Trick or Treat | P/M

ooc: bump?

Ace had originally sought Nia out to find out more about her magic. However, when she brought up joining her club, Ace realized that he still wasn't sure what kind of club she belonged to. Had she explained it? Ace couldn't remember. He took the sign up sheet and studied it. "Uh..well maybe. What kind of club is this and are you the only member?" He asked. At the moment, Ace had yet to join any clubs. All of them had a strict 'no humans allowed' policy.

When Ace noticed the stares coming his way, he closed his eyes and released a long sigh. He wondered if he'd ever get used to being the school's outcast. He would have loved to return to the human realm, but the Headmaster seemed to take joy in Ace's daily suffering. Now that Ace thought about it, he wondered why Nia was even talking to him. Sure, it would have been rude not to..especially after he had put so much effort into finding her. Still, it seemed odd that she was willing to converse with him so happily. Nia didn't seem like the type to plot evil schemes like the Jocks. "Maybe thats just how she is.." Ace thought to himself.

"Hey, its Nia right?" Ace asked. "You do know that I'm not a demon right?" he asked, his brow raising slightly. Suddenly, a few werewolves, who had been looking for Ace since yesterday, walked right up to their table. "Oh shit.." Ace mumbled, but greeted the boys with a nervous smile. "Hey Curly, Larry, and Moe. Hows it going?" Ace smiled brightly. The werewolves circled both Ace and Nia, growling as they bared their dagger like fangs. They seemed unimpressed by Ace's humor.

"Beat it loser. You dont belong here." One of the wolves snapped while grabbing hold of Nia's backpack. The boy then tossed it over towards the right, spilling her papers everywhere. "Ah..I should probably go with her..you know..to make sure she gets to her next class safely!" Ace smiled as he rose to his feet. The blonde boy was quickly shoved back down by one of the Jocks. He wasn't going anywhere.

The next morning, Nia pretty much slept through most of her homeroom. She had spent about two hours searching for the birds last night, however she had managed to track all of them down. Thankfully, none of the school windows were open since it was raining, and all of the teachers had been preoccupied at a staff meeting. So, the only one who had witnessed the mishap was Ace, which meant, for once, she didn't have detention at the end of school. So long as the rest of the day went smoothly, anyway.

After homeroom ended, she casually wandered down to the cafeteria to take her usual spot. She didn't always eat there; occasionally she ate her lunch in the medical office, depending on whether the doctor was busy or not. She usually sat alone, predominantly because she didn't belong to any of the 'groups' in particular. Even among monsters and ghouls, Nia was considered a bit strange. Nice, but strange. It didn't help that she was the only colour witch currently enrolled in the academy, as many of the 'groups' tended to sort themselves based on species and such.

Nia was in the process of doodling in her beloved book while snacking on an apple when Ace approached. Curiously enough, the remainder of the food on her lunch tray was monochrome, and looked entirely untouched. She glanced up only once Ace sat down, surprise briefly flitting across her features. "Only when there's something to be chased or something to run from." She replied, her usual cheerful smile returning to her features.

She closed the sketchbook and placed the half-eaten apple onto her lunch tray. "So, did you change your mind then? I found the sign-up sheet in my backpack this morning." She stated, pulling a sheet of paper from the backpack sitting at her feet. She placed the paper in front of Ace along with a pen, pointing down to a small line at the foot of the paper. "Just sign right here. If you want to join that is, though I don't imagine you would have tracked me down for another reason. Unless you did, in which case I must seem quite foolish. Oh, and I'm sorry for last night. I would have gotten into a lot of trouble if I hadn't caught all those things. The teachers are very picky about magic in the hallways and classrooms. Especially after hours. Not enough supervision or something like that."

The instant Ace had sat down and begun a conversation with Nia, a number of students had taken notice. He was, after all, the only human in the school; most of the students wouldn't even look at him, never mind talk to him. The common consensus was immediately that the turquoise-haired girl was simply oblivious to Ace's origin; it wasn't unthinkable, considering her reputation.

Ace studied her expression. She seemed completely unphased by her score. He wondered if she was just use to receiving bad news. Ace returned her smile, but found it a bit odd that she was smiling so happily. His smile soon faded after hearing that Nia had spent the last few weeks cleaning up the clubroom. Ace's eyes shifted from left to right. "If this is what it looks like after a few weeks of cleaning...I wonder what it originally looked like..." Ace thought to himself.

