Kosei Kasahara's Story

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Kosei Kasahara
LOCATION ║ Academy Dormitories
CURRENT TIME ║ 6:00 AM
DATE ║ Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#C52325 ║ #0B5F6A
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬Bong, bong, bong, bong, bong...

A loud, yet muffled bell made itself known to all the students sleeping in the dormitories as it began to resonate throughout the academy grounds. "An alarm clock for the students." The staff would say. "So we better not be hearing any excuses coming from you guys about your 'alarm' not going off,' because it would most definitely be a lie with this thing ringing every morning."

So, the waking of the students began throughout the dorm rooms; there was no way any of them could have slept past the disruptive noise that giant bell had made. Of course, you could always fall back asleep, but if you wanted to be on time for your first day, that probably wasn't the best of ideas. The "alarm" only rang once in the morning, so it wouldn't be waking anyone back up again after that.

Down at the east dormitory building, Kosei's eyes cracked open after the echoing began to fade away into a peaceful silence (other than the loud thud that had come from the room above, likely someone had fallen out of bed on accident), and let out a quiet, tired sigh, before tossing the blankets away and forcing himself to sit up. He was used to the bell, after being here for nearly a month and a half already, but he'd had a rather restless night. Of course, that was normal for him, barely being able to get a wink of sleep. Though it was this time that he actually had to wake up; he couldn't just ignore it and go back to bed and forget about his problems like he had been able to during the "school break." So, he just had to make himself get up, as painful as it was. He would be fully awake sooner or later anyways...or at least, he hoped he would be.

Rubbing his eyes, he finally twisted himself so he was sitting on the side of the bed, and then stood up, letting his shoulders slump with no care of fixing his posture at the moment. He had plenty of time to get ready for the day before his classes started, with that being at 7:00 AM. But with the way he was moving right now, and how he basically moved every morning, it was best if he started getting himself moving as soon as he could. Otherwise he'd end up at the academy's doors half ready and looking dead.

Moving over to the small bathroom, Kosei flipped on the light and groggily began to splash his face with the cold water that he turned on, as an attempt to make himself more alert. It seemed to do the trick well enough, and as he looked back up at the mirror, he let out a quiet groan. Talk about some serious bed head. His hair was completely flat on one side. This would take a while to try and fix.

After about ten or so minutes, he finally had it looking normal again, much to his relief. He quickly brushed his teeth after that, and then moved out back to get dressed. He spotting his uniform already sitting on the desk, folded nicely and ready for him to change into. He lifted it off, and threw on the black pants, along with the white shirt, and the long sleeved, grey sweater over that. It hadn't actually gotten too cold outside yet, but September was technically autumn, so they were asked to wear these now. He didn't mind it, really. It was actually quite a comfortable addition.

He let out another sigh as he finished dressing, and the plopped down onto his bed, looking over at the clock that sat over on the nightstand by his bed. 6:45 AM, it read, so it seemed that he'd made pretty good timing this morning. Even so, it would probably be best for him to head to the academy now. He grabbed his bag that laid on the side, checking inside once more to make sure he had everything, and then pulling it up onto his shoulder.

"Let's hope today goes well." A quiet mumbled escaped his mouth as he walked himself over to the door, grabbing the card key that sat on the table and shoving it inside of his bag to keep himself from losing it. Saying he wasn't stressed out or becoming more paranoid by the second was an obvious lie; he was already having a hard time take the first step out the door. How was his first day going to go? He hoped at least decent. Maybe he could actually make a friend now, since he was going to have to go out and be around people.

Overthinking things wouldn't get him anywhere, of course, so he finally forced himself out the door, heading down the stairs to the exit, to begin the short walk to the academy's entrance.

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Kasahara Kosei
LOCATION ║ School Building
CURRENT TIME ║ 7:15 AM
DATE ║ Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#C52325 ║ #0B5F6A
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬Well, he definitely hadn't been the first person to arrive at the school's building. People were already lined up around the door, some already sitting inside, waiting for class to start. It seemed the teacher hadn't arrived yet, which Kosei was fine with. Especially when he looked up at the time, and realized he was fifteen minutes late. How lucky to have the teacher late so he wouldn't have to be marked as tardy on the first day.

Letting out a quiet sigh, he began to move into the class, squeezing past several students who were crowded around the door, blocking the entrance, and then letting out a sigh as he moved to sit down at a desk he was just going to say was his for the day. It was near the back, but in the middle, which he found was a good, comfortable spot.

Looking around, he could see all different students. Some looked excited, some nervous, one looked particularly embarrassed like he'd just said something awful, and one girl was being quite loud, yelling about accepting friendship with a boy by the window who looked like he was...well, he couldn't really tell. It didn't look like he felt anything actually, and if he did, he could only imagine it was annoyance.

As the students from outside of the classroom began to shuffle in and take their seats, it was clear that their teacher had arrived. No later did he actually come in, wearing a rather nice looking suit and tie, and he moved towards the front, clearing his throat once to let those know who were still talking that he had arrived. He waited silently for a moment, before the noise of the class died down, and finally he nodded, letting out a quiet sigh, and then offering a small smile to them all. The man was rather tall, with red hair and strange, sharp yellow eyes. He seemed to be looking over his new class in that moment, as if he could tell who would be the troublemakers causing him problems.

"Welcome, students," he suddenly began, snatching back all of the students attention, "to your first day at the academy. I hope you've had a good enough start here, and I can tell some of you have already made some friends. Of course, this class isn't exactly about socializing, so save that for later. He turned towards the board then, and began to write down his name, neatly as he could. "My name is Takahiko Nakajima, but please just call me Mr. Nakajima. I'm your teacher for Power and Ability Control. The name basically explains what this class is about: learning to control your powers, as one of the Awakened. Now, this class is all first years, so each of you will be on the same level, or at least most should be, in controlling each of your abilities, so we'll all be starting at the very beginning. Believe me, this class won't be easy, and some of you may seem catch on faster than others, but by the time we're finished, you all should at least be able to use your newfound abilities quite a bit better.

Kosei wasn't entirely sure how he felt about this class being the first thing in his day. Trying to use his powers, in front of the others? So much could go wrong with that. He had hardly used his abilities before coming to this place...he didn't even have a basic understanding of how to use or keep control over the electricity stored inside of him. What if he released too much? Or if there was water around... But, this is just the first day, they won't make us use our abilities too much, right? I don't know...if I'm up for this.

Mr. Nakajima continued on, moving closer to the front row of students, and then scanned the class again. "Now, I'm sure most of you have figured this out by now, but this place is much too small for us to actually have our class in. That being so, we're not going to have our class here for the most part. Instead, we'll be having it down at the sports facilities in the field, where we have plenty of room to try out things without having to worry about destroying the school building." He turned to the door. "We'll be heading there shortly, as well, after I explain several things. First of all, you'll all be changing into the school PE uniform, which includes a white t-shirt and black shorts of different lengths or pants. Those will be provided for you down at the sports facilities, and you'll have to change into them there, in the changing rooms. Don't worry, these don't cost anything on you kids, because they're constantly being destroyed and need to be replaced after 'accidents.' Be sure to be fast about that as well, because I'd like to get started as soon as possible."

"The second thing is, there's usually some kind of academy guard "wandering around" while this class and the Power and Ability Use class is going on, so be sure to be on your best behavior and try not to get into any fights. I'd rather not have them get involved."

The guards. Kosei had only heard bad rumors about them in his short time here. Some claimed that they were all anti-awakened, and were constantly looking for a chance to attack and harm the students, or "get involved" with them if any fights or the such were to break out. So, it was clear they weren't particularly liked, and it even seemed like his teacher wasn't all too fond of them either.

Of course, he wouldn't try to hold any negative feelings against them until he knew for himself...but that was quite a challenge after hearing all of that.

"Now, third, I'd like to try and make this first class as injury free as possible. Of course, I can't expect that completely, but I don't want anyone trying too hard to use their powers, because I've already had classes where that goes out of control, and ended up having to send more than just the careless students off to the medical office. Do your best to keep it under control, and if it feels like something might go wrong, stop yourself as soon as you can." He crossed his arms for a moment, trying to think, and then nodded. "Alright, that's all I can think of. If anything else comes up, I'll talk to you all about it down at our class. You're dismissed to head for the field."

Kosei sat where he was for a moment as the other students began to get up, and then finally, he stood from his seat, lifting up his bag from the ground and then forcing himself through the crowd so he wasn't the last person out. He glanced around the class, wondering what each of their abilities were, but decided to not think about it too much. He'd find out soon enough anyways.

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Alfred Komatsu
Location || Classroom: Power and Ability Control
Current Time || 7:15 AM
Date || Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#029729 || #002BD9
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Well the initial introduction to Nao didn’t go as badly as Al thought it could have been, considering she laughed at his mix up. Better than confused and awkward Alfred thought to himself as she playfully mocked at his mistake, intentionally doing it herself to ease the tension. Alfred breathed an inward sigh of relief at that, he had no qualms playing the fool he just didn’t like it being the very first thing people saw him as. She asked about his angels, and almost at her words they picked themselves up from the floor and wandered closer although the rippling effect was still happening across their bodies. Calm down, now is not the time to be having a fit. Alfred commanded to his angels, and while it took a couple seconds for them to acknowledge him, they did so but the sense of frustration and begrudging acceptance was felt clearly.

”Yep, they’re mine. My angels, one and all of them. He held out a hand and one of the orbs came closer and enveloped the arm in a metal casing. ”They’re useful, if somewhat annoying at times.” Alfred smiled, watching as the metal on his arm rippled once more with the distinct feeling of irritation. He laughed inwardly, petting his arm slightly to get the metal to calm down. It was definitely a weird interaction, like he was petting himself but until people got to know him better and what his ability was capable of, that was simply something he was going to have to deal with. It wasn’t long after a short conversation with Nao that the teacher showed up and lead them into their classroom.

