"How am I late for school again!”

Along the sidewalks of a metropolitan city, a boy scurried towards the bus stop. His hair stood on its ends, his uniform was untidy, his shoes were undone, and his bag flailed behind him. In his mouth was a piece of toast clad in jelly that hang off the ends of his canines.

“Damn it, why did my alarm clock run out of battery?" the boy complained while he chewed on his toast.

From a distance, he spotted a bus stop towards his destination. As the bus was about to leave, he quickly sprinted to catch up to it.

“Stop! Stop! Stop!” the boy screamed as he raised his hand.

The female bus driver sported a bun hairstyle, as well as a blue uniform with white accents. She suddenly stopped the bus after seeing the high school student in the right-wing mirror. The boy caught up with the bus, slammed change into the receiver, and took a heavy breather.

“Kazuma.” the bus driver greeted bluntly.

“How many times has this been now?”

“I’m really sorry!” Kazuma panted as he bowed respectfully.

She sighed deeply.

“Make sure you’re on time next time ok? You’re lucky I didn’t leave yet.”

“Thank you, Miss Akira. It won’t happen again.”

“Yeah, yeah. Get in.”

Kazuma got on the bus and sat in the back seat as he sighed with relief.

Ding dong, ding dong. The school bell rang by the time Kazuma was sprinting through the empty hallways. He quickly opened the classroom door, and his female homeroom teacher, Kuroki Tomika, was already taking roll. She wore glasses, a dark blue suit, and a skirt with high heels. Everyone looked at Kazuma when he entered the classroom.

"You’re two seconds late Saitou.” Tomika as she fixed her glasses. She clicked the pen in her hand and wrote a side note on the attendance sheet.

He slumped on his knees.

(“I-it’s not possible…”) he mumbled as he tried to catch his breath.

Tomika fixed her glasses.

“Saitou, please don’t interrupt the class any further. Just go sit down.”

While Kazuma walked to the back of the classroom, he could hear some of the students that whispered to each other even after he sat down at his desk. Tomika cleared her throat, and the students directed their attention towards her.

“Now that class has begun, I assume all of you have your homework. Please pass them forward."

Everyone else had begun passing up their assignments forward while Kazuma was rummaging through his messenger bag over and over, hoping that he would find his missing homework.

(“Not here, not here, not here…”)he muttered to himself.

He scratched his head trying to remember where he had put his homework. Suddenly, it struck him that he had left his homework on his desk at home. Since he was so caught up trying to catch the bus, it never occurred to him that he had forgotten to get grab his homework.

(“No, no, no… not again…”)

Tomika instinctively knew the situation as soon as she saw Kazuma put his head down on his desk. She sighed as she grabbed the stack of papers that were being passed up to the front of the room.

The class continued as the other students were paying close attention to Tomika’s lecture. On the other hand, Kazuma was looking out the window as he spaced out. He sighed while he still thought about how this day could have turned out if he had caught the bus earlier or if he had remembered to bring his homework.

("Hey, Kazuma.") a voice whispered to him.

The murmur of his name had barely reached his ears, which caused him to snap out of his daydream. He turned around and scanned the classroom to find the source of the sound.

To his dismay, the voice came from Yusuke Makoto, who sat two seats from his right. He wore a blue beanie that covered his disheveled hair and wore the same signature school uniform. Kazuma groaned at the sight of his classmate giving him a thumbs up. Meanwhile, from the seat to the right of Makoto was Akimoto Shinji. The stoic boy overshadowed Makoto and responded with a lukewarm wave at Kazuma.

Soon, after school came along. Everyone except for Kazuma, Makoto, and Shinji had left the classroom.

"So, you didn't do homework too?" Kazuma asked as he turned to look at both of them.

Makoto snickered as he crossed his arms. With one hand, he pointed at Kazuma mischievously as he rubbed his chin with the other.

"Of course."

“Why are you saying that like you’re proud of it?” Kazuma sighed as he slumped on his desk.

Shinji got up from his seat and patted him on the shoulder empathically.

“…It’ll be okay Kazuma, you were just unlucky. Misfortunes happen.”

“But this wasn’t an accident! I really did it this time! I just forgot it at home… after I finished it at three in the morning… More importantly, why are you here Shinji? I get Makoto is here, but you’re usually the responsible one out of all of us.”

“Heh heh yeah—Hey wait a minute! What’s that supposed to mean?” Makoto argued.

The three friends then suddenly heard the door open, and Tomika cleared her throat. They stopped their discussion and turned their attention towards her.

"You three are free to go."

The students looked at each other confused as they had hoped that they would have received some sort of punishment for not turning in a homework assignment.

(Why did she have to make it sound like we're being released from jail?) Kazuma's expression soured as he thought to himself.

“…Sensei.” Shinji raised his hand.

“Yes, Shinji?”

"…Does that mean there is no penalty this time? You’re not going to giving us remedial lessons? No after-school punishment?"

(“Shinji, you dumbass! Are you crazy? Why would you ask that?”) Makoto whispered.

