Influence

A young energetic boy with short feathery black hair pressed his squishy face against a miniature television screen in the compact living room of a tattered house. The house's wallpaper was ragged and scruffy where no amount of steady or concentrated repair could ever fix its frail material. An upgrade would be required, but costs skyrocketed in their world. Tangled wires and scratched-up wooden floors indicated that the house was in rough shape. Dirt-soaked raindrops leaked from the ceilings and buckets were specifically placed near the seams of the house to catch the droplets. Even the leather couches were in a state of horrid condition, smelling like wildlife that nestled there for years.

The boy wore a sewn fuzzy milky-white cat-themed sweater with light brown torn-up elastic sports shorts. His restive mind was so fixated on the cartoon's comedic effect to pay any attention to his house's roughened-up condition. The dramatic and bombastic sound effects of intense smashing and pounding made the boy shake in overloaded joy. Wooden mallets, giant anvils, and bundles of dynamite riddled and exploded on the screen with certain words spelling out "BANG!" or "WOOSH!" Such attractive and pleasurable eye candy enticed the boy to glare at the screen with ecstatic joy. His eyes were in a state of chaotic trance the more his mind focused. He was already on all fours, prancing up and down like a hyena laughing at its prey.

"Ryo, get away from the screen," His father said. He stepped in the living room, smoking a royal gold-trimmed cigar while dressing in a black business suit. A fancy pen was tucked away into his breast pocket, and the man's fancy cologne seemingly took away the smell of the leather couch. He stared deeply into his silver and golden encrusted watch, tapping his slim dress shoes on the stained kitchen floor tiles. "A ghost will pull you in if you stay there for too long."

Ryo pouted and stared at his father, blaming him for ceasing his cartoon immersion. "You've told me that already before, dad. It's not gonna happen. Bob and Marie aren't ghosts or the bad guys."

"Well, they certainly aren't the good guys either, are they?" His father replied with a stern look. He began dousing a glass of fresh orange juice on an antique tea table before wiping his mouth with his opposite wrist. "And why aren't you dressed yet? You're going to be late for school. The toast we put in five minutes ago is all cold too."

Ryo kicked back the television with a sulky attitude by refusing to listen to his father. His eyes never left the television screen even under his father's demands. "I don't wanna go to school. Aliens are coming."

Ryo's father sighed in disappointment at his son's heavily racialized and biased statements. "Don't tell me it's because of your school's new plan. Ryo, it's not nice to be harsh against the new students. And stop calling them aliens. They're just as human and smart as you are, so you'll embarrass yourself if you stand out for the wrong reasons."

"You're wrong, dad! They're aliens and they're weird. If I was Bob, I'd smash them with that wooden mallet that he uses all the time!" Ryo leaped up and mimicked him as Bob the Cat, swinging an imaginative wooden mallet across his head.

Ryo's slender and attractive mother entered, wearing an ivory white dress with a shimmering pearl necklace. She rotated a leather brown purse over her shoulder and shook her head against Ryo's immature answer. Her mother's blazing red hair was layered and tied with a frilly white hairband. "Not this again. Honey, you need to stop letting Ryo watch those violent cartoons. And now he's talking about aliens? I knew it wasn't a good idea to let him watch television. If he explodes in class talking about Bob and Marie, we're going to get a phone call for sure-"

"Nothing like that is gonna happen, okay, Hina?" Ryo's father said, giving her a swift kiss on the cheek. "We're lucky to have Ryo in this family. We shouldn't curse him out like that, it'll jinx his efforts as a student in Seiya."

Ryo threw his arms out, opening his mouth at a loss of words. "Umm, I still exist and I'm right here! I can still hear you guys, you know."

Hina sighed while rolling her eyes. "Just get dressed, get your toast, and get in the damn car."

Hesitatingly languid at first, Ryo slouched up from his seat navigated to his ordinary room. The only extraordinary part of his room involved his colorful palette of Galaxyman figurines positioned on his nightstand. Several large schoolbooks were prepurchased and set into his backpack before his middle school semester begun. Pieces of clothing were scattered endlessly across his blue striped blankets and underneath his bed. Another bucket settled near the window, collected rain droplets from an opening on the ceiling. Toys had been littered across as well, making it a hazard to even properly step inside.

A large sunset-orange plushie version of Bob the Cat nestled by the opening in his room. As his favorite cartoon, Ryo, still envisioning the exciting mayhem from the previous episode, leaped into the air and gave him an accurate high five at his paw. With the spiky toys and slippery clothing littered on the wooden floors, Ryo lost his balance and face planted on his bed to cushion his fall.