Alfred wasn’t too worried about seating, he waited a few moments and allowed people who had a preferred seat to grab it before managing to snag one that was relatively in the middle of everyone. His orbs naturally tried to hover around him, but a quick mental order had them drop to the floor and roll under his desk to stop obscuring the views of the people around him. He spared a quick glance around the room at the people in it, smiling when eye contact was made. He was simply trying to remember faces and names if he had them. Before long, the teacher started talking and relaying the orders. Alfred dug into his pack and pulled out a notebook to make some notes as the teacher was talking. He summarized the rules on the index page, a semi-reminder just in case something slipped past his memory. For the moment, there only really seemed to be 2 rules that Alfred wrote into his book.

1) Thou shalt not fight on school grounds lest thy face be broken by guard’s fist.
2) Thou shalt not injure students during Power and Ability Control class lest the wish is to be considered dangerous.

Alfred took a moment to consider these two points and found himself worrying slightly. He didn’t know what it was like for the other students, but for him it might be harder than he would like to stick to those thoughts. Even if he was knocked out, his ‘ability’ wouldn’t stop, if anything it would react according to their own whims without any direction from Alfred, which would prove to be incredibly dangerous to the person who did that to him. He sat in his chair, his hand on his chin and his pen tapping away at the desk lightly. He had tried to consider other options, like giving them a permanent standing order but it seemed like they didn’t remember much in the way of orders from more than a day ago. He had to constantly remind them or order them around in order to do things. Granted, he did have to admit that they were a lot less aggressive now, but he had a feeling that had to do more with his eventual taming of his own emotions than anything else. A power that could be given directions based off of emotional impulses was a dangerous thing to the user and the people around him.

Alfred was broken from his revelry when the class started moving to head down to the sports area, so he shoved his book back into his bag and stood up. Immediately his angels were hovering slightly behind him and above his head. Before he knew it, he was being dragged along with the rest of the class who seemed to either be anxious or nervous to start, maybe a couple were indifferent or excited but he couldn’t see any. He kept an eye out for Nao, but in the rush to get to the sports field, he lost track of her. Regardless, he would see her again without a doubt so for the moment he allowed himself to be dragged along with everyone else towards what should be an interesting class as his angels bobbed happily behind him.

---

The gym clothes they were given were nothing fancy, easily replaceable articles of clothing. Having grabbed the clothes from a requisitions area near the sports field on their way in, the boys and girls were naturally separated into their own locker rooms to get changed. Alfred made his way inside, his angels floating up and seeming to ‘sit’ on top of the lockers. He looked at the lock he had been given in order to protect his belongings, ripping the code off the back and holding it up to one of the angels, who immediately absorbed it for safe keeping. He unlocked it and looked around. People were already grabbing lockers and getting changed. So he just grabbed the closest one he could get to, and opened the locker next to a blonde spiky haired kid who looked like he was doing his best to shrink away from the eyes of everyone else. Alfred began changing, tossing them in the locker as he did so.

“Nervous?” Alfred asked, looking over at the kid. “If ya are, it’s nothing to worry about.” Alfred stated with a bit of levity. “This place is secure and focused on teaching us not only how to deal with our powers, but everything that a normal school should also include. If it’s your power you’re worried about, I say partner up with me and I’ll take on whatever you can dish out.” Alfred finished dressing down into his gym clothes and closed his locker door. His angels immediately took up a position behind him. “Or, if you’re shy or don’t know anyone here, let me fix that.” Alfred held out a hand to him.

“I’m Alfred Komatsu, known to one as ‘Morning’.”

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Kasahara Kosei
LOCATION ║ Sports Facilities, Field
CURRENT TIME ║ 7:30 AM
DATE ║ Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#C52325 ║ #0B5F6A
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬It was a pretty short walk to the field outside of the actual academy's building, which Kosei found a bit relieving. At least it wouldn't take too much time for him to walk from the dormitories to their class's meeting spot in the morning. Now he really had no excuse for being late, ever. That was somewhat disappointing, he wouldn't lie.

He quickly made his way over to the area that held their clothes, with it being a long table and giant piles of clothing marked in all different sizes ranging from extra large to extra small. There was a plethora of the cheap outfits, and Kosei guessed that these were probably going to be handed out all throughout the day, to each class (Hopefully it wasn't all for just one class. He couldn't imagine they would already have to replace that many on the first day in, right?)

Grabbing his own size, Kosei made his way over to the male locker room's doors, being around one of the first inside. He found himself his own locker, quickly finding the small strip of code, and repeating the numbers over and over in his head, doing his best to try and memorize it so he wouldn't have troubles getting his things back once this class was over, or the embarrassment of having to call into some teacher to do something about the lock.

After repeating it under his breath several more times, he finally opened the locker and stuck the paper inside, before he began to change. Slipping off the sweater and the white button-up shirt beneath, he hung them up on the hooks inside to keep them from perhaps finding stains or being ripped or ruined on the bottom of the locker (he didn't want to chance it on his first day). He was about halfway finished with getting dressed when a red-haired male found his own locker next to Kosei's, and the blonde slowly slumped his shoulders and looked away. Not in disappointment or anything of the sort. He simply didn't know how to even approach the stranger in conversation, or anything at all, and felt...awkward, to say the least. Though it seemed in the end, he didn't even have to try.

Kosei's tongue seemed to be stuck in the back of his throat as the male suddenly spoke to him, and he stammered for a moment, trying to think of some way to reply. He definitely was nervous, even if the red head said he had nothing to worry about. How could he not worry, in a situation like this? He could only imagine: Day One: Kosei Kasahara has already failed everything and has no chance of redeeming himself. EVER. How awful.

Finally, he got himself to force out a single, quiet word, "thanks." It wasn't much longer before he felt a sudden pang of guilt for hardly answering, after all the newcommer had said, and he turned over to look at him, doing his best not to break any sort of eye contact or seem anymore awkward than he already was.

"I...wouldn't mind partnering up with you...if you really don't mind." He managed. Whoever this person was, he seemed pretty nice. Perhaps he wouldn't take Kosei for an idiot if he really did end up completely failing this first day with the use of his powers. He knew some people had had practice with their abilities before coming here, enough that they had a basic idea of how to work theirs, but Kosei didn't. He'd kept his own to himself for so long, and thinking of trying to use it at all now gave him a headache of paranoia.

As Kosei finished dressing, partway through his sentence, he turned to look over at his newly found acquaintance, who had introduced himself as Alfred Komatsu. A bit of a strange combination, with his first sounding english, the last sounding japanese, but he shrugged it off as no big deal. Though the morning part of his introduction confused him, he decided it best not to try and find out what he meant by that for now.

"Oh, I'm Kosei Kasahara." Kosei introduced himself, putting his own hand lightly into Alfred's to shake, and then offering a somewhat awkward smile. "It's nice to meet you, Alfred."

---

Outside of the dressing rooms, Mr. Nakajima stood silently in the sun with his black suit, occasionally looking down at his watch stuck on his wrist to see what time it was. All of the students had spent quite some time in the locker rooms now, with only three or four having actually come out. Of course, that was normal on the first week. He would be lenient with that for now, but if they decided to take this long next Monday, he'd have them run a lap or two with Coach Tsunematsu's twelfth grade class. The students never seemed to like that after a single experience there, and were usually pretty good about timing after that, so he figured it worked pretty well for himself and his class.

Nakajima stood where he was for several more minutes, before he could suddenly hear heavy breathing and the quick stomping of feet behind himself. Confused, her turned around to see what was causing the noise, only to spot a female student approaching him who looked like she'd just run several miles. He watched her for a moment before got herself to talk, apologizing about her lateness. He gave a quick nod and then brought a small clipboard he was holding to look at.

"You must be Manon Portier." He said simply, looking back up at her. "No need to apologize. I marked you as absent before, but I'll be sure to fix that." He paused for a moment. "Normally I would have to put you down as tardy, but if you quickly make your way over to the dressing rooms and get changed and back out within five minutes, I'll look past this just once." He said, giving her another small nod. "Now quickly, be off."

It didn't take much longer for Kosei to finish up what he was doing, and shut the locker's door quietly, locking it again before turning in time to see a boy running out red faced. What was he so embarrassed about? Was someone teasing him?

Not thinking about it too much, Kosei turned and began heading out to where Nakajima was waiting for them. He paused for a moment at the light switch of the locker room, before he placed his hand over it, feeling a small surge of energy in his chest, and then he went on his way. It seemed pretty relaxed outside, with their teacher talking to a student who seemed to have several questions, and the other student talking amongst each other in small groups.

The emotions of all of them were varied, excitement, nervousness, neutral expressions, and all sorts of other things. Kosei himself was in the...paranoid group, as he made his way over to a spot somewhat nearby the class's teacher, waiting for him to begin.

Several minutes later, it seemed everyone had finally made their way out, and as Nakajima took notice of this, he clapped once. Gathering their attention. He cleared his throat, and then began speaking.

"It seems we've all found our way out from the dressing rooms, finally..." He mumbled the last part, looking through all of them. "Good. Now, this shouldn't be too hard to understand. We're going to be testing your abilities, whether they're newly found or not. I'm sure all of you are on different levels of control right now, some worse than others, but even so, any training you've had before now likely wasn't 'proper,' or was just you yourself testing out what you could do. That isn't going to cut it. Your idea of control probably isn't the same as mine."

"But again, for today, we aren't going straight to the whole learning part. We're just testing things out. I'd like to see what level you're at, and the best way to do so would be through a small sparring. One on one, that's all I'm asking for." He paused, thinking for a moment. "We'll go through a couple rules. Some may be repeats, but all the same, they're good to know.

"First, while this class may include fighting today, I'd still like to keep it as injury free as possible. That is...nearly impossible, with what we're doing, but that doesn't mean we have to go all out on each other. A couple scrapes, maybe a bruise or a cut or two? That's okay. But gaping wounds and gashes, head injuries, all of that other lovely stuff that's much harder to deal with? Avoid those.