"So...what kind of-" Ace began, but paused as Nia's search for her notebook began. "Um..can I help you find whatever you're looking for?" Ace asked while eyeing the mess of boxes that surrounded the room. Suddenly, a flock of brightly colored birds quickly filled the entire class. Ace couldn't tell if they were real or not. They certainly felt real as they slammed into Ace's body. "W-Whats going on?!" He yelled over the roar of flapping paper-like wings.

With his hands guarding his face, Ace turned towards Nia. He caught a glimpse of her magic. It looked like the birds had come from her sketchbook and she managed to capture maybe half the flock. "Uh...yea...nice to meet you too." Ace blinked while lowering his guard. He was about to ask Nia what kind of magic shed used, but the time his lips parted she had already sprinted right out the door. Ace blinked again. This was the second..or maybe third time Nia had bolted. "Hmm so her name is Nia?" Ace mumbled to himself. He'd have to do a bit of research on her. He'd never seen anyone use magic the way she had

The next day, Ace left his homeroom in a hurry. He had managed to dig up a little information on Nia from a few other students in his class. Apparently Nia considered herself a color witch, tho Ace still wasn't sure what that was. Lunch was in about five minutes, and Ace had learned that Nia usually ate alone. When he got to the cafeteria, Ace's eyes scanned among the faces of the 'human' looking girls. The school had some real cuties, not that any of them would give Ace the time of day though. "Ah, there she is!" Ace smiled as he moved towards her lone table. "Well you left in a hurry. Do you run everywhere you go?" Ace asked while taking a seat next to her.

While Ace spoke, Nia managed to wriggle her way out of the box she had fallen into and get to her feet. She straightened out her uniform, glancing only briefly at the quiz he held out to her. Her pleasantly cheerful expression didn't change at all; it was next to impossible to tell what in the world she was thinking. "Oh, did I drop it? Thank you for returning it; Fideal would've been angry if anyone had brought it back to him instead." ...She was apparently completely unfazed by the mark on it. Either that meant it was the usual for her, or she was choosing to ignore it.

A bright smile met her lips as he introduced himself, "I'm Nia; it's nice to meet you." She replied, "And I already told you; I left to attend a club. This club, to be exact. This is the clubroom. Kind of. It's a bit messy right now, but I've been working on cleaning it for the past few weeks. It used to be impossible just to open the door, and there was dust-" She stopped talking rather abruptly, anxiety briefly flashing across her gaze. She hadn't noticed it until now, due to all the excitement and whatnot, but her sketchbook had been on the table. The table had flipped over.

"Um...just hold on a minute please." She half-mumbled the words, distractedly glancing this way and that. She tip-toed around and over the boxes that had fallen down, pausing every few seconds to scour the floor. No good. Temporarily absorbed by her search, Nia knelt down near the overturned table, pushing aside fallen boxes and papers. With each passing minute, her searching seemed to grow just a little more nervous. Ordinarily, she was not an anxious girl, however her calm demeanour only applied so long as she had at least one of her precious sketchbooks within reach. Without them, it was only a matter of time before she turned into a nervous wreck.

After a few minutes, she finally uncovered the corner of the book trapped underneath of a corner of the table. With a sigh of relief, she tugged the book free...only for the open page on top to tear free. "...Uh oh." No sooner had the sounds left her lips, then a flurry of multicoloured birds quite literally erupted from the torn page. Nia hastily pulled the rest of the book free; as she ran her finger along the ripped page, it simply re-attached itself as if the paper had never been torn in the first place. Ace's instincts were correct; Nia was not human. She didn't need spoken incantations or written words to cast the form of magic she had been gifted with.

She practically sprinted to the door of the room, slamming it shut just in time to catch about half of the birds. Flipping the book open to a random page, she swung it through the air, causing the birds to vanish as they struck the page. Nia was a creature known as a colour witch; not quite human, but not quite a conventional witch either. While traditional witches used spellbooks and wands, colour witches used paper and anything they could draw with. As such, a colour witch's sketchbook tended to be imbued with a fair degree of power. Since Nia was still young, this also meant it could be unruly at times, especially if damaged. While she could get away with letting a few sketches fly free, an entire flock would definitely get her into massive trouble.

