Chapter 5 - last part

I heard voices. People were talking. What happened? My head was hurting. I felt like I forgot something important. I opened my eyes. The light in the room made my headache feel worse than it was. I was in the infirmary, on one of the beds. Oh right, Hiro! We brought him here, we, Ryuu and me. Ryuu... Right, now I started to remember. He told me about the SA, why such a class existed. And about me having an ability. He wanted to proof to me that I could use it on him too. I was a tamer. Someone who could influence other people’s abilities. And he proofed it to me: I could control the tiger. So the voices I was hearing were of Hiro and Ryuu. Before they notice that I am awake I tried to listen to their conversation.

“... to protect her.” Ryuu said. Protect her? Me? What were they talking about?

“If they find out they will definitely misuse her. We can’t let them do that, you are right.” Hiro answered. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to start listening in the middle of the conversation. It wasn’t making sense at all. Right when I wanted to show that I was awake Hiro continued: “How is your head? Feeling better?” So I wasn’t the only one with a headache.

“Yeah. Luckily she fainted before me. If she withstood just one second more I would have fainted too. Controlling the tiger must have been a heavy burden for her body. She should wake up soon.”

I thought it was time to interrupt them. My curiosity didn’t leave me more space to pretend anyway. “I woke up.” I said simply. The next second Ryuu and Hiro were surrounding me. Both of them looked relieved.

“How are you feeling?” They asked at the same time.

“I am fine” I gave them a light smile to show them it’s true. “My head still hurts, though. Why did I even faint?”

Ryuu was the one to answer: “Without training the attempt to control someone else’s ability is really difficult. The stronger the ability is the more burdens it will bring to the tamer’s body. The tiger is one of the strongest abilities that exist. And you tried to control it while I did it. Because we did it at the same time we both almost fainted from exhaustion. If you had withstood the exhaustion just one second longer I would be the one to faint.” With this explanation he even answered my unasked questions to the conversation I heard before. But not all of my questions were answered yet. Seeing Hiro standing near me I got worried before I could ask the remaining questions. “Are you feeling better? Why don’t you lie down?”

“Thanks for worrying. I am totally fine“ he answered.

“Don’t play the Hero!” Ryuu grinned and tripped him so that he fell backwards to the second bed. I sat up on the bed. They were really good friends to even joke around in this kind of situation. But I couldn’t hold up the questions any longer: “What will happen with me now that you found out about my ability? What were you talking about just then? Misuse my ability? Who would?” all them just spurted out of me. Suddenly the expression on both of their faces changed. It got darker. “You were awake since then?” Hiro sighed. He didn’t seem happy. “Ryuu, we have to explain to her anyway, so how about we tell her everything?”

Ryuu also sighed. “It doesn’t seem like we have another chsoice.” What were they talking about? Was there a really big secret they were keeping? Did that have anything to do with me? I didn’t have to wait long to find out. Ryuu continued: “We won’t tell the school that you have an ability. You keep it a secret too!” At this sentence he pleadingly looked at me. “The SA everyone admires isn’t such a good place. The school is training the special ability students to become useful to them. In the future most of us will be used for the government to do underground work, or we will be sold to other countries. There are almost no chances for us to break free from this system. To train us for that they send us out to missions. Some of those missions are really just training, something set up by the school. But if you have a really useful ability, and if you are a splendid ability user, you will get real missions.” When he said that I instinctively looked at Hiro.

Hiro and Ryuu nodded at the same time. Hiro replied to my unspoken question. “Yeah, you even come back hurt from the mission. The school doesn’t care much about the students’ lifes. You just have to fulfil the operation and you will be granted with something. That’s the system behind SA.”

“We decided that as long as you have a chance, you shouldn’t be part of this. And you have a really strong ability, means they would send you out to missions immediately without training which would risk your life.” I understood what this was about. I never thought that the SA was such a place. The SA everyone admires, that’s how Ryuu referred to them when talking about it. I already wondered why it sounded so sarcastic. Now I knew. I nodded. I would keep this a secret.