"Second, don't give the guards a reason to get involved. If you haven't already noticed, we've already got two of them hanging around just over there." He gave a small, almost unnoticeable gesture with his head over to where the two of them stood, leaning against the fence of the tennis court a little ways away. "And those two just so happen to be Yutaka Ueda and Arata Saeki. Please don't let them get involved. They're a nightmare to deal with.

"Third, if you think you really can't take control of your power about halfway through the fight, then do your best to shut it down. If you can't stop it, call me out, and I'll come help.

"Fourth, if you have a serious reason for why you can't use your power, such as...it could seriously injure someone or yourself with simple attacks, or...it messes with your personality and mental control while in use? Come talk to me, and we can figure something out. Otherwise, you all need to participate.

"Fifth, once I've come around and watched you for a little bit, to get a feel for where you're at in control, I'll let you know you're okay to stop, and that isn't a request. I don't want us dragging these fights out for too long, because that never ends well."

He paused for a moment. "That's all I've usually stuck by rule-wise while doing this." He said. "I don't want to have to add anymore, so do take care during this whole thing." He looked through all of the students. "Go ahead and pair off with whoever you'd like for today, and find a spot in the field. You can start whenever you'd like." He said, waving them off before he made his way over to the field himself, walking past Coach Tsunematsu's class who were currently running around the track for the fourth time.

Kosei stood where he was for a moment, listing down all of the rules that Nakajima had explained, and then turning back to look at the crowd of students that were already finding themselves partners. He looked around nervously, trying to spot his classmate Alfred who had offered to pair up with him, hoping that he hadn't found someone else already. Who else would Kosei pair with?

---

Alfred gave a smile at Kosei, doing his best not to press what limited social boundaries he had set up for himself to survive what would inevitably be an onslaught of forced social interactions with the other students. Seeing as he seemed agreeable to what Alfred had to offer in terms of partnering up, Alfie set about changing out of his clothes into the preferred gym garments. They were standard issue he supposed, not really caring about the look of them one way or another...until a rather odd student seemed to burst in. Well, to put it bluntly, a female student it seemed. Alfred paused halfway through putting his shirt on to stare at the newcomer with more than just a little bit of undisguised confusion. What was a girl doing in the men's change room? A kid darted out of the room blushing and Alfred knew why. He felt like he should say something, but at the same time he didn't feel like being that guy who started rocking the boat unnecessarily.

Once he finished getting changed, casting one more glance at the girl...boy...person, he wandered back out onto the field. He gave a quick jog, his angels falling in behind him as he did so, rotating together clockwise on their own volition. Once everyone had more or less fallen in line, Alfred listened to the spiel that Mr. Nakajima gave out and grinned inwardly at it. Alfie wasn't prone to violence, but at the same time he had never fought another ability user before. This would be a good test of his skills, maybe impress a few people, feel proud of himself for a few moments before realizing his ego was getting large and chastising himself for it once more. Alfred listened intently to the rules, most of which seemed self-explanatory save for the guards section. Alfie let his eyes drift to the guards with an inquisitive glance. Were they here to protect the students or keep them in line? The more he heard about them, the more it seemed like the latter.

Regardless of his thoughts on the matter, he had more important issues at hand. When they were told to pair up, immediately Alfred started combing the area for Nao before he remembered his promise to a certain blonde hair kid. It felt weird calling Kosei a kid considering they were the same age, but it generally felt that way. Alfred rubbed his chin and made his way over to Kosei, placing a light hand on his shoulder. "Kosei, lets get to work shall we?" Alfie stated with a smile as his angels flew over and bobbed at his shoulders. He gently lead Kosei out onto the field, taking up a place with a fair amount of distance from the students. The facility was large enough to allow them to do so, of which Alfred was grateful. "Tell me, have you ever fought anyone before?"

Kosei quickly shook his head. "No, not yet." He said, looking down for a moment. "I actually haven't even used my power more than...three times now." He gave a sheepish smile.

Alfie rolled his shoulders slightly, giving a nod. "Fair enough, just wanting to know what kind of level of action to expect out of you. Guess we'll start low and work our way up, right?" Almost in tune with his sentence, the angels stopped bobbing in place and instead went completely still in the air. Going for ten percent power here guys, play it light, let him decide the pace. Alfred ordered his angels, who took off at a moderate pace towards Kosei. Nowhere near their maximum speed, but still enough to probably make the kid backpedal. Instead of immediately attacking, they surrounded him, hovering and circling like vultures over a fresh kill. A few moments later, one of the orbs lashed out, striking Kosei in the shoulder. Once again, the power was scaled back, allowing the hit to undoubtedly cause some amount of pain and push Kosei back, but nowhere near enough to worry about actually hurting him. After that first hit, every few seconds another one would lash out, then another and another. Every single one most likely inflicted some pain, but that was simply the nature of the course.

Alfred stood on the other side of Kosei, his arms crossed and simply watching everything unfold. He didn't display anything akin to a smile or a frown, but more of an inquisitive glare that made him look more like a teacher than a classmate. "You need to fight back Kosei, that's what this class is all about. Don't be afraid to hurt or strike them, they can take whatever you dish out."

---

A bit startled by Alfred suddenly placing his hand on his shoulder, Kosei gave a small jump, but that was it. He turned to look over at Alfred, and then nodded, offering a small smile of relief. Thank god he hadn't been left. Hopefully Alfred really didn't mind partnering up with him, though..."Yeah, sure." He said, and followed Alfred to where he wanted to go for the sparring.

At his next question, Kosei quickly shook his head. "No, not yet." He said, looking down for a moment. "I actually haven't even used my power more than...three times now." He gave a sheepish smile.

"Guess we'll start low and work our way up, right?" Alfie's response came to Kosei's ears, and he gave a small nod, unsure of what to expect from Alfred. He guessed that the orbs had something to do with how he would fight, and figured he was right when they started moving towards him. He quickly moved back a couple of steps, his eyes moving back and forth between all three of them before he found himself surrounded, each one hovering just above him. Unsure of what to do, he froze in his spot.

It wasn't much longer before one of the orbs struck out, smacking him right on the shoulder. "Ow!" The sudden pain in his shoulder, though it wasn't too bad, was enough to make him flinch and stumble several steps. The cycle was repeated for some time, before he spotted Alfred a little ways away, watching him as he pathetically let the orbs beat him around. The gentle expressions from before were replaced by a new glare, which threw Kosei into a loop of confusion. Had the way he acted before been an act? Or was he just like this when fighting?

"You need to fight back, Kosei." Alfred said, before Kosei felt another strike on his shoulder. "Don't be afraid to hurt or strike them, they can take whatever you dish out."

Kosei stared at him for a moment, processing what the red haired male had said. Fight back? The thought echoed in his mind for a moment. He guessed that if he didn't, he'd get stuck with being beaten around by metal orbs for the rest of class, which didn't sound all that great, but Kosei still couldn't really control how much he released at once, and he didn't want to accidentally...

He shook his head, biting his lip he quickly grabbed the bands around his wrist, tossed them to the side and took in a deep breath. Finally, several sparks jumped off of himself, and then, a sudden release of electricity. The volts struck out in almost all directions, though a majority of them sprung out at the metal orbs, striking them head on.

---

Alfie was worried that he might be overestimating the kid, or maybe he was being too rough. He wasn't a combat teacher after all, and he himself had never formally been trained. Was this how they normally did it? Wasn't there usually some kind of orientation? Alfred was flying by the seat of his pants to be honest. When Kosei seemed to be in distress, Alfred was caught between wanting to stop and also trying to force a reaction out of him. The only way for him to move past being nervous, was to eliminate the reason for being nervous entirely. In the end, Alfred deemed that 'fight or get hit' method was the best he could come up with at the moment despite not liking it at all. Alfred put on airs, trying to act like the combat teachers had seen in the movies and tv shows and felt like it didn't really suit him. Yet he remained strong, he had to be if he wanted to help Kosei move forward.

Finally, Kosei seemed to clue in that he needed to push back and Alfred gave a small smile. That's it, cmon! Alfred thought to himself as Kosei grabbed the bands around his wrist and ripped them off. Inhibitors? was Alfred's thought a moment before static seemed to surround the kid. Electricity? Oh that's neat...wait.. The thought that his angels were made of a liquid metal came a moment too late as they were struck by several bolts of man made lightning at once, and Alfred's head kicked back as if he had been struck in the face.

His vision became spotty, his ears rang, he smelled burning as if his very brain was on fire. His tongue and mouth went numb and so did his legs as he fell to his knees, barely getting his arms in place before crashing to the ground in a heap, barely holding himself up as he literally gagged and struggled for air. Everything was one fire, a headache...no a massive migraine had filled Alfred's sinuses so quickly everything in his stomach threatened to decorate the ground as he did his best to supress it. He couldn't see, was he blind? The ringing in his ears, like someone had clashed cymbals right beside them. What was burning? Why did it smell like burning? His head pounded worse than an African drum as he sat there for a moment dry heaving despite his mental protests to stop.

It was a long few seconds before Alfred's sight started to return to him and the ringing died down. The symptoms, save for the headache seemed to more or less dissipate. He slowly stood to his feet, his blurry vision returning to normal to see a very worried and panicked looking Kosei staring at him. Alfred rubbed the back of his hand against his forehead, feeling the thick coat of sweat that covered it so thoroughly that his bangs had been nearly instantly soaked. He gave a laugh as he started to piece together what had happened. Electricity plus metal plus mental connection equaled a horrible time. "Good one Kosei! Really...got me there." Alfred's words came out slurred, almost like he was drunk as feeling slowly returned to his mouth. He looked to his angels, giving a nod. Ground yourselves.

Instantly the angels morphed, becoming more like rods as they connected to the floor. "Again! And don't hold back! Like I said, I can take anything you can dish out!"

---

Somewhat relieved about finally getting his ability out and striking the orbs, Kosei stayed still where he was, letting out a quiet sigh as he watched the metal stiffen, but he was quickly caught by surprise as he heard a thud close by, and looked over only to see that Alfred had collapsed onto the gound.