Within two minutes, Nia managed to re-capture the birds within the room. She glanced briefly over her shoulder at Ace, "It was nice meeting you, feel free to drop by whenever if you change your mind about joining!" The words were so rushed, they were nearly impossible to understand. Furthermore, she was sprinting out the door before she even finished saying them. Running away. Again. At least this time she had a decent reason to. Kind of. And this time she really was full-out sprinting; Nia could move quickly given the right motivation, and catching those birds before they got into trouble was the perfect motivation.

Ace's eyes shifted back towards the leaning tower of boxes. He quickly got up, and moved out of the way. Though, there wasn't exactly anywhere for him to move to. Everywhere he looked boxes and other junk covered the floor. "I'm fine.." Ace mumbled while rubbing his head. When Nia mentioned that he should've just knocked on the front door, Ace stared at her long and hard. The blonde boy stood completely dumbfounded. "W-What the hell is this girl talking about? She's acting like she didn't just run away after bumping into me..." Ace thought to himself.

He took a harder look at Nia. She 'looked' human, but something about her seemed a little...off. Still, Ace hardly considered himself to be the definition of normal either. "Uh..." Ace blinked when she mentioned trying to find the club's sign up sheet. "I didn't come here to join your club. I came here because you bolted..again." Ace sighed softly. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out the quiz Nia had dropped. "This yours right?" he asked while showing her the score on the paper.

Something wasn't right. How could someone who made worse marks than him, had solved Troll-Face's problem? "I dont understand..why'd you run from detention? I mean dont get me wrong...I was eager to leave to...but because you did, the teachers I think that I solved that math problem." Ace stated with an annoyed sigh. "Oh..my name is William by the way. Ah, but my friends just call me Ace." the boy explained.

As the magical pressure in the room abruptly increased, Nia felt a chill crawl up her spine. What was going on? Before she could get up to investigate, something struck the bottom of her chair with enough force to send it reeling backwards. A yelp escaped her lips as she fell backwards, crashing into a stack of empty boxes. Dumbfounded, she simply sat there for a moment; what had just happened? Her gaze shifted to the boy on the ground nearby; the exact same one she had left behind in the hallway. Ah. He must have used some kind of magic to find her.

Nia proceeded to attempt to climb free of the box she had landed in...however that proved more difficult than she had initially anticipated. It didn't take long for her to give up. "I think so. What about you? Sounds like you hit your head pretty hard." She remarked, her gaze shifting briefly to a spot just above his head. "Those boxes stacked behind you are going to fall, by the way. I don't know what they're filled with, so you might want to move."

No sooner had she given the warning, than the boxes behind Ace began to lean dangerously in his direction. Had he not moved at that moment, the tower of boxes would have toppled right onto him. Thankfully, the ones that fell were not filled with anything heavy. Regardless, the entire room was now a mess. The table and the chairs had been overturned, boxes and papers were scattered everywhere; it was impossible to tell the room had been even somewhat clean in the first place.

Once everything had settled, Nia spoke up again. "So...you know you could've just knocked on the front door if you wanted to enter the clubroom, right?" She questioned, smiling lightly. In spite of the circumstances, it seemed she had not lost her cheerful demeanour. It also seemed that she was choosing to pretend he had NOT specifically come to the room in search of her. "Although it is a bit late to be coming here in the first place. Still, a new member for the club is always good, and I guess you lucked out since I happened to be here anyway. I would look for the sign-up sheet, but with the room in this state...it might take awhile." She had also apparently assumed Ace was there to join some kind of club.

"W-What? Hey wait!!" Ace yelled as he watched the girl bolt once again. Before he moved to follow her, Ace noticed that she had left a piece of paper behind. He quickly scooped it up before running to catch up with the mystery girl. Unfortunately, by the time Ace looked up Nia was long gone. He ran towards the last spot he had seen her. "Crap..." he sighed deeply. His blue eyes scanned the surrounding area. There were at least three buildings she could have ran into.

