kunrendeotaku

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 16

I lead us towards Fergusson’s room, figuring his parents would be busy in the kitchen for a while after their customary weird greeting. I used to not bother knocking on my friends door when I walked in, but after a rather terrifying experience that I’m doing my best to forget from last year, I’ve changed my ways.

A couple taps on his door later and I see a thin guy with a curly jew-fro and thick glasses pull it open, “Marco! And random girl I don’t know! Ferguson, we’ve got company.” Alfonzo moves out of the doorway to open up the pathway into Ferguson’s room. I find myself wondering how Star will think of seeing the room of a teenage boy from Earth for the first time, as most people don’t have the same religious devotion to cleanliness as I do.

“Wha? Isn’t that the girl who almost burned down the school?” An overweight redhead with bright green eyes glances up at us from where he currently sits flopped on a bean bag, game controller in hand. Both of my friends are dressed rather casually in sweat pants and t-shirts, Alfonzo’s much too large for him. Is he borrowing some of Ferguson’s stuff again? The room itself is casually decorated with posters referencing various games and movies, and liberally coated in trash, old food, and dirty clothes. Smells about like you’d expect from a fourteen year old boy’s room.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Star claims innocently, widening her eyes. I had no idea she was half that good an actor. Either she really doesn’t remember, or she’s had a criminal amount of practice claiming to be innocent of her ill deeds. I think both possibilities are about equally likely.

“I’m just glad it apparently ended with only ‘almost’. This is Star Butterfly, the new exchange student. She’s from Mewni, which is uh. Apparently a different dimension. Go figure, we aren’t alone in the universe after all.” I shrug, realizing why Star tends to cast a big spell whenever she does her introductions. The claim is more than a little bit impossible to believe without seeing it with your own two eyes. Honestly, I’ve been so caught up in the craziness that is my life with her that I haven’t really adjusted my worldview to realize how much bigger everything really is. Who knows how many dimensions there are? How many have sentient life, or things we couldn’t even comprehend?

Ferguson struggles up to his feet in what I’m sure he thinks of as a graceful maneuver, before swaggering over to me. He leans an elbow on my shoulder with a confident smirk, “Marco Diaz, my man. Serving up a hottie on a platter for me, right here in my room? I knew there was a reason we’re friends.” Completely ignoring anything outside of the fantasy world he lives in, as usual. He’s a great guy, but I swear he’s even crazier than his parents. Star doesn’t seem to know what to make of the round red-head’s ridiculously forward nature. Honestly, I think she’s still trying to come to grips with how this kid had managed to come from his overwhelmingly attractive parents.

“Ferguson O’durguson, sweet cheeks. I’m into foreign chicks. Where’re you from again? Like, past New York?” Alfonzo wrings his hands behind his much wider friend, clearly worried that the redhead is going to get himself slapped again. At least ‘Casanova’ here isn’t using his sharpied on stomach face trick yet, most of the time he starts with that one.

“I’m the Crown Princess of the Butterfly kingdom! And you aren’t exactly my type, sorry. Wait-” Star squints at Ferguson, taking this whole thing much better than I expected. Maybe she’s already pretty experienced with dating, or something? She comes off as immature as hell, but I really don’t know much about Star yet, “Maybe with a stache?” Her wand snaps up and flashes a pink beam at Ferguson’s face. The spell resolves itself into a truly impressive red mustache wider than the rest of his face with twirled up tips. “Nope! Sorry, better luck hitting on the next princess you find.”

Both of my human friends stare with wide eyes at Star, who descends into a giggling fit. The first glimpse of real magic is always a shock, as you come to slowly realize that you aren’t dealing with just a crazy girl lost in her own imagination. You’re dealing with a magic princess, who happens to also be both crazy and often last in their own imagination. Alfonzo reaches around Ferguson to tug at his mustache, and both of them yelp when they simultaneously realize that it's real.

I disengage from the trio as they begin bombarding Star with the standard nerdy questions a teenage boy might ask a magic user upon finding out that it’s real. What her world is like, are elves real, can they learn magic, can he keep the mustache, you get the picture. I busy myself with some desperately needed cleanup while they manage their introductions, Alfonzo eventually getting around to explaining that his father is a very very busy Veterinarian. He tends to stay with Ferguson rather than sitting around an empty home.

Once I have the room in a livable state, I begin setting up a game for us. You might think I would feel used, cleaning up someone else’s room and doing all the prep work for us to have fun. The thing is, I’ve never once been asked to do anything for Ferguson but I literally can’t help myself sometimes. He’s just such a slob now and again, organizing chaos is writ into my bones. And what kind of friend would I be if I didn’t plan out something we could all enjoy getting to know each other with? They might never notice how I smooth things along, but it’ll never stop me from doing so.

“Hey, kids. I’ve got zombies set up. Who wants to see how many rounds we can go?” I call over to the trio of excited teens still standing around the doorway. Each of us has a beanbag and game controller set out, the game ready to start on the television with a press of a button. Ferguson was kind enough to always keep a spare bean bag for any exchange students I brought along, after getting a set for the rest of us.

Star gasps, her eyes sparkling, “Soft chairs!” she makes a face first dive onto the one clearly set for me by its maroon color. I don’t really blame her for ignoring the bland grey exchange student one, but it still stings to have my seat taken! Ferguson thumps back onto his prison jumpsuit orange bag, while Alfonzo delicately folds his legs under himself before taking a seat on his beige bag o’ beans.

“C’mon Star, that one was mine.” I whine a little, before obediently taking the bland leftover. At least it's still super comfy, as they all are. Star only wiggles around on the bag in answer, happily exploring the brand new feeling. I wonder how a medieval age person would react to sitting on a beanbag for the first time? Maybe a normal person might even panic a bit, but Star reacts to the new experience as she always does-with joy and excitement at the new challenge.

Once she masters sitting up straight on her chair, we move onto the next exceptionally difficult task. The following few hours consist of all three of us Earthlings doing our damndest to teach Star how to play videogames, primarily the zombie killing multiplayer game we tend to prefer. It doesn’t go that well, unfortunately. While she loves the idea of the game with a passion even I wasn’t expecting, she’d never before even seen a gun, much less a video game controller. There was a lot to go over. Shockingly, she seemed to remember all of it with a burning zeal that I can only attribute to her monster slaying side. I imagine a few more study sessions like that one, and she’ll be ready for actually playing.

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 15

“Marco! If you don’t open your eyes, how are you going to tell me where we’re going?!” Star’s voice is full of laughter, her voice piercing directly into my ears from only a few inches behind me. As her question implies, I have my eyes squinted tightly shut against the chilly fall wind that blows more powerfully than I would have ever expected. Then again, I don’t often consider what it would feel like to fly.

I weigh my options. On the one hand, my insane magical friend could easily fly us to the next country if I don’t give her directions. On the other hand, maybe if I keep pretending this isn’t happening we’ll magically teleport back to the ground. Crazier things have happened, today. Our winged red wagon finally pausing its acrobatics to glide gently is the deciding factor for me peeling open my eyes to take a look at what I’d been missing.

My sleepy little California town spreads out below me, a view I’d seen perhaps a fraction of every now and then caught from drone cameras or news helicopters. Seeing it for myself for the first time is an experience I will never forget if I live to be a million years old. Without even thinking about it my whole body relaxes my previously hyper-tense muscles and I lean back into the architect of the chaos infecting my life, her body still running hotter than I would have expected. It feels nice in this chilly air.

She begins giggling, still holding me tight with her non-wand hand, and when I look back at her face with awe-struck eyes I see the same expression she always tends to have. Full of a wonder at the amazing sights you can see if you chase after adventure. Is this what I’ve been looking for, more than a chance to test my martial arts, more than an escape from the boredom of the world, and so much more than safe kids or bad boys?

Perhaps I would have found the answer for real in those sparkling blue eyes of hers if not for the whole wagon beginning to shake, “Marco, for real! We need a destination, I have no idea how long these wings will last!”

“Oh! Oh, okay!” I sit up and peer over the side of the wagon, the desperation of the new emergency throwing me out of my thoughtful mood. Now that we’re past the initial fear of climbing so high in the air, my own apprehensive attitude about heights is blasted away to wisps of butterflies in my stomach that I honestly rather like, but I’d still rather not crash and die. My destination is rather difficult to find as I’ve never looked for it from the air, but desperation is a powerful motivator. I point out a certain little house in a cul de sac in the middle of town, yelling out, “There! Land us there!”

Immediately the wagon dips into a nosedive. Star clearly is in the mood to get us to the ground as quickly as possible, which is likely due to the fact that I can now see the glittering purple wings dissolving before my very eyes, “We’re not gonna make it, Staaaaaar!” I yell out, her name transitioning into a high pitched (but definitely still totally manly) scream as I feel gravity take hold of us completely.

Star’s grip on my hoodie tightens as we approach the ground at a horrifyingly fast pace. We’re perhaps fifty feet from the ground when for the umpteenth time today I consider myself definitely dead. “Cotton Candy Cloudy Charm!” The princess screams out behind me, and a pink laser blasts past my head to summon a truly massive clump of what looks like a solid cloud of the same color. It has blue eyes and a smile that opens wide as we approach, munching us right out of the air.

The next few moments are a nearly vomit inducing simulation of what a pinball must feel like, as we bounce around the supernaturally soft and durable material until we finally disperse all of our momentum. Somehow we’ve managed to become entangled in a confusing mix up of limbs and odd positions, and I believe the wagon is actually on top of us as I feel I’m laying on the cotton candy-like being Star had summoned.

I find myself feeling a strange mixture of disappointment and relief that it is quite dark in here, as from the feeling of her legging clad knees and thighs on my head I might actually be looking directly up Star’s skirt. The oddly bittersweet feeling doesn’t last long, Star’s wand lighting up to blast the wagon off of us and poof the giant cloud out of existence in the same flash of pink light. She jumps to her feet, then yanks me up as well to spin me around by my wrists. I can’t help but join her in laughing, exalting in the feeling of simply being alive after our harrowing experience.

We’re thrown out of our revelry when the wagon crash lands on one of the homes in the cul de sac and smashes right through the ceiling. The pair of us blink at the property damage, then nearly dissolve into another giggle fit. Someone could definitely have died from that, “Oh, my God Star. That was the best experience of my life. Let's go see if we actually made it to the right house?” I pull my hands away from Star and hook a thumb at what definitely looks to be Fergusson’s home, the grin on my face impossible to suppress even by focusing on the new collection of bruises and scrapes I’d added to my body with the latest escapade. Am I becoming a masochist?

“Okay!” Star rushes off to the doorway and manages to contain herself to only three doorbell dings in quick succession. She’s learning! I follow the crazy blonde up to the door, a bit slowly. I might not be bothered by the injuries I’m slowly racking up, but they’re definitely slowing me down, especially as the adrenaline stops pumping.

The door is answered by Fergusson’s mother a few moments later. She’s probably one of the prettiest adults I’ve ever seen, a gorgeous petite little pixie of a girl with bright orange hair and slender limbs. She could nearly pass for our age. I swear, the only thing Fergusson got from her is his hair and her friendly personality. Not that he can make use of it very often, considering how basically his only friends are me and Alfonzo. Perhaps when he gets to college or so he’ll come into his own?

“Why, Marco! C’mon in, my Ferggie is with Alfonzo in his room as usual.” She barely even seems to notice Star for the first few minutes as we catch up, her talking about a thousand different little nothings a mile a minute. Star simply follows the pair of us into her home looking a little confused at being ignored. Must be strange for a princess to not even be greeted when meeting someone new, but Francine has always been really attached to me for some reason. I happily chat with her until Fergusson’s father, Olaf enters the room.

“Well now, who’s this with you Marco?” A deep voice booms out of the kitchen as a massive giant of a man squeezes through the doorway into the living room. He’s blonde, probably seven feet tall, and all muscle with a gigantic beard. He’s also carrying a tray of brownie fresh from the oven. I swear to all that is holy, how that giant tub of lard Fergusson managed to come from these two parents is a mystery that could stump our world’s greatest minds.

“I’m Star Butterfly! Basically Marco’s best friend, and new roomie!” Huh. First time she’s gone with that as her introduction. Is she actually getting the fact that the magical princess introduction breaks things more often than not?

“Aha, well, I’m Olaf. This is my wife, Francine. A pleasure to meet you, Miss Butterfly. Marco often introduces his foreign exchange students to this household, and I extend the same invitation to you that I always do give them: You’re welcome here anytime.” The little woman dances up to her husband, gives him a peck on the cheek (she has to jump, which is the most adorable thing), and steals a brownie before tossing us both a wink.

