North High. The school of John Smith.

It's my first day here, and today is the day everything changes. This is where interesting things are bound to happen- they HAVE to happen.

It's my last hope.

Here we go...

3-3-3

The classroom is boring. The teacher is boring. And from what I've seen of the students, they're boring too. This isn't looking good...

Okay, calm down. It's not as if things are always as they appear on the surface, and it hasn't even been an hour yet. I haven't even announced my purpose or done any real investigating yet. No reason to panic.

2-2

Ugh. We're doing the lame "introduce yourself" thing again. Whatever. At least it'll give me a chance to make my goals and interests clear.

One by one, everyone stands up and says some meaningless little blurb about themselves, putting no effort in to it whatsoever. I don't even bother remembering their names, they're obviously not anyone I'm going to want to talk too. There's got to be someone interesting in this school...

-1

It's almost my turn. The guy in front of me is sure to be as equally plain and dull as the rest, I can just tell. The normalcy is practically oozing off this one; even his hair is literally the exact style I think of when I envision "average". Hurry it up...

He stands up, and the moment average-guy opens his mouth, my jaw nearly drops in disbelief.

0

"My true name is not important. You may refer to me as Kyon. I have absolutely no interest in ordinary humans. However, if any of you are aliens, time travelers, sliders, espers, or any other type of supernatural beings, please come see me!"

"That is all."

He sits back down.

Did- did this guy just steal my entire introduction?! That was almost word for word what I was going to say! What the hell?! There's no way I'm letting him get away with that!

I stand up, slamming my hands down on my desk. "Hey! You!"

"Kyon" turns around to stare at me, along with the entire rest of the class. I can now see his face, and it's even MORE irritatingly normal than I could have imagined! Where does such a drab looking guy get off trying to pretend he's interesting?!

"What? Unless you're a supernatural being, I don't want to talk to you." he says in an infuriatingly dull near-monotone.

Then his expression turns quizzical, even a little excited. "Are you?"

I think I'm about to boil over.

"Says the guy who's an esper himself! I'm Suzumiya Haruhi, and you just stole the words right out of my mind! First of all, how dare you, and second, you really couldn't think up your own introduction?! What kind of lame mind reader are you?!"

Average-guy (there's no way I'm calling him "Kyon" just because he thinks he's special enough to give himself his own nickname, no matter how stupid it is) grunts in annoyance. "Hey, as much as I wish I WAS an esper, I'm not. What, do you think I'm lying when I say that's what I'm looking for?"

I really hope he's telling the truth about not being an esper, because I'm already starting to hate him. It wouldn't do for my first paranormal encounter to be this guy. "No, that's what I'M looking for! If there are any supernatural beings in this school, they can come to me! Not you!"

"Excuse me?"

I look up. The teacher whose name I didn't bother listening too is looking at us, still smiling, but evidently running out of patience.

"If you two are done...?"

No, actually, I'm not. Not even close. But when I look back at the maddening boy in front of me I've completely lost my momentum, and have to settle for giving him a death glare as I cross my arms and sit back down.

Great. Average-guy screwed up my introduction so badly that I ended up looking like a raving lunatic. Not even the kind who actually has a reason for it, just an angry, possibly violent one. What sort of supernatural being is going to willingly come talk to me after that sort of first impression?

This isn't fair...

KHJSKHJS

After that, everything proceeds exactly the way I had expected it would- the way I had prayed to the heavens that it wouldn't. It's just like middle school, only somehow even MORE ordinary, besides the pretender sitting in front of me. I cannot wait until the seats are shuffled, even staring at the back of his head is making me mad.

As lunchtime approaches, I get ready to bolt out of the room so I can search the other classes for interesting people, and possibly at least salvage some part of today. When the bell rings I shoot out of my seat like a cannonball, so ready to leave the room that I nearly trip on my desk on the way to the door.