"I don't wanna go to school..." The mountain of clothing muffled Ryo's exhausted voice.

Digging his head out, Ryo began snatching the clothes riddled on his bed and tossing them endlessly behind him onto his floor. Pairs of socks were incomplete, and dried sweaty clothes were in the same stash. He searched for his school uniform, but could not locate it.

"Damn it," Ryo said, slumping towards his half-opened closet. Upon first glance, Ryo's closet was neatly organized. But after sliding his closet to the side, his closet was so disproportional that a tornado striking his room would have been a viable excuse for its colossal messiness. Small individual mountains of jumbled clothing were inexcusable beyond human standards. Ryo jammed both of his hands within the mountainous sets of clothing, tossing them behind him once again disregarding cleanliness.

The navy blue school uniform of Seiya Middle School rested on a hangar on the far right of his closet. Ryo's gasped, snatching the outfit and tossing his unorganized set of clothes inside his closet without sorting. He shut the closet as he disregarded the sound of them toppling over inside.

Ryo grabbed the uniform and managed to wear it successfully after a lengthy session of tugging and pulling over his neck. Some of the fabric on the uniform tore near the armpits, but his lack of self-consciousness and ignorance pinned it away. Ryo hopped back onto his bed and snatched a set of used khakis tucked into the ground. After buttoning them on, Ryo searched for an incomplete pair of socks where its color was mismatched. Without any regret, Ryo placed them on.

"Finally," Ryo said, unzipping his black backpack. He placed it on his bleached chair and began yanking all his school semester's textbooks and journals into it without much care of its condition. He left his school agenda on the table, which was the most significant tool to have on the first day of middle school.

"Ryo, hurry up! I'm gonna be late for work!" Ryo's father's voice echoed from the outside of his rain-soaked window. The thin walls propelled his voice loud enough for Ryo to hear.

"I'm coming! Damn…" Ryo called as he sprinted out into the kitchen. He grabbed his bland and tender pieces of bread and chomped on them like a lion. He stepped out into the streets with his black running shoes and leaped into the car without another word.

***

Seiya Middle School; a reputable public school located in Asahikawa of Hokkaido in the country of Japan. Seiya was a brilliant home to thousands of endearing and audacious young children searching for a bright future. Seiya had its official school district spanning over five different schools in Asahikawa. These included other reputable and high-class colleges and universities, and if a student was popular enough in their early stages of elementary school, they would skip the rudimentary process of failing to rise through the ranks.

Before Ryo's middle school semester began, the Japanese government, in alliance with the Aries government, tasked the Seiya District to accept adolescent alien students from other planets to their school district as part of their protocol to expand diversity intergalactically. News from the district spread immediately among school staff and personnel about three young alien students from Scorpio arriving at Seiya Middle. While some teachers were against the idea of aliens attending school on Earth with the belies spreading across Earth, some were disinterested and found it exciting to enrich their experience in education. However, a majority of students found it revolting to be in the presence of an alien, no doubt mesmerized by their family's biased thoughts.

Ryo was a belligerent individual who was part of the majority. In Seiya Elementary, Ryo's friend group was comprised of delinquents and bullies who managed to drag him in their travesty of a group. Together, as a group, Ryo became one of many delinquents who focused on attracting attention, even if it meant bullying or vilifying students for the sake of popularity.

Yet Ryo's personality shifted dramatically whenever he was home. He respected his family regardless of his school's experiences with delinquents. Whenever Ryo would abruptly interrupt his family with one of the jarring random statements he would learn from his peers, his mother and father would chastise him harshly. Thus, at home with his family, Ryo came to learn a great deal of respect and honor.

Yet he was always had mixed feelings when it came to his opinions about the alien students from Planet Scorpio coming to his school.

As soon as his family kissed him goodbye affectionately for the day, a special morning assembly was called, inviting three of the students from Planet Scorpio to the stage. Ryo lazed back alone in the corner of the assembly room, slouching to maintain his coolness. He was alone, as the majority of his delinquent friends transferred to different districts in Asahikawa. He hostilely glared at the three students from the shadows. Although he couldn't see their faces particularly clearly, Ryo had the idea that many students were against them attending a Japanese-only district and school after hearing students murmuring about their unwanted stay.

