Nerusona

Chapter 2

Part 1: April

Chapter 2

“Hey, did you hear about that rumor? That worthless kids come here at night and mysteriously disappear?”

Tanaka’s ears twitched as his curiosity piqued. He was tempted to turn around and ask the students sitting behind him what they meant, but the principal’s speech was drawing towards the end.

“You are allowed to choose from one of three classrooms depending on your grade level, but keep in mind that after your assessments you will be assigned teachers. May you all try your hardest to graduate and become fine soldiers and workers. ○○○’s future depends on you to crush the Conquest. And with that, I dismiss you all.” The principal then wandered off the auditorium stage, and students began to mingle amongst themselves.

Yamaguchi nudged her brother once more. “Let’s choose the same classroom,” she said.

Tanaka replied with a nonchalant nod. They both rose from their seats, and Tanaka picked up on a conversation held by the students a row ahead of them.

“Where do we go?” queried a female voice.

“We’re high schoolers, so we go to the third floor. Elementary classes are on the first floor, middle school classes are on the second floor, and high school classes are on the third floor,” answered a male voice.

Yamaguchi took a hold of Tanaka’s hand. “Looks like we’re going to the third floor, then.”

Tanaka yanked his arm away from her. “Stop grabbing me.”

“Fine, I’ll go on ahead.” She began to follow the other high school students out of the auditorium.

“That girl has weird ears.”

Tanaka exhaled a sigh and followed his sister, accidentally bumping into a girl in the process.

…

“This school is huge!” exclaimed the dog-eared female, sitting backwards in her desk to talk to her brother. “There are three classrooms per grade, which means the first floor has a total of eighteen classrooms. The second floor only has half of that, nine, but to make up for the space there’s a library and extra rooms for which I believe are for clubs. And on this floor, there’s an indoor pool. Cool, huh? I can’t wait for summer so we can use it.” She gave the male a bright, toothy grin. “Too bad there aren’t any dorms. I’d love to live here.”

“Are those animal ears?”

Yamaguchi only babbled on. Was she not aware that kids were already talking about their ears, or was she simply ignoring them?

“Maybe they lived in one of those war zone cities and mutated from one of the attacks.”

“Gross, I don’t want to be mutated either if they’re infected!”

Tanaka frowned. No matter where he and Yamaguchi went, there was always someone who talked about their different appearances behind their backs. Part of him wondered if they were even aware they had sharp hearing.

“You keep zoning out,” noted Yamaguchi. “What’s on your mind?”

“Nothing.”

“You always say that. There’s—”

“Good morning, class,” spoke a deep voice, a tall figure walking into the classroom.

Everyone immediately sat down in their desks, and Yamaguchi turned around.