Round One: Fight!

The gate looked far too pompous for what it was. In fact, gates in general seem to do that, but this one especially so. Red bricks, black wrought iron and gray plaster, assembled into a whole that didn't feel welcoming at all. I wondered if it looked like what a gate for a school for students with super-powers should look like, but couldn't really decide. Probably not.

Of course I didn't want to get stuck thinking about the gate for too long, so I entered through it, looking around. I walk towards the main building of Yamaku Academy slowly, looking around.

I'm alone, as my parents are taking my stuff to the dorms and there's supposed to be someone waiting for me, but I don't see anyone.

The grounds are incredibly lush, filled with green. It doesn't feel like the kind of grounds a school would have, more like a park, with a clean walkway going past trees and the smell of fresh-cut grass and all other park-like things.

Before I can get a good look around, I hear a loud whooshing noise and turn, searching for the source.

"That him?"

The voice comes from somewhere above, and I look up. There, crouching on the branches of a tree like a pair of predators, are two girls, both Yamaku's white and green uniform. One, with bubblegum pink hair that spirals into drills past her shoulders has an excited, dangerous glint in her eye. The other has short, blue hair and glasses. Her eyes are hard, boring into my own as she gives a brief, sharp nod.

"Good," the pink-haired girl snaps as she drives a fist into her palm. "Let's go!"

I finally stop gaping up at them long enough to open my mouth to ask a question. Before I can, I hear the wooshing sound again as the blue-haired one disappears from my sight and I feel something explode against the side of my face.

The world spins, and before my mind can begin to comprehend what's happening, I hit the ground, and roll. I lie there for a moment, stunned, before automatically trying to pick myself up, noting somewhere in the back of my mind the feeling of the side of my face already starting to swell up. No sooner have I gotten to my feet however, than I hear a shout as the pink-haired girl appears before me, her foot colliding with my stomach, smashing the air out of my lungs. I double over involuntarily, my legs starting to give way beneath me once again, but before I can fall, I feel another blow against the bottom of my chin. Stars explode in my eyes as my head snaps back and everything goes black.

"Hi... Hisao? You came?"

"Iwanako? I got a note telling me to wait here...it was yours?"

"Ahmm... Yes. I asked a friend to give you that note... I'm so glad you got it."

"So... ah... here we are. Out in the cold..."

"You see..."

TH-THUMP

"...I wanted to know..."

TH-THUMP TH-THUMP



"...If you'd go out with me...Hisao? Hisao?! HISAO!"

TH-THUMPTH-THUMPTH-THUMPTH-THUMPTH-BOOM

I bolt upright, shouting, my forehead beaded with sweat.

"Ah, good to see you're awake."

I blink rapidly, shaking off the nightmare. I'm sitting on a hospital bed bed and a guy with purple hair and wearing a white lab coat and a scowl is standing over me.

"Feeling alright?"

Suddenly, the memory of being attacked by two ninja-schoolgirls comes rushing back and I lift a hand to the side of my face where (I assume) I'd been punched, expecting to find it swollen. It wasn't. I run my tongue over my molars. No loose teeth, either.

"...Fine..." I say in surprise. By all rights, I should be a mass of bruises and aches with a few missing teeth thrown in for good measure.

He smiles a little, holding up his arms. "Healing hands. Quite literally." He explains, wiggling his fingers. "Main reason I'm head nurse here."

"Nurse? I thought you said when we met at the hospital that you were a recruiter of some sort..."

His grin widens. "Let's just say I'm a man of many hats."

"I see..."" I take a moment to look around what is obviously his office.

The desk in the middle of the room is neat and tidy, but the bin under the table is overflowing with used medical utensils and there are at least a dozen coffee-cup rings lingering on the desk.

The room is not large and it smells strange. It's the epitome of generic, I'd like to say. Beige walls and ceiling, dark gray laminate flooring, and all the equipment you'd expect from a school nurse's office. Even the ridiculous educational posters are hanging on all four walls, reminding me to eat properly - three times a day and from all the food groups.

The more I see of Yamaku, the more it seems like your average academy. Well, except for the kung fu girls...

I take another look around the room, half-expecting them to jump out from behind the desk wielding nun-chucks or something. The nurse senses my apprehension and huffs, folding his arms.

"I must apologize for Hakamichi and Mikado. I told them to show you around, not beat you senseless. They're two of the best fighters here, but sometimes..." he sighs and shakes his head "Apparently when I told Mikado and Hakamichi to show you around, they decided to take the opportunity to gauge your strength. Speaking of which," He crosses to the door and opened it, sticking his head out into the hallway.

