Chapter Three: Shun Kaido, AKA The Jet-Black Wings

WALKING TO SCHOOL IN THE MORNING WAS a tad bit more annoying than usual which was due to the fact that a blue-haired, eighth grad minded boy had joined the pair of superpowered teens on their walk. Unfortunately, there was another weirdo who had latched themselves onto Kusuo and, by association, Akari. Unlike Nendo, Kaido Shun wasn't completely stupid which meant that Kusuo could read his thoughts, which he wished wasn't true. All Kaido ever thinks about is how he's the "Jet-Black Wings'' and about the Dark Reunion, an evil organization after him. It was extremely annoying.

Akari didn't mind Kaido all that much, as long as he didn't go on and on about his secret power and his destiny. He was tolerable to a degree. Though he was just like everyone else who never noticed her and mistook her for a shadow. However, she did find amusement from his reaction to when he did notice. She found it quite cute.

Now, Akari sat in her seat all the way in the back of the classroom, completely unseen by just about everyone, including the teacher. It was in the corner of the class almost completely in the shadows which Akari appreciated so much. No one bothered her when she wanted to take a nap in the back of the class or if she was annoyed. It was a little piece of paradise for her. Something that Kusuo envied quite a bit. 

"Hey did you hear the news?" An unnamed male student asked, grabbing Kaido's attention from across the room. "A poisonous snake is on the loose!"

Another student, a boy with boring brown hair gasped, "Seriously? That's so dangerous!"

"Are you sure it's loose?" Kaido walked up to them, as cool as he could with his school jacket around his shoulders like a cape. He had a faux sense of confidence around him that only ever comes out when he acts as his hero persona, Jet-Black Wings. His fantasy went as far as him wrapping up both of his arms every day in red bandages to "keep his powers from overtaking him" or something silly like that. The mind of an eighth-grader, I'm telling you. "Sounds like another Dark Reunion's lie. But they can't fool the Jet-Black Wings! Someone must have released that snake!"

"Wait a minute!" A third unnamed and unimportant student shouted, "You know who did this?"

"Did this Jet-Black Wings dude do it?" The other boy asked in confusion.

"No!" Kaido called out, "I'm the Jet-Black Wings! A secret society called the Dark Reunion is behind it! And this is the first step in their Human Sorting Plan!"

'Dark Reunion!' The other students thought to themselves in shock before rolling their eyes and walking away from the self-proclaimed superhero. 'Never heard of them. What a waste of time.'

Kaido just scoffed lightly at their dismissal of the dangerous secret society. He slides over to Kusuo with his arms crossed, trying to pretend like he wasn't upset at the other students ignoring him. "I guess it's up to us superheroes. Right, Saiki?"

'Whatever.' Kusuo rolled his eyes, 'Of course, he doesn't know I'm actually a psychic. It's all just part of his fantasy.'

'At least he can talk to you,' Akari huffed and pushed some of her hair out of her vibrant eyes while still sitting at her desk across the room. She gazed at the pair with a small bored uptick of her lips. 'He can barely even form a sentence when he does notice me.' Akari doesn't like having attention on her, though there are times that she would like to be treated as a normal person. A simple "hello" or "how are you?" from someone could go a long way. The only ones who do that are the Saikis, her own family, and Nendo, which is nice and all, but she would like to have someone other than them acknowledge her without her having to go out of her way to get them to see her. Though when Kaido does see her, he is unable to speak to girls and it is so painful at times. However, Akari found it entertaining and cute at times.

"Saiki, tell me what you think. I don't like this one bit. That snake, which I have named the Murder Dragoram Snake, is probably no ordinary snake!" Kaido said passionately, still going on about his fantasy narrative about him being a hero.

'That's quite the dramatic name.' Kusuo commented which caused Akari to giggle softly across the room.

Kaido continued, "This Murder Dragoram Snake is probably a dangerous monster created in a top-secret Dark Reunion lab."

'That's all speculation.'

"It's up to us." He said heroically, "We must save humanity from..."

