Dry Summer Sauce, Part I

The sky didn't seem to like Eriko. Every day she went out, the wind blew hard, it rained, or it was cloudy. And today, they proceeded to show no mercy again. Everyone decided to play together, and they invited a new friend, lightning, to the game. No matter, Eriko wasn't going to entertain them today.


Nevertheless, she had better things to do than worry about the weather. She had just come back from Quincy's house after delivering the pictures for the school paper. Tomorrow was the due date, and those photos were a must. Now that she was finished, Eriko had to go back home and prepare dinner. Her mother would most likely not be home yet until two in the morning, so there was no one to watch over her. With that, her soaking clothes could wait for a few minutes.


Eriko reached some cover under a bus stop not too far from Siren Academy, the school she has attended for some four or five years after her move. She had moved out from Derych up north only moments before its invasion, and it was not a matter she would discuss with anyone. Eriko felt as if she was forgetting something then, but she shook her head at the thought. Surely she had brought everything she needed, right?



There was a pool of rainwater gathering at her feet, and Eriko decided to have a look. She wanted to see how drenched she was, and it's not like she carried a mirror in her pocket. After Eriko had taken out some little twigs from the pool, she looked down.


What she saw was not all that different from when she looked at herself after taking a shower, the only difference was that she was wearing clothes; this was expected. Eriko was more interested in her face. She had always wondered what others saw her as. Was she pretty, or not so much? Was her perpetually straight black hair a strength, or a problem? What about her face? Sure, she had long eyelashes and didn't wear too much make-up. She also had a small nose, thin lips, and vividly green eyes, which were said to be her strong points by Sei and them. But what did the others, the strangers and the boys, think?


After some five or so minutes, Eriko decided that looking at herself was not going to tell her the answer and continued on home. Since Quincy lived on the opposite side of the academy, she was running down the street next to one of its long border walls, and she was thinking about exactly what kind of school she went to.


Siren campus, as a whole, was massive. Containing the classrooms, the gymnasium, the library complex, auditorium, the outdoor auditorium, two fields, three fields, the "haunted" science/technology labs, the offices, the GCF (Global Communications Facility), a dorm for female live-in students and a separate dorm for all boys attending, and much more, the area required to house all of these and then surround it with a 7-foot high brick wall easily occupied a square mile.


Not just that, the potential education level that could be achieved was ranked as the highest in all of Sector 4, second place in all of ZION (lost to Sector 2), and eleventh worldwide. All the teachers and staff are skilled, with the oldest ones rumored to be international experts on their subject matter. The list of classes available was extremely diverse, with everything from atoms to ZION history covered. The most miraculous fact was that most of the costs for maintaining and upgrading the facilities were paid directly by Sectors 0 and 9. The only thing required was a relatively low starter price of 5000 ZEN a year. How could the homeland afford this, or even allow this? The question was not for her to answer, and she knew it. Let ZION deal with it.


However, there were sounds and smoke coming from the campus. It seemed that something peculiar was happening at the eastern entrance. Strange, no one should be here because of the rain and because it's summer, Eriko thought to herself. She decided to go check it out. Hell, she could spare a few minutes. Her mother wouldn't notice and couldn't care less if she did. Without another thought, she hurried towards Siren's eastern gate.