Chapter 5 - part five

“You think I have an ability? And then it’s not an ability, it’s even the strongest type? And above all, the greatest of the strongest type? Aren’t you thinking too highly of me?” I asked. I couldn’t believe what I just heard. Alright, I admit that I could kind of influence Hiro’s ability, but isn’t it enough to think that’s a coincidence? Well, maybe not. But I never could see myself as someone special.

“Yes, you definitely have it. You can influence Hiro’s and my ability.” Even his ability? The tiger? I could SEE the tiger, but I definitely couldn’t influence it, or could I? I stared to him speechlessly. He noticed my doubts and continued. “Usually no one would notice my tiger if I don’t want them to notice it. But the notice I am talking about is just physically, no one can actually SEE the tiger other than me, that’s impossible. But you can’t only see it, you can even touch it. And all that without me  ‘allowing’ you to.”

“Allowing? What are you talking about?” Our conversation got weirder by second. If I didn’t proof to him soon that I was perfectly normal, well, what then? Wasn’t it fine to be special? To have an incredible ability? Why am I denying it this much? But he is talking about me having a ‘strong’ ability, not just a regular one, that’s the fact I just couldn’t accept.

“Let me show you.” He said and turned to Hiro. The tiger jumped out of his body and went directly through his friend. I was so stunned my mouth literally opened wide. It was like his tiger being a ghost. I stepped towards it and reached out with my hand. I touched the fur. How was that possible? Ryuu, who was watching me closely and following every of my movements, continued. “I am sure that there is more to it. If we tried you could even control it.”

Control? How was that possible?

“That’s something you should try out.” I heard Hiro’s voice. I immediately turned to him, Ryuu did the same.

“You are awake.” Ryuu and me said almost at the same time. He sounded really relieved. “How are you feeling?”

“The usual. “ He winked. “Which means I am awesome! Thanks to you two I suppose.” The grin on his lips made me smile also. “But, that’s enough about me. How about you demonstrate me what you were talking about just now?”

Demonstrate? What was he talking about? There was no way of me being able to control more than one ability. And definitely not such a strong one. But I didn’t have time to voice my thoughts. Ryuu nodded and already thought about it. “You just close your eyes and listen to what I say. If this works there will be no doubt about your ability alright?” he asked but because it didn’t seem like he wanted an answer I just closed my eyes. I felt something going around me, touching my fingers, striping my legs, it was the tiger, I was sure about that. Ryuu continued instructing me. “Now think about the tiger, if you want touch it when thinking about it. Be one with the tiger.” What did he mean, be one? How should I make that? Should I ride on it? It’s probably not the way he was talking about. Just when I wanted to ask him he grabbed my hand and continued. “I’ll help you a little with this. Because it’s your first time you probably don’t know how to do it. Think about the tigers eyes, you are trying to see what the tiger sees. Do you see anything yet?” he asked.

I concentrated hard, but his hand holding mine made me nervous and I couldn’t fully occupy my mind just with the tiger. He felt my nervousness and started to brush softly over my backhand with his finger. Strangely the hand which made me nervous calmed me down and I gained back my concentration. I wanted to tell him that this won’t work and he should give up, but right at that moment I suddenly got an image in my head. It was Hiro, but I wasn’t looking through my own eyes, it was the tiger’s eyes! I noticed it from the angle in which I was looking at him. “I see it!” I shouted and heard how Hiro and Ryuu giggled over my enthusiasm. “Yes, that’s it Nao!” Ryuu said, when hearing that in surprise I opened my eyes wide. He said out my name. I thought he didn’t know it, and why was he using it so casually? It gave me a prickling feeling inside of me.

“Hey don’t open your eyes so suddenly!” Hiro scolded me. “Concentrate!”

Oh, right, Hiro was here too. In just a few seconds I totally forgot about his presence. I blushed and closed my eyes. As soon as I closed them I saw the vision of the tiger again.

“Now you have to try to send him in any direction. Try to control him with this first. Think of the direction and he will move.”

I thought about right and the tiger turned to the right. I saw the table where the disinfectants were standing on. When I thought about getting closer to there the tiger moved that direction. The more the tiger listened to my orders, the bigger the headache got. “Oh shit” I heard Hiro saying, right before I fainted.  