After the special assembly concluded, morning classes had begun, with Ryo's being in classroom 3-C. At the beginning of the middle school semester, it was more than quite often to find approachable and gregarious with one another to stabilize their reputation as a student. Troublemakers were rare, but Ryo on the other hand maintained his delinquent standing. Minutes before his class hand begun, Ryo menacingly stuck both of his hands in his khaki pockets while slouching forwards. Students did their best to avoid his impertinent stare by shrouding themselves in different friend groups. Many students often commented on Ryo's mysteriously different eyes; his pupils appeared shorter than the average human. Because of this, Ryo was labeled as a bigger threat and troublemaker because of his pupil size. As much as being labeled was a drag to him, Ryo still stood by his childhood ideals to stay popular and known, even if it was egregious.

Before classes had begun, Ryo chose a spot in the back of the classroom to hide from the teacher's attention. As Ryo sat in silence twiddling his fingers, he began biting his nails in nervousness for how the first day would turn out. Several young girls who knew of Ryo's dangerous personality did their best to avoid them after eyeing his unusual behavior outside. Instead of disregarding them, Ryo glared at them with the intent that they mind their own business. They immediately dispersed to eschew from his wrath, searching for chairs away from his presence.

The classroom was extremely simplistic. A typical olive-colored chalkboard with a teacher's podium stood in front of the class. Closets and lockers filled with pencils, pens, rulers, erasers, and sharpeners were accessible for new students who had forgotten their writing utensils at home. Highly decorative posters listing student rules were pasted above the chalkboard. Student desks were riddled with pencil and marker graffiti, despite Seiya's reputable charm.

Where Ryo was seated was marked with an aggressive and eerie aura that repelled every individual away like bug spray. Darkness shrouded his seat. Yet a shining radiance came from the bright sun outside that glistened through the window sills. For Ryo, sunlight was problematic for his eyesight, yet the majority of students adored its natural radiance. He covered the sunlight seams with his hands, viciously annoyed at the brightness of its vibrance.

"Yo, mind if I sit here?" A beckoning voice asked Ryo with a tap on his shoulder. Ryo swiftly set his hand down, turning around to face the unknown student. The slicked-back brown-haired boy with thin eyes, thin arms, and thin mouth grinned with a fake friendly complexion that delinquents back in Ryo's elementary school were keen on. Ryo's voracious delinquent attitude remained in his head, feeling a sense of connection from the boy. The face of the boy resonated with his own. "Name's Sezan Fuma, by the way. But people just call me Sez."

Ryo tried his utmost hardest to maintain his composure and stylish attitude. "Fine, whatever." He said.

Sez approached the seat in front of Ryo, setting his backpack behind his chair hastily and roughly. His slouched-back and careless attitude towards the school's personal property indicated that he was exactly Ryo's type. He flinched backward and tilted his seat to speak to Ryo. With a stern and acrimonious smile, Sez met his eyes with Ryo's through a delinquent to delinquent connection.

"So, I heard one of those aliens from Planet Scorpio's gonna be in our class. I know it's classroom rules to not call those guys "aliens," but don't you agree with me? They don't belong here. They're all weird and stuff, right?" He asked for Ryo's opinion, curious about his point of view.

"Yeah, you're right. I feel the same way. Those stupid aliens. My family always thinks they're cool, but they don't understand…" Ryo whispered, stating the recent news about unwanted alien activity and riots across Earth. Ryo's eyes were attracted to Sez's menacing thin eyes after hearing his tall statement. He was surprised that Sez's dogmatic beliefs resonated with his own on a grand level. He could tell he had a strong predilection for this boy, whoever he was.

"I know…" Sez whined, resting both his arms behind his head in a pompous manner. "Seventh grade is gonna suck because of them. They're gonna get all the fucking attention. But you know what I think? I think it's time for a change of pace."

"What do you mean?" Ryo asked, curious to know more about the relevance of his statement.

"Well, as I said, those aliens don't belong here, right? So, all we gotta do is make it so that they don't come back here. They've got hearts like us, but we can make it easy to break them apart. As long as we stay out of the teacher's way, we can do almost anything to those aliens." Sez said as he winked at Ryo, feeling a sense of comfortability with Ryo's attentive eyes.

"I guess," Ryo shrugged and leaned back, imitating Sez's prideful posture. "Gotta ask though, why do you hate them so much? Is it cause of what they did to Earth?"