Suddenly, another student burst through the door, cutting the "Jet-Black Wings" off, "Hey, they caught the snake!"

Kaido froze. A different student sighed in relief, "Thank goodness! Where was it?"

"In front of the gate. Apparently it was nearly dead," he explained.

'No way!' The Jet-Black Wings mentally gasped, 'Could there be others with powers like our own out there? Is my theory about Watanabe-chan true!'

Kusuo eyed him with agitation in his violet irises, 'You're what about Watanabe?' 

The students continued to discuss the now nearly dead snake. "Why was it almost dead?"

"They say some elementary school kids were messing with it."

Akari cringed at the mental image of a couple of young kids using the poor snake as a whip. A horrible and painful way to go, humiliating as well. Kusuo did the same with a raised eyebrow, 'Who knew the Murder Dragoram Snake was so weak?'

"Guess the Dark Reunion isn't a threat after all." A student called out to Kaido who seemed to be hurt that his fantasy had broken slightly.

"Careful, now!" A boy called out sarcastically, "This is a secret society we're talking about!"

A girl laughed along with the teasing, "Watch yourself or you will be sorted."

Kaido huffed and made sure that his eyes were hidden by his hair. Akari frowned at the sight. "Go ahead, laugh while you can. It's the calm before the storm. They're coming for us. I tried to warn you..." It was obvious that he was trying to keep the tears from coming out of his baby blue eyes. Sure, Kaido could be a bit much and quite childish, but there was no need to bully him over it, Akari thought. It was a harmless game that he liked to play with himself, he wasn't hurting anyone while doing it so Akari thought that he should be left alone. As much as she hated dealing with people and being noticed by them sometimes, she didn't like seeing their feelings hurt like this.

She finally stood up from her shadowy paradise and glided over to her psychic friend. Her small figure weaving through the desks and other students who shivered as a cold wind brushed over them. She crossed her arms and tilted her head. 'He's going to cry, isn't he.'

'Yup.' Kusuo simply answered.

Akari sighed with a small, sad breath, 'I almost feel bad for him... almost.'

Kusuo was then struck with a premonition and suddenly stood up abruptly from his desk. Akari watched as he started to walk out of the classroom with a raised eyebrow. 'We should go too.' He barely looked in Akari's direction but knew that she would come with him. She truly is a shadow the more you think about it. Always in the background sticking to places where someone could barely see her and hiding behind the pink-haired psychic like he was a wall and following him in nearly every step he took. Why couldn't he have been blessed with the amazing power that she had? The little to no effort that she put into being completely inconspicuous was a trait he envied.

'Huh? Why?' Akari mentally asked as she followed after her one and only friend like a lost puppy. They walked towards the bathrooms where Kusuo walked right in. Knowing that she couldn't be seen walking into the boy's bathroom, Akari turned herself into a shadow and slipped through the door completely unnoticed as she followed Kusuo into a stall. Now, she didn't usually do anything like this. So don't think she is some kind of pervert or anything! There was no way that she would ever abuse her powers to do something as idiotic and disgusting as this. The only reason she ever did this was when Kusuo told her to follow him in there which was not as often as you might think. Please, we all know that neither of them are like that perverted medium that has yet to show his stupid face in this fanfic.

So now, Kusuo sat on the toilet seat while Akari hovered in her shadowy form on one of the walls of the stall. Her glittering yellow eyes were the only real visible attribute to her which gave her quite a menacing appearance. In this form, her eyes seemed to sharpen in a seemingly dangerous way. The narrowed yellow eyes appeared to be those of a cat as they glowed through the waves of shadows that rolled off of her. If someone were to see her like this, they may think she was some kind of ghost or demon. The only one who didn't fear her like this was Kusuo. Though that was because he was far too overpowered to be frightened by a shadow manipulator who could barely cause anyone harm.

She gazed down at him as her form gracefully floated against the wall. Her sharp eyes watched as her friend crossed his eyes behind his glasses and used his clairvoyance to see what was happening in their classroom. The yellow-eyed shadow wasn't exactly sure what was going on in her classroom, though she suspected it was bad from the distant screams coming from down the hall. 

