'I was late, blew up the front gate, and all I got was this stupid sign that doesn't rhyme' around Valgaav's neck. The teacher dusted off his hands, a job well done. "Now then, you remain like this for the rest of homeroom."
"Why you - "
Xelloss smiled, well smiled more widely than usual. "Gaav."
Valgaav shut his trap and made like a statue.
At the end of ancient history, Zelgadiss stormed out of the classroom. Having homeroom with Xelloss as bad enough. Having homeroom and ancient history back to back equaling a total of two consecutive hours with Xelloss was hell. He was going to get either himself or that Xelloss transferred if it was the last thing he did.
"Zel-kun!" Xelloss called, leaning his head around the door and into the hallway. "Shouldn't you stay around Lina-chan to protect your claim?"
"Yakamashii!"
"Yare yare. He's not being honest to himself at all. Or maybe he hasn't reached that stage yet. Curses are such an impediment to social growth and development," the teacher sighed. "Ooooh, looks like time for some fireworks and I don't mean romantic ones either."
Valgaav smacked an iron pipe on Lina's desk, from where he got that, the hall monitors are still trying to find out. "Hey, brat."
Now that caught Lina's attention.
"Who would have thought that I'd end up in the same class as you. It's because of you that I looked like a fool in front of Gaav-sama. Don't think you can get away so easily for that," the former delinquent snarled.
Lina looked at him silently. And then she hit her fist in her hand. "I remember now. You're that lowlife who robs people after they spent all their money buying groceries."
A piece of the ceiling fell on Valgaav's head.
"Hey, you didn't need my help to look like an idiot when you already are one," the redhead shrugged, purposely irritating the new student. "All brawn, no brain. I don't even know why they let you into school. You'll probably just flunk out and stay in the same class for the next ten years."
"Ki...sa....ma..."
"And you idolize someone to death but you don't even know what he does now. The head of police and here you're doing illegal things in his name. What an embarrassment you must have been to him. If you want to find an idiot, go look in a mirror. That is, if you don't mistake your reflection as another person."
"Urusai!" Valgaav snapped, swinging the metal pipe at Lina. She rolled out of her seat into the aisle, and grabbed the arm that had swung at her, unbalancing the taller male and flung him over her shoulder. He landed in a crash and mess of desks and chairs. And textbooks, let's not forget the textbooks.
"I've heard of students hitting the books, but never books hitting the students," Xelloss commented sagely as a dictionary of ancient words and meanings added the finishing touch by falling on Valgaav's head and sending the student into the realm of the beyond. He picked up the class phone. "Filia-san, we have a customer, I mean victim, err patient for you."
There were sounds of something breaking on the other side of the line.
"Filia-san? Did you just break someone's leg while bandaging it? I always said you should be careful with the other more delicate species. After all, very few people can withstand a dragon's monstrous strength."
"WHAT DID YOU SAY???" she screamed with enough force that Xelloss felt he was standing before a fan set to an ultra, knocking down trees, high level.
"Didn't you hear the first time? Perhaps you should get your hearing checked, Filia-san. They do say that your hearing is the first thing to go when you grow old. Or perhaps that was your vision? Or maybe even your reproductive urges?"
"Namagomi! Cockroach! Monster! Spawn of evil!"
Xelloss just held the phone away from his ear as the school nurse ranted on. He didn't want it to melt or explode in his ear. All of the students passing by the classroom looked oddly at it and made sure to keep a good distance between themselves and the room. Xelloss had a well-known reputation for being weird, disturbed, and half a step in the padded room.
Then the fire alarm went off.
"Filia-san set it off again."