The teacher went to the shrine, and everyone turned toward him. The fluorescent lights were turned off, and he lit candles. In the eerie glow, I looked at Kazz and barely recognized him. He had closed his eyes and pulled a huge sword from a sheath. Where did the sword come from? He raised it high over his head and waved it. It was a real sword, razor sharp, the kind that cut and hurt and killed. It wasn’t broken. It wasn’t metaphorical. Kazz looked like a furious samurai fighting a bloody battle. I looked around and saw other warriors waving their just-as-real swords in the flickering light. They chanted words that I could not understand.
“What the hell?” I muttered to myself. “This is nuts.”

Back to the thumbnails...