“Have fun, Marco! You’re especially welcome, you know. Even if Fergusson isn’t around.” Francine leaves us with that to disappear into the kitchen, giggling like a teenager. Olaf is all smiles until she leaves the room, but once she’s out of sight bends his massive bulk down towards us to give me specifically a death glare.

“You keep him away from my wife, Butterfly girl. I’ll be watching.” His accent deepens, perhaps scandinavian? I’m not that good with accents, for all that I’ve been around foreign kids for years. He then heads back towards the kitchen as well, prompting Star to give me an absolutely befuddled look.

The best I can offer her in return in a bashful shrug. “They’ve always been like that. I don’t really get it, but they’re definitely nice people!” Crazy, but nice. Kind of like Star herself!

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 14

Star immediately snaps to it, figuring out how to open her box of nuggets quickly. She tosses one in her mouth and begins munching down. A frown quickly forms, and she sticks out a surprisingly long tongue to look at the mushed goop on her tongue. “Something wrong, Star?” I ask, leaning back and away from her. Gross gross gross. Who does this?

Her tongue disappears back into her mouth to finish chewing the gross looking chicken before it can completely destroy my own appetite. Thankfully she swallows before answering “I don’t know… it's hard to explain. Like, sure, it's tasty, but it's so different. I can’t taste any real obvious corn products, which we put in literally everything on Mewni. The taste is chicken, I think, but that texture is so odd. It's gonna take me a while to get used to the food here. Sugary sweets are the same everywhere, though! That drink and cake this morning were both amazing.”

Interesting stuff. I assume there's things she doesn’t even have the ability to put words for. Are both of our dimension’s chickens even the same species? Do we have the same periodic table, the same taste buds or dietary needs? And if her society is medieval, she’ll not have any answers to any of the bigger science questions. Hell, if they’re a magical society they might never develop that far down the science route. I suppose I should be grateful that we’re so similar to each other physically, most people would never guess that Star was a different species. “Hey, Star, that reminds me.” I open up our dipping sauces and demonstrate their purpose for my new alien friend by soaking a nugget in sweet and sour and munching down on it. “What are your people called? Like, on Earth we’re humans as a species, American is our nationality from the country we currently live in, I’m of Latin descent in terms of what I look like physically and where my ancestors come from. What about you?”

Star takes to the dipping sauce like a fish to water, alternating between licking straight from the container and actually dipping her food into it. She also begins munching on her fries with far less confusion than earlier, I imagine salted potato sticks are less of a culture shock than processed food. “Well, our dimension is called Mewni, so anyone who looks mostly like me is considered a Mewman. Our continent is divided up into several different kingdoms, along with the wildlands where the monsters live. The Butterfly kingdom is the place where I’m the princess of, so I guess that would be our nation. I’m not sure we have a proper term for our nationality thing, just citizens of the Butterfly kingdom. Half my ancestry is the Butterfly family, who all tend to be really fair skinned, slight, pretty people. We’ve historically been very rich, as my family controls the wand, the most powerful magical artifact on Mewni. This doesn’t make us the leader of all the other kingdoms, really, but we’re the most powerful individually and tend to take the lead when alliances need to be formed or outside forces need to be dealt with. My father is not a Butterfly, though! He’s from the Johanssen clan, a family of massive warriors and monster hunters. That’s where I get my monster fighting from, I think.” Star lifts up her arm and flexes a rather impressive bicep, though it's less amazing considering she still is covered in grime and now has sweet and sour sauce around her mouth.

Wow, that was quite the info dump. I allow the conversation to fade away into the near silence of crunching and munching on our lunch while I consider all of that. The biggest surprise of all is that my dumbass friend actually remembered all that. It sounds like she was quoting from some lecture or something, they must have really tried hard to get it to stick. I say a brief prayer for whoever suffered through that particular experience. More seriously, I had no idea that wand was that important. It still kind of looks like a plastic pink toy to me. Is that why Ludo wanted it? So that the monsters could try to overturn the powerful Butterfly family? Hmm.

I’ve heard her refer to dimensions quite a lot, as well. She doesn’t seem to refer to planets much. Did they gain access to the multiverse before they even fully explored their whole planet? I’m not sure what kind of scale Star is talking about when she talks about her whole continent, but I get the feeling her kingdom is actually pretty small if she managed to set the whole thing on fire in a few days. Maybe I should set up a homeschooling curriculum for her to help catch her up on Earth history, politics, religion, and geography. She might be the worst student possible, but I’m sure I could manage to beat the basics into her head given time.

But for now, we both seem to have finished up our lunch though. We can have more info sharing later, probably, since I’m sure she’s already getting bored of it. “Hey, Star, let's get out of here. I’ve got a couple more friends I’d like you to meet, these guys I -actually- like.”

“Sure!” The Mewman gal slides out of the booth and starts skipping towards the exit, her eyes constantly on all the new things that she sees. The longer I spend with her, the more I understand how truly strange and new my mundane life is for her. Since she clearly adores adventure as much as I do, I find it difficult to really become frustrated at her various antics. I’d be the same in her shoes, if maybe a bit more sane about it.

“Where’d you get this wagon anyway?” I ask once we’ve made it back to our vehicle of choice. Star only responds with a shrug, which does not make me feel any better about its origin.

“Who cares? We’re not gonna be pulling it anyway. I’m done with that gig. Hop in!” Star jumps into the wagon, landing on her backside with a giggle. She slaps the bottom of the thing in front of her, clearly excited for what she has planned. Then again, when isn’t she excited? Considering it's just a boring old wagon and no one else is around, I imagine our method of locomotion is going to involve magic.

“I-I’m not sure, Star. This doesn’t seem safe, like, at all. And I don’t even know what you’re going to do yet.” Star rolls her eyes, then points more aggressively down at the space in front of her.

“Get in the wheely box, Diaz.” I grumble a little bit more, but my adrenaline junkie side just barely manages to win out over my dedication towards keeping my head on my shoulders where it belongs. I hop in, grabbing the sides of the wagon and preparing myself. What’ll she do? Summon a horse to pull us? Shoot a rocket from our back? Give the wagon sentience?

“Super Sparkle Box Fly Wings!” I hear yelled out behind me, along with a flash of pink light. Oh god, that does not sound good. Wings?! We don’t have a flying permit! Do you need something like that?! I’m pretty sure it's illegal to be in US airspace over a certain distance! And we don’t have any seat belts! I let out a whimper that quickly turns into a scream when giant purple wings pop into existence on the side of our wagon and lift us up way higher than should be possible in just one flap.

“STAR! Why would you do this?! We’re going to fall and definitely DIEEEEEE” My voice is lost to the rushing of air past our improvised flying vehicle as it experiments with its capabilities, dipping up and down in dramatic nose dives, corkscrews, and loop de loops. I feel like I’m on the most violent roller coaster to ever exist, with no seatbelts. The only thing holding me in place is one of Star’s arms around my waist, my iron grip on the sides of the wagon, and centrifugal force at times. On the bright side, I’ve managed to completely and totally forget about the feeling of lacking all body hair.

[kunrendeotaku]

Person: So how are you spending the weekend?

Me:

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 13

“Ughh. You’re right. I’m an awful princess.” Star slumps against a rail separating one half of the restaurant from the other, waving her empty cup in her hand. “Just like today, I can never get what I’m supposed to do right. If I do remember my lessons, it's always exactly the wrong ones.”

I lean against the rail next to her and pat her shoulder, then shrug. A bit of self reflection will be good for her, I don’t actually want my city burning to the ground after all. “Hey. Maybe you’re a bit of a screw up. But that just means you have to keep trying, and more importantly, it's what lead you here. We wouldn’t have the chance to hang out like this if you’d never had to be sent to Earth.” Much as my day hasn’t been the best, I’d trade massive highs and massive lows for the stagnant boredom of my usual life any day. Fight a demon, lose your hair, fun and despair all nicely paired together. Doesn’t change the fact I plan to mourn Rodrigo properly later tonight, but it helps get my head straight with the idea of Star altogether-rainbows and fire, amazingly wonderful but definitely going to get me horribly killed one day. I… like it a little too much.

“Aww. That's so sweet. You’re right! I just have to do my best, and listen to my Earth guide. Speaking of which… why are we carrying around empty cups??” Star tilts her head, bright blue eyes clouded with confusion. Perfect timing, she’ll be distracted by the drink machine for sure.

I walk us on over towards the machine in question, thinking that after that little detour our food will likely be ready by the time we finish off with the machine. “Behold! A soda dispenser. You just hold your cup against one of these levers, and carbonated sugary deliciousness comes out! This one here is for ice.” I quickly demonstrate by filling up my cup with ice and root beer, all the while noticing how wide Star’s eyes are.

“It… is it free? How do people not come in and just drink all of it?” I was wondering if she had any real concept of money. I guess she did have some economics lessons sink in during childhood, though I doubt she did much small money purchases as a princess.

“Ah! You see, that’s the ingenious part. We buy our -cups-! You can’t bring in your own cups or you get in trouble, so you fill up these empty ones we bought.” I flick my still lidless paper cup to show my point.

Star just responds with a roll of her eyes. “Is that all?! Anyone could cheat that! Look, look, I can do this super easy.” The crazy girl twists her head to the side and slams the side of her face into the various levers used pushed for soda, holding her mouth wide open. Immediately a small river of three different colors and kinds of soft drink pour onto her face. She doesn’t seem to care at all, other than a twitching eye from a stream of mountain dew pouring directly onto it.

Lord save me from the shenanigans of this idiot. I take a few moments to allow myself the brief stress relief of a face palm, Star giggling all the while as she glugs perhaps a third of the diet coke heading for her mouth. The rest, of course, just soaking my new exchange student’s head and upper body. Once appropriately facepalmed, I yank Star away from the soda fountain by the back of her dress and just glare at her.

She giggles nervously upon seeing my look. “I, uh, guess that's against the rules too?” I give the girl no answer for the moment, as I am too busy grabbing an absolute mountain of paper towels.

“Hold still.” I order her, before beginning to wipe her down. I swear that it feels sometimes like I’m already a parent. My mother can be a messy eater as well, and it stresses me the hell out to the point where I used to carry a handkerchief around all the time just for cleaning up any messes on her, though after one particularly grueling summer of training I disabused her of the habit enough that I no longer bother to carry one. Perhaps I should start doing so again.

I find myself thinking how odd her cheek marks are. I thought they were stickers at first, perhaps magical ones considering how they sometimes changed to reflect her emotions, but now that I’m wiping her cheeks I can clearly feel they are just her skin. She looks a bit uncomfortable at the vigorous scrubbing of her face and neck, but one look at my face convinces her that escaping me when I’m in my mothering mode is a terrible idea. I dry off what I can of her hair next, but that will likely be damp and sticky for a while.

For whatever reason, she blushes deeply when I dry off the front of her dress. Maybe the soda had started to stick and felt uncomfortable, I dunno. Ignoring her cherry red cheeks and the fact that she appears to be considering hitting me now instead of being just uncomfortable, I brush my hands off and declare “Passable. The art of cleaning is one not practiced well enough by people. If I had some wet wipes you’d be good as new, but we’ll have to be satisfied with adequate.”

Star glances towards the floor, muttering “Turnabout's fair play, I guess?” before simply shrugging and letting the tension out of her shoulders with a sigh. I’ve got no clue what she means by that, but I blame Janna. She glances back towards the soda fountain and stretches out her empty cup this time, bless her soul. She starts by grabbing some ice that quickly goes into her mouth to help chill out the blush on her cheeks. A crunching noise sounding out nearly throws me into a full on return of the rant I had on our first meeting, but I manage to just barely keep it in. Ice is bad for teeth, but not even normal humans usually care.

“C’mon Star, get something. I think we’re holding up the line.” I look behind me to see a number of impatient people who were rather unamused to be held up by our antics at the soda fountain. Thankfully Star avoids the dilemma of deciding what to choose by filling up her cup with a bit of every single type of soda. Snapping on the plastic caps for both our cups and grabbing a pair of straws goes relatively smoothly after that, after which I lead us to a booth. They’re just more comfortable than tables, you know? Even if we only have a couple people.

“This. Is. Amazing.” Star is absolutely sucking down her soda, the joys of carbonation or perhaps simply her straw made clear by the sparkling of her eyes. I’m not sure which, I still haven’t pinned down the exact technology level of her old dimension, but it seems vaguely medieval. “It’s tingly like magic potions, but instead of swamp water and magic it takes like sugar water! Best thing I’ve tried on Earth yet, hehehe.” She snags a seat on one side of the booth and slides up against the wall, then glances up at me curiously when I don’t follow her.

