The Hell Inside My Head

“Hey, Rikita,” Alessei said through a mouthful of noodles.

“What, Aless? And chew your food first.”

Alessei gulped down her food, scolding herself inwardly. She kept forgetting that these people were more refined than her old crowd. DWMA students had always seemed snobbish to her old friends, but to Alessei they were unearthly in their grace and manner. And while her fellow demon dusters wouldn’t mind a girl chewing with her mouth open, bad manners were frowned upon here.

“Y’see that kid over there?” She pointed.

“It’s not polite to point, Aless.” Alessei groaned. Rikita was her meister, but she got on her nerves to no end. I’ll learn eventually. The redheaded meister turned to where Aless had pointed. “Which kid?”

“The tall one with the pink hair,” Rikita’s weapon responded. “Is that a dude or a chick?”

“Dude. We think.” Riki took a bite of her sandwich. “His name’s Crona. Tough name for a he-she.

“Tough or not, I don’t care. He is fiiiiiine,” Alessei cackled to her friend. “Who’re those people around him?”

“Them? Well, that girl Maka Albarn, and the white-haired guy’s Soul “Eater” Evans. They’re okay I guess. Why?”

“Just wondering,” Aless mumbled, downing half her bottle of soda and letting out a humongous burp. She slapped her hands over her mouth.

“Oh, relax, Aless. Nobody heard. It’s too loud in this cafeteria.”

“I don’t give a crap if they heard, Riki!” She leaned in closer to her meister. “What if they saw my…” She tapped her lips with one bony finger.

Now it was Rikita’s turn to cackle with laughter.

“Girl, it’s obvious what you are. Somebody’d have to live under a rock to not get it the moment they saw you. Your eyes give you away as much as your fangs.”

“Oh, shush,” she said with a flick of her hand. “It’s a reasonable concern.”

The bell rang and Alessei bolted out of her chair, grabbing her bag of school books. She marched off to Honors Biology with a soda and a dream.
******
“Alright, class!” cried Dr. Stein, clapping his hands. “Let’s start! Today we’ll be doing dissections, so-”

“We always do dissections, Dr. Stein,” grumbled one of the students.

“Yes, but today,” said Stein, pulling the cover off of the large crate next to his desk, “we’ll be dissecting tigers!”

“But Dr. Stein,” said one student tentatively. “Aren’t tigers, endangered?”

“Nonsense, Sasazuka! Don’t question me like that! Points deducted from your grade!”

Sasazuka just put his head down on his desk and moaned. The poor boy doesn’t deserve that, thought Aless. And tigers are endangered. I’m pretty sure it’s a crime to kill them.

One of the students was saying just as much when Stein silenced him.

“Well, a lot of good that’ll do us, seeing as they’re already dead!” He clapped again. “Get into partners and we’ll start!”

Alessei watched dumbly as the students all paired up with their friends. Nobody wants to be with the new girl. Across the room, she saw someone else standing alone. The pink-haired he-she! What’s his name…? Crona! She made her way through the throng of students to the boy, whose eyes were downcast in anxiety. He looked up with a gasp as she neared him.

“Hey,” Aless chirped, trying her best charming smile. Lips closed, don’t show the fangs… This boy was tall, at least ten inches taller than her scrawny self. Up close, she saw deep bags under his eyes and the pallor of his skin. “Wanna be partners?”

“S-sure,” said the boy, wringing his hands together. “What’s your name? I haven’t seen you here. Well, I haven’t seen much of anyone, actually. I’m new.”

“So am I,” she replied, nodding. “My name’s Alessei, but you can call me Aless. And what name may I match to this lovely face?”

It took a second for the boy to realize that she meant him.

“Crona,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

“A pleasure. Now let’s get our tiger. You any good in Biology?”

“No,” Crona mumbled. “I don’t know how I got into Honors. I’ve never dissected and endangered animal before. I don’t want any guilt from this. I don’t know how to deal with it.”

Alessei chuckled.

“I don’t know how I’m gonna deal with it either. But don’t worry. You get used to guilt after a while,” she added, looking at him sidelong to gauge his reaction. To her shock, her nodded.

“Don’t I know it,” he said. “I’m used to guilt, and yet I still can’t deal with it. I’m kind of a failure that way.” He pinched the pale skin of his wrist and winced.

“What was that?” asked Aless asked, puzzled.

“Oh. The pinch. The doctor told me that I have low self esteem, and that whenever I think something negative about myself, to pinch myself so I don’t think it again. It hasn’t really helped, though. I’m used to pain, so it doesn’t do anything.”

“Used to pain?” she asked, grabbing a scalpel and a slightly heavy bag that could only contain a tiger cub. She felt sick. “What do you mean?”

“I have black blood, didn’t you know? It’s all around school. The story, I mean. Not the blood.” He let out a nervous, high-pitched giggle.

“Well I haven’t heard it. Black blood? I’ve never heard of that before.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Fair enough,” she sighed. She snapped a pair of rubber gloves on. “Let’s get down to business, shall we?”

*******

“Eeeee, Riki!” Alessei squealed, tackle-hugging her partner. “Guess what guess what guess what?”

“What? And for your own sake, get off me before I throttle you.”

“Ah, ah, ah!” she mockingly scolded, wagging a finger. “There will be no throttling. It isn’t polite, now is it?”

“Neither is tackling people from behind. Now are you going to tell me or what?”

The two girls were walking down the arched halls of the DWMA back to their dorm wing. Alessei loved the architecture of the building. The high ceilings were so different from the abandoned houses she used to flit between with her friends. It was a good thing, she’d decided. Made the place feel less cramped.

“I was partners with that Crona kid in Bio today, and he wants to study with me sometime! Yay!” She leaned against the marble wall and sighed.

Rikita put a hand to her head and moaned.

“Alessei, you do know that he’s…”

Aless lifted her head suddenly, the sharp movement leaving her vision fuzzy for a moment. The side effect of the madness…

“What? What is he? He seemed fine to me.” She felt a defensive wall rise up between her and her meister.

Riki held up her hands, palms out, refusing to look at her partner.

“You know what, Aless? I’m not even going to try to tell you this. I can hear it in your voice. You won’t listen to reason. You’re just too stubborn. Have your little study session with that freak. Find out yourself.” She started walking.

Alessei got up from her position on the wall, and tried to follow her friend.

“Riki? You’re being totally unfair! Of course I’ll listen to you!”

“And don’t follow me.”