Uninstall

chapter one

A young silver haired girl walked alone to school. The sun blared much too brightly for her taste, and all of the surrounding students were speaking much too loud.

She stepped in a puddle, soaking her socks in dirty mud water. A trail of wet footprints followed closely behind the girl, marking to the world what a dumb person she was. After all, most anyone would have seen the puddle.

Proof of her failure continued to plague her until she stepped off the concrete and into the soft dewy grass. It had just been freshly mowed. Tiny blades crunched under her feet and annoying scraps clung to her shoes as if clinging to some semblance of life.

The girl wandered far from the school building and instead found peace under a solitary cherry blossom tree. She sat next to the rough bark and began to look through her pockets. They were both empty so she searched her bag instead. When that too proved to be fruitless, she dumped out all of the contents. How could she be so stupid? She only had to remember one thing... There!

Her eyes caught sight of a small metal item. Quickly now, or the bell would ring and she would miss her chance. Her hands grasped for it, much like a child would reach for sweets. When it was in her hands at last, she could clearly see that it was not what she had been after.

Of course not. That would require her to be smart. And smart was one thing she was not.

The item was nothing more than a blade to a pencil sharpener - tightly screwed into place. Try as she might, the girl could not use this blade. Her fingers were much too fat to reach the cool metal, let alone unscrew it from its prison.

With a heavy sigh, she leaned back into the tree. The bark rubbed against her skin in an uncomfortable way. Not enough to make any difference. Even the sharp grass that poked her legs was much too soft.

Her breathing began to get faster and more hysterical. If she couldn't manage something so simple, how could she do anything else the day might ask of her?

It was this thought that led the girl to wrapping her arms around herself. At first, she was just rubbing up and down. But soon enough, that wasn't enough.

Footsteps to her left. What would they think of such a pathetic person? Finger nails gripped her arms as she tried to steady her breath.

Keep walking. Keep walking, she thought.

And to add onto her luck factor of the day, the steps stopped directly beside her. Her nails dug freely into her soft skin, she couldn't bring herself to look.

"I thought you may be here," a man's voice said softly.

She looked up, not yet meeting his eyes. He had bright red hair and a smile anyone could trust. He knelt beside her and wrapped his scarf around her neck.

"Let's go Haku," he said quietly, "Dell and Zatsune are waiting."

Haku flinched at the mention of her brother's name. He'd be so disappointed in her, no doubt.

"Though I suppose we should clean this mess up first."

He's talking about me. He's calling me a mess and he's right. I'm a mess. I"m always such a useless mess.

Her thoughts froze when he touched her shoulder. His fingers grazed over the small crescent indentations. He was frowning, but didn't say anything.

She pulled away and turned to place the items into her bag. A red blush swept across her face and she was grateful that he couldn't see it.

Once she had calmed down enough, she zipped up her bag. It snagged on itself a few times, eventually she just gave up and hoped half way closed was good enough.

Haku got up to her feet and muttered, "T-thanks Akaito."

"Anytime."

That was the last thing they spoke before walking in silence towards the back of the school. The doors next to the dumpster had a broken lock that was never important enough to fix. And so they found themselves inside and arrived in the choir room just as the first bell rang.