"Hell yeah, it is," Sez added with a scornful face of contempt for alien existence. "All those monsters do is take away our freedom on Earth. It's up to us to kick them back to whatever planet they came from. My family and the entire world are suffering because of them. Hell, I bet your family is too, but they haven't said it to you, have they?"

Ryo coldly stared into Sez's thin eyes. "No. They haven't," He bluntly said, letting biases cloud his vision. "They would never..." A certain rebellious spirit ignited within Ryo's heart the moment Sez intervened with his statement about Earth's current economic state. There would be several random instances where Ryo eavesdropped on his family ranting and censuring the aliens on Earth. Ryo cheered for himself through his mind. As long as he was able to maintain his family's respect, he was gleeful. Perhaps a hidden surprise for his family where Ryo verbally explained his stance on aliens would make them proud and gain approval over his opinions.

When the class bell harmoniously rang as a signal, Sez brushed off Ryo's presence and turned around. His bothersome expression was sly to the eyes. Ryo imitated his position once again, repeatedly adjusting his posture until it was on par. Ishida Yumi, a middle school glasses-wearing instructor of the seventh-grade class, entered the class with a kind-hearted smile.

Ishida charmingly greeted with a powerful and confident voice. "Morning class, and welcome back to Seiya Middle," she said. Her posture was lean, and her thin dress was quite sensual to Sez's liking. "Now, I know you all just came back from a long break, but we're in for a long day today, so everyone please pay attention!"

Sez attentively wolf-whistled at Ishida to declare his attraction for her, but Ishida immediately castigated him by slamming her brown clipboard on the teacher's podium. Several male students in the classroom chuckled at his actions. Ryo noticed how powerful a single interaction was to attract attention; he imagined doing it himself later to others so his peers may laugh at him as well. Sez smirked at the response of others, placing his knuckles against his chin in a pompous manner.

"Excuse me..." Ishida poked her ears and cleaned them out, pretending to not have heard Sez's perverted and immature decree. "Everyone, please be seated, situated, and comfortable. Before we begin our class, I need to introduce a new student who will be attending our class for the rest of the semester I ask that you all respect her! Everyone, this is Ash Meguro," She gestured her left hand to the entrance of the classroom like a spotlight.

The delicate and frail nature of Ash Meguro's thin posture and passivity was one that would steal the hearts of many individual students. While the spotlight focused on her, students voiced their utmost attentive respect by gasping in awe at her beauty. Yet the majority of the class was against it; only a small section was unbiased to the alien cause. Ash Meguro was an extraordinarily short and petite silver-haired girl who unexpectedly appeared like a human. Her pale white skin and pink suspenders complimented her innocence, along with her shivering and quaking face in the sight of her peers. As a result of her anxiety, her eyes would always focus on the ground instead of the crowd.

"Meguro, huh. What a fake ass last name for an alien. She's not Japanese." Sez objected quietly.

"Alien?" Ryo hissed, stunned by the fact that such an innocent being was an alien. Not only has she imitated the humanistic appearance, but she has shrouded the fact that she was an alien from another planet. This damaged his trust in alien existence even further. "She's an alien?"

In response to Ryo's comment, Ishida chimed in to clear the classroom of its immoral ideas. "Okay, everyone, I don't want to hear the word 'alien' in this classroom. Everyone deserves to be treated fairly in this classroom, regardless of where we come from," Instructor Ishida informed the classroom with a strict tone. "Now then, Ash, would you care to introduce yourself to the class? Also, go ahead and find yourself a seat."

Without hesitation, the young and innocent Ash nervously scanned through the classroom to see a mixture of volatile and uplifting eyes gazing upon her. "Nice… to meet all of you." She softly introduced them with a respectful bow. She traveled to the center of the class next to Ryo when suddenly, Ryo mimicked Sez's wolf-whistle aimed at her. Sez gallantly chuckled at his attempt.

"Hey, Ryo!" Ishida slammed her clipboard down to repel his immature response. "Didn't you hear what I said earlier about equal treatment? How dare you treat one of my students like that?"

"Who cares, honestly?" Ryo shrugged off, imitating Sez's personality. "Aliens will be aliens."

"Okay, that's it! One more insult like that will send you to the principal's office!" Ishida scorned without hesitation. She then shifted her attitude towards Ash's still body. "My apologies, Ash. Please, find yourself another seat."

Ryo shrugged off his teacher's annoying comment, slouching back in his chair. But before he could congratulate himself on humiliating Ash, she silently wolf-whistled back to Ryo, unsure of its actual meaning. Ryo's eyes widened in bewilderment, peeved from her unusual equivocal attitude.