His heart stopped for a moment at the sight, and panic and fear took over Kosei's mind. What had happened!? He hadn't struck Alfred, right? Only his orbs! So why was he dry heaving on the ground, as if Kosei had really hit him?

"Alfred!" He suddenly blurted. "Are you okay!?" When he didn't get a response, he stopped breathing. What have I done? Oh god, this can't be happening...not again...no way...no way..."

When he'd nearly began running over to Alfred past the stiff, metal orbs, when he began to rise up on his feet, looking rather shaky, and then looked back at him, "Good one Kosei!"

The blonde wasn't sure if he considered knocking Alfred down onto the ground like that a "good one." In fact, it was terrible. He hadn't even been nearby his classmate and he'd done that much to him, getting the red head to collapse onto the ground, and now having trouble to even speak clearly.

"Again!" Kosei's heart sank as Alfred called out again, his metal orbs even returning to his side and then sticking themselves in the ground. "And don't hold back!"

Stuttering through his own words, Kosei barely managed a quick head shake of refusal to his partner's commands. He couldn't do that again. He felt like he was going to get a headache just thinking about it. "N...no, no I can't." He stammered. "I can't."

Before Alfred could say much of anything, their instructor approached, holding a clipboard in his hand, and a pen between his fingers. "That's enough, you two." He said, looking between the both of them. "You can go ahead and stop now. I've already seen enough of your abilities to know where you guys are at." He nodded, and then turned away to start heading to the next group. "Go ahead and find your way back over to where we first met, by the dressing rooms. We'll talk more there."

Overwhelmed with relief, Kosei quickly nodded, and then searched around frantically for his bands, before finding them laying in the grass a little ways away. He quickly slipped them on, and paused for a moment, glancing over at Alfred several times before he slowly approached him.

"I...I'm sorry..." He said, his voice barely loud enough to hear. "I didn't mean for that to...do anything to you." A frown had appeared over his lips, and he kept himself staring down at the ground the entire time.

Alfred looked over at Kosei, and after a moment of contemplation gave a soft smile and walked over to him before placing a hand on his shoulder. "Hey. I told you not to hold back, if anyone's to blame here it's me. I didn't know how strong you could be." Alfred stated, making sure that Kosei actually heard him. "It's something we'll work on, and knowing what you can do I can plan accordingly. We'll get your ability under control and working in your favor soon, don't you worry." Most of the color had returned to Alfred's face as he smiled and led them both back over to the designated area.

---

---

“Nice to meet you, my name is Ito Nao.” Nao introduced herself, with a slight formal bow, before she sat down next to Kaoru. “A girl who teleports herself and everything she touches all over the place is a lot of trouble.” Nao first answered the girl's concerns, recalling her own youth. “Back then I didn't have much control over my abilities. When I had to do the dishes, I'd hear them shatter in the other room before I even scrubbed the food off of them. There was this one time I sneezed and ended up in a telephone pole. It was quite difficult to explain to the fire department how I got up there.”

She smiled softly, though her story was interrupted by their ability control teacher's instructions. Nao calmly listened to mister Nakajima explain the house rules. Nao hadn't judged the man to use rough and tumble teaching methods, even if she herself didn't exactly object to them. Well, appearances weren't always all, but still, she was coloured a little surprised.

When mister Nakajima was finished, the other students were already standing up to look for a partner. She'd finally found Alfred, but it seemed he had already made another, spiky-haired friend. Nao didn't quite expect Kaoru to take that kind of initiative, she still seemed – what did she call it - tired? Nao scooped closer to the girl, noticing a slight blush. Nothing she hadn't already dealt today, Nao noted. She stretched and crossed her legs in front of her, watching their fellow students picking a spot in the field.

“Sometimes, it takes someone else to believe in you, to believe in yourself.” Nao mused and put her hand on Kaoru's, “Kaoru, I'll be your partner today.” Nao stood up and pulled on Kaoru's wrist to get her up on her feet. Perhaps she didn't have as much faith in Kaoru as Nao wanted her to believe, but Nao was confident enough in her own ability to feel safe regardless. An unwavering image, in her smile and eyes, easily mistaken for blind trust.

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Kasahara Kosei
LOCATION ║ Sports Facilities, Field
CURRENT TIME ║ 7:50 AM
DATE ║ Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#C52325 ║ #0B5F6A
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It seemed as though Nakajima had been watching them for a while, though a little ways away, as once they'd finished he almost immediately spoke up, while also scribbling down several notes and a couple other things before finally looking up at the two of them.

"Well done, the both of you." He said, tucking the board and the thick notebook of paper underneath his arm, and then crossing them as he looked between the two. "I was going to ask you to stop, but it seems you both knew it was time. Anyways, you're the last ones I believe, so let's go ahead and move over to where everyone else is waiting, shall we? Then we can finish up this class, and you'll have some free time to relax and clean yourselves up." He nodded, and then turned around and began the short walk back to the area with the dressing rooms.


Kosei stood quietly over by the classes designated meeting area, shifting around on his feet for a moment as he tried to calm himself down after what had happened. While Alfred had been forgiving and hadn't seemed to have any kind of reaction that Kosei had expected from him after hitting him so badly with an attack, he couldn't help but feel awful. His chest felt heavy, like there was some kind of weight on it, and the more he thought about it, the worse his head hurt, and his stomach churned. Had he really done that? After being so careful...

A quiet, but heavy sigh escaped through Kosei's mouth as he closed his eyes for a moment, trying to calm himself. It would be okay, Alfred seemed to be okay, and he didn't seem to be upset about it, but...

"Well done with your abilites, everyone! I'm quite impressed with this class. You all seemed to handle it pretty well, other than...a pair that went a bit overboard." He glanced to the left at a male, who's face had been dyed a deep red as others turned to look at him...though his partner seemed to be missing.

"But besides that!" Mr. Nakajima quickly said, calling back everyone's attention and sparing the embarrassed student from suffering any longer. "I'll be looking through the notes I took, and see what I can do to help all of you as we start off this new year and figure out how we're going to keep you powers under control, so you can perhaps use them properly and for good reasons as you get older." He waved the clipboard in front of everyone for a moment, before sticking it back under his arm and then looking down at a watch on his wrist.

"There's not much else I can say, other than you did well, and I think that this will be a good class. So good luck everyone." He said, before turning his back towards them. "You are dismissed to get changed back into your normal clothes, and head to your next class, though class won't actually be out for a little while longer. I'll see you all tomorrow, dressed and ready once I arrive here."

Kosei watched as he began to walk away, heading back towards the academy building, perhaps to prepare for his next class, and Kosei quickly began making way over to the dressing rooms, like all the others. Thank god it's finally over...

---

---

Well done? Nao asked herself, puzzled by their teacher's assessment. He must be joking. She thought, putting her hand on her hip as she listened to Nakajima. Nothing about threatening to squeeze the breath out of a fellow student Nao could interpret as worth a compliment. Nonetheless she made a slight bow and offered her thanks. She considered helping Lucien up, but the boy had already gotten back on his feet by his own accord and lost in thought again.

Even as the class was being dismissed – Thanks goodness she could finally change out of her duckling skin – Nao couldn't quite put her mind to rest. What about the boy had provoked her to lose control? Had they met before? Nao couldn't put her finger on it. When she thought about it, Lucien was far too passive to be insufferable. He didn't even seem to flinch much when his air was being cut off. Either Lucien had felt in control of the entire exercise or he had a long history of violence and torture. That guy was not normal by any stretch of the word...

Nao wasn't deep enough in thought to – finally – get a hold of Alfred. She sure could use the distraction. “You look like you had quite the work out.” Nao commented when she peeked behind Alfred to see three angel-sized patches of scorched grass. So that was fire she smelled. Well, that was a topic if any, and there was some time before their next class.

“Could you use a drink, Morning?”

"This is the part where I never live down our first meeting, isn't it? Alfred stated, rubbing the back of his head slightly with a sheepish smile. The smile faltered a slight bit as he seemed to glance back looking for someone. "Sure, I wouldn't mind a drink, but could you wait for just a minute? I'll be right back."

“I suppose.” Nao raised an eyebrow, wondering what his business was. Alfred took off at a light jog back towards the dressing room, stopping at the blonde haired kid he had been paired up with during the class. He stood there for a moment, their conversation out of earshot. Alfred placed a hand on the kid's shoulder, giving a light clap on it before jogging back towards Nao.

"Sorry, just had some business to finish up. What you feel like?"

“A change of clothes, to start with.” Nao smiled. Really the plain white shirt and shorts were sucking the soul out of her. “A friend?” Nao asked, nodding to the spiky-haired blonde. Alfred glanced back at the kid, giving a half smile as he did so.

"If I have my way, then yes. Looks like he could use one." Alfred then gave a look down at his own gym clothes, covered in more than a little bit of sweat. "And yeah, guess we should change out of these things first. Kosei gave me a run for my money today." Alfred peered up from his clothes. "So change and meet back out here, sound good?"

“You didn't tell me you were a mind-reader.” Nao placed a hand on her hip, “See you in a minute.” She flipped her hair as she threaded her way back to the changing room. Surely Nao was still worth watching walk, even in the duckling skin.

"..O...ok." Alfred more or less stammered, before the sounds of a muffled surprise cry seemed to come from him. Sparing a glance back, Nao could see that one of his 'Angels' had covered his face and was dragging him back towards the boys' changing room. She had to smother a giggle in the palm of her hand.

Nao didn't spend quite as much time on the changing room etiquette as she had before the lesson, content to smile and nod as the other girls exchanged their first experiences. She briefly examined the room for Kaoru, but the girl wasn't there. In the back of her head, courtesy demanded she'd ask if anyone knew what the pink-haired girl had wandered off to, but courtesy could wait. There was only so much time before the term Ability Use.