Chapter 5 - part four

No one was in the infirmary. The nurse was out like always. Ryuu brought Hiro in and laid him down on one of the beds. I closed the door after him and went to get the bandages and disinfectants. I prepared what could be needed. When I heard a ‘click’ I turned towards the sound. Ryuu locked the door and was sticking something on the doors blurry window. “What are you doing?” I asked. The nurse couldn’t come inside like this.

“Do you want people to see Hiro in this state?” he replied. When walking to me to help me carry the needed utensils.

“But the nurse!” I said. “And what did you stick there?”

“Not even the nurse” he answered and took some of the bandages out of my hand. “And it’s better if you don’t know too much.” You know plenty already” he sighed. He bent over Hiro to check his wounds. He especially checked the one bleeding with a frown on this forehead. it was like he couldn’t believe it’s bleeding. I soflty swept over one of his ‘frozen’ wounds. It suddenly started bleeding. “Ryuu! Blood!”

“What are you doing?” He yelled and came around the bed to check the newly bleeding injury. I flinched because of his loud voice. when he noticed he turned around with regret seen in his face. “I’m sorry. It’s just that I’m worried about him. usually his wounds stay frozen until they are dry enough to stop bleeding.” I didn’t know what he was talking about. Freezing blood? But after I saw his tiger it didn’t seem impossible anymore. But Hiro was having a fever, I remembered. I ran to get some cooling bags to stick on his forehead. when I got them a thought came into my mind, which I said out loud. “can’t it be that his wounds are defreezing cause of his fever?” Ryuu shook his head. “It’s his ability” when my eyes widened in shock he continued. “My tiger is my ability, right? His ability is to freeze and liquidize everything, which can be liquidized. No matter how weak he is feeling, his ability doesn’t suddenly stop working, never!” Again his voice became desperate. I could see how important a friend Hiro was. His worry was obvious.

“Then how come his wound is bleeding?” I asked. But then I noticed myself. Just the wounds I touched bled. Ryuu noticed that I came to a conclusion. “You tell me why. I don’t know.” I walked to another of his frozen wounds and turned to Ryuu. “I am not sure but let me try something.” When I reached out with my hand I stopped right before I touched it, because I had another idea. “Help me out please. You softly touch his wound first!” Ryuu did as I told him. Nothing happened. Then I lifted my hand and put it on his wound, softly, without any force. The wound started bleeding.”

“What the...” Ryuu whispered. “It can’t be...”

I looked at my hand, where I could see Hiro’s blood. This was really strange. I didn’t hurt him right? So why did his wound start to bleed? “It can’t be what?” I asked Ryuu in hope that he knew something. He didn’t answer first, he looked at the wounds and re-started bandaging his friend. After some time passed, which seemed like an hour but probably was just a few minutes, he talked again. “You are a tamer.”

“A what?” I asked. I knew what a tamer was, but I don’t remember being one in any zoo or circus for any animal. He was saying really confusing things.

“A tamer is someone with the ability to influence other abilities, means you” Which explains your recommendation bow”. Now it got even more absurd. Me having an ability? I would have laughed if Ryuu didn’t look this serious. “You can’t mean what you just said.” I replied in shock. He didn’t answer, but finished helping his friend in silence. “What does that have to do with my recommendation?”

He looked me straight into my eyes when answering. “The SA everyone admires are a bunch of recommendation students right? You are the only one not in it. SA stands for special ability. You having a recommendation means that there was a scout at your old school, someone who can sense abilities. But he wasn’t 100 % sure about it, that’s why you are in a normal class, not SA.”

He just told me the answer to THE question everyone wonders about. So that’s what the SA was about. A special ability class. So everyone in this school with a recommendation or just in SA classes had one. I wanted to know more about them. What kind of abilities were they? What do they do with them? Does the SA class get trained by the school? What is the school doing with these SA students? But when thinking up all my questions I remembered my own recommendation. I had a special ability too? Me?  That couldn’t be true. I was an ordinary girl. I could never have one. I probably said the last part out loud, because Ryuu shook his head. “You do have one, you are a tamer, one of the strongest types.” He interrupted himself and watched me kind of surprised. “Maybe even the strongest tamer ever”.  Strongest? Me? I giggled hysterically. This guy was regarding me too high. “What’s a tamer anyway?” I asked when I calmed down.“ 

A Tamer is someone who can influence other abilities. Usually he can just ‘tame’ one type of ability, for example the mental types like mind reading. But you can influence more than one type. Maybe even all kinds.”

