Well, how's this for a fresh start? It's March of 2016 and I'm finally getting around to editing this thing to an acceptable level -more or less- so it's not so cringe-worthy. Sure, it's nowhere near as bad as INROMCI is -cause' that crap is just plain...ugh- but hey, if I can spruce this chapter up a bit then things will be great!

Funny thing though, this thing is well over 2K word-wise. That's a lot longer than most of my chapters nowadays…

How the hell did I manage to edit all that way back when? XD

~oOo~ INITIATING CHAPTER REVISIONS...

~oOo~ REVISIONS COMPLETE.

~oOo~ PLEASE PROCEED TO CHAPTER...

I was never one for sitting still so one could say that school was rather challenging. Maybe it was the location, maybe it was the board of education -the hell if I knew- but there was a genuine lack of hands-on projects...which was ironic given I was currently sitting in my art class. Speaking of art class, one would think actual art would occur regularly.

Nope.

Instead I sat in a desk, fidgeting and ansty while the teacher droned on and on about the mid-term projects. Sure, art was still one of my favorite classes when there was actually something to do, but listening to her drone on and on was just...

"MRS. HARMONIA!" shouted the teacher.

"Listening…" I replied with a semi-awkward grin.

"Would you be so kind as to stop writhing and squirming in your seat? The creaking of the wood is most distracting." She complained softly.

"Writhing and squirming? Like as in both and not just one?" I inquired cheekily.

"MRS. HARMONIA!"

"Sorry, sorry, I'll hush. I gotcha' professor!" I grinned giving my 'favorite' teacher a two-fingered salute.

"The things I go through to put up with you child." She groaned under her breath, but the class seemed to have heard her anyway.

I looked around the room to qualm my wriggling. A few people were still snickering at my restlessness. When a few started pointing I pig-nosed at them. Either in shock or disgust they stopped laughing and stared. I rolled my eyes when some even went as far as to do it right back. Dismissing the whole shebacle with a shrug, I did my best to focus on what the teacher was saying instead.

"As I was saying before our small interruption, I'll be choosing the project partners this mid-term." She called out, granting me a pointed look.

A few collective groans rang out among my classmates, though I took pride in the absence of my worry. I knew just about everybody in the class except for this tall dark haired kid who seat claimed its spot in the farthest corner of the room. He really never said anything to anyone so I really didn't care for him. Though what chance was there that fates would be dickish enough to pair me up with the one kid -out of a class of sixteen- that I didn't know?

Either way I realized I didn't know what the project was -my fault entirely for not paying attention- and raised a single hand to ask. When the teacher ignored my hand I waved it around a few times to escalate the effect. After a few minutes, the other students started to stare and the teacher finally gave up trying to ignore my endeavors. She gave an exasperated sigh and cast a pointed glare in my direction.

"For the sake of our remaining class time, Harmonia, what is it?" she asked with her tone heavily hinting her annoyance.

"What is the project about?" I asked, trying to sound innocent.

"If you had been listening to me instead of doing your little wiggle dance you would have caught the project assignment." she growled slightly. Another round of snickers erupted from the students.

"Could you tell me it anyway?" I asked hopefully.

"Would somebody be kind enough to announce the project to Miss Harmonia?" She called out to the crowd.

At first nobody even twitched a pinky then my sister Mowgli raised her hand tentatively. When the teacher nodded to her she rose from her seat and turned to me. Giving me a small wave before opening her mouth.

"The project was to create an original work of art or take the best drawing you ever made and write a small seven page essay about it. But the essay has to be a fictional story using the content of you picture. Such as a picture of a person that person you drew could be the character in your story. If it's a big mess of color then you use your imagination with the colors. Make sure you and the partner the teacher chooses has both made a contribution to the project or you can only receive partial credit." She explained sounding just like our 'instructor'.

I thanked her and gave her an I-owe-you-one look before she took her seat once more. Grinning I turned to our teacher.

"I got it!" I chimed in a sing-song tune.

This little action caused everyone to burst out laughing. I swung my dark brown hair around to the other side of my head causing the bleach golden ends and electric blue streaks to whap me in the face. I rolled my dull dandelion irises at my klutzy move.

"Smooth Harmonia, Smooth." I shook my head, sheepish to think I could have pulled off a hair flip.