When she made it out of the changing room, Alfred wasn't there yet. Late? Nao wondered as she straightened her skirt. She had figured she was the girl between the two. Suddenly three floating silver orbs, Alfred's Angels, came floating rather quickly out of the boy's changeroom. They seemed to be surveying their surroundings for a moment before darting over to Nao, hovering mere inches from her face as they seemed to ripple and change shape on a whim. Are they analysing me? Nao thought, as the Angels seemed to be trying to determine who she was or what she was like. Well this isn't creepy at all. Nao crossed her arms as she glared at the floating metal balls.

"Hey! Stop that, get away from her!" Alfred stated in firm tone like a father reprimanding his children. Almost immediately they withdrew to float behind Alfred's head. "You know better than that, c'mon!" Alfred walked forward slightly. "Sorry, they're naturally curious about pretty much everything. Where to?"

“Angels, you called them?” Nao bit her tongue, staring down each orb as they retreated. Nao did her best to hide the disgust in her voice, but her eyes alone were enough to make the orbs ripple like it was raining on them.

“The school cafeteria,” Nao walked ahead at an easy pace, facing away from Alfred a second to take a deep breath. It's not a big deal. She sighed inwardly, but being sniffed out wasn't exactly Nao's idea of a proper introduction.

“What happened during your exercise, Alfred?” Nao shifted gears to a more pleasant tone, “I thought I smelled fire.”

"Oh yeah, that would be my brain." Alfred stated as if that wasn't a completely alarming statement. "Apparently Kosei, the guy I was paired with, is capable of outputting a ton of electricity or something. That tends to suck when you have giant floating metal balls that are connected to you through a mental link." Alfred stated as he continued to walk. One of the balls landed on his shoulder and pretended to melt, covering a good portion of him in silvery liquid. He didn't seem to register what it was doing at all, but Nao couldn't help but frown at the Angel's odd habits.

"So, trying to put Kosei through the paces and see what he was capable of, I got one hell of a..." Alfred peered over at Nao with a mischievous look on his face. "Shock."

The corners of Nao's mouth curled. “That's awful.” Her words contrasted her expression, Alfred's smile only got wider as he continued, revelling in his own pun.

"But yeah, that was my bout with the human battery. What about you?" Alfred peered over, his orbs hovering closer to him almost as if they wanted to hear the story for themselves as well.

“I wonder about that myself,” Nao mused, recalling her spar with Lucien, but she wasn't about to tell Alfred she nearly choked a guy. “Not half as electrifying as yours.” She dodged. Alfred winced and smiled, to Nao's relief.

“Looks like we're here,” Nao announced, as the cafeteria wing came in sight. Hardly fit for any lunch occasion, Nao thought, but unless they wanted to leave campus, it would have to do. “I believe I offered you a drink, what can I get you?” Nao asked, as the pair walked up to the entrance.

"Nah, don't worry about it, I'll grab them. Why don't you find us a seat?" Alfred asked, walking ahead of Nao slightly. "Chocolate milk is generally a good drink right after a workout. Sound good?"

“Tea, please. Green if they have.” Nao intervened. Chocolate or milk, just weren't for her. For a second, her thoughts wandered to what the girls' changing room's reaction would be to that revelation.

During classes, the cafeteria was practically empty. It wasn't so much finding a seat as picking one between the handful of teachers sipping their morning coffee. The window, Nao decided, was a good place to sit by, so she pulled back a chair in the middle far away from both the door and lunch-lady and waited for Alfred to join her.

Before long, Alfred was walking towards her with a chocolate milk in one hand and a plastic cup filled with tea in the other. One of his Angels floated over before he got there, planting itself on another chair as if it were a person. The other two followed suit, each grabbing a chair for themselves around their area as Alfred placed the tea in front of Nao. "One tea, colored green, as requested."

“Why thank you.” Nao nodded as Alfred took a seat across from her, taking a swig from his chocolate milk as soon as he did.

"And that is how you put out a brain fire." Alfred stated, rubbing his temple ever so slightly. After a moment of that, he looked back at Nao once more. "You never did quite tell me how your fight went? I doubt any of them were too boring to bother telling details about."

No escaping the inquisition, Nao narrated internally, as she folded her hands and studied Alfred's features. “Well,” She delayed answering and sipped her tea. “It was over very quickly. I think my opponent tried to get in my mind but...” Nao looked out of the window by her conveniently chosen seat. “I think I'm supposed to check on how he's doing.” She answered somewhat nonchalantly and took another sip of her tea. “We didn't get along as well as you did with your partner.”

Alfred's eyes didn't narrow, but they did seem to track several different things at once on Nao's face as she spoke. Once she finished, he smiled softly but it wasn't necessarily one of happiness or mirth, more of... Understanding? Alfred took a big chug out of his chocolate milk, almost like he really did need to put out a fire on his brain. "Well getting along isn't necessarily for everyone I suppose. He said with only the slightest sound of resignation. Just as fast as it appeared, it was gone again as he seemingly perked up from out of nowhere. "Did you want to go see him then? Make sure he's not passed out on a bench or crying in the bathroom somewhere?" Alfred paused, as Nao thought to herself she wouldn't mind the latter. Alfred glanced at his wrist and at the watch that was on it. "On second thought, we may want to start heading towards our next class. It's going to be starting soon."

“Same thing then.” Nao politely reflected Alfred's smile, though wanting to see Lucien wasn't exactly the way she would put it. Unlike the young man and his chocolate milk, though, she was still far from finished with her tea. She shoved her tea mug to the middle of the table and chair back, before letting her eyes wander from the campus back to Alfred's.

“Thank you, Alfred,” Nao softly ran the tips of her fingers over the back of Alfred's hand. She smiled more warmly, silently thanking him for his understanding. “-And for the tea too, but next time is my treat.” Nao stood up, making preparative to get back. “I insist.”

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Alfred Komatsu
Location || Classroom: Power and Ability Use
Date || Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#029729 || #002BD9
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Alfred thought the day was off to a great start.

He had already made a new friend, managed to have a sit down with a beautiful woman…

If it wasn’t for the fact that he had nearly been electrically lobotomized it might have been a perfect morning. Still, there was the fact that Nao was avoiding answering him on the fight portion, of which he was still curious as to why but he understood boundaries. She was reaching out to him just as he was to her, and he didn’t want to strain the very fragile bond that was just starting to form. Her reasons for not wanting to talk about it were her own, and he had understood that. The next class was Ability and Power Use, which from Alfred’s understanding was meant as a way to limit one’s abilities and to better fit in with society at large. Alfred pondered how much use it would be to everyone, considering the wide range of abilities already on display. Alfred looked over at Nao for a moment. He still didn’t really know her aside from the fact that she had an almost regal air to her. He didn’t know what her ability was, or if it was tied to the reason she didn’t want to talk about her fight with the other classmate Lucien. Still, he was enjoying the fact that she had reached out to him at least a little. He didn’t know the problem yet, but his intuition was telling him that Nao had issues, possibly deep seated ones that she would eventually need help with. When that time came, Alfred would be there to aid her in whatever way he could.

They stopped their walk only long enough to grab their supplies for the next class, and the rest of the trip was short enough that not much conversation was necessary. When they got to the classroom, Nao’s eyes were drawn by a dark-haired boy at the far end of the class. “I suppose I better see to him before class starts.” Nao stated with lingering reluctance in her voice. “Talk to you later, Alfred.” She excused herself with a slight smile and bow, before wandering into the classroom.


“Sure thing.” Alfred said as nonchalantly as he possibly could while moving into the classroom himself. He took up a spot somewhere near the middle, most of the kids having yet to arrive to the room. The teacher was already there though, sitting behind her desk and looking completely too busy for someone who was just about to teach a class. Several documents lay littered over the desk’s surface as fingers quickly and calmly typed at what seemed a thousand words per minute. Her eyes kept darting from the papers to the computer screen, only glancing elsewhere to peer at any new students entering the room for a split second before returning to whatever it was she was doing. Soon, the bell rang signifying the start of the next class and she seemed to stop instantly. Alfred took a look around, recognizing that many of the classmates he had for the ability control were also there. Maybe they would have largely similar course loads, would make getting to know people a lot easier.

The teacher stood up from her desk, walking to the center of the chalkboard and looking at each of the students. Her gaze was inquisitive, hard but not necessarily harsh. She had a sharp beauty to her but a ring on her finger would ward off any potential suitors or eager beaver students. She turned towards the board, a small light appearing from her hand as a piece of chalk seemed to materialize into her fingers. With that chalk, she wrote her name on the board with a slight amount of flourish. “My name is Mrs. Masumi, and I will be teaching you Power and Ability use.” She turned back towards the classroom, seeming to emphasis her hand as the chalk was enveloped in a small amount of light and it retracted into her palm. An interesting way to let us know you’re an Awakened yourself ma’am. Alfred thought to himself as she continued to talk. “The purpose of this course is to manage your ability usage, to better mold yourself to societal norms, and ultimately understand your powers and yourself in such a way that interacting with…’normies’ as some of you have colorfully put it, is as easy as breathing.” She took a moment to make sure everyone understood the core concept before continuing. “This course will involve a few homework assignments over its lifespan, although most of them will be practical in nature. There will be tests and pop quizzes to make sure you are paying attention, but a lot of what I will be hoping to teach you will rely mainly on literal application of your power and discussion material as to what it means to be an Awakened in a mixed world. Any questions so far?” Alfred raised his hand, and Mrs. Masumi pointed at him. “Mr. Komatsu, correct?”

“Yes ma’am.” Alfred stated, before lowering his hand. “Assuming that this class is primarily about helping us live with our abilities in a society that doesn’t consider them commonplace or altogether natural, what about the ones who show no outward signs of their awakened status? Conversely, what about those ones who can’t necessarily hide their abilities?” Alfred felt a couple pairs of eyes on him, and undoubtedly more than a few people were muttering ‘nerd’ underneath their breath but it was question he wanted to ask since he felt he fell under the second portion of it.