"Alright, get in here," he calls, before stepping back into the room and folding his arms sternly, as the two girls from before follow him back in.

The pink haired one has a huge grin on her face, while the blue haired one just looks bored.

"I think you two owe Hisao here an apology." The nurse prompts.

The pink haired one laughs obnoxiously, not sounding very sorry at all. Her friend snorts disdainfully, pointedly not looking at me. Apparently that's their apology.

I shrug awkwardly. "It's okay..." I mumble under my breath, still wary of them. I'm fairly certain they won't try anything with a faculty member standing not ten feet from them, but you never know.

Unfortunately, the nurse chooses that moment to deny me any hope of safety. "Now, take Hisao back outside and show him around. Without bludgeoning him senseless this time. If I see him back in here before tomorrow for any reason, you'll be healing your own stab wounds for the next week, got it?"

The bluenet rolls her eyes, as her accomplice laughs again. Distressingly, the nurse seems to take both of these as affirmative responses.

"Good. Take him to Mutou first so he can get him entered in the database."

"Okay! C'mon Hicchan!" The pink haired one bubbles.

I ignore the nickname for the moment, glancing at the nurse apprehensively. He notices my trepidation and grins. "Don't worry. They won't bite...this time."

That does not fill me with confidence, but I dutifully get to my feet and follow my assailants anyway.

"I just realized we haven't introduced ourselves yet!" the pink-haired girl chirps as she leads me down the hallway; her friend keeping her gaze fixed ahead. "I'm Misha, and this is Shizune. Nice to meet you, Hicchan!" She beams, as if she hadn't beaten me unconscious not twenty minutes earlier.

"Uh...nice to meet you too..."

Shizune is staring pointedly at the brick wall next to us.

"Oh, yeah..." Misha giggles. "Sorry again about earlier. We didn't mean to knock you out, but we had no idea you'd be so weak!"

"Weak?" Sure, I'm no Charles Atlas, but I'm not exactly a featherweight either. Then again, these two did just force-feed me a knuckle sandwich, so I guess weak and strong are relative terms here at Yamaku.

Misha cocks her head. "So what is it that you do anyway?"

"Uhhh...I'm not sure..."

"Oh..." Misha seems a bit disappointed but perks back up right away. "Oh, well. That's what we're going to see Muto-sensi for!"

"Who's he?"

"He's the guy who runs most of the systems around here!"

"Systems?" I ask as Misha pushes open the door and we walke back out onto the school grounds. The more I learn about this place, the less I know.

"Yeah! For example," she points to the walls surrounding Yamaku. "he's got some kind of power dampeners installed in there." She explains. "Basically, they don't let anyone on the outside see inside."

"What? Like invisibility?" I'm surprised, but not as much as I should be. It makes me uncomfortable to realize how quickly I'm becoming used to outlandish things like magic healing and invisibility fields.

"Nooo..." Misha purses her lips, thinking. "They can still see the school, they just can't see anything out of the ordinary about it."

"I see..." I reply, thinking about how Misha had said the word 'they'. Like normal people are outsiders, unwelcome in this new world I've ended up in.

I take another look around as we walk across the school grounds. Yamaku just does not look like a school for fighters. Come to think of it, I'm not sure what a school for fighters is supposed to look like. Some kind of military base, maybe? But Yamaku just looks like your average, high-class boarding school. But then again, maybe that's the point...

I take another look at the other girl, Shizune, out of the corner of my eye. Her hair is short, yet carefully and neatly brushed, so dark it's almost navy. Her glasses balance on the tip of her nose, through which she stares straight ahead. I get the feeling she knows I'm looking at her, but doesn't consider it worth her while to acknowledge my presence.

I shrug mentally as we enter one of the smaller buildings on the campus, a squat, rectangular shape sitting roughly in the center of the school's grounds. The inside is a single room with white walls and a tile floor, the entire room humming with the sound of dozens electronics running at once.

Half of the space in the room is taken up by lab benches, each one covered in assorted electronics in varying stages of assembly. The other half of the room is occupied by rows of machines which look like cross between medieval torture machines and doomsday devices.

An array of computers sits against one wall, the screen of each one displaying the type of information I'd need at least eleven hard science degrees to understand. A muted TV hanging in one corner of the ceiling is tuned to a 24-hour news station. In all, the room gave the impression of belonging to the love child of an evil genius and the absent-minded professor.

There doesn't seem to be anyone around though, which causes me slow as I enter the room. Shizune doesn't, shoving past me as Misha bounces ahead.

"Muuuuutoo-sensei~! Where are you~?"