"Fortunately for you three, I’m not so cruel like other teachers. And because I’m in such a good mood today, I decided to give you guys a free pass. You all can turn in your homework to me tomorrow."

"Thank you! I'll work hard this time!" Makoto cheered with his arm around Kazuma’s shoulder.

“That's what you said last time.” Shinji and Kazuma both said.

“And you better not screw it up this time either.” Kazuma added.

Tomika put her hands on her hips.

"Anyways, get out of here, before I change my mind. I'm only giving you ten seconds to leave this classroom."

She began to count down out loud, and the three friends quickly sprinted for the door. She sighed as soon they were out of her sight. Just as soon as she turned around, a hand patted on her shoulder.

“Yo, Kuroki~.” Akira greeted.

“Ah. Hello Riko.” Tomika greeted back as she fixed her glasses.

“I didn’t expect you to be here this early. I thought your shift didn’t end till later.”

“Well, today my boss let me off early. So because of a day’s hard work, I decided that we should go out today.” Akira smiled.

“…I see.”

Akira stared at Tomika as she awaited the answer to her invitation. Tomika sighed as she put her hand on her forehead.

“Fine, let me go get ready first.” she said as she closed the door behind her.

The efforts of the three friends soon got them to the school's front entrance. The haze of the afternoon light had never felt more victorious. The three friends split off at the intersection of the road. They all said their goodbyes and the two split off from Kazuma, heading down the opposite direction. While making his way home, Kazuma’s stomach began to growl. Until now, he didn't notice how hungry he was. After all, he didn't have any time this morning to pack lunch.

Conveniently, there was a convenience store that was fifteen minutes away from the school. Kazuma went in and bought a chicken sandwich and some gum with the limited money that he had in his wallet. After buying the items, he exited the store with a plastic bag in hand. Kazuma hesitated as he slightly peered into his wallet.

(“I only have forty zeons left…”) Kazuma mumbled to himself.

He sighed and then looked over at the vending machine that was in front of the convenience store.

“I think have enough for the bus. Might as well buy a soda.”

Beep. Beep. Kazuma pressed a couple of buttons and inserted ten zeons from his cash card into the vending machine. After a brief moment of rumbling, the machine spat out a soda. As he squatted to grab his soda, Kazuma noticed a dark fabric that was on the ground. He cautiously raised his head and was face to face with a small girl that was oddly dressed and sleeping against the vending machine. It took a moment to register what he was looking at, and when he did, he jumped back.

“Wha—a girl?”

He scanned around him to see if anyone had noticed the sleeping girl, but people kept walking and minding their own business.

Kazuma turned back to the girl that was sleeping peacefully.

“You’re kidding, right? How can you even sleep with all of this noise?”

He couldn’t stand to just leave her here, so he tried to wake her up.

“Hello?” Kazuma called out.

He waved his hand in front of the sleeping girl’s face to grab her attention, but there was no response. However, her nose started to twitch a little bit, and seconds after, the girl was suddenly invigorated by the smell of food.

“F-food?!” The girl quickly asked as her mouth watered.

At first, Kazuma was confused upon seeing her wanting gaze but quickly realized that she wanted food from his bag. Just when Kazuma pulled out the chicken sandwich which radiated an aromatic smell of deliciousness, the girl was immediately fixated on the sandwich.

“Uh, do you want it?” he asked.

“R-really?” she gulped.

“Uh, yeah. Sure.”

The girl’s eyes twinkled as Kazuma handed the sandwich to her. She tore open the plastic bag and scarfed it down.

(Well, there goes my lunch…) he thought to himself.

Kazuma sighed as he unwrapped the chocolate he had bought at the convenience store. As she scarfed down his lunch, he noticed that the girl was fairly young and oddly dressed. She had blond hair that fell down to her hips and wore a black and white dress, along with high knee socks, and round brown shoes.

The girl stopped eating for a moment and looked up at Kazuma. He wondered why she was looking at him, but his stomach suddenly growled. He frowned as he held his stomach.

“I guess the candy isn’t enough…”

The blond girl held out her half-eaten chicken sandwich in front of him.

“Do you want some?” she asked.

He shook his head.

“No, it’s fine. You can have it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah… just take it.” he groaned.

The girl beamed at Kazuma.

“T-thank you!”

“You’re welcome…”

(That was supposed to be my chicken sandwich, damn it…)

Kazuma stood up and looked around as the girl happily continued to eat the chicken sandwich.

(How long has she even been here? Heck, but how has no one even noticed her sleeping near the vending machine?)

“So, uh, are you lost?” Kazuma asked.

She looked around for a while and her expression seemed to tell him that she was unfamiliar with the area.

(So I guess she’s not from here then…)

“Do you at least remember your name?”

“Alice. My name is Alice.” She said as she looked up at Kazuma.

“Alice? So you’re a foreigner—”

He paused mid-sentence for a moment.

“Wait… you can understand me?” Kazuma asked as he pointed at himself.

“Of course I can.” Alice nodded her head.

“Well if you know that and you can communicate with someone like me… your English must be pretty good then. But then how’d you ended up here? Anyways, I think you should get some help. Wait here.”

