A sunny morning starts another week at the VCC, with classes beginning shortly. Leaving the dorm building, Rebecca brought her backpack forward - it was quite large for something carrying books, a duffle bag more than anything. Her roommate Tabitha joined her as the other students walked by, curious why she stopped, but with other questions as well. 

"Why do you have such an unusually bulbous bookbag?" Tabitha questioned. "Not that there's anything wrong with having plenty of space, but I wouldn't have guessed you were a book fantanatic as well." 

"Nope~" 

Rebecca whipped out a longboard and hopped on, moving a foot forward on the ground to drift forward. Tabitha rushed to her side, thankfully able to keep up since she was not moving any faster than someone who was walking. 

"Is that actually allowed on school property?" Tabitha questioned. "I mean, we're not technically in a location where skateboarding would be prohibited but in the event you bring that into class I can't imagine the faculty would approve of--" 

"I'm not gonna skate in the haaalls." Rebecca stopped her with a smile. "If it's taken away then how could I skate at all?" 

As they made their way down the stone path leading to the school, Tabitha couldn't help but notice they were - at this point - behind most students on their way to class, but she estimated that they would still be there in a reltively acceptable amount of time with this pace. However, Rebecca's smooth and subtle tilts to her stance to swerve her way forward were also... oddly mesmerizing. 

In the time that she'd known Rebecca, it was amazing that she could even walk a straight line since she lacked balance and was so impulsive and clumsy. Yet this appeared to be something she was actually good at - how? 

"'How' what?" Rebecca asked. She did a quick spin back on the board, then used her one foot to twirl the board around to face herself forward again. 

"Oh, sorry, just thinking aloud." Tabitha realized. "It's just, I've never seen you skate before - how did you get so good at it?" 

"Good?" Rebecca turned to face her, putting a heel towards the front to make the board lean while still skating towards the school. "I dunno. I've been doing this for like ten years - my mom just sent the board here recently since I forgot to pack it." 

"You have a good sense of balance after all." She remarked. "Amazing!" 

"You bet I am~" 

. . . 

At her own dorm, Glee was tapping her foot as she waited outside of her roommate's door, then cracked it open out of impatience. Peeking inside, she saw Natsumi slipping on her shoes now. 

"What are you doing?" 

"Getting dressed." Natsumi said simply. 

"The answer was actually 'taking it way too slow'." Glee snapped. "You haven't even got your books together." 

As Glee approached the small bookshelf near Natsumi's bed, she grabbed Glee's arm before it could touch anything. 

"Don't mess with the order." Natsumi said with a hint of caution. 

Backing up, Glee had a hand on the hip with her backpack slung behind her. Natsumi kneeled down and touched the book on the far left, then moved right a few times to pick the two books needed for her classes. As she continued this method, Glee started to piece it together. 

"Oh, my bad. That's how you tell which books you need." Glee said timidly, remembering Natsumi's lack of sight. "Still, we should get to our classes as early as possible so we don't miss a thing!" 

Glee closed the door to their dorm once Natsumi came out. 

"You're not normally this active on Mondays." Natsumi remarked. "Usually you complain about the weekend being over until Wednesday." 

"I got an inside source that tells me there'll be a surprise match for anyone in Science, History, Fitness and Advance Moves." Glee told her. "The teachers'll ask some kind of question at the start of class and the one who answers right gets entered into a one-on-one match with one of the other three." 

"Oh." 

"Cool, right? Sneaky, too..." Glee started to pick up her pace in spite of Natsumi. "So get a move on, we've only got one chance!" 

. . . 

Tabitha eyed Rebecca's duffle bag now that the longboard was stowed away, realizing it was pretty well hidden there. She found a seat near the front, motioning Rebecca to join her. Meanwhile, Glee entered the class when it was nearly full. She tried to find a seat near the front row, ending up relatively close to the front. 

Finally, the teacher - Mr. Crothers - entered the class. He adjusted his coat and walked to the front of his desk, leaning against it casually. 

"Morning, all!" Mr. Crothers said, getting the students to quiet down slightly. "Hope you've all been asking yourselves some important scientific questions as you get ready for school." He motioned to his white tie, which had a black circle on it. "I know I did - there's an answer that's on the tip of my tongue, but I just can't think of it. Can anyone tell me what happens when two neutron stars... collide?" He opened his hands, mimicking an explosion. 

