Chapter 10
Kaine is getting genuinely annoyed, which is honestly impressive since he is a very patient person
If he's being honest, he expected to be feeling like this towards his “sister” Kiana from the rumors that he’s heard about her, but no, she's not the one he’s feeling annoyed by
If anything his annoyance is directed towards the opposite end of rumor mill, straight at his squadmate, Raiden Mei
He is really contemplating how Kiana wasn't pulling her hair off when dealing with the stubborn and surprisingly bullheaded purplette
Unless of course, the snow haired girl was out stubborning the purple haired one, in which case he’s definitely impressed
But really, how can someone who's in the top 5 of the class and is generally considered to be one of the best people to have as a squadmate, be one of the hardest people to deal with during combat simulations is beyond him…
He supposes that the saying “don't judge a book by its cover” exists for a reason
Speaking of “judging a book by its cover”, how hard is it to find one snow haired girl with blue eyes that is known for standing out no matter where she is?
As it turns out, extremely hard, Kaine is reaching the point of admitting that Ghost hunting of all things is going to be Easier than finding Kiana
The only times that he honestly sees her is when she’s with Class Monitor Fu Hua, with their cousin Ana, when she’s in class or when she's in the Dorm house
Date: 12/08/2014
Location: St. Freya Academy
The latest combat simulation has ended and squad 7 consisting of Kaine Kaslana Apocalypse, Raiden Mei and Bronya Zychik got their points docked once again
Kaine lets out a frustrated sigh as he looks at their score
“Is Kaine-nii-sama alright?” Bronya asks him with a tilt of her head
“For the life of me i don't understand how Kiana handled her as a squadmate” he says with frustration in his voice as he continues to stare down the points their squad had gotten
Bronya for her part had a small near unnoticeable frown on her face “the Bronya has begun to see some of subject Kiana’s points about Mei-nee-sama, now that subject Kiana isn't there to cover for Mei-nee-sama’s short comings”
“The irony of that statement does not elude me…”
“The Bronya does not understand”
“Majority of the people believes that Mei is the “glue” that kept this squad functioning when its now being revealed that Kiana is really the one that kept this squad functioning properly” Kaine says dryly, “and now that she isn't here everyone can see the cracks that's always been there at the seams and a number of them blame me for it…”
They were both quiet for a few moments
“What does Kaine-nii-sama think of Mei-nee-sama?” Bronya asks with a hint of curiosity in her voice
“I think that she's stuck living a fantasy”
Seeing the confused look she sent him he elaborates
“I think that something happened to her in the past and that she hasn't been able to move forward from, and maybe because of that she living a realistic fantasy” he sighs as his shoulders slump, “and from what I'm seeing and living through, she's rejecting anything that doesn't align with her current fantasy”
Bronya looks back at their squad's score, “what would happen if Mei-nee-sama’s dream gets broken?” she asks softly, almost afraid of the answer she might receive
“I'm not an expert on these things but I imagine that it's not going to be anything good” he says while suppressing a shudder as his encounter with the Herrscher of thunder and their conversation came to mind
“Bronya”
“Da?”
“Have you managed to re-evaluate Kiana yet?
“Da, the Bronya has, the Bronya has decided that the Bronya was in the wrong and will apologize to subject Kiana and attempt to make amends with her” Bronya answers her older brother figure “the Bronya is not sure how successful she will be, but she will try”
“When are you planning to attempt to make amends with her?”
“The Bronya will wait until the bet is over, the Bronya wishes to speak with her without the need of a translator” Bronya says
‘the Bronya does not want to admit that she is beginning to miss subject Kiana’s voice’ she thinks to herself
“Alright, but here’s a word of advice” Kaine says seriously “it's best to start sooner rather than later, even if you have to swallow your pride to do so, after all, we don't know what will happen between now and then, for all we know something may happen that may make things significantly harder than they have to be”, his thoughts go back to his encounter with the Herrscher of thunder
“Da, the Bronya understands” Bronya nods
Date: 16/08/2014
Location: Dorm House
That weekend Kaine wakes up quite a bit earlier than he normally does
As much as he wants to go back to sleep, he's not feeling tired this morning so he reluctantly gets up and goes downstairs to see if there's anything that he can eat for an early breakfast
“Morning little cousin” his cousin Ana greeted him from the dining table surprising the boy as the barrett wearing girl is a night owl and not an early bird and seeing her up and about before noon during the weekend is beyond weird
“Good morning cousin Ana” he greets her as he stifles a yawn, “you're up early”
Ana hums, “i didn't sleep last night” she says as she takes a sip of her coffee, “was up gaming with Kia and Hua”
She rolled her eyes at the stare she was getting, “they were playing and i was providing colour commentary, Happy?” she says dryly
“Little bit, yeah” He says with a slight smile
Ana gives the boy a long look
“So, What's with you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Lately you've been looking more and more agitated by the day”
Kaine just looks down to the table and didn’t say anything
“Let me guess, it has something to do with a certain, certain purple haired individual that is long since overdue a reality check” she says with a raised eyebrow
The boy’s head snaps up in surprise and looks at his cousin across from him wide eyed
“Why're you surprised?, I was one of the candidates to become the next captain of squad snow wolf before i chose to come here” Ana said amused with a lazy smirk on her face
The boy clears his throat
“Cousin Ana, can I spar with you?”
“After 30 minutes or so, sure”
Later
“Gah!!!” Kaine screams as he’s sent flying back by Ana after she had whacked him with the side of her practice lance into his torso
The boy lands on his back and groans in pain
“Still too slow Kainey” Ana says with an amused smile, “it's almost like you haven't improved since we last spared~” she continues with a sing-a-song tone of voice
Kaine growls as he gets up and dashes at his cousin “stop calling me that!”, he yells as he swings his practice sword at her
Ana easily dodges his attack attempts, all the while the amused smile doesn't leave her face “why not~, it sounds suuuper cute~” Ana replies with the same tone of voice, which only infuriates him further
And sadly for Kaine, Ana is still leagues above him in terms of skill and a final thrust of her practice lance takes him down for the count, the Boy groans in pain
“You know the deal lil cuz, i get to keep calling you Kainey until the day you beat me in a spar” Ana says while standing above him, he just groans in response
What could he really say to that?
His arrogance in his younger days led to this deal between them (and thankfully it stayed between them), something that he had learnt about Ana during that first spar was that she is a beast in battle
Even Later
It was close to lunch time when they had finished their spar, the pair of them had changed out of what they were wearing for the spar and had taken a shower
Today just so happens to be one of the few days where everyone is actually there for lunch (often times Theresa or Himeko, sometimes even both of them would have some work that needs to be done and would end up skipping the home cooked meal at the dorm house)
“Sweetie, why are you brooding?” Theresa questions her son due to the dark cloud over his head
“Im not brooding” Kaine, well, broods
“You're definitely brooding” Himeko states, seeing the same thing
“he's not brooding, he's just salty that i beat him in our spar earlier” Ana teases him with an amused smile
“I'M NOT SALTY!” Kaine growls/yells(grells?) at his cousin
“Yeah, you're right, you're not salty” Ana amends, and Kaine doesn't like the look that ana has on her face “you're just reeealy well seasoned”
This statement causes Kiana to spray out the water that's in her mouth and hua to start coughing as some of the food she was eating went down the wrong pipe
Bronya just looks at the pair of cousins that are more or less behaving like siblings
While Mei is doing her best to not explode due to the Herrscher in her head’s constant taunting over Kiana’s clear preference for the pair of girls that are seated on either side of her