Aerith [Original Story] [On Hold]

Chapter 6: In Which I Get a Tattoo

A/N: I revised the end of the last chapter a bit, so make sure that you read the updated ending before reading this chapter!

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My dreams were full of evil hounds and faceless people covered in tattoos. When I woke up, all I wanted was to go back to sleep, but I couldn't. I read the time on the alarm clock and groaned. 8:00 a.m. Usually, I never got up before 9:00 at the earliest. This sucked.

I pulled on a simple-but-comfortable outfit, which was made up of a fitted t-shirt and long, loose cotton pants. I got ready slowly, taking as long as possible to yank my comb through my hair.

I wasn't sure if everyone here ate breakfast together, or if they just ate on their own whenever they got up. Well, standing around wasn't going to get me an answer to that, so I made my way downstairs to the kitchen. It took me a few minutes to find it again, but I eventually got there.

All of the cooking appliances were chrome, and the counter-tops were all made of some sort of smooth, dark stone - obsidian, maybe? - that made the kitchen a shiny land of black and silver. The large table sat near the bay window, giving whoever was eating a nice view of the front lawn.

Tom, Nicole, Xavier, Anthony, and Renee were all seated at the table already, just talking. None of them had food, although Nicole had a water bottle in her hand. They all looked over when I entered.

"Finally," Renee sighed. "We were starting to wonder if you'd ever get up. You're welcome to anything in the fridge or pantry."

I had slept in late? It was only 8 in the morning! "What time did you get up?" I asked.

"We've all been up since 7 o'clock. Roughly," Anthony told me, grinning.

If I was going to be expected to get up at 7 each morning, we were going to have a big problem. I just shook my head and opened the refrigerator to see what food there was. I had plenty of breakfast options, but being the lazy person I was, I didn't really feel like cooking anything. Therefore, I simply grabbed the milk carton and opened the pantry to grab a box of cereal.

Once I had made my bowl and poured a glass of orange juice, I sat at the only open seat, which was between Renee and Tom. I felt a bit awkward, being the only one at the table who had food, but I was starving. At first, I was silent, but my curiosity began to get the better of me.

"Um, what exactly will I be doing today?" I asked, unsure of what the routine was around here. I could almost imagine a schedule: 7:00 - breakfast, 7:30 - archery practice, 9:oo - break, 10:00 - sword practice.......

"Well, I suppose you'll need to start training," Tom said. "The only reason your parents would have sent you here is if they wanted you to learn how to fight monsters. So that's what you'll do. We'll have to figure out what weapon works best for you."

This is going to be a rather interesting day, I thought. I couldn't help but wonder if I'd still have all of my limbs by the time I went to bed. Knowing myself, I'd probably end up slicing my arm off with a sword on accident.

"And of course, you'll have to get your tattoo," Xavier added.

I almost spewed milk. "What?!" No one had mentioned that I would have to get one of those. I didn't want to imagine what it would feel like. Needles and I didn't get along very well.

Nicole laughed. "Relax; they're just inked on using a brush."

I slowly calmed down. "No needles?"

"No needles."

I relaxed. "Oh. Okay."

It was obvious that everyone at the table was working hard to resist laughing. Yeah, when they were constantly fighting monsters, needles probably seemed like nothing.