Ace gazed down at the piece of paper he had scooped up. When he saw the score, his eyes widened a bit. "Are her grades...worse than mine??" he blinked. Something didn't add up tho. IF her grades were worse...how had she solved Troll-Face's math problem? Ace was determined to find out. In any case, it wasn't like he had anything better to do. If he went back to the male dorms he'd have the deal with a few Lycans that had promised to tear him to shreds if they ever saw him.

With a deep sigh, Ace placed the paper down onto the ground. He made sure to pick a spot where it couldn't get wet, a spot that was dry and full of shadows. Ace summoned his deck of cards once more. It was a long shot, but maybe he'd be able to find the girl he was looking for as long as she was near by. "Shadow, hear my command and come forth! Your master wishes it!" Ace shouted and tossed the card up into the air. A bright, eye blinding light shot out from the card just before it vanished. Suddenly, a dark hooded figure emerged from one of the surrounding shadows. It stood face to face with Ace, awaiting his instructions.

Ace pointed to the piece of paper laying on the ground. "Do you think you can track the shadow of the person who wrote this? If she's here, she has to has some sort of magical signature." Ace stated. Sometimes he surprised himself with just how much he actually understood about magic. Shadow silently hovered over the paper. The hooded figure gazed long and hard at the paper before tilting its head towards the building Nia had entered. "Seriously? Sweet! Lets go!" Ace commanded. Shadow nodded and stretched out its arms, wrapping Ace in a dark embrace. Ace closed his eyes as his body was literally pulled down into the surrounding shadows. It had taken allot of practice and many screw ups to refine the technique.

Sure enough, Shadow was able to locate Ace's target. The key factor was light. As long as there was a source of light, there would always be shadows. As long as their were shadows, the Shadow card could easily travel between them, or manipulate them. The spell relied heavily on Ace's magical powers however and although he had trained long and hard, every now and then he screwed up.

Just as Nia had sat down, a significant amount of magical pressure filled the room. Suddenly, Ace came bursting out from the shadow located under Nia's seat! His body shot out like a rocket from right under her, knocking both of them and the table over. "O-Ouch..." Ace groaned as he rubbed his face. He had hit the underside of Nia's chair pretty hard. "Jeez thanks allot Shadow. You could have ported me anywhere, but you specifically chose the shadow right under the fucking chair!" Ace spat at the hooded figure. Shadow simply shrugged it shoulders. Ace's cards had all sorts of personalities. "W-Whatever..." Ace mumbled and canceled the spell, sending Shadow back into its card. His blue eyes shifted over towards Nia. "You ok?" he asked softly. He had yet to notice all the junk surrounding him.

Nia's head cocked to the side slightly, confusion flickering briefly across the golden gaze. Understanding replaced it once he elaborated on his question; yep, definitely the boy who had been in detention. Well. This could be problematic. "I was late for a club." She responded simply, as if it explained absolutely everything. She reached down and picked up the textbook she had dropped, before flashing a smile in the boy's direction. "Sorry again for knocking you over. Bye now."

And just like that, she hurried off past him. Granted, she wasn't full-out running, but she was walking very quickly; it was clear she was intending on avoiding him. To reinforce that notion, she turned sharply down the next closest hallway and entered the first room on her right. Just in case he actually was following her (she wasn't willing to stop and find out), Nia exited through a door on the far side of the room, went through a supply closet, and exited back out near the end of the hallway. She was well acquainted with the layout of the school.

Alas, she had failed to notice something rather key; a piece of paper had fallen out of her textbook back when she had crashed into Ace. She hadn't picked it up before departing. The paper was a test from Professor Fideal's class; 15 percent was written in the far right corner in bright red ink. More importantly, the girl's name was located just underneath of the grade. Or part of her name anyway. All that was written was 'Nia'. So, if Ace did not manage to catch up to the girl or did not pursue her, he could always attempt to ask around the next day to find her. Unfortunately, considering the conversation the two professors were currently having back in the detention room, that may have been necessary.

If Ace DID manage to keep up with her, Nia would have led him up to the second floor and through a maze of hallways, down to a door at the end of a long corridor. Upon reaching the door, she pressed her hand to the door frame. A series of magic runes flashed under her palm, the door swung open, and she entered the room. The room itself seemed tiny, though this was likely due to the fact it was absolutely filled with junk. It seemed that the small room used to be a storage room, judging from the contents. A small path had been cleared out among the debris; it led to a cheap card table with a trio of chairs set up around it.

