CH2: First Impressions

CH 2:  First Impressiosn

	My sis and I walk through the courtyard.  We both arrived fairly early, but I could see some students wandering about.  A couple of them looked at us and began whispering.  It's hard to ignore us.  Sis was dressed up in her work attire, which consisted of a crisp, reasonable skirt, a clean blouse, and a simple jacket.  It was a stark contrast to the casual town below, which consisted mostly of sweater vests and plain t-shirts.  Of course, my own appearance made me look out of place.  I had a long ponytail and a dark scar that crossed the bridge of my nose.  I was pretty much the spitting image of a delinquent.  The only thing that was missing was bleached hair.  My appearance would unnerve most people.  Certainly unnerves dad.

	I shook my head.  Gotta not think about that for a while.  Wait until I settle down a little before I open that can of worms again.  As we approached the front door, sis puts a hand on my shoulder.   “Well, I need to go now.  I'll drop off your stuff at the dorms.  Anything you particularly want to say before I go?”

	I wanted to say a lot of things, some emotional, some nasty, some a combination of the two.  I went with funny.  “Tell Maya that she should stop feeding Zai so much.  At this rate, she'll have to roll him around if he wants to get anywhere.”

	Sis chuckled.  “I've always been wondering how Maya always stays so thin.”  She offered her hand out.  “Best of luck, Ten.”  I gave her a firm handshake, and then we parted ways.  As I entered the lobby, I was impressed by the size of lobby.  Everything was spacious, but it gave the feeling of it being a little too empty.

	I wasn't alone though.  Standing in the middle of the lobby was a rather tall man, slouching ever so slightly.  His beard was shallow and light, as if he had been trying to get it to grow for the past several months.  He noticed me coming in, and walked up to greet me.

	“You must be Hiro?”

	“Hirokawa.”

	“Ah, then you must be him.  Pleased to meet you.  I am your homeroom and science teacher, Mutou.”  As he says this, he extends his hand.  We gave each other a handshake.  He checked his watch.  “It seems that you are a little early.”

	“Am I?”  I rose my eyebrows.  Judging from his tone, he sounds almost disappointed by the fact that a delinquent decided to be punctual.

	“Yes.  I would like a little bit of time so that everyone can meet you.  Do you mind if we wait a little?”

	“Not at all.”  It makes sense, after all.  No one would want to find a delinquent sitting in their seat.  Besides, a teacher allowing me to be late, even by a little bit, is a rare occurrence that should be savored.  I spent the time immersed in my own thoughts.  I was so distracted, that I almost didn't catch Mutou's question.

	“Would you like to introduce yourself?”

	“Hrm?  Oh sure.”  Something crosses my mind though, and I ask “Why do you ask?  I thought that it was pretty much expected”

	“Not everyone likes being the center of attention.  Now let's go, it's almost time.”

	I followed Mutou up the stairs.  I guess what he said makes sense.  Some people wouldn't want others focusing on their physical...traits.  We approached the classroom 3-3, and Mutou made a gesture that told me to stop.  He entered the classroom, presumably to quiet down the chatter.  I hear a “Quiet down now and sorry that I'm late again.  We have another transfer student joining us today.”

	Another?  I wonder if the student was a...”normal” like me or some freak accident happened.   Either way, I took that as a cue to step into the room.

	The room was bigger than I thought.  The ceiling stretched well above us.  The classroom was wide and spacious.  Despite that, the room seemed filled, but that was before I realized that there was a lot of space between the desks.  I took a quick scan across the room, taking note of the classmates of my new school.  Some had very obvious traits: a beret wearing guy had a bandage on one of his hears, a tan girl was missing her entire hand, another tan girl had prosthetic legs.  Others were subdued.  There was a girl in the front row who looked like she was ready to sleep at a moments notice.  A guy in the back had a cane propped beside him.  Still others look like there's nothing wrong with them at all.  My eyes immediately fall upon a pink drill haired girl who-garish hair style and color aside-look out of place in this school.   And then there was the guy that was sitting right next to them.  He looks like the most “normal” person in the whole class, even more than me.

	Looks can be deceiving though.

	Mutou looked like he was finishing up whatever he was talking about.  As he turned his attention to me, I gave a bow towards the class.  “Hello, I am Yuuji Hirokawa”  I pause.  I guess I should say my hobbies but I wasn't really all that interested in revealing what they are.  I went with relatively neutral responses.  “I play a little bit of basketball and do some fishing”  Good, nice, neutral responses.  They don't show either side of my life.  Bit boring though.  Maybe the town's atmosphere is already rubbing off on me.

	Evidently, Mutou and the class don't care much about that, and gave me a short applause.  Mutou says  “Please take a seat Hirokawa, I'm about to begin my lecture.  You can take a seat near Kapur.”  I was about to bring up the fact that I had no clue who Kapur was until the prosthetic tan girl waved her hands at me.  I took the seat next to her.  Judging by her name and appearance, I would guess that she was fully Indian.

	I turned towards the front of the class, but I mentally phase out.  It's not like I can fall asleep, seeing as how I am in the front seat.  I'm not directly by the window either, so I can't gaze outside.  All I can do is just get immersed in my own thoughts.

	That doesn't last long though.  Mutou tapped the chalkboard.  “Now, we will begin the group work.  Kapur, can you and Maeda work together with Hirokawa?”

