Life's Hard When Everyone Hates You

 Busywork might've been nicer if his team wasn't dead-set on hating his guts.

The entire week flew by in a haze of dizzying knowledge stuffed into his head, and glares drilling enough holes into it that everything all leaked out like a sieve. At least that was the theory he ran by while the history of the Shadow Corps, tips on glimmer manipulation, advanced Nihonjin lessons, and lectures on Core-En all started to blur into mush to the beat of his shoes on the trail they ran almost every morning.

"Lift your core Ki throttle, gaijin fool," Eden's voice snapped at him when he moved too slow to avoid the glowing pole smashing into his face.

"Don't know what ki has to do with anything," he grunted, pushing the one on his right anyway, because he assumed that was what he meant, and wincing at the crackling tingle. Like too much glimmer on his skin, except this just about smothered him.

"Ki is Core-En. A nickname," Drake helpfully informed him. Half a second before Lachlan's head burst into pretty sparkles.

Still too damn slow, thanks to all the wincing.

At least, despite everyone else, Doresu went along with him. When Ariake went on a rant about the latest pointless Guardian job and King Ed lectured them all from his throne, the big lad faded quietly into the background, doing his part without any protest.

"You take Tonkatsu Road," he told Ariake, once.

"You take Tonkatsu, gaijin," Ariake snapped back, and marched off down his own route inspecting glimmer lanterns.

"Guess he's taking Unagi," he sighed, and turned to find Drake the only one left. "...Tonkatsu?"

"Sure." Man didn't seem bothered at all.

He appreciated it.

Sure, the kid didn't talk much and he kept to himself most of the time when Lachlan wasn't putting off his own homework to offer him tips on Nihonjin, but compared to everyone else.... It was a start. Gave him something to work with. Two cats and one dog wasn't the worst starting point.

He just had to win over the cats.

Eden thought everybody was beneath him so good luck with that, and Ariake could really hold a grudge, but he kept at it. He could be stubborn when he wanted. Didn't do him much good, but it was only the first week. After a year, who knew?

Besides, he damn well needed this to work out.

Staring at the leaderboard and Hirano crawling his way up past team Twelve, who'd just about tied with team Seven, and their own team falling ever further behind, he couldn't help but wonder if they wanted to sabotage themselves. They couldn't win as a discordant mess, that much was clear. "We'll need two years at this rate."

"You don't have one, gaijin."

He twitched, glancing over his shoulder to see— Hirano, of all people. "What?"

The blond star pupil folded his arms, stepping up beside him and regarding the board with a satisfaction bordering on arrogance. "I pity you. You don't have what it takes to bring your team together and come at the top. You're a stringless kite blown by the wind." He turned to meet Lachlan's eye, just slightly above his level. "It won't end well for you."

Lachlan cocked an eyebrow. "Inspiring. I'm more interested in the 'less than a year' you mentioned. Don't suppose you could enlighten me on that, too, while you're here spinning my hopeless future?"

Hirano smiled, turning away and heading for the door. "We graduate on the first of December, gaijin. Your hopeless future ends in nine months."

Eight months.

That crowded in the back of his mind while his Samurai ate dust, his blistered feet whinged on the trail, and he tried to mediate between old grandmothers complaining about their favourite yokai being bullied by the neighbour's beloved spirit pet. Not even a year? Were they that desperate?

"We train in high school for four years for this, ignorant gaijin," Ariake said when he brought it up, stabbing a piece of beef with his chopsticks. "Eight months is all the best of us need to master a real Samurai."

Lachlan narrowed his eyes. "I thought it was because that team out in Kaijan was wiped out."

"No, that's why there are sixteen of us, including you." The chopsticks stabbed at him. "It's always eight months, and no one's going to change it just because you can't learn fast enough."

He carefully clenched his jaw, refusing to rise to the bait.

"Do you finally understand that you shouldn't be here?" Ariake obviously took his silence the wrong way. "Because of you, we'll all be dragged down. You and your idiot mistakes sending us to the bottom of the leaderboard—"

"Don't see how it's my fault you won't listen when I give you an order," he cut in. "Maybe we should put you in charge, see how well you manage to hold it all together."

"I'm not the one who fought Goudon-san! I didn't get this whole team punished!" Ariake stood and slapped his hands on the table, his chair teetering dangerously, no one else but the four of them in the currently-empty mess to see. "I'm stuck with you, but that doesn't mean I have to play along with whatever damn tune you want me to play along with! If Kyubi-sama would let me, I'd take your offer, but we both know what she'd say."

With that, he stormed off to crack his half-eaten bowl on the kitchen counter, and left.

Lachlan whistled low. "Dramatic much?"

"Of course she'd refuse him. He's too hot-headed," Eden sniffed.

"Almost sounds like you're defending me."

Piercingly pale amber eyes did their best to knife him. "If there had been anyone even slightly more suited for the job, you would be replaced in a heartbeat."

The lack of faith was a little depressing.

As the week ended, and the cherry tree petals began to drift down like snow, they finally came to the end of their punishment, open bidding on the more fun Guardian-jobs teams Seven and Twelve already had free pick of bending within reach. According to Guardian-san, the amount of terrible jobs they'd already done amounted to a boatload of free points they could use to out-bid the others on something more interesting, if Hirano didn't match them, at least. The thought of it seemed to raise even Ariake's mood, after the teen spent the last couple days barely even talking to the rest of them.

Everything might just turn around for the better, he hoped as he walked into the "quest room" with his practically cheerful squad.

Only to find one last pointless, weird-ass job waiting for them.

Lachlan held the file in a gloved hand, eyeing a cartoony doodle of a giant humanoid frog licking a... bath, maybe? "You're joking."

"Our own newbies do have fun making up the assignments." The Guardian took a draw from his cig and puffed it out to the side. "It's a joke to them."

Part of him wondered how they'd fare if they ever happened to be unlucky enough to run into his team. He frowned as he read it over, distantly wondering if this was a last, dying cackle of cosmic punishment. "We're supposed to track down an akaname leaving... slime in bathhouses?"

"And bathrooms."

Lachlan gave him a flat look as Ariake let out a sharp "what" and snatched the paper from his hand. "You saved the best till last, eh?"

"This can't count as a job! Who cares about this?" Ariake demanded.

"Lots of people. Now get out of here."

They really didn't have a choice.

He watched them pass it around once they were outside by the car, Ariake still muttering over the injustice of it all, Eden frowning at it like it personally offended him, and Drake possibly not able to actually read it, since he still had trouble with kana, let alone kanji. "Well, if we get it done quickly, we can take our pick of the better ones."

Ariake sighed explosively, raking his hands through his hair, and got into his car. "For once, the gaijin has a point. Let's just go and get this over with."

Lachlan leaned down to look through the window, lifting an eyebrow at him. "What're you doing?"

"What do you think? If we're going to find it, we need to visit the bathhouses."

"According to the map, one of the apartments that was hit is just a block away. You're really going to drive there?"

"They're all over the city, gaijin. Do you really want to walk everywhere?"

He hummed, tapping the roof with his knuckles, which inadvertently led to Ariake glaring at him. Oops. "Not all over the city. It's a wide radius, but it's sticking around one general area."

"And we can't just drive to those places?"

He smiled, tapping the side of his head with a wink. "Let's just say I've got a plan."