“If you think that's good, just wait til you try nuggets with their sweet and sour. Absolutely divine.” I kiss my fingers like what I imagine a food gourmet or chef might, then giggle a bit. “I’ll be right back, I figure our food is ready by now.” A quick run to the counter and back, and our wonderful meal of boxes of nuggets and fries is ready to be served. Naturally, I slide into the other side of the booth across from Star and get ready to dig in. Before I can touch a single bit of food, however, Star holds up a hand with a squint in her eyes.

“Waaaait.” I blink, then my new exchange student dips down under the table. I hear several crashes, bangs, and weird curses. Standard stuff for when I don’t have my eyes on her. Next thing I know her face pops up between my knees. More than a little awkward to have her that close to my crotch, but the pure oddity of her behavior helps to avoid more than a slight blush on my cheeks. “Oh, whoops! Almost got it, hehe.” She disappears back down under the table before popping up right next to me and plopping into the seat with a smug look.

“If you wanted to sit next to me, you could LITERALLY have just stood up and walked around.” Her continued refusal to take the easy way to do anything still baffles me. I notice she’s also managed to pick up another layer of dirt and grime all over herself, and at least three pieces of chewing gum in her hair. Is it actually impossible for her to stay clean for more than five minutes at a time?

“Life is an adventure Marco! You should try it sometime. Besides, if I hadn’t gone over there I wouldn’t have found...THIS!” A muscular arm disappears into her huge mass of hair before ripping out a piece of gum I hadn’t spotted before. “It's squishy and smells like sugar!” I swear my hand has never snapped out faster than in the moment I realized she was about to toss the old gum into her mouth. Whip crack quick the chewing gum is slapped out onto the floor.

“Star! Oh my god, don’t freaking eat things off of the floor! Or the bottom of the table! Or other weird places!” My voice shakes in horror. How had she survived until now? Even now she looks more upset about her stinging fingers and lost treat than the fact she had almost committed suicide by bacteria. I feel the urge to lecture rising sharply in me, and only the threat of our food going cold stops me from doing so. I cut things short with an almost growled “We’ll discuss this later. Now eat your lunch, young lady!”

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 12

I’m not sure how much longer Star drags me along before I finally look up, thinking that surely we should surely be home by now. To my surprise, I can’t immediately place where we are, but I think I see the mall fairly close by? That’s halfway across town! How far has Star dragged me? Ugh. I guess I have to put my own personal pity party on hold to ensure I can end up in my own bed tonight. The sheer amount of despair that thought provokes nearly makes me give up and lay back down, but I guess I’ve become more tired of sitting in this wagon than I thought, because the shaking now feels unbearable.

I roll out of the wagon and land on the concrete, but Star continues determinedly pulling her load along. I pick myself up, brush myself off, and rush to catch up with her. It causes a litany of aches and pains to run over my body, unfortunately, but I guess that's what you get for fighting above your weight class twice in the span of two days. Professional fighters usually spend months between fights, but I sure ain’t a professional. Still… they remind me of what I’ve been up to since I met Star. I fought monsters, I just finished fighting a fuckin demon! And I literally haven’t been bored even a single moment, the whole time. In spite of my grief for Rodrigo and his many brothers, I find a smile on my face.

“I see you finally decided to get up.” Star sounds completely miffed, perhaps understandably so. She must have been dragging me for miles. A twinge of guilt runs through me, she protects me (Mostly?) from Janna while I’m unconscious, then carries me away from the queen of creepiness herself? And I respond by making her drag me miles in a little metal wagon. I chuckle a bit nervously, scratching the back of my head. “Yeah, well, sorry about that. Janna… really gets to me. Where are we going anyway?”

Star glances over towards me with her lips pursed, but after only a few moments her gaze softens. In addition, that flush crops back over her cheeks and she looks away. Suspicious. I might have to find out if Star has anything to be guilty over herself. “Uh, yeah. We can call it even I guess. We’re heading to the school! We came out for your bike, we’re gonna get it.” Star declares, before pumping her free fist vigorously to punctuate her statement.

“Star…” I look at her in pity. “Did you take directions from Janna?” She blinks, tilting her head. “Yeah, why?” I grimace and rub the bridge of my nose. Stress levels rising. “Janna will literally never give you correct directions. Something about a middle school dare. We’ve been heading in the wrong direction for like, two hours.” I’m treated to my second view of Star’s cheek marks shattering in the same day, though unfortunately far less enjoyable this time. She groans, tossing herself back into the wagon to take my place. Her gigantic mass of blonde hair cushions her fall and honestly makes the thing look much more comfortable.

“C’mon. We’re pretty close to McDonalds, let's just grab some lunch.” Only unintelligible muttering comes from the bed of the wagon, and so I decide it's my turn to drag her around. I grab the handle and begin wheeling her along the sidewalk, wondering how in the world she’d managed to pull me for so long. A person is crazy heavy! Stupid warrior princess muscles. Probably the very same things making it so heavy for me. Luckily I don’t have to drag her nearly as far, but it's still going to be a grueling ten minutes of exertion all the way to our McDonald’s parking lot. “Listen, Marco, about earlier. You’re my guide to all Earth stuff, right?”

“Urgh. Yeah, that's right.” I answer, grunts of effort sometimes leaking out. Are these wheels even turning? “Well, you’re really smart about Earth stuff, but like… crazy dumb about magic. In the future, I’m gonna need you to follow my lead on that stuff. I’ll be your guide to the weird and wonderful magic of the multiverse!” Talkative when she’s not the one pulling, huh. I take my time to think that over, pondering what that would mean. On the one hand, that means I’m putting my safety and sanity in the hands of someone I’m pretty sure would classify as crazy. On the other hand, I really do have no clue what I’m doing when it comes to magic. That demon could have killed us, and it was all my fault. If we’re gonna keep seeing things like that…

“Alright, alright. That makes sense. We’ll just have to *gasp* teach each other.” Star bounces up onto her knees with a manic grin, shaking the whole wagon. “Great! First rule from your magic teacher: Unless I say otherwise, everyone who claims to be an Earth magician is doing real magic.” I slap my free hand into a vigorous facepalm, already feeling that that particular misunderstanding is definitely going to come back to bite me. “God-fine, sure Star. Every wacko who claims a mastery of voodoo or card tricks is a real wizard.” I hope my heavily slathered sarcasm makes it through that glitter filled skull of hers, but if so, she doesn’t react to it.

“Great! Also, I think we’re here.” Star jumps out of the wagon and points up at the building in front of us, done in beige and yellow. McDonalds written out in nice big letters, guess she’s right. I wonder if her dimension uses English in their writing as well, or if she learned before coming here? She does have a weird accent, now that I think of it. Something distinctly European, almost like a British accent's weird hyperactive cousin? About the best way to explain it. I of course park our wagon perfectly in the center of a parking space, finding myself compelled to click an imaginary electronic key. “Beep beep.”

I feel a hand snag my hoodie and drag me violently towards the door. “Hurry up, Marco! I smell food!” We blast into the door, which is thankfully push, rather than pull. I honestly think we might have busted the glass the other way around. Star thankfully releases me after I give her an affronted glare. The nerve, going after my hoodie. It could have stretched! She herself is bouncing up and down giddily, eyes swerving from place to place at lightning speed. I can tell the only reason she hasn’t gone any further into the room is that she simply can’t decide which to explore first.

“Earth Guide, rule one. When you find yourself in a place you don’t understand, do exactly as I do-or what the majority of others seem to be doing.” I gesture to the line of people getting ready to order, and step into line myself. “Oh, oh yeah. I can do that. No problem.” Star slides into place beside me, rather than behind me. Close enough, I guess… I’ll be paying for her food anyhow. “See that sign above the counter? Some of the items have pictures, some don’t, but that's the menu. Pick out one item from there, and a drink size.”

Star responds only with a few rapidfire nods, eyes already locked onto the menu. I wonder how she’ll do at her first time ordering a meal in an Earth restaurant? Unfortunately she’s not the most observant. I doubt she even hears how everyone else makes their orders, focused as she is on picking out her items. Eventually it comes time for us to make our orders, and she glances at me first. Good girl! She can learn! I step up and make my order quickly. “I’ll take a number three with a large fry and a large drink.” She asks if I’d like to make it a combo, which, obviously. I nod, then glance over at my new friend to see if she can follow along.

Star takes a deep breath, then holds up her wand and points it at the employee taking her order. It begins glowing with a menacing pink light. This isn’t exactly a promising start. “I don’t know what any of these are! I’ll just take the corn nuggets with the largest drink you have!” I quickly elbow her and shake my head, the poor confused lady just staring at us. “Star, there aren’t any corn nuggets on the menu!” She blinks, suddenly seeming just as befuddled as the rest of us. “What kind of food place doesn’t have corn nuggets?! I didn’t even bother looking for them, since I figured they weren’t one of the items with pictures!”

I sigh. Of course she only looked at the pictures. I slowly move Star’s wand arm down towards the floor so she can stop threatening the nice lady taking our orders, and thankfully she lets it stop glowing shortly after. “Look, she’ll take the 8 piece nuggets, large fry, and a large drink. Yes, Combo, whatever. Listen-thrown in a kids meal toy and she’s less likely to cause another scene.” The look of sheer exhaustion on my face must have clued the employee into something, as she suddenly gives me a look of sympathy and nods. I snag our two cups and lead Star over to the drink machine, a confused look on her face.

“Star. Can you tell me what you did wrong there?” She blinks, then frowns, thinking back over her actions. “Well, I greeted the lady, asked her for the food, and told her my drink size. Honestly, I think I did great. Pretty much the only one in the wrong is this place for not having corn nuggets.” Star scoffs, clearly unrepentant. We have a lot of work to do here. “No, Star. You threatened an innocent woman, demanded food instead of asking, and didn’t read the menu. At all. Worse, you didn’t observe anyone else to figure out the right way to do it-even me! You could have literally only repeated what I said and been fine!”

“Ohhhh. I just figured princesses behaved differently, so I never really think about how other people do things.” Star begins holding up fingers in turn as she lists off “Always meet a new person vigorously and with your weapons at the ready, from Dad. Never ask for anything as it makes you look weak, from Mom. Annnd both of them always said it was other people’s responsibility to match my demands. I did it all right! Three boxes checked, woo.” Star pumps her arms, a proud grin on her face.

I simply shake my head, wondering where this spoiled side of Star has popped up from. I mean, when she said she was a princess, it was always kind of hard to see-she treats me like an equal, along with my parents, and even Janna. But I guess service people automatically ping as ‘peasants’ for her royal upbringing? I wonder if it's even possible to overwrite fourteen years of habits built while considering yourself one of the most important people in your country. “Second Earth Guide rule: Marco’s orders supersede princess training. You can’t be a normal Earthling if you follow all the crazy rules of being a princess at the same time-heck, I find it hard to believe you follow them even half the time anyway, so this should be easy!”

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 11

“Quid ego faciem exitium?” The demon asks again, less patiently this time. That turns his already room rumbling voice into what feels like a miniature earthquake, causing me to stumble and take another cat punch, this time to the head. As you might expect, with my brains rattled I’m pretty much out of the fight from that point forward. I slump against the door I’ve been thrown against, all the strength seeping out from my limbs as my chest cools down.

“Marco!” I hear Star’s worried voice moments before she slides in between the creature's frog-like legs, ending up right in front of me. She calls out “Translucent Bubblegum Dome!” and a pink tinted bubble pops up over the two of us. I’d love to thank her for being such a hero, but all that comes out is slurred mumbling. “C’mon Janna, do your weird witchy stuff!” The demon slams its lion paw into the barrier, which shudders. I’m not sure how long that’ll last…

A snap rings out through the room as Janna closes her book of Latin soundly, and begins finally saving the day (?) “Corpus capillus exitium!” The witchy gal yells, pointing directly at me. Welp, I guess this is it, Janna planned all this just to finally kill me off. My premonition is quickly given weight when the demon dissolves once more into black smoke and slithers through Star’s shield like it's not even there, heading directly for me.

Star doesn’t even have time to spell up a counter before the black smoke hits, engulfing me completely. I feel what most closely resembles a hundred thousand static shocks, not super painful for each of them, but the sheer amount almost makes me feel like I’m on fire for all of half a second. I let out a strangled scream, but then the pain stops. The smoke dissipates almost immediately, leaving only three sweaty teens, a destroyed room, and candles in the closet that mysteriously light up again.