	“Sure thing sensei,” Kapur said.  She said it without a hint of an accent, which means she probably grew up here.  As she moved her desk around, I saw the beret guy sitting down.  Kapur smiled, and held out her hand.   I noticed, however, that she was a little tense. “Hello, Hirokawa.  You can call me Molly, although I doubt it would be easier than saying my last name.”

	I shook her hand, and Molly seemed to relax a little. I looked at Maeda.  He simply shrugged, and started to work on the worksheets.  Molly sighed.  “Don't worry, he's always like this.  He's so dismissive of everything.  Anyway, do you need help on anything?”

	I gave a quick look over on the material.  It seems mostly about stoichiometry, nothing too complicated.  “If I start to majorly panic, and/or I look at you with deep puppy eyes, that's your cue to help me.”  That seemed to lighten the mood, as Molly simply giggled, and turned to work.  We just sat there working on the worksheets.  It was very peaceful, quiet.  Boring, but maybe a start for a rec-

	“Who cares?”

	A loud shout cut through the silence, and caused me to jump a little out of my seat.  I turned around to see who made such a noise.  My gaze falls upon the pink haired girl from earlier.  The “normal” guy was trying to quiet her down, but to no avail.

	“Human beings evolve with each new generation!  The ideals and beliefs behind a festival will inevitable change with time!”  It was then I noticed that the blue haired girl was signing everything.  Pinkie must be acting as translator for her then.  Still, I don't think Blue was expecting her to be so loud.  “Now, it's about delicious food and amusing little games that you play to win prizes~!”  Pinkie then let out a loud, hearty laugh.

	Mutou finally decided that enough was enough, and cleared his throat.  Pinkie quickly quieted down and sat back in her seat.  I sighed.  I guess there's going to be something a little exciting.  It was then that I noticed that a girl was trying to sneak out of class.  She wasn't in a group, and it doesn't seem like anyone but me has noticed,but it was going to be hard when the teacher is directly staring at you.

	To my surprise, Mutou made no attempt to stop her, and she simply walked out of the classroom.  I rose an eyebrow, but said nothing else.  Maybe she's a special case or something.  But there was something else that was bothering me.  I have a feeling that I've seen her somewhere, and it wasn't during the initial scan of the room.  Sometime further back.  You'd think that I would remember a purple haired girl that was skipping classes, but my memory simply doesn't draw up anything.  Whatever it is, it's not going to help me finish my work.  I continued my worksheets until I was done.  I glanced up at Molly and Maeda, who were both done with the work, and were making small talk with each other.

	The lunch bell rung, signaling the end of class.  Before I got up, I was approached by the boisterous trio (well, more like boisterous solo and her two accomplices).

	“Hello!”  Pinkie shouted.  “It is surprising to receive so many transfer students in such a short time.  I am Shizune Hakamichi.”  She pointed to Blue.  “And I'm Shiina Mikado!  But everyone calls me Misha.” She pointed at herself.

	“So you have multiple personality disorder.  Good to know,”  I said.  I knew what she meant, but I decide to tease her a little.

	Misha apparently takes in good jest, and had a huge grin on her face. Shizune was less than amused and gave me a glare.  It wasn't quite enough for a death glare, but it was no less intense.  I didn't back down though.  People with no sense of humor are no fun.

	“So what are you three planning?  I don't assume that you three would come here just for idle talk.”

	Shizune made some more signs, and Misha said, “Well, Shicchan and I were planning to eat with Hicchan in the cafeteria.  As you are also a new transfer student, I figure that we might as well show you around as well.”

	So there's the other, mystery transfer student.  I glanced at “Hicchan”, who was the generic guy from earlier.  One look at him told me what I already knew-that he was generic in almost every way.  Almost nothing from him particularly stood out, except for his brown hair, which had a strand of hair that was literally standing up, pointing up and breaking the laws of physics and maybe a fashion statement here or there.

	I got out of my seat, and followed the three towards the cafeteria.  While walking there, I talked to “Hicchan”.   “Seeing as how I doubt your parents would be sadistic enough to name you Hicchan, how bout you tell me what your name is.”

	“Hisao Nakai,” he said, but he didn't really seem all that interested in making small talk with me.

	I decided to take a stab at him.  “So does your hair stick up like that all the time, or do you use gel?”

	Hisao shot me a dirty look, and asked “Does your hair really grow that long, or do you use a wig so you can intimidate people better?”

	I grinned.  A fellow knight of snark.  “Yes, it does grow this long.  In fact, it regrows so fast that I've stopped bothering to go to the barber.  Gotta admit though, I look fine in long hair.”

	Hisao grumbled.  I didn't quite catch what he said, but I manage to pick out something about finding genes or something.  He didn't come up with any kind of witty retort though.

	Shortly afterward, we made it to the cafeteria.  After looking most of the school, I was kind of disappointed by how it looked.  The rest of the school look like some old school from at least 50 years back, only with a handful of modern adaptions.  But the cafeteria looks like any other-sleek and spacious.  Despite that, not that many people were in line for food.  Maybe like all other cafeterias, the food just sucks.

	As I walked up to the line, I was surprised by the sheer number of options that they offered.  I get that the school has to provide for a bunch of  dietary needs but can they even make that much?  I settled for the tried and true classic combo of yakisoba sandwich and pork katsu sandwich.  Hey, if no one else was getting them, might as well not let them go to waste.  I sat down with the rest, and ate our meals in silence.  Once we finished however, I inexplicably found myself a part of a conservation that had happened earlier.