Except that the infuriating boy (the back of whose neck I know quite well by now due to having been glaring at it for the past couple hours) jumps up at the same time, moving for the same door I'm heading out of. Don't you dare-!

Naturally, I move to cut him off, and he attempts the same. It's a race to the door that he reaches just a hair before me (not fair, his legs are longer!), which doesn't mean all that much, as our concurrent attempts at being first just gets both of us caught in the narrow passage. Damnit, leave me alone already!

I try to shove him backwards, but he attaches his hands to the doorframe and tries to pull me out of the way. I pull, he shoves. I shove, he pulls.

That's it. I've had enough of this guy for one day.

When I turn and move to knee him in a place I know he won't be able to recover from, he notices it and takes the opportunity to grab for my hair, both of us succeeding. As satisfying as it is when he drops like a load of bricks, I can't take proper pleasure in it since his hand is still clenched around my hair, making me cry out in pain as I'm dragged to the ground with him.

In tandem, we collapse face first through the door, both of us crashing to the ground in serious pain. I can hear people laughing from inside the classroom. Laughing! This is humiliating!

I turn my head to glower at him, still on my back. He's on his stomach, doing the same to me.

Still irritatingly in sync, he opens his mouth just as I'm opening mine to give him a piece of my mind.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!"

"What the hell is wrong with you?!"

...

I've got it. This guy is some sort of evil male doppelganger, sent here to prevent me from making any progress or ever finding anything. Well, I'm certainly not going to let HIM stop me! I've waited three years to get here, and if he thinks he can waltz right in and destroy all my plans on the first day, he's got another thing coming!

I stand up in tandem with him (would you stop that?!), rubbing the back of my head where my hair got pulled. Clearly I need to try something different.

Rounding on my obviously evil counterpart, I give him a very forced grin.

"...Sorry... about that." I manage to get out through gritted teeth. "Why don't you go on and do whatever you were going to do? I think I'm going to sit back down in the classroom for a few minutes."

Average-guy gives me an odd look, before turning around and stalking (with a notable limp, I gleefully note) off down the hall, muttering under his breath. Good riddance.

I do actually decide to reenter the classroom for now. I'll give him plenty of time to get far, far away, even if it cuts in to the time I was going to use to look into the other classrooms. There'll be plenty of opportunities to investigate them in the days to come anyways- so long as I'm not around him, I'm willing to sacrifice a few minutes of my schedule.

The classroom seems to have quickly forgotten the door incident, thankfully, with everyone simply engaging in the sort of typical, banal talk I've grown so tired of. At the moment, I don't think I could ask for much more. Three more minutes and I'm taking off again.

"...So, there really is another Suzumiya out there, huh? That 'Kyon' guy and her would be perfect for each other I'd bet."

It takes all my willpower to ignore Taniguchi talking to some brown haired guy in the corner. I apparently have had the misfortune of being stuck in the same class with him again. Just another wonderful addition to this perfect first day of high school.

"Hey Kunikida, you know that guy, right? Which of 'em do you think will make the first move? Suzumiya's not exactly shy, but it doesn't look like this 'Kyon' is either..."

Does he think I can't hear him, or is he really just that rude? What an ass.

KHJSKHJS

Three minutes seems to take an eternity to pass. The moment it does, I rocket out of my seat, blissfully free of the hellish double that's been plaguing me all morning. Maybe I can finally get on with my plans without him interfering.

Moving even quicker than usual, I do a few quick scans of the nearby rooms- no one strikes me as particularly interesting. Most of them don't even glance up. But I've still got quite a lot of school to search.

After I've checked most of the rooms on the lower floor (not promising), I decide to check out a few of the upstairs ones before heading back. Sprinting up the stairway, I end up stopping in my tracks as soon as I reach the top- he is peering in to one of the rooms, looking for all the world like he's doing the exact same thing that I am. For the love of- does this guy do anything BUT what I was already going to do?! Besides that, I gave him plenty of time to move on, why is he still here?!