I’m feeling much more clear headed after that *wonderful* experience, and slowly push myself to my feet. Star allows the bubble to disappear and slams me back into the wall with a worried hug. “Marco! Are you cursed?! Are you dead?!” She begins patting me down in a way that would be quite nerve wracking in a less stressful situation, but doesn’t appear to find anything at first. “Wait- what's this?”

I blush and look down, wondering what she’s managed to see. Unfortunately for me, I find myself face to face with a giant centipede. It has crawled out of the collar of my shirt and currently has its little feelers waving at me, which is far too much after the events of the past ten minutes or so. I feel my consciousness leave me in a rush, darkness overtaking my vision for I’m not sure how long.

********

The next thing I know, I hear the squeaking of wheels and a few grunts of effort. My body vibrates with the uncomfortable feeling of bad suspension over concrete, which has my head feeling like the gong of a particularly enthusiastic musician. I let out a pain filled moan, murmuring “Stop…” But unfortunately for me, my rest is further disturbed. I feel the evil motion finally stop, but that discomfort is replaced by a massive bash against my chest. My eyes fly open to see a worried looking Star staring right at me, her face so close that our noses nearly touch.

Her knees remain firmly lodged on my ribs, however. Couldn’t she have aimed for a less painful awakening? Still, I do my best to play it off and give my new friend a shaky smile. “Hey, Star.” She finally relaxes, spreading her knees and plopping her butt onto my stomach instead, which is wonderful in about six different ways. “Oh, thank Glossryck. You don’t have brain damage. Some of the things Janna said...Marco! I was worried about you!” As usual, concern quickly changes to anger. Usually I’m the one doing the lecturing, though.

“I, I don’t know what to say. I’m sorry for worrying you, Star. Where -is- Janna anyway? Where are we?” Star grabs the metal sides of the box we’re in and pushes herself up and out, allowing me a full view of what I’d been riding in. Apparently Janna has lent Star a wagon to carry me around in, unless Star stole it. I’m not sure which would make me more comfortable, honestly. “Oh, she’s back at her place cleaning up. You reaaaaallly made a mess of things.”

“I made a mess of things?! Her crazy demon destroyed her room! Which, I may add, should not have been summoned at all, because Earth magic doesn’t work!” I can’t believe what I’m hearing. I push myself up into a sitting position, nearly hysterical at this point. I’m not sure what I might have said next if she hadn’t shocked me so badly by saying “Marco, you know it wouldn’t have attacked us if you didn’t punch it? Those things look like monsters, but usually they just have a job to do after a summoning like that.”

I flap my lips for a few moments, completely flabbergasted. I caused all that chaos? Oh, my god, Janna’s revenge is gonna be… “Wait! I was unconscious in front of Janna, what did she do to me!? Star, you protected me, right!?” I reach up and grab at the front of Star’s shirt, desperation in my eyes. Has she gotten revenge already? Now that I think about it, I do feel a bit different!!

Damningly, Star looks away with a sudden blush on her cheeks, staying silent. “Star!” I repeat, shaking her while my voice cracks a bit. She sighs, still refusing to meet my eyes, but at least answers. “Ah, um, we didn’t do much. I wouldn’t have let her do more of that creepy witchy stuff to you. She just...checked to see if it worked. And maybe took a few pictures, since she said losing the ones she had was part of her payment.” I let go of the somewhat embarrassed girl and start patting myself down. I jump up out of the wagon and keep looking, before eventually finding out what the demon took away from me.

“Rodrigo…” I whisper in horror. My first chest hair is gone, along with every single other hair I had below the neck. That's what feels different, my pants, my boxers, my hoodie...they all feel different, without that thin layer of protection. “Hehe, you feel really smooth now.” Star takes advantage of my grief to pull up my hoodie sleeve and rub her cheek against my forearm, giggling out “Smoooooth.” Once I recover enough to move, I yank my arm away from my new friend, fall to my knees, and call to the sky “WHYYYY?!”

Star simply pats me on the back, saying “You know, she said she was doing you a favor. Apparently some girls like their guys clean shaven?” She just can’t understand. As much as I despise seeing my parents giggling over each other, a lot of my understanding of manliness comes from my very, very hairy father. Will I ever grow hair again? Will I be able to get a girl? What will Jackie think?! I flop myself back into the wagon, pull up my hood, and curl up in the fetal position. My bike will have to wait, as it is very much time to mope.

“Marco! I do not want to drag you all the way home in that thing. Are you listening to me!?” I’m too lost in despair to respond, of course, which ends up with her just sighing. “Guess I’m doin this.” Squeaky wheels and grunts of effort sound out once more, and I find myself longing for the sweet time when I was unconscious and had no idea I’d been cursed. Cursed with utter smoothness.

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 10

Interestingly enough, my first thought is how different their hands are. Star has calloused hands, strong and thick-she probably swung around a weapon before picking up that wand. Janna’s hands are different, softer, but not as much as I expected. Maybe she really works hard on the mechanical stuff I saw in her room? I didn’t even know she was interested in that, but I guess it makes sense that she’d have to be the one building most of her more complicated traps.

More than that, Star’s hand is so much warmer. Does she run at a hotter temperature than the rest of us? Is it something else? My left hand is getting sweaty because of it, which makes me nervous enough that the rest of me is sweating soon after. Definitely doesn’t help that we’re stuck in a little closet with a bunch of candles. Star doesn’t even seem to care about the little rejection from earlier, smiling in anticipation at both me and Janna equally. Am I the weird one for still feeling hurt she didn’t take my side…?

Before I can put more thought into it, Janna finally starts doing something. “Janna Ordonia, qui maga Echo Creek. Marco Diaz bellator est ab Echo Creek. Star Butterfly, a procer magicae. Tres vocant inde supplices te. Niotalosed, responde huius vocationem.” I raise my eyebrows as she starts chanting in what sounds like latin. Not one of my specialties-there is a limit to being a straight A student. I’m pretty sure I heard our names in there, though…

“Wait-are we summoning an actual demon? This better not be one of Tom’s pranks.” Star frowns, suddenly seeming a bit unsure she wants to be a part of this. I snort, shaking my head. “I’m telling you, Star. We have plenty of crazy people who chant Latin in their basements on Earth-if they could actually summon demons, the planet would be chock full of em by now.” She seems unconvinced, but then she doesn’t tend to believe me on matters of Earth magic I’ve come to realize. Perhaps she just considers herself an expert, bah.

Janna continues chanting that same thing over and over, and just as I begin to wonder how long I’ll be kneeling on this stone floor I start to feel something...odd. It’s an uncomfortably warm sensation in my chest, near my heart. I’d think it might be some weird heartburn, but I’ve actually felt it before-since this year started, I’d get this feeling sometimes when fighting, and almost always during our heavy meditation sessions. Sensei said it was nothing, and the doctors seem to agree when I got myself checked out. I wonder why I’m feeling it now? I guess it could be since I’m kneeling which is...kinda like how I sit while meditating. Close enough?

Janna’s eyes slowly close and her chanting gets a weird echoey background reverb. A microphone? Her room’s acoustics? But why would it only sound out now? I turn to Star to see if she’s noticed this weirdness, but blink. She’s looking rather odd herself-are her cheek stickers glowing a little? “Star, are you causing this?” I try to say, but my breath feels like it's stolen away as soon as I open my mouth. She turns to me when my hand tightens on hers in a panic, and I see by her own wide eyes and flapping lips that she can’t speak either. Shit. Something is definitely wrong, and it wasn’t Star’s doing this time-at least not completely.

Star and I share a deeply concerned look, gripping our hands tighter. Then we both look at Janna, hoping that my creepy friend hasn’t thrown us completely into the deep end. The burning feeling in my chest gets stronger and stronger, while Star’s cheek marks start glowing like lanterns. Just as things reach the point where I’m certain something is going to explode, a wave of cold black smoke blasts out from the center of the pentagram. It chills my chest, and sets Star’s cheeks back to normal, in addition to blowing out the candles.

Janna, however, is still going-she finishes one last chant before throwing open her eyes, a crazed look and a thin green film of energy over them. “Niotalosed, ostende te!” She calls out, and in answer the weird black smoke that fills the room now congeals once more in the center of the pentagram. It slowly forms the shape of an obsidian skinned monster, with squat toad legs, a human torso, lion’s arms, and the head of what looks kind of like a snub nosed dragon of some sort. Lizard like, with more teeth and horns than any being should have.

“Quid ego faciem exitium?” It asks in a rumbling voice. It seems almost conversational in tone, but its size and the sheer depth of its voice still seems like it vibrates the room. It's at this point that Janna’s eyes lose their power and she falls back with a look of amazement and awe on her face. When she lets go, the circle is finally broken and I’m free to move and speak. “Star! What the heck is this?! What the heck was that?! Janna’s eyes were glowing, and your cheeks were doing something weird!”

I jump towards Star’s side of the room and yank her up to her feet and behind me, then take a defensive stance against the monster. It seems rather amused by my actions so far, though my ability to read the face of a lizard thing is probably not exactly the best. At least it hasn’t tried to kill us yet. “Okay, so, yeah. This was definitely demon summoning. Bogwash, I was hoping for something way cooler from Earth magic.” Star lets out a sigh, clearly quite disappointed. I have no idea how she’s staying so calm with this thing in front of us, and that answer of hers wasn’t exactly complete.

Unfortunately I can’t demand more from her as the demon suddenly starts moving. It has apparently lost interest in us and turned towards Janna. She is staring at the thing like its an angel from heaven, cheeks all aflush and still seeming out of it. Regardless of how Janna managed to pull off an actual demon summoning, or my thoughts on her personally, I can’t let this monster just eat her or something! I dash towards it and slam my fist into the kidney of its human looking torso. That clearly seems to hurt it...but not enough, and possibly not as much as it hurt me. That skin is hard as rock, so my scraped up knuckles tell me.

The next thing I know I’m being thrown through the closet door and crash landing on Janna’s bed. I only just barely managed to get my guard up, those lion paws pack a punch. And if it had used its claws… “Hey, that's my friend! Honeybee tornado Swarm!” A yellow tornado buzzing like angry syrup is suddenly visible in the dark closet, after which I see Star flying through the doorway exactly as I was a few moments earlier. Seems she took the hit about as well as I did, though, as she gives me a determined nod once I help her up. “Lets kick this demon’s ass, Star.”

The next few minutes are a blur of bruises, scrapes, lasers, cute animals, and fire. We managed to drag the demon away from Janna to fight it in her room proper, but while we’re destroying all her stuff pretty easily the thing doesn’t even have a scratch. My nascent lizard emotion reading skills tell me it's probably just annoyed at everything we’ve thrown at it. “Janna! You’re the one who summoned it, do something!” This seems to finally knock my weirdo friend out of her daze. I see her walking out of the closet with a book labeled ‘Latin for dummies’ in her arms, and fire in her eyes. Figuratively this time, no weird green magic juicing up my friend, just determination and more than a little smugness.

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 9

“Oookay, we should probably get going!” I immediately reach over to grab Star by the shoulders, hoping to drag her away using this perfect distraction. Unfortunately for me, Janna recovers faster than I believed possible. She looks mostly like her usual self, but I dislike the look in her eyes even more than usual. “Well, you two can leave if you gotta… or I could show you a little bit of Earth magic. I’m a witch, you know, hehehe.”

The next thing I know I’m being spun around to be planted right back on Janna’s doorstep. Star’s hands are clutching the front of my hoodie, and she yells right into my face “I -knew- it! No dimension could survive without magic. Stupid Earth immigration class.” I wince, wondering if my new friend will ever learn how to turn down her volume. Thankfully she releases me and bounces over to Janna instead. “Show me show me show me! Witchy stuff on Mewni is usually suuuuper creepy, but magic is magic right?”

This is it. Today is definitely the day I die. Nothing good can happen from this pair teaming up… “Yeah, like, totally.” Janna brushes off Star’s words, probably barely even listening. She has a terrible habit of getting into her head when she’s got a scheme in mind, which throws even more warning alarms off in my own brain. I briefly consider just leaving and coming back later, but I know I’m too tied to my responsibilities as Star’s guide to leave her alone, so I just sigh and follow the pair of girls inside.

Contrary to all expectations, the inside of Janna’s house is perfectly normal to the untrained eye. Nothing creepy or evil or witchy, no traps or hidden caches of forbidden knowledge. I know better, being her primary victim-I’m certain every single painting on the walls and rug casually tossed on the floor is hiding secrets. We’re walking through the living room when Star and I are just about shocked out of our socks. A pair of blank, peaceful voices speaking in unison greet us with “Oh, hello Marco Diaz. Welcome again to our wonderful home.” They sip what I deeply suspect are empty teacups with identical dumb looks on their faces, eyes dull and smiles polite.