There's a rattling crash as one of the lab benches jumps, sending it's contents spilling onto the floor, followed by a salvo of expletives coming from under the bench itself.

"DAMMIT, MIKADO!" A tall, scruffy-looking man roars as he staggers to his feet on the other side of the spooked lab bench, rubbing the back of his head. "How many times do I have to tell you to knock before you come in!"

Misha stops bouncing and pouts. "But you never hear my knocks, so I just have to come in anyway..."

"That's not the point; it's the principle of the thing!" Mutou grouses as he starts scooping up computer parts from the floor and dumping them back onto the bench.

He sighs in resignation as he straightens, which only serves to highlight his bad posture. "What do you want?"

"The nurse told us to bring Hicchan here so you could get him analyzed and registered!" Misha chirps, already back to her grinning self.

Muto's scowl remains fixed as he turns to face me and for a moment I'm worried he's going to snap at me too. Then recognition dawns on his face and the lines in his forehead smooth out. "Oh. You must be the Niki boy. I'm Mutou."

He holds out a hand and I shake it. "Pleased to meet you. And it's Nakai, sir."

He furrows his brow for a moment, as if trying to figure out what I'm talking about, before it dawns on him. "Oh. Whatever." I shoot Misha a glance and receive one of her trademark laughs in response.

By now Muto's moved to a computer that's sprouting cables like tentacles from some Lovecraftian horror. A few clicks are all it takes to bring up my picture on the monitor, followed by my personal information; height, weight and such.

Muto's eyes flick over the information as he scrolls down my page. "So you're a Class...B?"

"A Class what?"

"Never mind," he says, clicking to close my profile and opening another program. "We'll find out in a few minutes. Stand in that." he points to what looks like a giant gyroscope sitting next to one of the tables.

I eye the machine warily. It's certainly tall enough for someone to stand in the middle of the surrounding rings, but... I glance around the room nervously, searching for support. Shizune is leaning against one of the tables, her gaze drilling a hole in the tile, while Misha is hovering around Muto, glancing over his shoulder as his fingers fly across the keyboard.

Taking a deep breath, I edge over to the...whatever it is and gingerly squeeze myself between it's rings, standing on an elevated platform.

"Good." Muto says without looking up from the computer screen. "Now, don't move."

I suddenly find that my fears have been substantiated as the machine begins to hum, and the rings begin to spin, slowly at first, but picking up speed.

"Uh...Muto-sensei? Are you sure this thing is safe?" I call over the increasing hum.

"Nobody's died yet!"

"What?!"

My shout is drowned out by the machines now deafening hum, and I squeeze my eyes shut, forcing myself to stand still. At the speed those rings are spinning around, I'd probably lose a finger, at the least.

The humming abruptly stops, and I crack an eye open. The rings have stopped spinning and Muto is giving me a hard look.

"I didn't do anything!" I say quickly.

"I'll say you didn't." Muto replies, turning back to glare at the computer screen.

"What's wrong, Muto-sensei?" Misha chirps.

"Nakai's not registering. Normally, the meta-scanner would tell us what kind of abilities he has, or at least give us a clue, but there's...nothing."

"You sure everything's plugged in?" Coming from anyone other than Misha, the question would've sounded sarcastic.

"Yes, I'm sure everything's plugged in." Muto responds dryly, his fingers rattling across the keyboard again. "There's nothing wrong with the scanner, so it must be something to do with Nakai."

"Me?" I ask as I try to disentangle myself from the rings of the whatever-scanner.

"Your power clearly isn't meta-physical," Muto says, moving over to another computer, "so, it must be physical. Get on that and try a few reps." He points to what looks like a bench press frame without weights.

I move over to it, and slide onto the bench, taking the bar in my hands, testing it's weight. I'm relieved that this test seems safe enough.

"We'll start easy," Muto calls as he presses a button, "100 kilos should do it."

"100 wha-URGH!" My question gets cut off as the bar suddenly becomes much, much heavier, forcing my arms down until it slams into my chest, driving the air from my lungs.

I try to suck in a breath only to find my lungs unresponsive due to the crushing weight pressing down on them. I start thrashing about wildly, kicking my legs as I try to disengage myself from the deathtrap.

"Uh...Muto-sensei? I think Hicchan is suffocating..."

I can hear Misha, but I can't see her. In fact, I can't see anything anymore as my vision starts clouding over. I'm finding it harder and harder to move as my limbs fill up with lead. Suddenly, the weight on my chest vanishes and I inhale deeply, dousing the burning fire in my lungs with air.

"You okay, Hicchan?" Misha asks as she pulls the bar off of my chest.