Chapter 5 - part three

When walking I thought about what Kuro-sensei said. Now I understood why Ryuu warned me specially. I had a feeling that this teacher tried to find out about Ryuu’s tiger. Even if I wasn’t warned I wouldn’t have said anything. The questioning of this teacher made me feel so uncomfortable that I didn’t trust him. He was too dangerous. While going up the stairs I wondered about this tiger phenomena once again, but it didn’t take long for me to get distracted. When I reached the half of the stairs I heard a ‘thump’ sound from the beginning of the stairs. I looked to where the sound came from and saw someone collapse on the edge. I hurriedly ran down towards the person just to see that it was Hiro. He was unconscious and I saw some blood on his leg. When I turned him around I saw that his shirt was torn and he was covered in more than just one major wound. I grasped for air. I felt something cold under my fingers where I was touching a bloody wound. Why was it cold? Isn’t blood supposed to be warm? Or was he already dying? His body becoming cold? But where I was touching him now was warm, almost hot. When I looked closer, none of his wounds leaked blood. All of the places were icy, as if the wounds were frozen so the bleeding was held back.

“Hiro” I whispered. “Can you hear me?” I didn’t want unwanted attention on him. I tried to get him up, put his arm around my shoulder to stabilize him so that I can help him on the 1^st floor to the infirmary. It was hard to keep him on his feet and he didn’t answer me. Slowly his body was getting hotter. He was getting a really high fever” The wounds blood which I touched before started dripping. So I was right. His wounds were strangely frozen so he won’t lose too much blood. Was he getting weaker or was there a time limit to this condition? I didn’t even go up 2 steps when I heard someone running down the stairs from above. Ryuu, I hoped. The moment I realized this thought I gave myself a mental slap. Why did I hope for him? wasn’t it bad if someone saw Hiro? I held my breathe when I saw the shadow coming nearer. It was Ryuu! Despite knowing that it was bad for other people to notice us, I sighed out of relief. “Why are you here?” He asked in an unfriendly way. I didn’t know how to reply. I was too confused of his coldness. Sometimes he was really nice, then he was damn cold again. What a strange guy. Before a decent answer came out of my mouth he started cursing. “He’s bleeding!” He seemed stunned, as if it was unbelievable.

“Well he has some serious injuries” I said.

“Not that!” he seemed desperate this time. He checked the wound which started bleeding again. I wasn’t sure if I should tell him that it was frozen before.

“That’s strange...” he murmured “just one wound started bleeding” I didn’t know what to say. Everything he said sounded strange to me. Slowly Hiro got heavier. I couldn’t really hold on to him anymore. Right when my legs were about to give in, Ryuu grabbed Hiro, so that I wouldn’t take him down on the ground with me. I landed on my butt. “Ouch.” I rubbed my back. Before Ryuu could comment on that, if he even cared about it, I told him “Let’s bring him to the infirmary, his injuries seem serious!” holding Hiro with one arm he grabbed my arm with his other hand and pulled me up. He nodded lightly but didn’t move. When I just wanted to ask why he’s not going, the tiger appeared. It’s size and his majestic appearance made me hold my breath. Ryuu closed his eyes and the tiger dashed forward, up the stairs. For a few seconds he didn’t move at all. Then suddenly he opened his eyes and stared directly at me. “Now we can go. No one will see us.” So that’s why the tiger appeared. Against my will I got excited. Being around Ryuu was really exciting and interesting. I nodded lightly. Now I noticed that he was still holding my arm. It happened a few times already, him holding me somehow, and each time it felt so natural I didn’t notice it. He immediately let go of it and turned to help Hiro.