It's been a while since I last saw Mr. and Ms. Ordonia. Janna’s mother looks like an older, lighter skinned version of her, while her father seems like the kind of guy who was bullied for being a nerd in highschool (I know the type). They’ve always been polite and boring, but this is the first time I’ve seen them look so… zombified. Hell, they were just silently sitting on the sofa when we came in, staring at nothing! We didn’t even notice until they’d spoken. Star seems to also get the idea that something is wrong, and looks rather confused at not being able to figure out quite what it is.

I, however, already have a good idea at who the culprit is. I turn to glare at Janna and throw my hand up at her parents. “Janna! What the heck did you do to them?” She frowns at this delay, likely mostly bothered by being unable to continue whatever scheme she is planning with Star. After a shrug, she simply replies “I dunno. They seem fine to me.” In time with her saying that, the pair once again pick up their teacups and sip at them with better coordination than the Echo Creek High cheerleaders often have. While that's not saying much, it’s still unsettling to watch.

Just as I open my mouth to continue arguing, Star apparently loses patience. Deciding to leave the poor family to their fates, she snags both Janna and my wrists and starts dragging us to the stairs. How she knows Janna’s room is upstairs, I don’t know. Maybe she just assumed all teens have their rooms on the second floor? “Nobody cares Marco! It’s Magic time.” Janna seems briefly surprised by Star dragging her up as well, but is over it quickly by the smug wink she throws my way. Absolutely infuriating.

We stop only when Star realizes that she has absolutely no idea where she is going. Luckily before she can get the bright idea to start kicking in doors, Janna takes the lead and opens one of them up herself, revealing what I had finally been expecting all along. Its like if a goth, a witch, and...a mechanic for some reason? All had a baby. And that baby was a room. Ugh, that was a terrible metaphor. “This. Is. Amazing!” So Star exclaims while I’m in the midst of mentally face palming.

“Yeah, it's pretty rad. This is where I get up to most of my magic stuff.” Janna claims, wandering around the room cluttered with shrunken heads, skulls, nuts and bolts, and things I don’t even have a name for. “Watch out for Vladimir. That's my giant centipede, he gets out all the time.” I glance over at an empty terrarium and shudder, already feeling like something is crawling over my back. It's been years since I last visited Janna’s room-maybe her eighth birthday party? She was so much less crazy then… or maybe just better at hiding it. I did remember her shoving a pile of stuff into her closet before we were allowed inside.

I don’t know if it's because of who Star is or where she comes from, but she seems perfectly comfortable inside the awful room. Even adding her own little flair of weirdness, since we’re still all covered in glitter that kind of flecks off every few seconds. “So how does Earth magic work? Do you have a wand? Spells? A cauldron, or a book? Ohhh, maybe talismans and charms!” Janna glances back at Star and grins, then yanks open the door to her aforementioned closet. She’s clearly renovated whatever it was originally, as it opens up into what looks almost like a stone room, lit only by candles. I see a pentagram drawn in what definitely can’t be blood on the floor, and a shrine in the corner that for some reason has a picture of me?!

That can’t be good… I walk over to Star and put a hand on her shoulder, glaring at Janna and her little reveal. “Earth magic doesn’t work, Star. It's all bologna. She’s probably just gonna try to trick us into a séance or something where she says vague things that anybody's grandma could say! It's a hoax.” Star frowns, clearly unhappy with my assessment of all of this nonsense. She places her hand on my chest and shoves me back, before walking over towards Janna with a hmph. “Well I for one know Earth magic is real! How else would doorbells and light switches work if not for creepy demon rituals?”

I’m shocked by my first real rejection from Star. Is this her rebellious phase?! Wait, she’s always been a rebel! That's how she got sent here in the first place! Still, not being trusted kinda hurt more than I expected. I wonder why? We barely know each other, of course we’re gonna disagree… “Exactly, Star. Marco’s just a skeptic. He probably doesn’t believe in any magic at all-even yours.” Janna leads Star into her little closet, the latter blowing a raspberry at me. Ugh, why do I even hang out with these girls?

Seeing little choice in the matter, I follow the pair into Janna’s spooky closet to find them kneeling around the pentagram. The door slams shut behind me, which is only to be expected in this horrible home of Janna’s. Still gives me a mini-heart attack. “C’mon, Marco. There’s no harm in playing along if you don’t think it's real, right?” Janna and Star are kneeling around her pentagram on the floor, holding hands. They extend their free hands to me, “Yeah, Marco. Like, don’t be a chicken. You have to complete the circle.”

God above, I’m definitely going to die here. “We are going to talk about why you have a picture of me on a creepy shrine later, Janna.” I mutter, but eventually kneel down and take their hands. They’re right after all, as long as Star’s wand doesn’t act up nothing should -actually- happen. For all her craziness, Janna isn’t a real witch, right…?

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 8

“Oh thank Mewni, we’re not going in.” I raise my eyebrows, bemused at Star’s reaction once I’ve told her we’re just going for my bike. “Why do you even hate it? You didn’t spend like, any time there yesterday.” Star blinks, then starts holding up fingers as she names reasons in turn “Well, the faces of all the kids there looked like they were suffering, it looked like a suuuper boring building, and it kinda reminds me of… Saint Olga’s School for Delinquent Princesses! AAAAAHHH!”

The blonde girl’s eyes go wide as saucers as she lets out the seemingly random scream. I myself nearly jump into the air, hands raising up into a defensive stance. I look around for what has terrified this girl who blasted monsters without a peep yesterday, sure that something right out of a horror movie is coming for us. “Star?! What’s wrong?” After my quick scan of the area finds nothing, I glance back towards where Star was and find her gone. This sends me into full on panic mode, and I run towards a nearby alleyway, the only place I see she could have gone. “Star!?”

Suddenly, a dumpster right next to me pops open and my crazy foreign exchange student pops her head out. I’m torn between having a heart attack and punching the dumpster, but thankfully I manage to avoid either. “Saint O’s is a horrible, horrible place where they send Rebels like me to have their minds wiped! They come out as perfect little dolls, all personality ironed out. If this Earth gig doesn’t work out, that's probably where I’m headed.”

I’m a hair away from going into lecture mode on the dangers of both dumpster diving and randomly screaming, but Star clearly looks honestly quite bothered by all of this. I let my tension out with a sigh, and reach up to grab Star’s hands. “C’mon, those things are where we keep our garbage. School might be...kind of like that, but it's got a lot of fun things too. Like my friends we’ll be talking to today.” I yank her out of the dumpster and start brushing off a few little pieces of tash from the front of her dress, then nod. Can’t do anything about the smell, but at least she looks clean.

“Well...I guess I can give it a try if you say so.” Star still seems a bit down, but I’m certain that with her personality she’ll have forgotten this little scream fest as soon as she sees something exciting. I wince, knowing that unfortunately there is someone who fits the bill, but I’m willing to brave that evil witch if it can improve Star’s mood. I’m responsible for her now, after all. I suppose it's time to introduce Star Butterfly to Janna Ordonia.

“Lets go, Star. I think we can make a detour and meet another…. friend of mind before we hit up the school. Maybe that’ll convince you it won’t be like this Saint Olga’s place.” Technically speaking, it's actually closer to walk by Janna’s house to get to Echo Creek High, but I naturally avoid her entire city block. I really hope these two meeting isn’t a horrible mistake, but I have a bad feeling in my gut.

“Okay?” Even the mention of meeting someone new has Star’s face brighten up, which is enough for me to keep on my current course. A few minutes later we’re in Janna’s territory. I shudder a little at all the bad memories here, Janna’s pranks tend to get more vicious when she’s less concerned about being caught-and she’s most confident in getting away with things outside her house. I still remember when I had to make my way home in nothing but my boxers, all the rest of my clothes stolen in a series of awful traps. I never saw that hoodie again…

“Alright, we’re here.” I stare up in trepidation at Janna’s home, but before I can get up my will to ring the doorbell, Star steps in. “Ohhh….what's this do?” She starts rapidfire ringing the doorbell, probably pressing the button a dozen times before I pull her back. “Star! Don’t be annoying. That's their bell, it tells them that people are outside.” She nods a couple times, muttering “Earth Magic…” with a thoughtful look on her face.

Before I can fix her misunderstanding the door is thrown open. I’m face to face with Janna for the first time in weeks, at least outside of a school setting. She has an understandably annoyed look on her face that morphs into a much less understandable look of pleasure upon seeing me. She is dressed in her usual green beanie and tank top, with a blue jacket and yellow skirt. “Marco Diaz. What a surprise. And you’re here with the little firebug from yesterday too, huh. Cool.”

I feel my skin crawling at the tone of her voice. Is this how girls feel when scumbag guys check them out? God, she’s creepy. Star seems completely unaffected, and waves her hand wildly in spite of being literally right in front of Janna. “Hi! I’m Star Butterfly! You’re Marco’s friend, right? I’m living with him now.” As expected, as soon as Star is introduced to something new and interesting she’s right back to her old self.

“Janna Ordonia. Me and Marco go waaaay back.” She slides up next to me with almost unnatural grace, and wraps an arm around my shoulders. I still have no idea how she can do that! I was dodging punches from half ton monsters yesterday, and now I can’t get away from a thin girl two inches shorter than me? It doesn’t make a lick of sense. I try to back away from her uncomfortably, but she has a grip on the neck of my t-shirt, hidden from Star’s perspective behind my head. “You’re the new exchange student, huh? You smell like a dumpster, but you look like an improvement over the last guy. That Swedish kid gave me the creeps.”

Gustav? Gustav was great! God, every word out of her lips is a lie. “Well of course I’m an improvement. I’m Ah-mazing~ Since I’m a magical princess from another dimension!” I freeze when I realize what has to be coming, and I jerk forwards, but only manage to choke myself with Janna still holding my collar. “Star, wait-” Is all I get out before she unslings her wand and declares “Rainbow Kitten Explosion!” And points her wand at the sky. A cat flashing psychedelic colors pops out of the front of her wand and sings ‘Wee!’ before spiraling up thirty feet into the air and letting out a massive *BANG*. The three of us are quickly covered in a disgusting amount of glitter, along with the front of Janna’s house.

Our reactions to this vary wildly. I’m rather accustomed to the chaos by this point, and gently extricate myself from Janna’s clutches before shamelessly hiding behind Star. Star of course is in her hyper-excited bouncy state, glitter catching all the light around her to really show off how otherworldly my new friend is. Janna seems shell shocked-her first introduction to real magic, as far as I know, has managed to stump the usually unflappable girl. Maybe I should take Star and run off before she can recover and turn Star’s abilities to her advantage.

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 7

My max level cleaning and organization skills have my room once again returned to normal within only a few hours. Everything in its place, other than the fragile collectibles I had a small tear filled funeral for. I flop back onto my bed and let finally relax, the exhaustion of the very, very busy day getting to me. Still, one last check. I glance around and see all of my many knitted rugs from grandma covering basically every surface, my sturdy wood desk and dresser in their respective corners, my blessedly undamaged laptop sitting on my desk, my inspirational karate posters on the walls, my newly cracked television, and finally my thin, pale blue silk pajamas-currently on my body.

I nod to myself, satisfied with the final check, and slide under my wonderfully soft brown comforter. As soon as I close my eyes, I….do not manage to fall asleep. I feel a powerful thwack as a heavy object lands on my stomach, and my eyes bug out as they fly open. “Marco!” God, will my ears ever get used to that shrill scream? I really need to teach Star about inside voices. As you might expect, I find a blonde who looks like she’s just chugged three cups of espresso sitting on my stomach, bouncing up and down with an excited expression. “How can you be trying to sleep?! We’re having our first sleepover!”

Sleep grumpiness gets to me more than anything, and I grab the edge of my comforter. As the heavy girl tilts her head, I snap the brown comforter and toss her off of my bed with a hmph. She waves her arms wildly to try to catch her balance rather than falling flat on her face, and somehow manages to land on her feet. “Safe.” I take this time to finally appreciate what the girl is wearing, and see that Star also enjoys a shade of blue for her sleepwear. Darker than mine, and made of a lighter variant of the weird almost silk all of her clothes are made of, the blue nightdress has a half moon on the front. Below that, she’s traded out her leggings for thick striped socks.

