It was now November in the year 2107, about two years later. I was twelve now, today was a Tuesday and I was at school right now. My school life was pretty unenviable in general, but...today was the day that it went from unenviable to straight-up pure hell.

Anyway, I was currently in my classroom during lunch break, and I was sitting in my usual seat at the back corner by the window. I was having my lunch and petting the class dog, Scruffy. I really liked animals, the homeroom teacher for this class kept her pet dog at school, and he usually stayed in the class.

​​

He was a lively and playful dog, and kinda ugly, he was old and had thinning fur, so most of the others in the class ignored him or found him gross, but I didn't care about how he looked. Pretty much all my classmates were snobby, arrogant assholes who thought the world of themselves, they were all the children of rich and influential families just like I was, and they sure as hell acted like it.

I didn't have any friends in this class, everyone else was so outgoing and extroverted, not to mention annoyingly self-important, so I didn't really fit in with anyone. My classmates generally ignored me, while some treated me like a weirdo since I kept to myself...well, I suppose I'm not exactly normal for my age, so fair enough. And besides, they were easy enough to ignore, so whatever.

"What is with you, you only ever interact with that mangy mutt...isn't your sister that super impressive Prodigy?"

Huh, someone was talking to me? He must be really bored. I looked up to see who it was. Oh, it's this guy.

Tairo Najimi, he was basically like the leader of the class, the most popular guy in class. He was kinda arrogant though, I didn't really like him. He had medium length black hair that he combed to the side, black eyes and a pale complexion.

"...and? I don't see any point to you coming over here just to say that," I replied with a shrug.

"Tch, you're a rude one, aren't you?"

Huh? No, that's just how I talk. Putting on a faux friendly persona sounded way too exhausting. Oh, yeah, my sister did say that I have 'resting bitch face', as in my natural expression looks rude, but what am I supposed to do about that...it's just my face.

"That wasn't my intention, but feel free to interpret it that way."

"Hey, don't patronize me, you gloomy loner!"

Wasn't that kinda uncalled for? I'm just minding my own business here, and he's the one that came up to me out of nowhere. Pfft, and he calls me the rude one.

"If you have a problem with talking to me, then just...don't. Simple as that," I retorted with a sigh.

That comment didn't go down too well with some of the others in the class, especially the girls...like I said, Tairo was the most popular guy in class.

"What a loser, talking so high-and-mighty to Tairo like he's better than him," Remarked one of the girls.

"I know right, and after he went out of his way to talk to that weirdo," Agreed another.

Hey, it's not like I asked him to go 'out of his way'...what did I do to deserve this, anyway?

...

About an hour later, it was time for PE. I was the last one to leave the class, mainly because I saw no reason to hurry. I changed into my PE uniform and began heading out, after petting Scruffy for a bit.

"See ya later, buddy," I said with a small smile, rubbing his tummy.

He licked my hand and barked, before letting out a yawn and scratching his ear. Animals are so cute, even the ugly ones. The only reason I didn't have my own pet was because the idea of them dying was too heart-breaking for me to handle.

I reached the school gym right on time, much to my relief. It was pretty boring, we had to do a bunch of exercises, run a couple of laps, pass volleyballs back and forth, and...that was about it, I guess. It wasn't hard or anything, in fact it was a cinch compared to the intense training I went through on the regular, but it was still enough to make me sweat, which was annoying.

About an hour later, the PE session ended. When we returned to class, there was a faint foul odor...where was it coming from?

Suddenly, a few of the girls exclaimed angrily, the source of the odor located. The girls had left some paintings they'd made in art class to dry in the back of the class, and...the dog had peed all over them.

"You filthy little mutt- ahh!" One of the girls snapped, reaching down for him, when he got spooked and bit her hand, inciting a pained yelp from her.

Before I could stop myself, I let out a stifled snort of laughter, doing my best to pass it off as a cough, but not very well, a few of them glared at me furiously. Oops...oh, well, it's not like I care what they think of me.