My sister seemed to have noticed. She snickered at me but I just flashed her a heart shape with my hands. Bless that kid and her artistic talent. I couldn't count the number of times having her in my advanced art classes had saved my skin.

Flipping the edge of my binder up, I began to sift through the doodles and drawings I had in the tab labeled -BEST- though as I flipped through them I began to frown. A lot of them were pretty bare or simply too...ill-fitting to be used in a project like this.

Crap, I guess it decided on my partner. Luckily for me the teacher had been reading off partners and my name hadn't been called yet. I scanned the room. My friends Cassie, Miko, Bailey, Sherbet, and Luca had been paired off with Tyler, Daniel, Hatsura, Vela, and Samuel respectively. That was ten of the students out of sixteen. I frowned as Kat got paired with Serena and Mowgli with Dylan. That left me and…

"Harmonia Jones and Jackson Darby will work together as partners." announced the teacher.

"Who in the world is…?" I began looking around.

My nose ran into a soft belly as I whipped my face around to look for this "Darby" kid. The belly backed up, revealing the tall kid with dark hair. I muttered insults at karma and fate as I 'discovered' who I'd be working with this coming project.

Of course the universe had been listening.

"Uh, wuzzup?" I asked, quietly.

"Not much, I guess we're partners, huh?" he shrugged, voice tonelessly indifferent to the situation.

"That we are, that we are." I replied with a pathetic attempt to look happy.

"So I guess I'll see you in the library after school?" he asked.

"How about this, at 8:15 tomorrow we meet at the Jameson Warehouse outside of town. It's just past the forest. I can mark it down or draw a map if you need me to."

"WHAT? Why?" he gawked, looking stricken.

"Because I have kickboxing class till' 5:55 and I have to watch my sister afterwards." I shrugged, "and as for the Warehouse, it's a pretty funny story. The place was condemned and whatnot but they couldn't demolish it without breaking a few too many laws." I winked, "So since this is Jasper and we don't have the money to do anything else with it, I took the liberty of making a little "art studio" of sorts out of it for my sister and I."

"Art studio?"

"Well yeah, I mean...paint isn't good on floors and too much can leak through the floors of your house if it's old -speaking from experience here- so the warehouse was a pretty nice gem to put some use to." I laughed, "I'd watch a few of ThreadBanger's videos of you want a general idea of what we do from time to time."

The slack-jawed look of shock on his face was priceless.

"You're kidding…" he accused in disbelief.

"Do I look like I'm kidding?" I said purposefully looking at him with a blank expression.

"Well…no." he stammered.

"Then we're good. So 8:15 tomorrow morning at the Jameson Warehouse. Just tell your mom you're doing your art project in the woods. Which you are." I shrugged in response.

"Well alright…if that's what'll work. I have to work at K.O. Burgers today, anyway." He muttered in reply.

"Great, so we're clear?" I asked sticking out my hand.

"Clear as crystal." He nodded somewhat reluctantly.

Right as I grinned the bell rang signaling the end of fourth period. I wrenched my hand from his iron tense grasp and gathered up my crap. Once everything was shoved and or stuffed into my bulgy satchel or laptop back which served as 'thing I stuffed crap in' and 'makeshift backpack', respectively; I raced past the daytime chatters in the hallway and made a beeline for the cafeteria doors.

I was especially excited for today because it was the one day of the month for double french-fry servings. I swerved around the open doorway to find, to my immediate pleasure, a short line. I hopped straight to the back of the line nabbing a circle pizza -the better and less greasy version of rectangular pizza- two servings of fries, a thing of peaches, a small salad, and a large bottle of apple juice. Considering what the school usually offered as what passed for a lunch, this was the Holy Grail, in my opinion, of a schools' hot lunch choices.

I quickly whipped out my lunch card and tapped my foot as the cashier slowly rang up my lunch. Retrieving my lunch card and promptly cramming it in my pocket, I proceeded -carefully- dash to my lunch table and 'chow down' on my prized lunch choices. I was nearly halfway done before the regular 'earlies' started to show up and file into line. I watched as the inevitable shoving took place as jocks, cheerleaders, apparent "losers", and the lovely nerds I appreciated, filed into line.

Along with the original Goths and norms, I could spot the stick-outs or better known to me as: my friends. Once all my friends made their way to 'our' table, number 7, I started to look for Jack. I knew basically nothing about him. I hadn't even spotted him yet when I received a tap on the shoulder from Sherbet.

