The announcement came on an ordinary morning, between a loaf of bread and a cup of coffee.
“Leo!” Tom said with the excitement of someone carrying wonderful news.
“You’re going to school!”
Leo raised an eyebrow.
“Going to school.” He repeated the sentence to himself, tasting the words.
“This is an interesting development.”
“Oui!” Tom said.
“Collège.
Marinette too!”
Lio looked at Marinette.
“You knew.” he said accusingly, with a small smile.
“I— no— I mean—” Marinette started quickly, the croissant almost slipping from her hand.
“I was going to tell you!
I was just…
waiting for the…
right moment.”
“And exactly when would the right moment have been?”
“I don’t know!
Definitely not this one!” she said, waving her free hand as if trying to shoo the idea out of the air, only to actually drop a piece of croissant onto the table.
Leo looked at the fallen croissant.
Then at Marinette.
“Thank you for clarifying the matter.” he said with complete mock seriousness.
Marinette made a sound somewhere between choking, laughing, and embarrassment, then hid her face behind her hand.
Leo thought about it—but not too seriously.
That wasn’t really his style.
School.
In his world, school had been a place where his body attended while his mind worked through its own problems under the desk.
Here, things were different in a purely comedic way: a language he barely knew, a body three years younger than he was, and classmates who were mentally younger than him by an almost impossible margin.
“So I’m going to learn things I already know, in a language I don’t know at all.” he said loudly enough for everyone to hear.
“A flawless plan.”
“That’s—” Marinette started, then stopped, then tried again.
“That’s not— I mean, you’re going to learn French!
That’s the point!
And…
mathematics.”
“Mathematics is the same in every language.” Lio said with a calm smile.
“That’s one of its greatest advantages, honestly.
If only people spoke in numbers, we’d have saved ourselves all this trouble.”
Marinette stared at him for a second.
“You’re weird.”
“And you dropped your croissant on the table a minute ago.”
“That— that was— irrelevant!”
The paperwork was the first problem.
“I don’t have any identification documents right now.” Lio said to Marinette later as they arranged the bakery tables.
“How exactly are they going to register me?”
“My father has—” Marinette stopped and bit her lip.
“No, wait.
I’m not supposed to say that.”
“Say what?”
“Nothing!
I forgot what I was going to say.”
“You remember clearly enough to decide not to tell me.”
“Exactly!” she said with strange confidence, as if that were perfectly sound logic.
Leo looked at her with genuine admiration.
“That’s…
a unique kind of logic.”
“Thank you!” she said before realizing that it probably wasn’t a compliment.
It turned out that Tom’s “connections” involved an old friend at the municipal office, a story about a “distant nephew who came from another country after difficult family circumstances,” a few knowing looks, and some quick signatures.
“This is…
not entirely legal.” Tom told Lio quietly with a wide grin.
“But!
Family helps family.”
“You’re not my family.” Lio said, without any sharpness—the statement sounding more like something he was saying just to see Tom’s reaction.
Tom stopped.
Then he said something Leo didn’t quite understand, but he gave him a firm pat on the shoulder that nearly knocked him over.
“Maybe not by blood.” Tom said.
“But you eat my croissants three weeks straight.
That’s family enough!”
Leo thought about it.
“That’s the weakest definition of family I’ve ever heard.”
“Works for me!” Tom said, walking away laughing.
Leo watched him leave, then found himself smiling despite himself.
That night—one day before registration—Leo sat in his small room above the bakery and took out his broken watch.
He looked at it.
“Alright.” he said to it, despite knowing perfectly well that it wouldn’t answer.
“Tomorrow, I’m going to a place called school again…
but in another world this time.” And that is something I thought I’d tell you.
“You would’ve found this very funny if you had a sense of humor.
Fortunately, I have enough for both of us.”
He turned it over in his hands.
“And there you are, silent as usual.
It’s fine.
He sighed.
“If someone saw me talking to my watch like this, they’d think I was actually crazy.”
He carefully put the watch back in its place, a small ritual that had somehow become part of his nights without him noticing when exactly it had started.
In the morning, Lio stood in front of the small mirror in his room, inspecting himself.
A bag Sabine had bought for him with an insistence that allowed no argument.
Ordinary clothes hiding someone far from ordinary well enough.
He looked at his reflection.
“A technological genius, creator of nanotech armor, wielder of a weapon theoretically capable of reshaping a continent—or perhaps the planet at worst.” he said to himself with complete seriousness.
“Now going to learn multiplication tables with fifteen-year-olds.”
He smiled at his reflection.
“Alright.
That’s actually funny.”
He went downstairs.
Marinette was waiting by the door, wearing her backpack completely unevenly, one strap hanging over a single shoulder.
She was trying to fix it quickly without letting him notice.
He noticed.
“Your bag is crooked.”
“I know!” she said quickly, pulling it into place with far more force than necessary.
“I was—fixing it.
That’s exactly what I was doing.”
“Of course.”
“Ready?” she asked, completely ignoring the subject.
Leo looked at her.
Then at the door.
Then at Paris beyond it.
“No.” he said honestly, but with a clear smile.
Leo thought, But I wasn’t ready to travel between worlds either, and here I am.
I’ll survive.
Then Leo said it with a full smile.
“I’ll survive.”
Marinette laughed louder than she intended, then immediately covered her mouth with her hand as if she’d done something embarrassing.
“You’re so weird.” she said from behind her hand.
“And you dropped your croissant twice this morning.”
“Only once!”
“Twice.
I’m counting.”
“Stop counting!”
Leo walked out the door first, laughing quietly, while Marinette followed behind him, trying to look annoyed and failing completely.
The two of them walked toward a school neither of them had planned to end up at this way.
End of Chapter Fifteen