“A good question Alfred.” Mrs. Masumi stated. “To be clear, this class isn’t about hiding your powers from society, but more about realizing how they can be used to contribute in a meaningful way and to limit their impact in terms of cultural feedback. Whether you display your ability much like Mr. Komatsu’s ‘Angels’ or your ability is more subtle such as Mr. Kasahara’s electrokinesis, everyone can have a positive influence on the community at large.” Mrs. Masumi started walking over to one side of the classroom. “There will be resistance, of which I’m sure most of you and even myself has felt. The fact is that people will almost always fight against change, because they have become used to the norm. They don’t want anything to be different, so they rebel.”

Mrs. Masumi’s hand reached out with surprising speed, grabbing a student’s phone out of his hand before he could say anything. With another slight flash, the phone disappeared into the palm of her hand. “You can see me after class and get it back then.” She stated in a tone so cold it could give ice chills.

“Were there any other questions?”

---

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Amari Chiharu
LOCATION ║ Power and Ability Use
CURRENT TIME ║ 8:30 AM
DATE ║ Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#80C6F9 ║ #FAE12A
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬Chiharu sat quietly near the front of the classroom, tapping her fingers against the desk in boredom as Mrs. Masumi went on with her lesson. The day had been rather uneventful so far, and perhaps wasn't her favorite. The first class had started with her having to team up with some other kid to spar off, which had ended somewhat okay, she supposed. They at least both displayed their powers well enough, with her blocking the attacks with her forcefields from the male classmate, while he attacked her with all she had. To say she wasn't exhausted from that would be a lie. It wasn't easy keeping up a forcefield and moving it around to shield herself, all while keeping the energy keeping it up strong enough so it wouldn't shatter.

So now she was sitting in the classroom, trying to keep herself awake as the woman went on about several people, answering several questions, stealing away a phone and somehow making it disappear...of course, that was fine with Chiharu, as long as she didn't really have to do anything for a while.

But of course, her wish of staying and doing nothing for a while was quickly dashed away as Mrs. Masumi spoke up after a minute or so of silence.

"No more questions then, I suppose?" She looked over them once more, to double check and make sure she wasn't wrong. "Alright, then we're moving on. If you have anymore questions, you can come to me after class, or ask me if we have any leftover time." Chiharu watched her as she began moving over to the desk, and then picked up several posterboards that had been leaning against it. "Alright, we're going to be doing a small group project, and it's easy. It should only take around fifteen minutes to finish." She placed them on top of one students desk, and then looked around. "I'll be placing you in groups of five myself. Each of you will be discussing your abilities, and what you can do with them to have a positive impact on today's society, perhaps talk about how you could help in certain job industries, or other things like that."

Group work? Why? Chiharu let her shoulders droop. Can't we just do this on our own...?

"It'll be a good way to get to know everyone in your class year, since I'm sure most of you haven't exactly been able to hit it off with anyone so far. Not to mention, others can help with giving you ideas on how your powers might work, broaden your horizons a bit." Mrs. Masumi began walking through the desks, looking at each of them. "I'll start by numbering you off. One, two, three, four..."

Chiharu let out a long sigh, watching her number off each person. She, herself, had ended up as a three, and she was hoping that she would get stuck in a group with people who were at least...okay enough.

"Three." The red haired guy from before, who had asked a question. "Three." Another male classmate, one with a particularly emotionless expression. "Three." A girl with dark hair, who was rather pretty if she did say so herself. "Three." The blonde, spiky haired kid who Mrs. Masumi had mentioned before in an answer to a question. So, these were the ones who would be in her group. They didn't seem too bad. Maybe she wouldn't have a hard time working with them...or she could just do her own thing while they worked on theirs.

"Okay, everyone, ones are here, twos here, and threes here," she pointed to a spot near the back, by the windows of the classroom, "fours here..."

Finally, after she finished listing off everyones' spots, she clapped her hands once, and then nodded. "I'm giving you all twenty-five minutes. Use it wisely, you have to present to the class after we're all finished. Go ahead, grab your posters, some markers, and get in your groups."

The class immediately began to move around, getting up from their spots. Chiharu did herself, and she found her way through the small blockage of students in the aisles of the desks to her group's spot.

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Dialogue Color – #3b0000
Thought Color – #5c2020

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Quite the underscore. Nao's lips tightened when their teacher emphasised the word lives. It almost felt as if mrs. Masumi was on the defensive. Of course - Nao swept aside, that was to be expected. The media hadn't exactly been kind to the awakened and the school was still far from completely turning the image around. Still, mrs. Masumi proved she wasn't blind to the dark underbelly of their side of the conversation. Nao could respect that sense of realism, but she struggled to think of herself as a doctor or rescue worker. Nao stifled a smile, the very suggestion felt positively ridiculous. She nodded along with the explanation, after which the teacher moved on to preparing the class for the following exercise.

Nao's eyes followed mrs. Masumi's finger in order to predict her number as the teacher systematically grouped the students. Nao soon deducted she would be in the same group as a particularly tired-seeming blonde girl in the front, at the same time when mrs. Masumi assigned Alfred to the same group. When the blonde girl's gaze fell upon her, Nao already had herself equipped with a polite smile, one Nao extended as then she glanced at Alfred.

Less pleased, Nao was to learn the third member of their ensemble was Lucien, inwardly sighing that in group discussion, she couldn't as easily uphold the unspoken silence agreement she'd just made with her neighbour. The final member of their group was the boy she'd seen Alfred running up to earlier, his sparring partner, if Nao's memory served her.

As Lucien and she were already sitting next to one another, Nao gestured to the others to come their way to the back at the window-side of the class. As they were making their way, Nao took three chairs from their now vacant desks to place near Lucien's desk. Habitually, Nao remained standing until everyone had sat down, as if she were receiving her classmates as guests in her home. “Ito Nao.” She bowed to her two blonde classmates respectively, before sitting down.

A short silence followed, as past introductions none of the others seemed to spark the talk. She had hoped to have a little more time to think about what she could say, but between that and a lingering silence, Nao decided to go first. “I'm a teleporter, I can move myself from one place to another.” She prompted, but no legitimate career choices came to mind. “I admit I've not thought about this subject very much... I rather thought society preferred I keep my abilities hidden.”

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Kasahara Kosei
LOCATION ║ Power and Ability Use
DATE ║ Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#C52325 ║ #0B5F6A
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬Kosei stood up from his desk as Mrs. Masumi gave them an "okay," and awkwardly shifted around the other students as he tried to make his way to the other side of the classroom, where she'd asked those in his group to go. He mumbled a sorry to those he bumped into, before finally he'd arrived at their spot. Looking up, he found that he had been grouped up with Alfred again, along with the girl he had seen him with after their last class. Then there was silent male who looked like he had no interest in this entire thing, and the blonde female who looked like she would gladly take a nap if she was allowed to. He guessed it was going to be an interesting group.

He quickly sat down on the chair that the dark haired girl had gotten for him, offering a quick "thank you," to her before he found himself comfortable. "Ito Nao" and a quick bow was how the dark haired girl introduced herself, and Kosei sat quietly for a moment. She seemed to be rather formal, which kind of felt somewhat strange to him in this kind of school setting, but it wasn't bad or anything. "Um, I'm Kasahara Kosei, it's nice to meet you all." He barely finished before the other girl, his blonde classmate, spoke up. "Amari Chiharu. Pleasure to be working with you all." Her voice dripped with sarcasm in the last bit, and Kosei had alreadu figured out by now that she really wasn't in a very good mood, and probably would have preferred to be somewhere else at the moment.

As the short silence was again broken by Nao, Kosei listened quietly, trying to think of anything himself. No one really seemed to be interested in talking or helping to keep the conversation going in this group, as the awkward quiet followed once again, and the blonde let out a near silent sigh, biting his lip for a second before looking back up and trying to force himself to relax. "Electrokinesis is my ability." He said, looking around at the others. "I haven't really thought much about what I could do either. I guess rescue work is a possibility, but I'm not really sure how I'd even do in that field." He shrugged. "I feel the same way about...society wanting us to keep our abilities hidden, like Nao. It sure has seemed that way in the things I've heard and seen."

"You would be surprised." Chiharu suddenly spoke up. "You see, not all of society is about the whole getting rid of us or keeping us hidden. Some of them would prefer maybe...worpshipping us, or treating us like some kind of higher being, which surprisingly isn't much better." She shrugged before leaning back in the chair, and closing her eyes for a moment.

"Oh, forcefields is my ability, by the way, and I would prefer to stay away from any dangerous types of occupations, as convient as having a forcefield would be in those kind of areas."

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Lucien Ashford
LOCATION ║ Power and Ability Use
DATE ║ Mon, Sept 11, 2023

#C5612A ║ #C5992A
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After the very short exchange with Nao, the class started to fill up with more students and the emotions pouring off of them meant that Lucien was struggling not to let anything show. When the class finally started, Lucien had listened to the information about what the class would entail, followed by the brief question and answer session. And then, of course, came something that Lucien decided he would severely dislike.

Group work.

And as if that wasn't bad enough, he was grouped with Nao as well. Although she seemed equally displeased at being grouped with him as well, given the emotions he could feel. The other three members of their group consisted of a blonde girl he had briefly spied during their previous class, the red-headed male that had been talking to Nao at the start of the day and the blonde boy who had been the red-head's partner during the previous class.

It was somewhat unsurprising that Nao introduced herself first once the group was settled into chairs. Of course, he had somewhat figured out her ability already from their spar earlier, but having that confirmed was useful. Teleporting. Oh how his friends would have loved for him to have an ability like that. Nao then mentioned that she hadn't thought much about the uses she could have for her ability. Although this class seemed to be for figuring that out.

What was surprising was the blonde male speaking up next, given the nervous energy that seemed to cling to him, Lucien figured that he would have to be prodded into actually speaking up. The other blonde piped in with her name and her displeasure for group work was obvious through both her tone of voice and her emotions. Lucien silently agreed with her.

