Transition and Restart, book one: Arrivals

Chapter two, 2040, buddying emotions, part four

The first sign Ko-chan might have been right was three senior students cornering her by the vending machines outside the cafeteria.

"You're like a nail sticking out."

"And we are the hammer."

"Get one freshman guy and stick to him. Right now you're an eyesore."

Three of them playing an amateurish game at intimidation was laughable, and Christina shrugged the incident off.

The second sign something was off waited for her almost where she had been cornered earlier that day. Going home she found her shoe-locker filled with trash. She shook her head, cleaned it out, grabbed her shoes and went home.

The third was someone trying to push her down the stairs the next day. That made her take Ko-chan's warnings a bit more seriously, but when she reported the incidents to her teachers she was told that she was seeing things. Bullying apparently was even less of an item on the agenda here than it had been when she attended school back home in Sweden. At least physical violence would have created a reaction.

From there it escalated to slashed shoes, torn books and yet another attempt to teach her how to grow wings and fly. And neither teachers nor students thought much of it. Most of 3:1 aside though, and the combined fan-clubs of hers and Ryu-kun's. They were in an uproar.

She was chatting along with Ko-chan after PE when suddenly a second year grabbed her bag and dashed all the way back to the locker room they had just left.

"You little bastard!" Christina stared after the thief.

"Don't, Kuri-chan! It's dangerous."

Further ahead, by the vending machines outside the cafeteria, she saw the friend of the geek from 6:1 looking at them. Then she decided that enough was enough and chased after the girl who had taken her bag.

"Kuri-chan!"

And she was inside the locker room. Five girls, all second and third years, waited for her and her bag had been emptied on the floor.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Do you know how many hours I had to work extra for that make-up set you just spilled on the floor?

No response.

Two of the girls were fumbling with their cell phones.

"That's my bag. Hand it over to me!" I'm starting to hate these girls!

Still no response.

Behind her the door was thrown open and someone entered.

"Wrong room, moron," she told the second year boy who had arrived. "Get the hell out of here!"

Still the girls said nothing, and that was more than a little strange.

Something is wrong. There's a boy in here. They should be screaming bloody murder.

The first fist took her by surprise.

Is this what you warned me about, Ko-chan?

The second fist threw her head first into the wall. It hurt and she couldn't think clearly.

Then her assailant ran away.

A boy in our locker room, and those girls didn't say a thing?

"Stay away from our boys!"

What? What's... Did you invite him?

Christina felt hands dragging her from the wall. Then she was thrown and fell into the mirrors face first. Something broke and she felt a new sting of pain. Something rang on the floor. Several somethings.