I stared at the wrinkled paper clenched in my hands. The huge red "F" obscured everything
that was scrawled messily upon it the day before. It definitely wasn't my first time receiving that grade, but It wouldn't be my last either. Despondent at my failure, I groaned inwardly before folding it up, ready to toss it into the trash bin.

Before I could throw it, someone else took it from my grasp. Then I heard a snarky laugh that I was too familiar with.

"Another one, Nakamura?" a girl's voice said, "God, you really are helpless."

I gritted my teeth. "Shut up, Claire."

Claire ignored my retort, passing my chemistry test over to her right for her friends to see.

I rolled my eyes and slumped against my seat, trying to push away the sniggering behind my back.

Right when I was deciding whether my fist would look good on her face, Mr. Snow walked over to his desk and cleared his throat.

Mr. Snow was a bald, lanky man, and one of the newer teachers in the faculty. His class consisted of long, boring speeches about his love for veganism and rulers snapping against desks.

"Now, I'm sure that not all of you got the grade you wanted, but this was one of the highest scoring class averages this year. Give yourself a pat on the back for that," Mr. Snow said.

I've already established a fact that I was an idiot, so his speech didn't affect me as much as it should've.

"I'm sure Ethan was the one who dragged that average down," Claire whispered, causing more snickers to accumulate behind me. I swivled around and glared at her. She sat lazily across her desk, a small smirk plastered across her face.

"Mr. Nakamura, turn around and pay attention," Mr. Snow ordered. I reluctantly turned back, my hands crossing across my chest.

The class droned on. I stared blankly at Mr. Snow's powerpoint presentation about electrochemistry. The words projected from his monotonous voice flew over my head as the words on the slides jumbled together into a potent mixture of confusion and frustration. Eventually, I ended up stairing at the history club advertisement on the wall next to the door, which, unfortunately, was when Mr. Snow caught me.

"Mr. Nakamura," he said, "Since you seem very well educated on the concept of electrochemistry, would you mind presenting some of that knowledge to your class?"

I looked at him, startled, which was what he apparently preceived as a "yes".

"Let's start with the basics, then," he said, "What provides electrical contact between the anode and cathode solutions and also regulates their charge flow?"

He might as well be speaking Greek or something. "I don't know, sir," I replied.

Mr. Snow's gaze was then directed at someone behind him. "Yes, Claire?"

"It's the salt bridge, sir," rang out Claire's voice, proudly.

Mr. Snow beamed. "Very good!" He turned back to me, his expression indifferent, "See me after class, Mr. Nakamura." And with that, he continued on with his presentation.

When the clock struck 12:00, I walked up to his disorganized desk.

"I'll be right with you," Mr. Snow said, "I'm just going to get a drink." He then left me to the solitude of the empty classroom.

Bored, I examined the surface of his desk; papers and pencils were splattered across the table. My eyes tuned out the jumbled materials to focus on something underneath the class roster. It was a stone handle, a lot like a sword hilt, with weird markings engraved on the pommel. Although I've never seen the letters before, they seemed so familiar to me.

"Property of Kratos," I muttered, staring at the strange letters. I was about to reach out and touch the hilt before a hand flew onto my wrist.

"Mr. Nakamura."

I whipped around to see Mr. Snow, his eyes narrowed.

"Perhaps you should refrain from touching my property. Especially since your here to talk to you about the troubles you have been causing in my classroom," he said.

Troubles? To be honest, I haven't done anything wrong other than be distracted this entire year.

Mr. Snow let out a small chortle, which was a break of character for him.
"Now I understand that you don't mean any of that. After all, you have ADHD," he said.

I gave him an incredulous look. That was new information. Since when was he my pschychiatrist?

"Ethan," Mr. Snow said, walking over to his desk and leaning against it, "I didn't call you up to my desk to give you a referal or anything. I'm sure you've had enough of those this year."

Ouch. "Then why did you tell me to come up?" I asked. Mr. Snow was getting pretty shady, and I was gradually growing more uncomfortable.

Mr. Snow looked him straight in the eye. "I'm here because I need to get you to safety, before the harpyia get to you," he replied.

"You mean a harpy?" I fired back. I freaked myself out a bit for having a previously undiscovered gibberish translator in me. "Like those crazy bird ladies in greek myths?"

Mr. Snow opened his mouth to reply, but then his eyes focused on something behind me, causing them to widen.

"Ethan, watch out!" he growled, yanking me to the side. There was a hiss, and then the sound of metal on metal. I stumbled to the wall, my hands steadying myself back to balance.

I spun around to look at what happened. In front of me stood Mr. Snow with a huge shield and sword held upfront. Ahead of him was Claire, but she wasn't just herself-- she had grown wings and long, yellow claws.

She turned her head to look at me, her teeth bared, "You shouldn't insult me like that, Ethan Nakamura."

Notes