Kosei, the blonde male, stated his ability to be electrokinesis. It sounded like it could be a rather powerful ability if used right, especially given society's reliance on electricity. Kosei visibly forced himself to relax as he spoke, although Lucien's ability still picked up the nerves he was clearly feeling. The blonde hadn't thought much about it either apparently.

'Is everyone going to be like that?' Chiharu spoke up again here, interjecting that some people worshiped the awakened, as opposed to hating them. That said, she soon leaned back in her chair before mentioning that her ability was forcefields and immediately stated her desire to stay away from dangerous situations. Lucien could understand that as well. Danger was something he would have enough of once he finally left the academy, he had no desire to go looking for it in the meantime.

Given that three of the five people in their group had now spoken up, Lucien glanced over at the red-head as he silently pondered whether to speak up next or not. Figuring that he might as well get it over with, his nails discreetly dug into the palms of his hands, the pain helping Lucien to focus his emotions more.

"Lucien Ashford. My ability is Pathokinesis, and something involving crowd control seems likely to be in my future." He hadn't lied, it was entirely possible that he would be sent on some sort of job in the future where crowd control was needed.

His part out of the way with, Lucien glanced at the last member of their group, who seemed to have three silver balls floating around him. A confused look briefly flickered across Lucien's face, was he seriously feeling emotions coming from those things?

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Alfred Komatsu
Location || Classroom: Power and Ability Use
Date || Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#029729 || #002BD9
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A group project? Should be a good way to get some face time with at least some of the people in the grade here. I already know at least 2, so I’m better off than most.

Alfred thought this to himself once Mrs. Masumi started talking about the small project. He sat patiently, getting out his books and tools for writing as she started poking numbers at people. He only paused long enough to hear which number he was assigned before pulling out pencils and the like to help with the creation of the poster. He didn’t know who he was paired with until he sat down. He gave a smile to everyone as he took a seat, but was also slightly disappointed. He had already met Nao and Kosei, and while he didn’t necessarily know Nao’s ability, he had gotten a good read on her as a person and that was good enough. Kosei was the guy who kicked Alfred’s ass in sparring. Alfred smiled a little bit as he remembered that bit, already formulating strategies to combat it for next time. While two of the people in his group he hadn’t met, he had been hoping for it to be entirely new so that he could branch out and hopefully meet everyone in his grade.

Alfred dragged an empty desk towards the group so he would have a space to write on, and took the poster paper they were given, placing it in front of himself. He dug into his bag and pulled out several markers, one for each member of the group. Nao was the one to take charge of the conversation, something Alfred expected of her if it wasn’t him. She got the ball rolling, and he learned her ability. He took out the brown marker, putting her name down with a bit of a flourish, underlining it, and then describing her ability beneath it. A teleporter? Interesting. There were many applications for such an ability, depending on the limitations associated with her power. Alfred already thought of several helpful positions Nao could occupy in order to help people, if she could also teleport people as well. Even if she didn’t, she had options aplenty.

The next one to speak was Kosei, which honestly surprised Alfred. He had thought the kid would have been last and required a bit of poking to get talking, but here was speaking up on his own. Granted, Alfred shouldn’t be judging the kid based entirely off of one class worth of interactions, so maybe he wasn’t as nervous or shy as he displayed but had a hidden reserve of strength to him that he could pull on in times of need. Either way, Alfred already knew Kosei’s power as he pulled a red marker out and wrote Kosei’s name with a different style this time. Underneath he put Kosei’s title of his ability, but he also wanted to write ‘Giant headache inducing power’ underneath it. Electricity was not something Alfred was used to having hurled at himself or his angels, so Kosei had caught him off guard. Either way, he was proud that the kid sought the initiative to speak to the group on his own. Maybe he didn’t require as much help as Alfred thought. Not to mention his ability had several practical applications, mainly concerning power to be honest but he would never be out of a job should he decide to go that route.

With Kosei’s little bit out of the way, that left the two people he hadn’t introduced himself to yet. Amari Chiharu, a blonde girl who seemed to drip sarcasm and venom like a leaky faucet dripped water. Reserve Judgement Al, see who she is first. Alfred grabbed a blue marker, and like the others, wrote her name down slightly different from the others. There was a bit of discussion regarding society wanting Awakened to keep their abilities hidden, but Amari chimed in, stating that some people wanted to worship them and treat them as Gods. That hadn’t been Alfred’s experience, but it felt like she was speaking from history rather than speculation. She then added onto her thought like a side note that her ability was forcefields. She didn’t have any desire to put herself in harm's way, and while Alfred could understand the mentality he couldn’t agree with it. She had an ability that literally stopped harm in its tracks and she would refuse to use it to help people? There had to other applications for such a thing, but he would require more information before he could even begin to guess.

The next one up introduced himself as Lucien Ashford. He was curt and got right to the point, if anything he came off as incredibly apathetic, although if Alfred was correct in remembering the definition for Pathokinesis, it was understandable. It had something to do with emotions, right? Manipulation of such a thing, maybe projecting them into other people? Reading their emotions? Alfred would have to look up the definition later to be sure, but for the time being he went with his gut. He grabbed an orange marker, following his own standard and writing Lucien’s name differently. Lucien stated that his ability could be used for crowd control, but would that really be the only case? Manipulating someone’s emotions felt like an invasion of the mind to Alfred, and he had a hard time thinking up anything other than potential riot control as a career choice for Lucien. Alfred wrote down several notes on the paper, tapping the marker against his chin. There had to be something better than this, where his ability wouldn’t be considered a breach of privacy or the like. Maybe a therapist? Would that fall under mind probing? Who knows…

Alfred felt someone poke him slightly and he looked up to see all eyes on him. “Oh, my bad. Sorry, was thinking about everything you guys were saying.” Alfred put down his markers for a moment, allowing his orbs to float a bit closer to the back of his head. “Unfortunately, my ability isn’t as easy to explain as the rest of you. Some of you may have already noticed that I have these weird metal balls constantly floating around me.” Alfred held out a hand and one of orbs split off a small chunk of its body. That chunk floated down to his hand and ‘sat’ in it. As he moved his hand, the small metallic liquid slid between his fingers. “There’s no real name for them as far as the rest of the world is concerned, so I simply call them my Guardian Angels. They follow my orders but act like lost puppies sometimes. They can do a number of things…” The small orb hopped out of Alfred’s hand and into the middle of the table. It turned into a frog, and made the motion to make the sound ‘ribbit’ even though no noise was heard. It then turned into a cube, then a triangle, and then ended up making a very miniature version of Alfred sitting in the desk. “Versatile things really, but aside from commanding them I myself don’t have any actual powers.” Alfred glanced down to see his angel mimicking him as he talked and moved. Stop it. Alfred stated. “So, I don’t really know what kinda job I would want or get, since they’re always with me. I’ve always been interested in being a firefighter or even a police officer, but I wonder if these things will hold me back or help with that.”

Alfred looked down to see his angel was ignoring him and still mimicking him perfectly. He took a hand and quickly swatted the angel, which turned into a liquid and started sliding around on his arm. Alfred paid it no mind as it weaved around his wrist and fingers. “And in terms of society wanting our powers to keep hidden, while I don’t necessarily disagree with you Amari, it’s been my experience that the vast majority wish that we would keep out of sight and out of mind. Like Mrs. Masumi stated, there’s always a resistance to change and that’s how most of the world reacts...at least from my point of view.”

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Dialogue Color – #3b0000
Thought Color – #5c2020

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Great. Nao mentally recoiled at the intonation of Chiharu's introduction. Perhaps this was more acceptable for normal teenagers, but the lack of composure left a sour taste in Nao's mouth. It wasn't like the academy was Nao's first choice to be either, but at least the girl could try be a little more graceful about it. Her brow narrowed for a split second before it relaxed. They're inexperienced, Nao. She surmised to herself, but it would be a while before she could get used to it.

Taking turns the students spoke up. Manipulating electricity, generating forcefields, certainly abilities Nao could find use for – although her first ideas weren't exactly to the benefit of society. Then Lucien spoke up, uttering the word “Pathokinesis.” Nao tried to dissect the word. Pathokinesis, the manipulation of pathos- that jerk can control emotion! Nao almost sighed of relief upon the realisation. Yet as soon as the shame dropped off her shoulders, it was replaced by a sense of dread. Even if her self-control was not to be blame for this morning, Lucien could make her lose it, courtesy of his presence alone.

Last to speak was Alfred. “Some of you may have already noticed-” He began, to which Nao raised an eyebrow and inwardly commented; Really now, morning? Nao did listen attentively, as Alfred's explanation and subsequent demonstration if his angels connected the dots in Nao's head. Her prior experience with them began to make a little more sense.

“Why, worship would certainly make some things... Easier.” Nao followed, as her own future came to mind. A god wouldn't be put on trial. In spite of Chiharu's antagonism, however, the blonde girl was certainly onto something interesting.

“I'm not sure if this fits the purpose of this class, but does having powers necessitate we use them? I would rather be defined by my choices than what I was born with.” Nao posed to the group. Though food for thought, it was not a topic Nao deemed they would have the time to discuss. She glanced shortly at the clock, before cutting back to the original topic at hand with a gracious smile, “What if I don't want to be a delivery girl?”

Nao put her index finger to her lower lip. “I think you have plenty interesting options, Kasahara – was it?” Nao's eyes shifted as she moved the conversation away from herself – even if she half-expected Alfred to notice it. “Cost defines the accessibility of many technologies. Imagine you could help make medical equipment more affordable.” Nao mused out loud, rekindling the memory of how expensive a keeping a stray bullet out of the books wound up being.

“And Alfred, the fire departments already use drones-” Nao prompted,“Do you think your angels could be useful scouts? There's a lot of places people and drones can't safely go in a fire.” She asked, leaving out her initial thoughts of Alfred as a partner in crime. His angels' versatility as surveillance was hardly limited to emergencies.