"That dumbass. She thought you were saying hello." Sez knew the idea that Ryo tried to implement.

Ryo bit his cheek while his eyebrows fidgeted and twitched. His first attempt at trying to lower Ash's morale failed, even while using Sez's techniques. If he was willing to bargain his popularity to make Ash look unwanted, he was willing so to garner the attention he sought. Together, along with Sez, this would be a difficult task, nonetheless.

In the end, Ryo still believed he was doing his family a favor.

***

"Sophie?" Ash called the name of a young red-haired pigtailed girl who unintentionally opened her steaming bento box in front of her. It was a steaming blend of rice, fried calamari, edamame green beans, and orange wedges. The balsamic and creamy seafood aroma attracted Ash's attention, but Ryo and Sez were attracted for the wrong reasons. "Your food smells good. Can I try some?" She asked Sophie with a pinkish blush on her cheeks.

Sophie warmly nodded to her request. "Of course, Ash. Or, Meguro-san! I don't know what to call you, sorry about that." Sophie apologized, bowing in respect. Her attitude was charming, inviting, and optimistic to be friends with Ash regardless of where she came from.

"You may call me whichever you prefer," Ash solidified with a straightforward declaration of her identity. She enthusiastically dug her hand into Sophie's steaming bento box and snatched a piece of fried calamari and hogged it down. Sophie excused her poor and misguided manners, as she suggested that alien table manners were much different from human manners. "Mmm. So yummy."

Ryo stood on standby as Sez shoved his fingers in his pockets, rotating his arm in a bashful manner as he approached Ash and Sophie. His lips puckered forward while searching for the most intricate and negligible idea to call out Ash for. "Hey, Ash," Sez taunted. With a sneer on his face, his thin eyes struck Ash as particularly noticeable. "That's not a very nice way to eat someone else's food. Say you're sorry to Sophie."

Ash giggled while waving at Sez in another equivocal manner. She took Sez's request quite literally. "You're sorry to Sophie." Ash purposefully carried it out without a sarcastic tone. "Hello, my name is Ash Meguro. Do you want to-"

"Yeah, yeah, I know who you are," Sez hounded back, interrupting her introduction. "And that's not what I meant. I said, say you're sorry to Sophie, as in like, apologize to her. You have to sound like you fucking mean it."

"Hey, knock it off, Sez," Sophie forcefully ejected herself up to repel Sez's purposeful bullying. She firmly stood her ground after pulling Ash away to defend her position."She asked for my food nicely and I gave it to her. Stop picking on the new girl, and stop being an asshole."

Sez chuckled in response to the "girl" statement. "You mean, stop picking on the new alien," He corrected, digging his hand into his pockets and shoving Sophie aside gently. He then approached Ash with a menacing stare while Ryo attempted to replicate his actions as his second-hand man. "Listen, bitch, I just want you to know that you're not welcome here. You aliens stole my family's jobs and made them beg in front of their bosses. Now they got fired and we can't take the stress. You should have stayed back where you came from and never came here in the first place." He explained.

Begging in front of their bosses, Ryo daydreamed. His father was such a complicated and stronghearted individual; he could never imagine his father succumbing to such a humiliating act for something he was never responsible for. The more he jumped to conclusions in his head about his father begging for his job position, the more frustrated he was at Ash.

Ash seemingly disregarded all of Sez's speech by gently grabbing Sophie's hand to sit down. Sophie gasped for her friendly nature. Ash grabbed her pink colorful pinned backpack and pulled out a colorful decorative bento box of her own, attempting to imitate Japanese culture by having it in a compact box. Ryo's eyes nearly erupted into flames at the sight of her ignorance, as nothing Sez hinted was drilling through her mind. Even his wolf-whistle was ineffective. The more Ash disregarded their comments, the more peeved he was. The absolute disrespectful nail in the coffin to Ryo was how Ash was replicating Japanese traditional culture with her bento box. Ryo scorned individuals who failed to grasp the culture, especially under the noses of an alien.

"Do you want some?" Ash innocently asked Sez.

Sez's eyes rolled in response to her evasive manner. "Tch, stupid bitch ass alien. Come on, Ryo, let's get out of-"

Ryo's annoyance burst into action as he snatched Ash's lunch box and held it up into the air to prevent her from grabbing it. He began blowing tongue raspberries at Ash, shoving her frail body off of the chair hoping to trigger a rise inside her heart. "You want it, alien? You're gonna have to take it. Take it all from my hands, if you dare!" Ryo purposefully taunted.