The glance at her feet reminds me of our earlier shower adventure, and I blush for a moment. The embarrassment at least wakes me up enough to consider a conversation with her, and I grumble out “We’re literally living together. This does -not- count as a sleepover. Also, I’m exhausted. Can we do this tomorrow?” I’ve sat up in my comfy bed by this point, but by the end of my last sentence I can feel my eyelids rebelliously attempting to close. Star seems unwilling to allow me any amount of rest when fun can be had, however, and raises up her wand to point it at me.

“Shining Sugar Ru-” My hand snaps up to cover the front of her glowing wand just as the pink beam is almost finished charging, and I say “Nope. None of that.” I didn’t quite realize exactly how bad of an idea this was in my sleep deprived state, and later I couldn’t repeat this particular feat (no matter how much I wanted to) but apparently sleepy Marco couldn’t give two shits about how things should work. I flop back onto the pillow and begin snoring almost immediately while Star stares dumbfounded at the wand which had obediently stopped its spell cold.

The next thing I know, its Saturday morning at 6 am and I’m wide awake. I wish I could find it in myself to be annoyed at my inability to sleep in, but I have a confession to make-I’m a morning person, through and through. Just seeing the sun just past sunrise puts a massive smile on my face, and I find myself humming happily while dressing for the day. I head downstairs as soon as I’m in my standard hoodie with black jeans combo, and find my parents already hard at work in the kitchen. “Getting Star’s welcome cake ready?”

“Oh, yes Mijo! We’re currently wondering how much sugar is too much. She’s already quite the hyper girl, yes?” I snort at that. “She’ll be herself regardless, just put the normal stuff in. I wonder if she’s allergic to anything? Hey Mom, Star had, uh, a chat with you last night right?” The awkwardness of the question pierces through my early morning cheer only slightly, and seems unable to affect my parents at all. My mother answers “Yes, yes, she’s… got a lot to learn! But I think I passed on the basic girl to girl stuff.” She gives me a wink, then waves towards the living room. “Go put up the sign! We can’t have her first morning here be any less than wonderful! You know how homesick exchange students can get.”

I simply nod, glad that my parents share my morning person tendencies. We’ve long gotten into a habit where we throw a celebration for exchange students the morning after they move in-most of the time they can make it through the night on sheer excitement, but a lot feel worried when they wake up in a new place. I think if our tradition helps them feel at home, if only slightly. A few minutes later I have our balloons set up, along with the sign saying “Happy First Day on Earth, Star!”. With that, preparations are almost complete, and I begin thinking about my personal plans for the day.

I’ll likely be paired with Star throughout it all. She’s the target of those monsters, after all! So, first there will be a trip over to the school to pick up my bike, then I can show her around the town. Pick up some lunch at McDonalds (She’s sure to love that), then swing by Ferguson’s place to introduce her. Alfonso pretty much lives there, so she should meet with him too. I pull out my personal notepad and click a pen to start scheduling each thing down to the half hour, even knowing that considering my travel partner for the day -some- sort of chaos will happen and knock us off course.

By the time I finish, I see a sleepy looking Star still in her nightwear walking down the stairs, and I call my parents over quickly. We stand under the sign, cake lit with only a single candle, and yell out “Welcome Home!” Star jumps nearly a foot in the air, scrambling to aim her wand at us before letting out a gasp. Her eyes widen and she jumps again, this time with an excited squee. The energetic ball of fun rolls over the rail and begins dashing towards us, her stomping feet waking up the sleeping puppies who start a storm of yips and laser beams.

“Gimme gimme gimme gimme!” Star flexes her hands as she fidgets in place, only having eyes for the cake. My family and I share a somewhat bemused look, before my father hands it over. Our new foreign exchange student immediately smashes her face into the icing, to the mild horror of my parents. “I spent half an hour drawing her face on that.” My father’s voice trembles, but he manages a shaky smile when Star finally comes back up for air. “Its sho good! Thanksh for the cake!”

I find myself wondering if she can even taste what flavor it is by the way she’s inhaling it down, but before I can ask her she starts running back up the stairs with the half eaten cake. We never saw the plate we had handed it to her on after that-I personally think she stashed the whole thing in her secrets closet as a memento, though such realizations happened much later in our story. As soon as the blonde force of mayhem is out of sigh, my father flops onto the couch with a sigh. “Come on now Rafael, at least she was clearly happy, right? I mean, I think.” My mother pats his burly shoulder in an attempt to convince him that his work wasn’t in vain, though I find myself thinking she may have reacted the same had we given her a blank vanilla cake with bland icing. Star just seems easily excited by things.

My father has mostly recovered by the time Star skips back down the stairs. Fully dressed and with a newly clean face that only smells slightly of icing, she appears ready to take on the world. “Hey, I’m gonna take Star out to see the town. See you around dinner.” My parents wave back, their exuberance almost at normal levels. We all have some things to get used to. “Alright Mijo, have fun!” Star snags my arm and drags me out onto the street, nearly vibrating in place with her readiness to do things. “What’re we gonna do first?! Go dancing? Start a party? Head to your marketplace for some SHOPPING?!”

Ignoring her slightly odd terminology, I peel her hands off of my arm and inform her “We’re going back to school.” The crumpling of her happiness and the sad faces that pop up on her cheeks make me far more entertained than is probably healthy.

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 6

“Okay!” Star bounces through the steam filled bathroom towards the shower, and the look on her face gives me a bad feeling. “Star, you remember what I told you about how to use the knobs, right?” I throw her a pair of clean towels, leaning against the bathroom counter while still in my own towels. “Yeah, yeah, I got it. Hot and cold and righty tighty lefty loosey or whatever.” Star slams the stall shut and begins tossing her own clothes over the stall door with a lack of hesitation that surprises me. Its definitely not my first rodeo, so it doesn’t bother me knowing shes naked on the other side of that glass or seeing her underwear (petticoats? Chemise? Weird shorts? Medieval underwear is weird, especially with that almost modern blend, so i’m not sure what to call the little light dress and poofy, almost boxers I assume she was wearing under her dress) lying over her other clothes, but usually it kind of freaks exchange students out to have me in the room while they shower.

Regardless of male or female, I have to say. Although, the female response the first few times can be a bit more...violent. I distinctly remember the black eye I got from Jeane, a french girl who stayed with us a couple years back. Maybe being a princess, Star is used to changing and bathing in front of other people? I heard they used to get servants to wash and dress them back in the day, though Star seems independent enough that I doubt she had servants do that for her. If someone in her castle (does she have a castle, or just like a mansion?) actually is supposed to be the one in charge of cleaning this force of chaos, I really quite pity them. Anyway, long story short, I recognize that it's weird for me to do this, but I really have to make sure she’s safe! It's just a bit more weird that she seems not to care herself.

I watch her silhouette through the cloudy glass finally managing to turn on the water, and a sharp yelp echoes out from the shower. Clearly not quite the temperature she was expecting, though whether too cold or hot I couldn’t say. I decide to grab a nail file from its spot (outlined in a thin layer of chalk!) on my side of the counter and do my daily cuticle care. Hangnails could lead to terrible things, after all. The feeling of the abrasive surface dragging against my nails relaxes me, over the next few minutes. Really, this whole situation relaxes me. Star might be the...weirdest of our exchange students so far, but she still fills what always feels like a hole in the household when we don’t have one. I wonder if I would react like this if I had a brother, or sister? Sharing a bathroom, not feeling relaxed unless someone is watching my back? I don’t really know.

Out of the shower comes a steady stream of giggling mixed with yelps and weird curses as Star clearly can’t keep her adhd hands away from the knobs. She doesn’t seem capable of letting the water temperature be, getting bored within a few seconds no matter how comfortable she makes it. I’ve heard that if people are locked in a room with a box that does nothing but shock them, they’ll eventually start poking the box even though it hurts them, just out of sheer boredom. We hate that more than pain by quite a bit. I feel like I’m watching that process happening right now in fast forward, seeing Star freeze or burn herself every few moments. It actually worries me a bit that she might forget herself and blast a hole in our shower, but a quick glance around shows that she left her wand on her side of the sink. At least that won’t be a problem.

I nearly jump right out of my towel when I hear her scream “Marco!”, and opt to drop my nail file instead to grab and right my only current covering. “What, Star? Now my file is all dirty.” I begin grumbling, leaning over to snag the nail file from the ground. Just as I do so, I hear another, much louder clatter of something hitting tile-this time from inside of the shower itself. I blink, leaving the poor file where it lies and looking up at the shower. Luckily, based on her silhouette, the falling object wasn’t Star herself, but she seems squeezed into one of the corners. “Marco! I think I turned the knob too much and it broke! Now the shower is in like, super volcano heat mode. Can you fix it??”

In spite of herself, even Star seems embarrassed to ask a boy into her shower, her voice shaking with nerves for that last sentence. It's a first for me as well, I might act comfortable with all this, but familiarity is a thin blanket of defense against the realization that we’re both teenagers, alone in a soon to be very small space while wearing almost nothing. “I don’t think that's a good idea, Star! Just turn it off, grab your towel, and get out.” She messes around with the one remaining knob for a few moments, before it too pops off and falls. “That didn't work! And I haven’t gotten to play with the weird bubble syrup soap yet. Pleaaaase?” Surely she has shampoo in her dimension, or something like it. I just chalk this particular bit of oddness up to Star’s personality and sigh, a blush coloring my cheeks. I pinch the towel tighter, and glance down below my waist to give a warning look towards mister happy. Entering into a shower with a naked girl or not, I really don’t need any tenting going on around Star after only knowing her for a day.

“Fine, I’m coming in. Just...cover yourself up! I won’t look in your direction.” I wait until she gives the all clear, still huddled in her corner of the shower, before slowly pulling open the shower door. I’m immediately blasted with a wave of steam and small sprays of hot water-jesus, its has to be near boiling. Do we even have water that hot in our shower? I keep my eyes glued to the tile floor, and notice the pair of temperature knobs immediately. They’re sitting in the spray itself, which will make for a painful snatch and grab, but should be possible. The other thing I see is a pair of pale, surprisingly small feet. I wonder if she has her boots made larger than she needs to for some reason? Looking up further make it clear what her leggings usually hide, that her calves are just as toned as her arms. No delicate daisy, Star. I have to physically force myself not to look up any further than that, turning my attention back to the knobs.

Star, uncharacteristically, stays silent throughout this. Maybe she’s feeling just as awkward as I am. Or more so! I at least have a towel, after all. She just has….Don’t think about it Diaz! I grab both knobs with a slight his of pain at the hot water, my hands going as red as my face must still be. I’m afraid to look down at my groin, but at least it should be mostly hidden with me kneeling down and hunched over. The next issue immediately makes itself clear to me, after having acquired the knobs. In order to fix them, I’ll need to look up where they usually go-and Star will be directly in my line of sight. Half out of need and half out of teenage boy hormones, I raise my gaze.

A weird mixture of relief and disappointment engulfs me as I realize that Star is actually shockingly well covered. Her giant cloud of blonde hair has been moved from where it usually sits behind her, to in front of her shoulders. Everything from her knees up is completely hidden by the thick, wet blonde locks. Even her face is partially obscured, though when I look into the small part of her cheeks and eyes I can see, I realize she either was burned by that scalding water or is blushing even harder than I am-every bit of her face is the color of a tomato. She intently whispers to me “Marco, hurry up!” Which finally distracts me from my shameless ogling. I feel my cheeks attempt to experiment with new shades of red as my embarrassment at being caught staring at a ‘naked’ girl hits me, and I try to just quickly screw the temperature knobs back on.

Placing them at their perfect sharpie marked spot, I warn Star not to touch them again before finally backing out of the shower, closing the stall door, and standing back up. My heart slows down from beating a million times a minute, and I hear a similar release of tension in a sigh from the other side of the shower door. We both slowly find our previous positions, I finishing off my nails by the counter, and Star having distracted herself with the wonders of shampoo.

It's not long after that Star leaves the shower, wrapped in her own pair of towels. Her hair towel isn’t exactly equipped to deal with the sheer volume of her hair, but its doing its best. By mutual silent agreement, we don’t mention the shower escapade. Better news, now that I’m back in familiar territory, Marco Jr. has completely settled down-no damning tenting below the waist. “Now we can just head to our rooms and get dressed. I, apparently, have a lot of cleaning to do-and you need to have a chat with Mom ASAP. As soon as possible, is what that means Star.” I answer the question I can see forming on her face before she even gets the first word out, which has her giggling. “Okay! I’ll swing by your room later then!” She claims, before opening up the door and allowing two showers worth of steam to invade the house.

I pretty quickly follow her out, though I make the turn to my room instead of hers. Everything I own is back! In a giant, disorganized pile in the center of the room. I feel my eye twitch at the sight, slam my door behind me, and get to work on the first priority: Finding my Jam-Jams.