Just when Kazuma had turned around, Alice quickly tugged on his shirt.

“Where is this place?”

“You don’t know? It’s–”

The alarm on his phone began to buzz in his pocket.

“Oh crap! It’s this late? Sorry, I have to get to the bus stop. Otherwise, I’ll have to wait another hour for the bus. But I can’t just leave you here like this, I’d have to stay with you until we can find a police officer. But then…”

There wasn’t any time to waste. He had to decide quickly.

“Ah, screw it.” Kazuma said as he quickly grabbed her hand.

“I don’t usually let random strangers do this, but in the meantime, you can stay at my place. But you gotta leave in the morning.”

Alice withdrew her hand from his grasp.

“Are you sure?”

“What do you mean?”

Alice looked down as she twiddled with her index fingers. Kazuma needed to get to the bus stop quickly, otherwise, he’d have to wait for a whole hour for the next bus. He had to decide now.

“Look, don’t mind the small details. You can stay as long as you like if you want. Now come on.”

Kazuma walked ahead of her and Alice quickly followed.

“Thank you… um…”

“Kazuma. Saitou Kazuma.”

“Thank you, Kazuma. You’re really nice, offering food and a place to stay to a random stranger.”

Kazuma scratched his head.

“Well, who even leaves a girl alone sleeping on the street anyway?”

Alice covered her mouth, trying not to laugh.

Kazuma ignored her laughing and started to leave her behind.

“Ah, hey wait up! Kazuma!”

The two of them made it to the bus stop on time and then they both walked the rest of the way. Kazuma’s house was a small two-story building that was surrounded by brick walls and a metal gate. The nameplate next to the gate read ‘Saitou’. Kazuma opened the gate, unlocked the house door, and took off his shoes. Alice did the same and followed him inside.

Inside the house had a large living room, a green couch with a coffee table in front of it, and a flat-screen TV. Next to the living room was a small kitchen with a counter, and a dining table that could hold four people. There were also stairs that led up to the second story which had two bedrooms and a bath.

Alice looked around she beamed with happiness as she started to inspect every object in the house. Kazuma didn’t mind at all as he put his things on the dining table, went to the kitchen and grabbed a cup of water and filled it with hot water, and put a teabag in it. While Kazuma was making dinner for himself, he looked over and saw Alice sitting down quietly on the couch.

“Do you want anything?”

Alice shook her head politely.

“No thank you.”

Kazuma brought his food and the cup of tea over to the living room, placed them on the coffee table and sat down next to Alice on the couch, and turned on the TV. When it turned on, there was a show that displayed a motorcycle-riding superhero.

“Man, are channels showing previous episodes this late? That’s surprising.” Kazuma commented while he chewed his food.

On the other hand, Alice was mesmerized when the anime started.

“W-what is this?” she asked as if it was her first time watching television.

“Is this your first time watching TV?” Kazuma chuckled.

“What this ‘tee-vee’?”

“Are… Are you being serious right now?”

Alice nodded her head.

He disregarded that piece of conversation and The two of them both watched the episode together. In the middle of the episode, Kazuma looked up at the wall clock. It read 7:30 pm.

“Alright, I think that’s enough procrastinating for one day, time to do homework.”

Kazuma quickly grabbed his empty bowls and cup from the coffee table and went to the kitchen to put it in the sink. From the dining room, Kazuma grabbed his messenger bag to take out his school work and began studying.

“Homework? What’s that?” Alice asked.

“Hm? Homework is the stuff school gives you every day.”

“…School?”

(Please tell me this is a joke…) Kazuma thought to himself while he stared at Alice.

Alice became silent and didn’t ask any more questions. She frowned and looked down at her lap while she twiddled with her fingers.

“Sorry…I don’t remember much, so it’s hard for me to keep up with the situation right now.”

“You mean… memory loss?”

She nodded.

“You could say that, but not to the point where I can’t remember anything about myself. I still remember where I was from and my name, but I just don’t remember anything about the past few months.”

“That’s weird. Do you know how you got here though?” Kazuma asked.

“That is…” Alice hesitated mid-sentence.

Kazuma scratched his head and sighed.

“It’s fine,” he said.

“Huh?”

“You don’t have to say anything. It’s not really my business to know anyways.”

He turned around and went back to the dinner table to do his homework without bothering Alice any further.

A few hours later, Kazuma had finished his homework. He yawned as he stretched his arms and back.

“Finally done.”

He looked at the clock that read 11:40 pm and then looked over at Alice, who was asleep on the couch. Kazuma put away his school things, got up from his chair, and had turned off the TV.

“I guess I should go to sleep too. Ah, but before that, I have to change my alarm clock batteries. Damn alarm didn’t wake me up this morning…”

From afar, there was a hooded cloaked figure that stood watch over from the roof of the next house. As he loomed over Kazuma’s front window, strands of his vert hair swayed across his canary eyes. From there, he saw Kazuma putting a blanket over Alice and turning off the lights.

“I’ve found you.” he said.