Later, the homeroom teacher profusely apologized to the girls, but they were seriously pissed off, apparently they had used some really expensive fancy paint brand endorsed by a celebrity or something. And they were glaring at Scruffy pretty intensely. Yikes, if looks could kill.

Oh, yeah, there were plenty of celebrities in the Sanctuary, singers, dancers, actors and so on, just like before WWIII. Well, except for sportsmen, professional sports weren't a thing anymore, though a few popular sports like football, basketball, cricket, tennis and some others were still played casually.

Anyway, the school day continued...

...

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful, and time was going at an absolute snail's pace. This is so boring...

As a result, I fell asleep at my desk sometime during the last period, and woke up about an hour after school ended. Huh, looks like everyone's gone already...no, wait, a few of the desks still had bags on them. Scruffy was asleep by my feet. I slowly got up without disturbing him after gently scratching his head, and headed for the restroom with a yawn. Looks like most of the students and staff had already left. I spotted some of the girls in my class hanging around outside the classroom, watching me as I headed out...huh, that was kinda weird.

I entered the restroom, finished up my business, and headed back to the class after washing my hands and splashing some cold water on face. That took about twenty minutes, I should get back home now, I have one of those stupid training sessions in the Recreation District in the evening.

As I neared the classroom, I could hear a thudding noise coming from inside it, and...a faint muffled whimper. What the...?

My chest began pounding as I got a really bad feeling, and tried to open the door but it was locked. Before I could think it through, I kicked the door open and rushed in, my eyes widening in horror as I saw what was going on.

The girls whose paintings were ruined were standing by my desk, four of them, one of them was holding my chair...and swinging it down at Scruffy. They had gagged him with a rag so that he couldn't cry out loudly, and he was severely bleeding, his bones were broken, and he was just barely alive. The girl then lifted the chair high over her head and swung it down.

"No, stop-!" I cried in desperation, dashing towards them, but I was too late, the chair slammed down onto the dog's neck with a sickening crunch, the light in its eyes fading as a pool of blood poured out of its mouth.

No...how could they...? There wasn't a shred of remorse or regret on their faces...

"Crap, he saw us! Oh, well, it doesn't matter. Hey, weirdo, we're totally gonna pin this on you, it's not like anyone will believe you- argh!" One of them began with a sneer, when I interrupted her with a punch square on the middle her face, I swung as hard I could, breaking her nose and sending her crashing onto the wall.

I wasn't thinking, I was completely seeing red right now, blinded by rage and fury. One of the girls tried to run away, I tripped her before she couldn't get away and stomped on the back of her head as she fell of her front, knocking her out. I slammed my fist across another one's face, dislocating her jaw and knocking out a couple of her teeth, leaving her dazed. I then walked over to the one who had been swinging the chair, she was trapped between my desk and the back corner of the room. I pinned her against the wall before she could escape.

"N-no, wait-!"

I didn't let her finish, rapidly slamming my fists onto her face over and over viciously. I stopped when she was on the verge of passing out, blood pouring down her nose and mouth, and turned my attention back to the other girls. One had managed to escape. That changes nothing.

I began brutally kicking and punching the other two to the ground violently and relentlessly, my vision growing more blindingly red with every brutal strike...I don't really remember much of what happened after that, but by the time I was done my fists were slick with blood, with plenty splattered on my clothes and face. Speaking of faces, the three girls were barely recognizable by the time I was done with them.

Apparently, the girl who got away brought a teacher, and he forcibly stopped my violently brutal assault. The next day, I was brought to the principal along with my father, and I told them what happened and why I did what I did. Of course, my side of the story completely contradicted the girls' side of the story. Since there was no proof, they didn't pursue the issue of Scruffy's death any further, but I was still in deep trouble for what I did to those girls.

Ordinarily, I'd probably have been expelled, but thanks to my father's influence, I was let off with a two week suspension, and the incident was covered up so that no one outside of my class would find out, since it might hurt my father's reputation.