Nao sat back and folded her hands on her lap, content with the material she'd brought to the table, and looked around the group with a polite smile before motioning to the A2 Alfred had written their names on. “I'm sure you all have many ideas. Please share them.”

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Amari Chiharu
LOCATION ║ Power and Ability Use
DATE ║ Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#80C6F9 ║ #FAE12A
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬Chiharu listened to everyone as they spoke, keeping herself from butting in on the conversation for the time being. She couldn't help but give a quiet laugh to herself as she watched Alfred write everyone's names down. Each with a different style and look. Creative, and cute, she thought. And hey, at least theirs would look pretty and well done when they had to put it up for the rest of the class to see.

As Alfred got on with his ability, Chiharu watched the silver orbs strangely, but also somewhat curiously. They seemed...odd. But so did most of the other powers that people had, because none of them were normal. But she imagined that having three orbs of metal following you around would feel much more strange than just being able to summon up a forcefield.

But aside from Alfred, there was also Lucien who had introduced himself before. Pathokinesis? She wasn't sure how she felt about that. Surely it would make anyone feel cautious about him. He could do whatever he wanted with your feelings, right? Well, the blonde figured he would be someone she'd be sure to keep off her bad side. She didn't need him messing with her head.

At Alfred's last comment about society, Chiharu gave a quick shrug. "I didn't mean a lot of people want us to be treated as higher beings. I just wanted to point out that not everyone is like those who want us to disappear or stay low profile or something." She crossed her arms before looking away from him, and then back down at the spaces of his writing.

"I think Mrs. Masumi thought more in a way of what jobs our abilities could give us an advantage in? Maybe I'm wrong, but it's not like they can force us to be something we don't want to be. Then we'd be heading right back down the path to the problems the world just resolved two decades ago." She replied to Nao. "But, I do think others might try to push us or pressure us to become what they're wanting, or something along those lines, even if we say no a thousand times. Because wouldn't having a emotion manipulator at the scene of a riot or mob," she motioned over to Lucien, "or a teleporter who can travel longer distances in seconds to delivering objects be much better than a normal human, in the employer's eyes? I thinks so."

She listened quietly as Nao shared, and thought for a moment. Job options? Of course, there weren't really any she'd like to take or make a living out of that was associated with her ability somehow. When she thought about it, all she could come up with was creating some kind of defense when fighting against someone or something, especially those with abilities like her, so maybe the police force in the field of helping to defend those who can't defend themselves against her own kind. There was also disaster relief, which was a bit more "attractive," if she could even say that at all, than the others. Because she wouldn't have to be fighting or defending against something human, just the elements. Someone might even throw in helping inside of war zones or other dangerous, violent places to help defend innocents or those caught in the middle of it without any means of escape, but that was a very big nooo thank you from her. As much as it would be a good deed, if you want to call it that, she isn't sure she would even survive for very long somewhere like that.

"For job options associated with my ability, put me down with um...disaster relief, or something like that. You can throw in the police force with the field of stopping violence and danger caused by other Awakened if you want, I honestly don't really care."

Why should I anyways? It's not like I'm going to even go into those kinds of job fields anyways."

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Kasahara Kosei
LOCATION ║ Power and Ability Use
CURRENT TIME ║ 8:50 AM
DATE ║ Monday, Sept. 11th, 2023

#C52325 ║ #0B5F6A
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬Kosei watched quietly from his spot, his arms crossed as he watched everyone speak and then Alfred write some of the things they said down. It was definitely interesting to hear the others, with their input, their abilities, and opinions on different things. Their abilities and the diversity in them was interesting as well, he found. Who would have thought that there would be so many different kinds and types? He'd never really seen or heard much of other powers while he was stuck back at his old hometown, but always assumed there was plenty of variety.

As he opened his mouth to try and maybe give some of his own input again, he was quickly cut of by Mrs. Masumi, who clapped her hands once to get everyone's attention. Kosei let out a quiet sigh and leaned back in his seat again. Nevermind I guess...I'll just have to keep it to myself unless we have time later or something. He shrugged, and then turned himself to he was facing their teacher, who patiently waited for everyone's conversations to die out. They wouldn't miss anything that she needed to say.

"Alright, I believe I gave you plenty of extra time, or so it seems. We only have five minutes left of class before you guys will be heading towards your next. So! That's most definitely not enough for everyone to present their posters, and I'd like for us to just wait until tomorrow to do that." She looked around at everyone, and then motioned to the front corner of the classroom. "For now, just place the poster boards here, and we can sort through them all and pick them back up tomorrow, okay? Once you've placed those down, you're excused." She nodded, and then moved back over to her desk, to continue typing up whatever it was she'd been working on before.

Looking over at the clock, Kosei realized that time actually had passed quite quickly since they'd gotten together as a group and tried to figure everything out to put on the assignment. He was okay with that, of course. A fast class is never a bad class.

Looking back at the poster board still sitting on the desk, Kosei gave a quicky nod and then held out his hand. "I can take that and put it up at the front of the class, if you want." He offered with a slight smile. He hadn't given much to the conversation, so he could at least just do this. Not that it really was much of anything, though.

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Alfred Komatsu
Location || Dorm
Date || Tuesday, Sept. 12th, 2023

#029729 || #002BD9
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Alfred continued to jot down notes and ideas as to everyone’s suggestions as they made them. Admittedly he was probably more focused on making the poster look neat, organized and artsy than he was contributing to the conversation, but that thought wasn’t entering his mind as the table went back and forth on their contributions to society and trying to give suggestions as to what their individual powers could be used for towards the betterment of everyone around them. Alfred heard something about fire department, drones, and his name and he simply hummed an acknowledgment as he tried his best to keep up with everyone. Eventually he heard the clapping of Mrs. Masumi’s hands, but didn’t actually stop working until after Masumi had already said her piece. Alfred didn’t have time to get everyone’s opinion on the poster, but it looked presentable at the very least. He gave a smile to everyone as he got up from his spot at the gathering and took the paper up to the front to be handed in. Hopefully it would be adequate and none of the potentially artsier people in his grade would berate his admittedly shoddy artistic stylings. Once that was done, he helped move some of the desks and chairs back into their proper places, gathered his things, and was out the door on the move towards his next class before he stopped to realize that maybe there might be people that he could be walking with, making connections and friends as he went along. He sighed to himself as he started thinking that maybe he should get himself better situated in the school before opening himself up to every person he bumped into. With a quick glance around to make sure no one was flagging him down, he set himself to memorizing his schedule and paths around the school for the rest of the day.

---

It had been a long day for the most part, and his head still throbbed slightly from the electrocution therapy that Kosei had smacked him with earlier. He opened the door to his small dorm and threw his bag against the wall. His angels immediately took up separate spots around the room, either floating in place or generally making a nuisance of themselves as they seemed to grab things at random and toss them between each other. What registered as ‘contentment’ in his mind was the feeling he gathered from them as he made his way to the washroom and proceeded to wash his face and generally get ready for bed. The good thing about waking up earlier was a more alert feeling for the rest of the day, but it was never good if you expected or wanted to stay up later than 10pm.

After all the courses were said and done, Alfred had taken the time to take a thorough tour of the school on his own terms, doing his best to mentally memorize the layout so he wouldn’t have a problem getting around from this point on. He didn’t feel like his sense of direction was terrible, but it never hurt to be better prepared. As he finished brushing his teeth and splashing his face with warm water, he slipped his shirt off and wiped his face down with a towel before throwing it back into the bathroom, dark lines appearing underneath his eyes as the realization of just how exhausted he was started quickly infiltrating his body.

He flopped into bed, and was almost out in an instant, his Angels pausing for a moment before making their way to the center of the room and ‘clunking’ to the floor with a rather loud clatter. A few seconds later, there was a banging from the room above him but Alfred either didn’t register it or didn’t care enough to answer it with one of his own. One way or another, Alfred wasn’t conscious for too much longer after that.

---

The next morning brought forward the realization that maybe Alfred needed to pay attention to how and when he woke up, as he found a near repeat of the day previous. He found himself dressed and brushing his teeth before he was even fully aware of the situation. His Angels were milling around the dorm, doing random things associated with getting ready for school. One was slipping books into his backpack, another was toasting bread, and the third one was bouncing in place like a basketball. Alfred couldn’t really explain that one as he rubbed his eyes with his hands, his toothbrush hanging out of his mouth as toothpaste foam coated his lips. He really wasn’t awake enough for this.

Once he finished brushing his teeth, he splashed some cold water onto his face to shock his system into being more awake and aware, and immediately his Angels acted as if they had been shot, spinning around the room with the same speed as Alfred’s reaction to the cold water. They stopped long enough to ‘stare’ at him before continuing a rapid flurry around the room. Alfred ignored them, stepping through what could technically be considering a real life version of a bullet hell shooter without any problems as the orbs shifted to avoid him out of instinct. He checked his bag to make sure his books were packed properly, grabbed the bread out of the toaster and spread his choice of toppings onto it and shoved them into his mouth, and made his way towards the door. He took a quick glance to see what time it was before he opened the door to his room.

5am.

Alfred stopped, looking down at himself as he realized he was over 2 and a half hours early for class, but he was prepped and ready to go. Why was he awake? Had he been sleep-prepping and thought he had been real prepping? Alfred dropped the bag of books by the door, walking up to the Angels who were gathered in the center of the room. All three of them adopted the forms of puppies on the ground and hung their head. While they had originally gotten that idea from Alfred a few years ago, he couldn’t help but resent the fact that he was the creator of it. “Did you seriously just help me sleep walk through school prep?” The Angels held their heads lower, but Alfred could feel a sense of mirth coming from them.

They thought it was funny.

Alfred huffed, walking over to his desk and picking up a pencil before whipping it at the Angels. Naturally they caught it and threw it back at him, watching in what could only be classified as amusement as it bounced off of a very unimpressed Alfred’s head. He undid his tie, took off his sweater, rechecked his alarm clock and fell into the bed unceremoniously.

If this morning was any indication, this was not going to be a good day to be awake.