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 5

Star and I make our way back home shortly after. I’ve long dried off by this point, and my disheveled appearance doesn’t even bother me. I’m damn near skipping, to be honest, still riding on that wonderful high of battle. Once we make it inside, I’m rushed by my parents who wrap me up in a three way hug. “Marco! Star said you ran off, are you okay?” My mother asks, once I’m finally let go. I feel my cheeks warm up in shame at having thought of these wonderful people abandoning me only a few hours ago, and I start pushing them away. “C’mon, I’m fiiine. Star and I worked things out."

My parents share a look, but allow me to pull away. “Mijo, we want you to know that we aren't ignoring Star’s clear danger, or not listening to your warnings.” My father begins, continued by my mother after placing a hand on his shoulder. “We realize what she is, especially after she told us why she's on Earth to begin with...but we need this. You’re a great kid, Marco. Sometimes a bit too great.”

“What are we supposed to do if you mostly parent yourself? Over the last year you've lectured us, rightfully so, more than we have you.” My father seems uncomfortable with that, almost scared. My mother seems more frustrated than anything, she's always been the braver one of the pair. “But with Star, we have a chance to be real parents to an actual kid, one who messes up or might even need to be told to do their homework! We would never have wanted you to be forced out of the house, but I think I speak for everyone when I say I'm glad you two worked things out.”

The pair of them both smile at me, clearly feeling better after letting all that out. “I-uh. I don't know what to say. I'm sorry if I'm not quite the kind of kid you were expecting? I didn't even know you felt that way. I'll try to mess up more often, so you have a chance to give one of the old lectures!” It's a really awkward thing they've dropped on me, and I respond in kind-about as smoothly as a drunken chicken. They laugh somewhat nervously, clearly as torn about me possibly following through on that promise as I am. “You know what I need? A shower! Let's go, Star.”

I snag her hand and weave my way past my still a bit concerned parents, but I know they’ll be fine-it's not in their nature to worry about anything for very long. “Uh, Marco, why am I going with you? You’re getting a shower, right?” Once we’re up the stairs Star takes her hand back with a bemused look, continuing “I’m pretty sure people on Earth don’t take baths together.” While not completely accurate, she’s right this time-two American kids of different genders definitely aren’t gonna bathe together, at least at our age. I find myself wondering what common sense she really has about Earth-she got that right, but has no clue what a water fountain is?

“Well, Star, in this household we do things a bit differently. At least I do. Do you know how dangerous taking a shower is?! You can slip and fall at any time, and baths are even worse! I never shower without someone there to keep an eye on me. Plus, I can use this time to introduce you to the bathroom.” Star nods along reasonably obediently, though I’m sure she stopped listening once I got into full rant mode like most people do. Oh well, she’ll get the gist of it. I open the door into our new shared bathroom, and present it for the girl to see.

“Oh my god! What's this thing!?” Star immediately bounces over to the toilet, her namesake popping up in her eyes. She starts fiddling with it, lifting the seat up and down, poking the handle, and various other physical investigations that make me very glad I keep every single surface clean enough to eat off of. “It's our toilet. You uh, you poop in it. And pee. Then wipe yourself clean with that.” I gesture to the toilet paper next to her, which she immediately begins unrolling and spinning around herself with glee. “Wow! But how do you lift it and throw it out? It looks stuck to the floor.” She thumps the bottom of the porcelain throne with her boot, her upper body now resembling a mummy from her constant spinning.

I blink, a bit confused by what she means for a moment, before it clicks-chamber pots. I shudder at what the poor girl must have gone through in her clearly medieval dimension, then demonstrate flushing the toilet for her. “You don’t. You just do this and it uh, goes down the drain.” She blinks, then her eyes widen as she clearly realizes how amazing this is compared to throwing your shit out of the nearest window. “Where does it go?” She whispers, having managed to completely empty out the roll of toilet paper by this point. I whisper back “Nobody knooooows.” then open up our cabinets and snag another roll to replace it with. When Star starts looking thoughtfully at the newly replaced roll, I give her my best disapproving parent face and she simply pouts.

After that I go into full lecture mode, showing Star the various parts of the bathroom. Having shared with both male and female exchange students most of my life, I’m pretty comfortable with the necessities of both, and ensure Star has what she needs, although when she asked me what a Tampon was pressed a bit too far. I’ll have to leave that conversation to my mother, I think. I’m not sure how much she really got, as distractible as the girl is, but hopefully she at least knows the basics of toothbrushes, toothpaste, mouthwash, shampoo and conditioner, as well as where the razors are and what not to drink or eat.

When she starts staring blankly at me, I know I’ve pushed too far, and so I finally sigh and say “We’ll talk about the rest later. Don’t forget to have that conversation with my mom. And don’t leave!” I snag a couple of towels and hang them outside the shower door, then step inside. Immediately a series of crashes and bangs rings out, and I open it back up to squint out at Star, who in the process of trying to free herself from the toilet paper has managed to throw open virtually every cabinet and drawer in the room, and currently wriggles on the counter. “Oh, I got this Marco! You do you.” I just kind of sigh, closing the shower door and beginning to strip down and toss my clothes over the stall door. We have one of those thick cloudy glass showers, where you can just barely see silhouettes through the door and nothing else.

“Just rip through it! It's not that hard!” I call out, turning on the shower. I have the perfect heat settings sharpied onto the temperature knobs with little black lines, so I always know I’ll have the right temperature. “Where's the fun in that?!” My new roommate calls back, clearly having fun trying to unravel herself the hard way, and destroying our bathroom in the process. Man, I hope she has a spell that can fix things. Speaking of spells, I hear a loud crash through the wall, sounding like it's coming from my room. “Star?! What was that?! You didn’t leave, right?” I hear a somewhat damning silence for a few moments, before she calls back “Nooope. Definitely totally didn’t get bored and run to your room. Also, your stuff is back! Yay good news. I mean, that sound was probably your stuff.”

I groan, annoyed at my extremely flighty lifeline. How am I supposed to shower in peace without knowing someone is there if I trip and knock myself out!? Usually one of my parents does it, but I know they find it super annoying, so I use the exchange students constantly when I get the chance. “Just, play with the bathroom supplies or something!” I call out, shampooing myself up. I hear some rather dangerous muttering, but thankfully nothing else. It's a rather boring shower from then on, but I can finally relax and let the hot water do its job.

When I make my way out into the steamy bathroom, towel wrapped around my hair and a second one up to my chest, I see that Star has used her time...wisely, I guess? She’s made pink and somewhat alive copies of pretty much every she might need in the bathroom for herself, cluttering up her side of the counter with more toothbrushes, perfume, brushes, and hair products than any sane person would ever need. I physically flinch at seeing the disorganized mess scattered about, but I’ve had to learn hard lessons about giving the exchange students their space and not being a control freak. I just kind of shudder, then point at the shower. “Your turn, Star.”

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 4

“Marco! I’m so sorry, I can definitely fix this.” Star stands in front of me, furiously apologizing, while I have of course lost any and all goodwill towards the girl. She apparently sees that from the look on my face, and so tries a different tactic. “You know what’ll turn that frown upside down? Sunshine Smile!” She summons a bright miniature sun with a happy face above my head, and as I look up and wait for this new spell to somehow ruin my day further, my expectations are quickly rewarded. The sun becomes my own personal rain cloud, soaking me down to my socks and getting nothing else at all wet. “Alright, that's it, I’m out. If you’re staying here, I’m leaving.” I declare, before hopping out of the nearest window. I’ve unfortunately forgotten we are still on the second story, but thankfully our cactuses break my fall.

“Oh no! Marco, are you okay?!” I just flip the girl off in a display of brazen rudeness I didn’t even think myself capable of (thankfully she probably doesn’t understand the gesture) before painfully picking myself out of the prickly cacti and stomping my way down the street. My jeans more closely resemble shorts, my legs are covered in burns, and my shoes are completely gone. That, plus my own personal rainy day has me immediately heading for the nearest gas station-I desperately need a smoothie.

One crabby gas station attendant later, I have my smoothie, but am banned from reentering thanks to my creepy raincloud and awful appearance. I just flop down in front of the gas station and begin sucking it down, letting out a sigh all the while. A child and her mother pass me by on entering the station, and she points at me “Mommy mommy look! A homeless kid!” Though her mother quickly ushers her into the store with a warning not to look at me, the child is more right than she knows. My parents have abandoned me to my fate, picking a literal walking human explosive device over their own son. Woe is me.

I spend the next few hours attempting to get strangers to refill my smoothie, since I can’t enter the store, but no one takes me up on it. Even when I offer way more money. Perhaps I came off a little crazy, or maybe its the raincloud thing, who knows? Eventually, however, a very much unwelcome face finds me. Star walks up and dissipates the cloud with a sigh, looking very uncomfortable. “Look, Marco… I get it. You don’t want me around. I’ll find another family to stay with.” Just as I’m beginning to process that, a ripping sound echoes through space and I look over to see a murky green swirling portal has opened up in the gas station parking lot.

Horrible creatures begin pouring out of it-a humanoid lobster, a giant muscled man with green skin and antlers, a red two headed creature, a giant chicken, a frog man, and following them all up a tiny little...thing? I suppose it most resembles a kappa, one of those green turtle creatures from japanese folklore. I don’t know if it has the water on its head though, as it wears a skull as a helmet. The smallest creature points a little staff at us, and screams out “Star Butterfly! I’m here for the wand, hand it over or DIE!”

I haven’t the faintest idea what is going on, but I immediately stand up. My training kicks in and I step in front of Star, arms up in a defensive stance. Star blinks at me in surprise, before turning back to the monsters in front of us. “Ludo! How did you even find me here!?” The creature snickers evilly, responding “Wouldn’t you like to know?” Star rather blankly answers “Yes, that's why I asked..?” Her confusion fu is strong in this instance, and this Ludo is thrown for a loop, before just screaming “Get Her!”

I suppose now is a good time to talk about my martial arts training, as it will become quickly relevant for obvious reasons. I train at a Karate dojo in Echo Creek mall, but… we definitely aren’t learning Karate. I googled it shortly after I began training when I was a kid, and Karate has some very specific tendencies-certain ways to punch, kick, and throw, all of which is helpful to have but perhaps not the most useful (without getting to a ridiculously high level) in a street fight. We, on the other hand, learn an eclectic mix of martial arts, combined with some weird super focused meditation. Whenever I try asking why we’re learning boxing jabs or muay thai kicks, my Sensei just responds that I have no idea what I’m talking about and its all karate. I’m only a green belt, by the way, and have been for the last four years.

As the monsters rush at us, I pray that whatever the hell I’ve actually been practicing actually works, as pretty much all of these things look way out of my weight class. I rush for the toughest looking guy, mister antlers, and throw a roundhouse kick for his head. Being that he’s wayyyy taller than me, I have to jump a bit, but it lands solidly on his temple and knocks the guy flat on his ass. Everyone kind of just freezes and stares at me, the fourteen year old Earthling who I’m pretty sure didn’t even register for most of these guys. Star gives the feeling a voice, exclaiming “You can fight?!”

Apparently, yes. Though who knows how long my lucky streak will last, I find myself not really caring. Euphoria engulfs me from the simple pleasure of beating the hell out of something, and I yell back “Its called Karate!” Simpler than the truth, and won’t confuse the poor girl. Probably. By this point, the monsters have recovered from the shock and divvy themselves up equally between us. I begin knocking mister two-heads pair of heads together with a couple of jabs, and behind me I hear Star calling out various spells. I realize now that she has been -really- holding back with the destruction, and laser beams start firing out. Hallucination beams, narwal blasts, butterfly explosions, she is tearing through her side of the monsters quick!

I do my best to keep up. Unbeknownst to me, my high attuned Safe Kid senses (not trademarked. Blah.) Allow me to maneuver the battlefield mostly untouched. Glancing blows from the big ass creatures do still leave bruises, but I’m confident I broke quite a few bones in return. Still, I’m glad I have the force of chaotic destruction known as Star Butterfly on my side this time. In a matter of minutes, the monsters are moaning and groaning on the ground, bloody noses, broken ribs, burn marks, and more fantastical energy remains cover almost all of them. Ludo, in the back, realizes that he’s lost and calls for a full retreat, the more whole monsters carrying those who can’t walk. I glance over at Star to see if we should stop them, still high on battle lust and definitely willing to kick these losers until they never dream of coming back, but she shakes her head.