Of course, it wasn't as simple as all that for me. My father was furious, and beat the shit out of me when we got back home. He told me if I ever did something like this again, I'd be disowned...and I was pretty sure he was serious about that. It was in a lot of physical discomfort for a few days after that, my face was sore and swollen and I was bruised all over.

My sister was the only one who believed my side of the story, so that was something at least. After my suspension was over and I returned to school, things were pretty unpleasant. Three of those girls had transferred out to schools in the other quadrants, leaving the North Quadrant. Only one was still here, the one that managed to get away and call a teacher. And, of course, she had told the others in the class that I was solely to blame for it.

When I walked into the classroom for the first time following the suspension...

"Seriously, you're really waltzing back in here like everything's normal?"

"What a freak, I heard that his assault left those poor girls with disfigured faces."

"Ugh, we seriously have to be in the same class as this monster?"

...yeah, I was bombarded with several disgusted remarks along those lines. With no other option, I ignored the comments and headed over to my desk, narrowly avoiding a couple of attempts to trip me as I walked past some of my classmates...as much as I hated to admit it, the hours and hours of martial arts training I go through definitely pays off sometimes. As I sat down and began to plug in my earphones...

"Don't you have anything to say for yourself!? Quit acting like you're above all this, after what you did, you should be in prison or something!"

"Yeah, totally! They should, like, bring back the death penalty just for you!"

Ugh, wonder how long it'll take before this blows over...

"Hey...you aren't even going to defend yourself? That's basically like admitting your guilt, you piece of trash, and-!"

I was starting to get really annoyed. Well, I don't want anyone assuming my silence was an admission of guilt, so just once, I'll speak up for myself...

"There wouldn't be any point in defending myself, it's not like any of you would believe me anyway. But fine, I suppose it wouldn't hurt to give you my side of the story. Did I kill the dog? No, I didn't. Did I beat the living shit out of those four bitches who did kill the dog? Yeah, I did, though one of them didn't get nearly as much as she deserved, the lucky cunt. And that's the whole story, simple as that. I don't give a damn about whether or not any of you believe me."

A few uncertain whispers and murmurs began echoing through the classroom. Huh, might some of them actually believe me...?

"Wh-what total bullshit! You're just trying to make yourself look like a tragic hero or something. You said, uh...y-yeah, th-that's right, when we saw you killing that poor dog, you said that you were going to pin the blame on us because we had a motive thanks to the dog ruining our paintings. But you made a mistake...normal people don't freaking murder an innocent animal over something so trivial!" Cried the fourth girl, her expression enraged and her body shaking with anger...wow, that was some impressive acting, I'm not even being sarcastic...well, it looks like I'm screwed.

And sure enough, her acting was more than convincing enough to eradicate any lingering doubts. I defended myself a bit more before giving up when it became clear that they had all already made up their minds.

"Admit it, you killed the dog! That's the least you can do after trying to pin the blame on someone else!"

"You're worse than scum, murdering a dog and assaulting girls for your own sick pleasure!"

Uh...maybe phrase that differently, that makes it sound like I did something worse than simply beating them up. After several more minutes of their incessant griping, I finally snapped and said...

"Fine, I admit it," I replied with a blank look, "I admit...that I didn't kill the dog, but I did beat up the bitches that did. And I admit...that I fucking enjoyed it."

Well, that sealed it. With that comment, my school life was turned into a living hell with no going back. From that point on, I would often find my desk and chair vandalized, my stuff would often go missing or turn up damaged beyond repair, I had to constantly check my back for any of those 'kick me'-type notes, people would attempt to trip me almost every time I stood up, even our homeroom teacher treated me with contempt, meaning that she believed that I was the one who killed her dog.

Did it bother me? Yeah, of course it did. But eventually, I didn't have a choice but to get used to it. I mean...what else could I do?

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