My body still considers oxygen too precious a resource to waste any on words, so I'm forced to settle for a nod.

"Don't worry, Nakai!" Muto calls over his shoulder from where he's typing away at another computer. "There are plenty of other ways to gauge your abilities. We'll find one that works!"

By this point, I've recovered enough to respond with a dignified whimper.

Half an hour later I'm standing outside the lab, staring blankly off into space as I try to reassure myself that I am indeed still alive.

"Don't worry, Hicchan!" Misha says as she slaps me on the back with a surprising amount of force, snapping me back to reality. "I'm sure Muto-sensei will figure out a way to detect your powers soon! I'll bet it'll be something really awesome too!" she gushes, "Like telekinesis or solar manipulation!"

"...right..." I respond, still too relieved at still having all my limbs attached to wonder what solar manipulation is.

Misha tilts her head, frowning. "You look pretty tired, Hicchan. Maybe you should go take a nap or something..."

Shizune snorts and pointedly looks away.

"Awww, don't be like that, Shicchan! It's only his first day, after all! And we haven't exactly been gentle with him either." Misha giggles at her own innuendo, but Shizune just rolls her eyes. "Anyway, you know where the dorms are? We can show you!"

"Er...that's alright." I say hastily. I can feel my life expectancy dropping faster the longer I'm around these two. "Could you point me in the right direction, though?"

"Sure! It's that way, you can't miss it." Misha points in a direction past the main building complex. Shizune gives her a pointed look and Misha giggles.

"Okay, thanks!" I say, as I hurry in the direction indicated. There is a garden of sorts between the school and the dorms; shrubbery, flowers and that overbearing smell of fresh cut grass that fills the atmosphere. It dawns on my frazzled mind that the smell feels so novel because I haven't been outside at all for so long.

The dorm building is big and made of red brick. Like the others, it feels way too pompous for what it is, so I push forward, going inside. It takes more time than necessary to fish the key I was given from my pocket.

"Room one-one-nine..."

Despite the ornate exterior, the inside of the dorm is fairly new, functional and boring.

I poke my head around the corner of the common room door. Inside a few students are playing chess, while others play video games. One looks up and meets my gaze, appraising me before going back to his game.

Seems that only the girls around here are violent. I suppose that's perfectly fine with me.

I climb the stairs to the upper floor. Here, small corridors branch off from the main hallway. Each of these minor halls seems to have a toilet and shower, as well as four rooms. About halfway down the hall, I spy room 119. The nameplates on the rooms adjacent to mine are blank. I guess there are just two of us here. Light shines from below the door of room 117.

I raise my hand to knock on the door of the occupied room, but before I can, the door is flung open and the occupant tackles me around the middle, knocking the wind from my lungs and driving me backwards through the door to my room.

Everything blurs as we tumble across the floor, coming to rest against the far wall. Before I know what's happening, my attacker is standing over me and there are a pair of rather large and shiny handguns in my face.

My heart stops beating as the barrels of the guns being held on me seem to grow, sucking everything in like a black hole. My mouth hangs open, waiting for my brain to give it a message to relay, but nothing comes.

"...tch," My attacker lets out a sigh of disgust and disappointment, lowering his hand cannons. "and here I though I finally had someone to spar against."

I finally get a good look at him. He's about my age, with shaggy black hair and extremely thick eyeglasses. He's wearing the green boy's uniform of the school, as well as a red and gold scarf wrapped around his neck.

He slides the weapons into a pair of shoulder holsters and holds out a hand. "Name's Kenji."

I stare at it blankly for at him for a moment before I realize what he's doing and accept his hand up, still rattled.

His hand is sweaty and his breath stinks of garlic. "Uh...Nakai. Hisao Nakai."

He nods. "Sorry about the surprise greeting, but you can't be too careful. There were some suspicious-looking people going in and out of your room earlier."

"...it was probably my parents." I offer.

Kenji frowns. "Your parents? You sure? 'Cause they could've been some other people, too. You can't judge a book by it's cover. The only one I trust is myself."

I'm about to argue the point, but then I remember the oversized weapons he carries with disturbing casualness. Not that the rest of him isn't disturbing enough.

"Does that mean I shouldn't get to know you, either?"

He thinks about this for a while. "A wise decision. Damn, you are smarter than you look. Which is a good thing considering you're not tough at all."

With that he leaves, and shuts the door behind him. I stare at the closed door for a moment before rubbing my eyes.

Is everyone who goes to Yamaku like this? Am I seriously going to have to put up with randomly being assaulted every day? I'm too tired and nervous to even entertain that notion, so I flop face-first onto my bed, feeling hollow and uncertain.