Eventually, they all disappear, Ludo firing out one last “I’ll be back! Mark my wor-” Before the portal closes on his head and he pops out of existence. Star lets out a massive sigh, and turn towards me. “I’m sure you definitely want me gone after that. Those guys, and maybe worse, will keep on coming.” I stare at her blankly, having almost forgotten the situation that brought me to being in front of this gas station, before exploding out with “Are you kidding!? That was the most fun I’ve had like, ever! That was amazing, we’re amazing!” I run over to the shocked girl and wrap her in a hug, still as giddy as a kid on christmas. “Thank you, thank you! Please, stay with us for as long as you like.”

Star seems utterly baffled by my reaction, but after a moment shrugs and decides to just go with it. She returns the hug with a “Yay! This is gonna be so much fun!” I find myself agreeing with her. Maybe she’s just the thing boring old Echo Creek really needs.

[kunrendeotaku]

Chapter 3

I don’t stop running until I can no longer see Echo Creek High, at which point I let out a relieved sigh. It's been a crazy day, and it's only a week into school-will the school even be there monday, or will it be burned down? I guess they have the whole weekend to do repairs, since it is Friday and all. Maybe I’ll get home and everything will have been a bad dream. I glance around my sleepy little town as I walk the most efficient route home, cursing my forgetfulness in leaving my shiny red baby (my bike) at school, as I’ll likely have to go back for it tomorrow if I want to keep to my usual school day schedule. Can’t get to school on time to nod to Jackie if I go on foot monday morning.

When my home comes into sight, I smile, ready to get off of my feet after this exhausting day. I step up to our house and look over it, painted in gorgeous oranges and reds. It's always been too big for us, having been bought by my grandma back in the day. She was expecting a big, big family to always be around, but after grandpa passed away she’s the one who moved out. Living the big life now, always traveling around, checking ticks off of her bucket list. We tend to fill up the space with exchange students, having one or more every year, to the point where the school system calls us first whenever someone needs a home.

That...gives me a bad feeling, and I quickly step inside the house and walk towards our living room, where I can hear laughing voices. Three. My fears are realized when I see who is sitting on the couch, between my parents-Star Butterfly herself. I freeze up, wide eyed, as my father begins laughing at something she’d said. “Oh, Star, you have such funny stories of your home! This ‘Mewni’ sounds like….a completely horrible place! I’d love to visit.” My father, Rafael, is about a foot taller than me and twice and wide, with a burly build. He’s also not the most socially adept, in spite of being the most caring guy I know. My mother, Angie, is eerily similar to him in personality. I’ve never seen two people so in tune with each other. She’s about my height, thin, but with almost as much brown hair as Star, all bundled up with a couple of scrunchies. “Rafael, honey, that's rude! I’m sure Moonie is a perfectly nice place, and we’d love to visit anyway!”

I walk towards the trio and open my mouth, hoping to convince my parents that this crazy girl is dangerous, when the crazy in question jumps to her feet and gasps. “Marco! I had no idea you lived here, I thought -all- humans had the last name Diaz!” She begins bouncing up and down with an excited smile, and I have to sigh and turn to look at my mother and father with a skeptical look. “Really, you two? She’s dangerous! And magical! She set the school on fire!” My father, always ignoring my words of caution to my great dismay, simply laughs it off. “She's a bundle of excitement! We could use that energy around the house, it's been empty without any exchange students, Mijo.”

“We could have gotten that with a litter of puppies! And with much less danger!” I respond, fuming. Star’s eyes grow wide, the pupils expanding like she’d just taken a dose of something, and she whispers “I. Love. Puppies.” Before pointing that awful pink wand at the ground, and lasering something into existence. The next thing I know, a litter of the most adorable little golden retriever pups are rolling around on the ground, letting up a storm of yips. I can see with one look into my parents eyes that they have fallen in love with them instantly, and I admit even my staunch determination to avoid Star living in this home was melted...for a moment. Then, of course, the puppies began firing fucking lasers from their eyes.

All of them, every second or so. The house descends into chaos as I try to save pictures, vases, and everything else breakable, Star and my mother start chasing down the puppies, and my father goes down quickly in a stream of laser fire. “My Eyesssss!!!” He calls out, hands over his face and red burn marks popping up all over him. Ten minutes later, a frazzled family of three and one unfortunate princess sit staring at the group of adorable puppies, the room now puppy proofed, with only half of the former living room being completely unsalvageable. I throw my hands towards Star, feeling like my point is very much made, and she lets out a nervous giggle.

My mother and father share a glance (as much as my father could with both of his eyes red and irritated) before simply shrugging and giving Star another welcoming smile. “Marco, why don’t you show Star her new room while we get all of this cleaned up? And, em, take the puppies with you.” I blink in complete shock, nearly ripping my hair out in frustration. They still want to live with her even after all that?! I just stand up and start stomping my way upstairs, the puppies following me, along with Star herself who seems quite relieved to not be getting kicked out. “Hey, Marco, I’m sorry about the puppies. And, uh, the various other broken things. Its…..kinda why I moved here. I don’t really know how to use this wand, and I may have accidentally set my kingdom on fire, so they sent me to this dimension to learn control.”

Honestly, it was a rather heartfelt apology, and a reasonable reaction. I could sympathize with the girl...but more so with her kingdom, for kicking her out. Perhaps I was slightly more bitter than I otherwise would be, considering my jeans and shoes were currently being ruined by laser eyed puppies firing at my legs and burning holes through my clothes. “Look, I don’t approve of you being here, but I can’t change what my parents think. Here’s your room, just...try not to break anything.” I gesture to the guest room we have all of our exchange students stay in, and Star suddenly lets out a huge smile, immediately raising up her wand in her hands. “Sparkle Glitter Bomb Expand!” I facepalm, expecting a hole to be blown straight through our house this time, but when I look up I see the girl opening up her door into a gigantic room.

It seems like a weird mix of medieval and modern, with monster skin rugs next to modern day curtains next to a super fluffy princess bed. Its two stories high, somehow (I later found we have a new actual tower growing out of our home) and is honestly about the coolest thing I’ve seen all day. I take a closer look at Star, for the first time since I categorized her into my box of ‘dangerous to society’ things, and realize that she must be someone pretty damn cool in that dimension of hers. Her boots are clearly made from some sort of weird monster, full of horns and scales, and her leggings and dress are both cut from the alien silk-like material I’d noticed earlier. The stuff is relatively low key compared to what our Earth royals used to wear, but I could see this crazy girl as a Princess out on holiday for the first time, now that I’ve seen her skip into this room. Maybe not a Princess like we used to have, I amend, once I see her giant wall of ridiculously huge weapons, but definitely something.

“This...this is amazing, Star. And nothings broken! Or on fire! Can you do me?!” I mean every word, this is real magic! Not just a weapon for breaking shit, but actual wave your hand and make cool stuff happen! I can’t even imagine what my room will look like. Maybe a giant karate dojo?! “Oooof course, Earth buddy. I’d be happy to.” Star confidently strides out of the room, clearly ecstatic that she’d managed the spell with no complications. When I point out my room to her, she kicks down the door, holds up her wand, and yells out “Mystic Cloud Suck Transform!” After which, a small black hole pops up at the top of my room and sucks every single thing I’ve ever owned into it, before disappearing with another little pop.

[kunrendeotaku]

MVTFOE Chapter 2 pt 2

I ask, running up to yank her away from the fountain. “Open up!” I immediately order the girl, gesturing at her mouth. She blinks at me, then shrugs and opens her lips. I check her teeth for any signs of dangerous chipping, then let out a sigh of relief when she has perfectly healthy chompers. “Don’t chew on metal! You could permanently ruin your teeth!” I immediately start lecturing the poor, clearly uneducated foreigner on the dangerous things people do to their teeth every day, from candy, to chewing on ice, and more. Halfway through, Star says “Ohhhh….you must be the Safe Kid Skeevy was talking about! Hi Safe Kid! I’m Star Butterfly!” She beams those perfect white teeth at me, and I sigh, realizing that as usual my lectures are being ignored. I rub my hand over my face, and gesture for Star to follow me. “First of all, I am NOT the Safe Kid. My name is Marco Diaz, and I-oh, watch your step, loose tile.” I snag the (definitely muscular) arm of the girl and slide her away from that nasty trip hazard, then close a locker that was recklessly left open. After a few moments, I continue ranting a little, Star still skipping beside me. “I don’t know who told you about that, but I am definitely a misunderstood bad boy. I love danger and taking risks! I could use a bit more, to be honest.” I realize at this point that I’m not exactly being a great tour guide, but hey-I’ve gotta introduce her to me first! Can’t have her thinking- “Ohhh, a bad kid huh? Man, I know about that.” Star says, blowing a raspberry and casually waving a hand I now notice is carrying some weird toy wand. “As for more danger, sure! Ferocious Butterfly Transformation!” Star yells out some weird incantation and points her wand at a nearby butterfly. I blink, a bit uncertain what she wants from me here-should I play along with her imagination? Just as I’m thinking that, the wand begins to glow a bright pink, before zapping out a laser beam at the butterfly. The small insect transforms into a giant monstrous version of itself the size of a small truck, and gives a weird scream/hiss/roar right into my face. It has teeth-why does it have teeth? The monster flies away from us and snags another student from the ground, who lets out a scream as he is flown off into the distance. I of course am pretty much in shock, and the only thing I can think to do is throw a questioning/accusing look at Star, raising my hand in the direction that the monster disappeared to. The blond girl lets out a nervous giggle, pulling her wand up to begin nibbling on it (damn you plastic is bad too!). “I, um, whoops! You said you wanted more danger, right? Well there it goes! That kid is, uh, probably dead though.” I just blink at her, before finally finding my voice. “WHAT WAS THAT?!” I yell at her, throwing my hands out in frustration. Really, what the hell? Was that magic? Is a movie being shot? I’m nowhere near interesting enough for a prank show, and I don’t see any cameras. Star suddenly lets out another million watt smile, bouncing a little on the balls of her feet. I’ve noticed that she rarely ever isn’t moving. “Oh! That was a spell I made up, with my wand here!” She says, pointing at it. “You see, Mister Bad Boy Diaz, I’m a Magical Princess from another Dimension!” The girl twirls her wand in an arc over her head, a rainbow following in its wake. Little creatures seem to spawn, that look ever so cute, at least until the whole thing catches fire, burning most of them to a crisp and catching a nearby tree on fire as well. This is my final straw, way past my breaking point of weirdness. I give the girl my biggest smile, pull my hood up, and say “W-well that ends the tour! Good luck!” Before turning and dashing away. School isn’t over, but considering the fire quickly spreading across the school grounds, it’ll probably be ended early anyway. I hear her screaming out “Bye New Friend! Bye bye! See you later!” As I go. It only makes me run faster away from the weird girl who can summon rainbows and monsters that kidnap people.

[kunrendeotaku]

MVTFOE Chapter 2 pt1

Chapter 2

As I’m walking to the Principal’s office, wondering whether or not I should have asked for a hall pass before leaving, I see the man himself with a chest under his arm. Principal Skeeves is a short, round guy with a head so shiny he -has- to wax it. Pair that with glasses and a weird french looking mustache, and you have the guy who runs Echo Creek highschool. He seems to be chatting with a girl I’ve never seen, who is staring intently at a water fountain. “Ah! Marco Diaz, just the person I wanted to see. I needed the safest, most reliable kid in the school for a special task: This is Star Butterfly, our new foreign exchange student. You’re responsible for showing her around and teaching her what she needs to know.”

I’m still blinking in shock at the news that I wasn’t called out for my Bad Boy behavior (thank god, NO ONE MUST KNOW ABOUT THE LITTERING) when Skeeves plum runs off, muttering something about all fifty flavours. I sigh, then take a closer look at the new girl. My first impression of her is that she seems intense and excited, a bundle of energy wrapped up in a cute dress that my finely tuned eyes can’t quite make out the material of. She has a massive waterfall of blond hair that goes down to her knees, and seems to be almost the size of the rest of her body. Bright blue eyes, weird heart shaped sticker things on her cheeks, and an athletic build complete the picture. She’s not exactly bulky, but she clearly works out-kinda like some of those cheerleaders who get biceps from lifting other people all the time?

Still, more important than her weird look is that she is currently poking the water fountain in confusion. I start walking her way, figuring she might need some help figuring it out (some European countries are third world enough not to have running water, right?) but before I can get there, she figures out which button to press. Unfortunately, that clearly scares this ‘Star Butterfly’ girl, but instead of doing the understandable thing and flinching back, the crazy girl starts biting the stainless steel fountain. “Whoah whoah whoah! What the heck are you doing?!”