"Hey, knock it off!" Sophie said, grabbing Ash's hand tightly. "You can have some of my lunch if you want, Meguro-san."

"San, san, san! Stop calling her Meguro-san!" Ryo roused up. "She ain't Japanese. She never was. She's trying so hard to fit in with our culture that it's making her look like a total dumbass. And haven't you heard the news about the aliens stealing all the jobs, Sophie?" He added to try to resonate with Sophie's thoughts.

"I don't give a shit," Sophie declared, hiding Ash away again. "Just because Meguro-san's an alien doesn't mean you have to treat her any different. Didn't you listen to Mrs. Ishida at the start of class? I'm gonna tell on you both if you don't stop it," Sophie turned to face Ash and noticed her eyes were uneasy and puffy in response to their bullying. "Come on, Meguro-san. It's okay," She rotated her body swiftly and struck her palm out. "Return her lunch right now!"

Ryo's masterful plan rose to action, as he utilized this moment as an opportunity for an attentional fearful reputation. Students enjoying their lunch were eyeing Ryo's rowdy and dictatorial actions. "You want me to give it back? Okay. Here you GO!" Opening his pupils widely, Ryo forcefully tossed the bento box, aimed at Ash's nose. However, the unexpected occurred. Ash swiftly grabbed her lunch box without a single flinch, bowing at Ryo and Sez in respect before thanking them while moving away with Sophie. All of the students were more amazed at Ash's ability to catch the box at full speed so precisely, while Ryo remained stunned at his failure.

"Man, you suck. Well, I guess I didn't expect that," Sez said to Ryo's failure of an attempt. "It's gonna take a lot more than that to send a message."

"I don't even know," Ryo said. "Maybe we should just give up."

"Give up?" Sez expressed distraught over Ryo's response, opening his thin eyes widely. He slouched back in his seat, but this time, his posture was forced forward at Ryo's deniable request. "We don't give up around here. If we want to send a message, we'll have to do it much better than that. Why don't you come over to my house after and we can plan something out?"

"Hell yeah, man!" Ryo cheered, seeking to attain popularity and resonate with his family's emotions.

Sez chuckled. "Cool, cool. Anyways, we should probably eat something-"

Sophie, who had moved into Classroom 3-B, interrupted their conversation by storming the two of them with a tight puckering expression filled with rage. She focused primarily on Sez, who slouched backward and rolled his eyes. "I want you to apologize to Meguro-san. She didn't do anything. You have no right to bully her like the rest of the other guys and girls in the past." She lambasted with a fierce temper.

"Get lost, bitch," Sez said, carelessly flipping his brown slicked hair. His eyes never met with Sophie's either. Ryo noticed his devotion and was impressed by his smoothness, wondering if he could imitate him forever. "It ain't any of my business what happens to her. She should already know the problems of standing out above everyone else."

"I'm so telling on you," Sophie treacherously spun around and made way for the exit.

Sez forcefully snatched Sophie's hand, dragging her close. His seat toppled against a desk, creating a discomforting sound to attract the class's attention. With another menacing and restrictive glare, Sez threatened her just by the look he had given her. "No, I don't think you will, bitch. Stop trying to pretend that she's innocent when you-"

"SEZ!" Instructor Ishida happened to step into the room and raised her voice at the ensuing conflict. "To the principal's office, right now! I already said it before! I won't tolerate misconduct!"

Sez flung Sophie's hand away, thinking she was not worth the time. Sez maintained his overly pompous attitude with his swaying walk. All eyes were on him. Ishida escorted Sez to the office, as she was untrustworthy of him going alone. Ryo sat back in his seat sulking like a stubborn child. All of the other students were disgusted with Ryo's irrational behavior, shaking their heads in disappointment.

"You stay away from me and Meguro-san." Sophie declared before moving away with her outside of the classroom.

Ryo was baffled. How did they not know that an alien was the cause of this behavior, he said. Either he was made a fool out of, or he was transforming into one of the stereotypical "cool kids" that expressed only badassery through every breath. Still, he was feeling nonchalant over the situation. Being the only individual to not get in trouble made him feel subsequently empowered. He felt an aura of strength that he couldn't quite grasp often, but it granted him a tremendous amount of confidence to explore it.