Average-guy pulls his head out of the doorway, looking disappointed. This changes when he notices me, and the barely restrained rage contained in the scowl I'm leveling at him.

"For God's sake, do you have ANY original ideas?" I bark, too annoyed to keep myself from speaking my mind. "And if you're just copying me, what is taking you so long?! I waited practically forever for you to move somewhere faaaaar away in the school, yet here I find you barely one floor away!"

"Well, being kneed in the groin tends to slow one down, Suzumiya." he returns snappily. "Besides, I can't go too far, or I won't make it back to class in time. Same for you, I'd imagine, unless you don't care about the actual school part of, you know, school."

Before I can offer a rebuttal, he continues.

"Also, I'm getting really fed up with this 'copying' business. How do I know you aren't the one copying ME, huh? You introduced yourself after me, you got to the door after me, and apparently you've been checking out the classrooms after me. From where I'm standing, it sure looks like it's you that's the copycat, not me."

A black look comparable only to my own punctuates this statement, matching my current one in intensity.

...I have never met anyone I have loathed more than I do this person. In less than half a day he's managed to upstage me at every single turn, earning more of my ire than every naysayer and disbeliever I've met in the past three years. Quite an accomplishment, considering how much I hated some of my teachers and classmates.

Our impromptu staring contest is interrupted by the bell, which means BOTH of us are late to get back to class. Wonderful. Jackass here has managed to smear my perfect attendance record coming out of junior high on the very first day.

We march back stiffly, side by side, occasionally throwing dagger-filled glares over our shoulders at the other. The class stares as we walk in with a volitile electrical charge practically visible between our faces, but I couldn't care less about their opinions at this point. I don't even know why I was embarrassed earlier, it's not like I'm planning on interacting with anyone who isn't interesting, if I can help it.

Speaking of being able to avoid talking to people I have no interest in dealing with, I do my best to ignore Average-guy for the rest of the day, which thankfully isn't nearly as hard as it was this morning. At the end of the day I make sure to wait until he's already out the door before sprinting out myself. Luckily, it seems he lives on the opposite side of the school from me, so I won't ever have to deal with him on the way down the hill. Thank God.

Fueled by my pent up aggravation from the day, my legs carry me home at speeds even I probably haven't reached before. Not that I can appreciate it, because all that's on my mind is him...

No time is wasted between entering my house and proceeding to my room to punch a few pillows across it.

When I said I wanted to find something interesting, I didn't mean having to deal with my evil male clone. What was I thinking transferring to North High?! I could have gone to Kouyouen if I'd wanted! Why did I have to pick a place cohabited by someone so intolerable?!

John Smith...

...Right. Him. The first person who ever believed in me- one of the only ones.

Thinking about him fuels my determination even now. He went there, and he's the primary reason I'm still searching, even after countless failures. That school HAS to be hiding something interesting...

I'll just have to find way to cope. Average-guy is an annoyance, and a big one, but surely there's a method I can use to get around his fiendish copycat ways.

I have to see this through...

KHJSKHJS

In my dreams that night, I find myself once again watching the blue giants that occasionally show up to smash the city apart. They seem particularly rage-filled tonight, which I don't really mind. It matches my mood perfectly.

A single thought dominates my mind, even in the land of slumber.

Don't you dare think this is over, "Kyon".

It's only just begun...

Welcome to a story that will either be updated like mad, or rarely ever updated at all. I couldn't help myself; the idea appeared out of nowhere while I was working on Reality Roulette, and suddenly I was up until 1 in the morning writing this. Now I have FIVE stories that I'm supposed to be updating; I think I finally see why fanfictions are so rarely finished. ADCD must run rampant. Spoiler alert: the hate won't last. Just in case anyone was worried about that.

As always, thanks for reading. Hit me up with a review maybe? They are the fuel that feeds my muse. In fact, they fuel most fanfic writer's muses. They are a hungry species.