That was it. The subject of neutron stars was relatively unexplored in Crothers' class so far, but Glee raised her hand and hopped in her seat excitedly to get his attention. 

"Go for it." Mr. Crothers pointed her way. 

"When two neutron stars collide, they EXPLODE into dust and debris goes all over the place!" 

"You may be thinking of asteroids there, Clarissa." Mr. Crothers chuckled. "Not a bad guess considering we're talking about collission, but stars aren't made of anything that would leave debris." 

Glee grimaced slightly at her obvious mistake and slid back down. Tabitha raised her hand, priding herself on the front row seat she got. As his eyes moved towards the front, he found himself focused on Rebecca beside her, noticing she wasn't paying attention and was in fact messing with her hair. It seemed that a bit of one of her long ponytails was not tied properly, so she was adjusting it to keep it from coming undone later - such is the plight of someone with long hair like hers. 

"Rebecca, you look like you're spacing out." Mr. Crothers joked. "Do YOU know what happens when those two objects collide?" 

Rebecca blinked, pausing her hair work. "They... make a hole and screw things up?" 

"Seriously?" Tabitha muttered. 

"That's one way of wording it." Mr. Crothers said, to Tabitha's surprise. "Yes - it's believed that a black hole is formed from neutron stars, and THAT will be one of the subjects we'll be learning more about today." 

"I wasn't listening." Rebecca told the staring Tabitha. 

. . . 

It was once class was starting to let out that students were taking their last trip down the hall for today before heading out. As they walked past the door for combat arrangements, Tabitha took a moment to join the students who were eyeing the board of future matches - this was a routine thing for many who were interested in who'd be fighting over the week. 

Rebecca made her way to the door leading outside and walked down the steps, with Tabitha rushing to join her side. 

"Hey, I feel like a slice of hot'n'ready pizza, how 'bout you?" Rebecca asked her. 

"Hey, did you see the match board?" Tabitha asked, "You're gonna be fighting a Sophomore on Friday!" 

"Oh neat." Rebecca said simply. "Pizza, though, right?" 

Rebecca got out her longboard, scooting forward for a couple of steps before rolling along in her calm but swervy manner. Tabitha kept up beside her. 

"I just thought you should be a little more concerned considering you'll be up against someone whose combat experience is one year your senior and you're at a type disadvantage!" Tabitha blurted out. "This is the kind of match that tests students moving to the next grade and you haven't been around long enough to be prepared for that kind of challenge." 

"Hey, it's okay." Rebecca turned her body, facing Tabitha as she skated. "One lil match won't affect my grade." 

"It just seems like you're not taking it very seriously, you should be training--" 

Rebecca suddenly skidded her board to a halt, which stopped Tabitha. Bending down to meet Tabitha's face, Rebecca had a blank expression - one that, as best as she could tell, was her way of putting on a serious face. 

"Pizza now, training later." Rebecca paused, thinking about what she just said. "By which I mean tomorrow. That sound good?" 

"Fair enough..." 

. . . 

The late afternoon was setting in when Glee returned to her dorm. She'd sufficiently worked out until she let out her frustrations over today's blunder and walked over to the couch where Natsumi was sitting, listening to the TV. 

"You know, I feel pretty good now." Glee said. "Know why?" She leaned on the couch. 

"You burned something out of frustration?" 

"I didn't think of that." Glee paused. "Better, though: Looks like you must've aced a question since you're on the list of upcoming matches, so one of us got in!" 

"Oh yeah." Natsumi remembered. 

"And I was thinking it'd be cool to at least see my favorite roomie fight." She continued. "I don't think I've had the pleasure - what's your costume like?" 

Natsumi went to the bedroom, with Glee following. Underneath her bed, Natsumi pulled out one of three small flat baskets, which had prepared outfits in them. The middle one was her combat attire, consisting of a standard jacket with her emblem. 

"That's it?" Glee asked. "That's, like, what all the small-time casuals wear." 

Natsumi shrugged, "I didn't apply a combat costume when I enrolled." 

"I guess that makes sense." Glee said with a conflicted tone. "Hey, how about I help design one? If we start now and submit it tomorrow, it'll probably be sent over in time for your match." 

"Sure?" 

"Lemme get some paper - I promise this will look awesome."