Kusuo watched as the students in their class screamed and freaked out about the snake that was now slithering around the floor. He couldn't help but feel a little bit of satisfaction at the fact that they were being tormented after bullying Kaidou. Kusuo didn't care all that much about how Kaidou was treated, however, he knew for a fact that Akari did. So he knew that he wouldn't hear her complain about this all that much after school. As much as he tolerated Akari, she became a tad bit more annoying when she was angered and complaining about something. 'I saw that whole thing coming thanks to my powers.'

'What's happening?' Akari mentally asked him as she stared at her silent friend. She had no idea what was currently happening and was quite curious.

Kusuo uncrossed his purple eyes and glanced quickly up at her, 'There's a snake in the classroom.'

'Oh, really?' She asked in surprise as her invisible eyebrow raised. 'Quite strange how there happened to be two snakes loose at school.'

Akari still had no idea what was happening and Kusuo had yet to narrate to her what was occurring. It was slightly frustrating, she should have just stayed in the classroom. Not like anyone would have noticed her anyway. The one thing she did notice was the sound of Kaido crying in the stall right next to them. If it was one thing that Akari hated the most, it was people crying. It was such an uncomfortable thing to witness someone crying, in her opinion. She never knew what to do in that situation. A few moments pass with nothing for Akari besides the fact that the horrid crying from Kaidou had stopped.

As far as she knew, chaos was still ensuing in their classroom. Though at the moment, Kaidou had just courageously stepped in front of one of his female classmates to protect her from the snake that had lunged at her. Akari watched as Kusuo's eyes flashed brightly, signifying that he was using his powers for something. For what, she didn't know. Once again, she was stuck in the dark in this situation, and this wasn't the kind of dark that she liked.

Kusuo eventually stood up and started to exit the stall to leave the bathroom. Akari followed after him with her figure flowing against the floor and walls. When they got back in the hall and made sure there was no one around, Akari reformed back into her physical form and looked up at her friend with wide eyes. 'You took care of it?'

The pink-haired psychic sighed. He already knew what she was thinking at the moment, he didn't even need his mind-reading for it. Just because he was forced to "help" people from time to time, didn't mean that he considered them friends in any regard. Akari herself was probably the only person that he could possibly consider a friend. Though even then he still wouldn't say it out loud. He glanced at her from the corner of his eye as they entered back into their classroom. The students were still celebrating the miraculous lighting-like powers that Kaidou may or may not have possessed to kill the snake. 'As far as everyone else knows the Jet-Black Wings took care of the snake.'

Akari knew that as much as Kusuo liked to say he didn't care, he always does something to contradict that. He usually ended up helping someone he deemed annoying in some way or another. He looked after people who he would say that aren't his friends. He's just too tsundere to admit that he has actual friends. 'Hmm, and for some reason, you say you don't care.'

'Care about an idiot like Kaidou?' Kusuo's eyebrow twitched at the notion she was trying to insinuate. 'Of course not.'

Akari just giggled. The hauntingly pleasant sound just ticked off Kusuo a little bit more already hearing her thoughts about how she doubted him. It didn't matter, because he doesn't care what happens to these people. They were just annoyances that he had to suffer through on a daily basis. He only looked out to make sure that they weren't harmed so that there weren't any problems that could arise from them getting hurt. There was no way that he did any of this because they were friends or because it upset Akari to a degree. It's not like he cared how she felt about things like this. Why would he?

Later in the day, in their next class, Kaido now sat lazily in his seat with a smug smirk on his face. He had already been causing a bit more trouble because of his new confidence in his "powers". Their teacher stood over the blue-haired boy with a scowl, "I'm not liking this new attitude of yours, Kaido."

"Watch your tone." Kaido said sassily, "Unless you wish to be hunted by the Judgment Knights of Thunder."

"Counselor's room, now." The teacher ordered him, to the poor boy's dismay.

'That guy is hopeless.' Akari and Kusuo thought in unison while shaking their heads at him.