Nia dropped her belongings onto the table and sat down on one of the chairs with a sigh. That could have gone better. She felt a little bad for deserting the boy back in the detention room; had he gotten into trouble with the professors? At the time, she hadn't considered how her actions might have affected him. In fact, she hadn't really been considering her actions at all. She had just wanted to leave the detention room, so she did. Regardless, the professors probably wouldn't believe her even if she told the truth now.

"Another day in hell...literally..." Ace thought to himself. He stood with his arms crossed casually over his chest. He must have repeated himself ten times to the professors. They seemed unsatisfied with his answers however. It didn't help that one of the professors was a human hating wort-faced, troll. Ace had dealt with his type before. Well...not other Trolls...but human teachers that were just like him. While the professors argued over whether or not Ace had solved the equation, the blonde boy summoned several blue tinted cards into his left hand.


In academic terms, Ace was far from the 'ideal' student. However, when it came to physically using magic, he excelled. It was strange. How could someone who hardly understood the basics of magic, enchantment, and casting manged to break past the barrier which separated the Academy from the human world?

"Illusion." Ace commanded as he seized a single card from his hand. He closed his eyes and silently began to chant the incantation. Illusion was one of his best weapons. It required only a small portion of magical energy to cast, and could be used in silence. While the teachers fought, Ace used his illusion card to create a copy of himself. The card looked, and could even sound exactly like him. With a devilish grin, Ace ordered Illusion to stay put. He'd cancel the spell once he was far away enough from his professors. Illusion nodded and sunk down into a near by seat. Ace used the chance to sneak his way out of the classroom. "Mission success!" he grinned.


Ace was on his way home when he ran head first into another student. He fell back onto his ass and right into a large puddle of cold water. "Seriously?" Ace frowned. Could his day get any worse? He was about to give whoever had bumped into him a piece of his mind, but paused. The girl standing before him...she was the one from detention right? "Uh..yea its fine." Ace replied softly as he took her hand and pulled himself up. His blue eyes gave the girl a once over. "Yep its her..I'd remember that hair color." He thought to himself. "Hey..uh..why did you take off like that?" he asked. "I was back in that room..you know..detection hall...insane math problem...ring any bells?" Ace frowned lightly. "Troll breath and the other Prof think I solved it. Well...sort of...they should still be arguing over whether or not I solved it. Why did you bolt like that?"

The teacher paused for a fleeting moment, before a frown met his expression. "I'm not certain if you're being humble or whether this is just one of your elaborate pranks, however I can say without a shadow of a doubt that you are lying. I've known that girl since she was half the age she is now, and I know she could not have solved that problem." The teacher walked to the phone next to the classroom door and pressed a few buttons. "I'm calling Professor Fideal down to confirm the equation and get this sorted out. Until it is, you're not going anywhere. If this entire thing turns out to just be a prank though...you'll be spending a lot more time in detention."

~-------------------~

Suffice it to say Professor Fideal was not happy when he finally got to the classroom. The furious professor had spent the better part of 3 hours more or less grilling Ace in an attempt to determine if the student had somehow managed to steal the answer to the equation. Naturally, his questioning proved fruitless and he eventually stormed off in a huff, still unconvinced regarding Ace's innocence in the matter. It was worth mentioning, however, that Professor Fideal was an exceedingly grumpy troll with a particular hatred towards humans; he wouldn't rest until Ace was punished for his 'transgression'. In other words, Professor Fideal was going to talk to the headmaster about Ace and overall just make the human student's life that much more difficult.

Meanwhile, Nia was staring despondently out one of the many windows lining the main entrance of the school. A torrential downpour was currently assaulting the front courtyard. She should have left earlier, rather than going to the clubroom. Now she would have to wait until one of her brothers could come to pick her up to go home. But both of them were busy with work. At the very least, Rieza would probably be finished within the hour; Kinai wouldn't be home until much, much later.