"Yeah? What is it?" I asked, half ignoring her.

"Who are you looking for this time?" she asked with a teasing tone. I rolled my eyes and playfully shoved her arm.

"A kid named Jackson Darby, ya' know him?" I asked, trying for a subtle tone.

I didn't think it was such a big deal until everyone started to quiet down. Even Mandy, who was always chattering, even in class, hushed her usual mile-minute-chatter. I stared at the group of girls and few stray gay guys. Nothing wrong with being gay, gay guys are pretty cool in my opinion. They were just different and so much fun to go shopping with if they were into that sorta thing. At least Landon was...he and Travis were absolutely hilarious. Either way I looked from person to person with a confused expression.

"What's wrong, did I say something...?" I trailed off nervously.

"You haven't heard about him?" Bailey whispered in a hushed tone.

"Heard what?" I asked aloud. Causing me to receive tons of shushing from my fellow friends. "Oh huff it." I hissed, though quieter than before, "We're talking about an average teenager in our school, not the god forsaken Presidential Secret Service.

My friends looked to one another, wide eyes and worried looks in place, and motioned for me to lean in closer. It was enough to weird me out. The scared looks...on all their faces? Something wasn't right here. They looked to one another once more before turning to me, seeming to have reached some silent consensus.

"Okay here's the deal, this Darby kid is just plain mysterious." Bailey piped up.

"Okay…?" I urged on.

"Well according to what we've heard numerous times nobody sees this kid outside of school. Once school is over he just disappears off the face of the earth." Vela continued.

"Other people who noticed the same thing would watch him and report that he always goes into the desert outside of town. And it's close to that forest as well as that giant mesa." Cassie agreed.

"And it's not just him but Rafael Esquivel and Miko Nakade too." Sherbet added.

"But she told us the only reason she goes is so she can practice her loud guitar music without having to worry about being nagged at by her host parents." Hatsura cocked a brow, "I mean...it's believable if you've heard her play before."

"Well...even if her guitar skills fall on the loud and harsh end of the spectrum, that's not to say she's not just a really good liar." Cassie shrugged.

"She has said she's seen that very same thing, but never thinks anything of it." Said Hatsura.

"So they're hiding something. Well if he thinks he can just disappear without helping me with m-our project, he'll be road kill before he can even take another trip out to that desert." I grinned devilishly.

We soon decided to drop all the heavy talk and such and switch over to goofing off for the remaining fifteen minutes. Thankfully too. The bunch of us weren't really a gossip-heavy sort of group in the traditional sense of shady rumors and bad mouthing. But in the back of my mind I felt like I should be investigating this Darby kid instead of squeaking my apple juice straws through my nose.

~oOo~ INITIATING TIMESKIP TO LATER IN THE DAY

~oOo~ TIMESKIP COMPLETE - CURRENT TIME - 3:13 PM

I made sure I had all of my bags before putting all of them in my giant Duffy. With a smile in place, I proceeded to jog down the street, careful not to over-exert myself before kickboxing class. As I padded down the concrete I heard a loud rumble of an engine, but before I could turn to find the source a sick blue motorcycle sped down the street followed by a racecar with the number thirty-eight on the side. Of all people to be on that motorcycle it was the Darby kid! I called to him but received no reply, though understandable as he was already pretty far down the road anyway. With a confused shrug I kept walking until I turned the corner to find the door of the kickboxing studio being opened by Darby himself. I rushed to meet him.

"I didn't know you took this class." I commented casually before he could even place a foot inside.

"Harmonia! Uh, hi what are you doing here?" he asked panicking slightly.

"Dude, I thought we covered this. This is why I can't make it to the warehouse until 6:15. Remember that little conversation?" I asked with harmless rap of my knuckles against his head.

"Well…yeah. But something came up I can't make it…tomorrow" he said calmly.

"What came up?" I asked.

"Um, my mother is sick." He lied.

"No she's not…"

"How would you know?" Jack scoffed defensively.

"Uh...Darby, your mom comes by every other school week to give the hospital demonstrations to the students in the healthcare classes. Y'know, to help them get their CNA?" I raised a brow at him, "Hell, I said good morning to earlier today."

"Um…"

"Want to try another answer?" I raised a brow, unimpressed. If he was going to lie he could at least put a little more effort...

"Oh right well I mean that well…I really can't tell you?" He stammered.

"Why not?"

"I just can't."