Chapter 5 - part two

What was wrong with him? Kicking the table, leaving me here with new riddles! He wants me to keep quiet that I can SEE it, but he doesn’t care about the fact that there IS a tiger? It all seemed seriously strange. And then his teacher, Kuro-sensei! I thought he was pretty nice actually, just too flirty and easy-going, but today he seemed so scary! And Ryuu’s reaction to him wasn’t normal either. He didn’t seem violent, so how come he started kicking stuff? What bothered me most was his question to my recommendation. It was his second time noticing that. Why was it important? But thinking about it wouldn’t help me resolving my questions yet. I had to wait for the next day to find out.

I looked around me and saw the handouts on the table. Right, I had to bring those to the staff room and I had almost no time left for the next class. I hurried out of the room and finished what the teacher asked me to do. When I left the staff room to hurry back to my classroom Kuro-sensei was leaning against the wall near the staff room. I looked around and didn’t see anyone else, neither students nor teachers. I bowed and tried passing him but right when I was beside him he suddenly stepped in front of me. “Hi” he grinned with his flirting smile. I was surprised that he even talked to me. he shouldn’t know me and I didn’t even have any of his classes. I didn’t belong to the group of girls who drooled over him. when he noticed my shock he grinned even broader. “I didn’t mean to scare you” he laughed “I just wanted to talk to the girlfriend of my best student.” He winked but his eyes didn’t seem to smile. Something was off with this guy. He didn’t give me a pleasant feeling at all! I had a weird feeling when facing him. I tried to keep my cool, what Ryuu said made me be careful on how to handle people who face me directly about him. “What’s the problem sensei? I thought we talked about it before.” I hoped I appeared calm on the outside. The more I was together with this teacher the more uneasy I felt. Before he started to talk again, for a moment it seemed like he hesitated. But then he replied: “True, but I am sad that he didn’t tell me he had a girlfriend.”

“Why would a teacher care about his student’s private life?”  replied. He wasn’t expecting me to say something like that, I could see his surprise over the way I answered. I was surprised myself. Usually I am a calm person, never trying to provoke people, but with the situation now I just couldn’t hold back. It’s the chills this guy gave me. When he recovered from my answer he continued his questioning. “Ma...Ryuu”, when he corrected himself with the name I got even more suspicious, “never seemed like a person close to anyone. I was always worried about him not getting alone with anyone and then I saw him talk to you. I was surprised when I saw him together with such a beautiful girl. And in that small room. If another teacher saw you maybe he would have misunderstood and would have given you a punishment. I got curious because I never saw the both of you talk: since when are you a couple?” the more he talked with me the more suspicious I got. This teacher was more than he pretended to be, but I didn’t grasp yet what made him seem so. I tried to avoid the answer to how long we were together because it was possible that he also would ask Ryuu. “Well sensei, if we wanted it to be known to people we wouldn’t have to meet up in cramped places, right?” I tried to imitate Mia as much as possible when talking, because this kind of talk just didn’t suit me. “Anyway classes started and now I’ll be too late, if you’ll excuse me?”

He seemed perplexed about this but nodded. The grin on his face which disappeared while we talked was seen again, but this time it seemed forced. “Just be careful when meeting up from now on” he winked. “Tell your teacher that I stopped you on the way.” With this he turned around and went towards the stairs.

I stood there for a bit, because I didn’t want to follow the teacher immediately. After a few minutes passed I went towards the stairs, which led to the classrooms. To reach the teachers’ staff room I had to go down  to the ground floor. The school’s layout was like the letter ‘U’ surrounded with a big yard. The gym was on the one side of the yard, a field on another. The whole yard looked like a square, just that one corner was missing because of the bushes, but thanks to Sho I found out there was a hidden garden. Other than the teachers’ lounge the library and the student council room, as well as the shoe lockers at the entrance were on the ground floor. Other than the ground floor the school building had three floors and the students were distributed in those along to their years, first floor the first years, and so on. The SA classrooms were on one end of the building, separated from all the other classrooms, which were near each other. Empty classrooms and scientific rooms and one stuff room were on each floor, the infirmary was just on the first floor.