With a sigh, the girl sat down on a bench underneath the window, leaning back against the wall. She set her sketchbook onto her lap and flipped it open to a specific page, scribbling out a hasty doodle. For a fleeting moment, the end of her pencil seemed to glow softly. The doodles seemed to peel right off the page, colour filling them as they expanded. Once the process had completed, a trio of small birds hopped about on the end of the sketchbook. The red bird and the blue bird took flight while the yellow bird hopped into the palm of Nia's hand.

She was in the process of watching the red and blue bird perform clumsy aerial acrobatics when she heard footsteps. Immediately, Nia stood up, gathered her sketchbook and textbooks into her arms and whistled to recall the birds. She turned on her heel and headed off into the closest corridor. If one of the teachers caught her fooling around with her sketches again, she would definitely get detention. Unfortunately, the footsteps were still getting closer. Picking up her pace, she hastily rounded a corner into another hallway...and smacked right into another student.

She fell backwards, dropping all of her textbooks in the process. She did, however, manage to cling onto her sketchbook at the cost of losing her balance. The trio of birds following her chirped and trilled in alarm, fluttering off down the hallway in fright. Nia quickly got back to her feet, holding her hand out to the student she had run into in order to help him up. He looked familiar. Was he the boy who had been in detention with her earlier? "Sorry, I wasn't paying attention to where I was going."

[OOC: Thank you ^-^]

ooc: Cool drawing

ic:

Life at De Rosier Academy had been downright exhausting. Two weeks into the new semester and William had managed to piss off just about every teacher..and jock within the school. No one could understand why a human had been allowed to enroll in the first place. Not even William himself fully understood why his life had suddenly taken such a drastic turn. William sighed deeply as he recalled the events that had landed him on campus. None of it made sense really. One minute William was preparing for the ultimate prank, and the next, he found himself staring several beast like creatures in the face. What had gone wrong? He remembered setting up a teleportation field in the middle of town. He had set it up to port the town's Mayor into a near by pig pen. William wanted to be sure that his trap was working perfectly so he decided to test it. The boy still couldn't figure out how he had manged to port himself inside De rosier. The stunt had confused the teachers and headmaster as well.

In the human world, the use of magic was somewhat frowned upon. It made learning and mastering the arts nearly impossible. William's family was different though. Apparently he had come from a long line of mages and sorcerers...or so he had been told by his great grandfather.

"Damn that old man..." William muttered, as he recalled his first meeting with the Headmaster. He had just avoided becoming lunch, only to be captured, chained up, and thrown into the Headmaster's office. "William Scotsfield III...is this your name?" The headmaster asked while snapping his fingers. The chains which bound William quickly fell to the ground. The boy shot a cold glare up at the Headmaster while he rubbed his arms. "William Scotsfield was my grandfather...and my father...so just call me Ace." he sighed. The Headmaster smiled. Normally, intruders would be dealt with severely. "Hmm..so he's a Scotsfield eh? Interesting..." he thought to himself. "Very well Ace. I'll make you a deal. As I'm sure you've figured out, you've stumbled into the worst place imaginable for a human. My academy is home to some...unique students. So, here's the deal. If you can survive here for just one year, just one, I'll make arrangements to send you back to the human world." The headmaster stated. Ace's brow raised. "And if I refuse?" he asked. The headmaster leaned back against his chair smiling. "You'll probably die." he stated with a small shrug of his shoulders.

And so, Ace found himself a student of De Rosier. He had spent the last two weeks either running from students who wanted to rip his head off, or running from teachers who had grown tired of his pranks. He could only run for so long however, and was eventually caught. "So this is the detention room eh?" Ace sighed as he entered and took his seat behind the girl with Aquamarine hair. Ace found himself staring at the back of her head. She 'looked' human..at least on the outside. His blue eyes shifted up towards chalkboard. There was no way in hell he'd be able to solve such a problem..even with help. "Guess we're stuck here.." Ace mumbled softly while closing his eyes.

By time he opened them, Ace found that the problem had been solved and the girl was on her way out. "W-Wait..what just happened..." he blinked twice. When the teacher returned, Ace was still in shock. He slowly rose to his feet. It took him a second to realize that the teacher seemed to think that he had solved the problem. "Uh..." Was about all Ace could say. There was no way he could take credit for solving the problem. "Well the thing is...I didn't do a thing. That girl solved it." Ace confessed.