"You just don't wanna do the project." I accused falsely. I knew that wasn't why but I would find

out one way or another.

"That isn't it at all!" he protested.

"Yeah right."

"You really want to know why?!"

"Sure, I'll bite."

"My…dad."

"What about him?"

"My dad left my mom when I was really little. Now he's come back and I have to be there with my mother. That's why she kept me after that class."

"Fine…"

"What…do you mean?" he asked.

"Alright I believe you. Just next time I ask don't lie. Just give me a reason like its past issues or something." I explained.

"Oh…sure, whatever." he said, slightly uncomfortable.

"Well, Seeya later Jack." I waved, and walked inside the mini-gym. It was finally time to beat the shit out of that giant blue punching bag.

~oOo~ POV SWITCH INITIATED - JACK DARBY

"You were joking weren't you?" Arcee asked curiously.

"No I wasn't, I also was joking when I said I needed to go home instead of the base today." I replied hastily. Leaning to one side, I curved my metal friend onto my street.

Once we were safely inside the garage and away from the dangers of prying eyes I removed my helmet and set it carefully on the table. I couldn't face Arcee now. The female laid a servo on my shoulder.

"Jack…are you, alright?" she asked carefully.

"Just fine…the dad that ignored our family for years is suddenly back and I'm supposed to just be okay with that. After he left my mom and just took off. He left her to raise me on her own. I can't forgive my dad; not after he all he did." I burst out. I hadn't meant to be brash but it wasn't healthy for Arcee to be around right now. I'd just end up snapping at her again.

"Alright Jack, I can't claim to understand what kind of pain you're going through but I'll help if I can. I see you later Jack." she replied softly.

"Goodbye Arcee."

I watched as she sped off, her engine notably softer than before. I angrily tightened my grip on my black helmet. Why couldn't things just be...simpler?

~oOo~ POV SWITCH INITIATED - HARMONIA

~oOo~ LOCATION - KICKBOXING CLASS

I ran as fast I could and gave an outward leap, pulling into a perfectly executed jumping side kick. My foot made direct contact with the mat against James's hand. Next I swept into a dizzying roundhouse kick hitting the other hand pad; before finally planting a powerful left-handed punch to the padding over his abs. he stumbled back a few good steps before catching himself. Only the many years that my thirty-four year old teacher had under his belt kept him on his feet. I gave him a confident grin before pulling my form into a respectful bow. He gave a hearty chuckle.

"Another good execution session. My star pupil is going even farther." He said thoughtfully.

"Thank you sensei." I smiled.

"So how are things at home?" he inquired, beginning his daily clean-up of the equipment.

"They're okay. My mother is still in France but she'll be back next week or something like that. Dad is still at work right now but he'll be back in time to have dinner." I mused aloud.

"I believe you are getting accustomed to not having a mother around, aren't you?" he commented.

"Yeah I guess you could say that." I replied absentmindedly, I thought of Jack who grew up without a dad. He must be doing worse than I am...

"Something on your mind, Starfish?" he asked.

"Nothing that I should share." I shrugged.

"Alright then." he shrugged back. "Just don't forget, if you need to get something off your chest feel free to come talk to me."

"Does it have to be during business hours?" I asked with a giggle, "Are three AM visits acceptable?"

"If you're anywhere near my house at three AM don't expect anything less than a roundhouse kick to the face. I love ya' Starfish, truly I do, but I value my beauty sleep." James snorted, though somehow managed to sound serious as well.

I merely grinned at the man and made a heart with my hands, "Hearts to you too sensei."

"...enough with the stupid hand-shapes. Get back to your drills and routines."

"Sure th-."

"Harmonia."

I sighed, "Understood, Sensei."

~oOo~ CHAPTER ENDING ACHIEVED.

~oOo~ INITIALIZING ENDING AUTHOR NOTES...

~oOo~ PLEASE PROCEED TO AUTHOR'S NOTE.

~oOo~ THANK YOU FOR READING!

I will be doing that robot imitation from now on. Hopefully at least; so long as you guys don't find it too annoying or disruptive. I just thought it was a cute touch.

Either way, that's the edited chapter. Next chapter needs some serious revising too. But holy cow, the new edits added like a whole new page and took the story from roughly 2,800 to 3'539 words! Score!

Hope the edits meet your fancy, though I will be saving a file of the original draft anyway...Thank you for reading!