Rising Shards

It was supposed to be a nice lunch on a relaxed Saturday with my friends. Something chill before I headed out to my first major band practice since Nikki and I broke up. I had my bass over my shoulder and food in hand, ready to unwind a bit.

It was supposed to be a normal lunch, and yet...

"Why is she here?" I asked, looming over the table. The devils sans Caeda and Chickadee were all gathered, and for some reason Zeta Faleur sat with them. I refused to make eye contact with her, my tray of food shaking in my grasp.

"Who?" Charmaine asked.

"Don't egg her on, you know who she's talking about," Esther said.

Zeta had the audacity to turn and face me with a smile. Did she forget I hated her? That she and her foolish sister were my sworn enemies? I wanted to grab her by her tail and yank her off my table. Well, our table, it was the one the devils had claimed for their own on the campus cafeteria. A villain like Faleur didn't belong there.

"A teacher made me bring these cards around," Zeta said, gesturing to a baggie of dark red cards on the table. "I dunno why she picked me, because I got kinda freaked out handing them to people I didn't know well, but then I heard the devils talking about Tower and just kinda sat down here."

"You were talking about Tower?" I asked.

"I wasn't," Sai said. "I'd love to go one meal without hearing about that damn show. Really, if I could go fifteen minutes even that'd be amazing."

"I was just trying to figure out that triple time travel wheel thing," Myles said. "And Zeta explained it pretty well, I think."

Zeta turned to me with this horribly cocky smile. I was thirty percent prepared to yank her off the table by her tail and fling her across the cafeteria at this point.

"Don't look so smugly at me," I warned.

"I'm not smug about anything, really," Zeta said. "Do you want a card?"

I didn't dare ask what the cards were for lest I got locked in a conversation with Zeta Faleur that'd surely result in me hitting her. Hell, we were probably headed that way already, I was furious she'd sit at my usual spot and talk to my friends. Zeta fished one of the crimson cards out and handed it to me. I ripped it up immediately.

"Heh, figured you'd do that," Zeta said.

"Ana can be so predictable when she's pissed," Sai said.

"There's an event later tonight for the prom," Ash explained. "Not that any of us are going to that, but they're doing some kind of team competition thing. You get vouchers for a dress or tux if you go. Again, I'm not going, but maybe some of you might want that."

I let out an annoyed guffaw. "We knew about that already. I told you." Thanks to Mother's connections, I was able to obtain a list of the upcoming events at the school for the competition between Rising Shards and Wildfire Hearts. With the two schools merged the dynamic of that battle had changed, but not greatly. "And why would you want to hear it from the enemy? Zeta, do you possess a single cell in your body that's capable of strategy to have an molecule of realization about how foolish it is to give your enemy any information?"

"It's a game where you race shopping carts around to get a voucher for a dress," Zeta said.

"Yes, and?" I snapped back. "You really want to give your opponents anything in this bout?"

"I just don't think it's that big a deal," Zeta said. "A teacher made me hand cards out, that's all. Kinda rude for her to make me do that on a Saturday, but she said I'd get a gift card to Books Galore for this, so that's kinda cool."

Simply infuriating. Her smug, lacksadasical attitude made me want to do something productive. I adjusted the strap to the case for my bass over my shoulder.

"I was hoping to enjoy a nice lunch with you all, but since this is the case, I'll go elsewhere," I said. "I have band practice anyways, so. I'll be back in time for..." I trailed off there.

"Back in time for what?" Zeta asked.

I growled. "You'll know soon enough," I said, trying to sound as ominous as possible.

"You mean the shopping game thing?" Zeta asked. "Because I did just tell you about that, and you said you knew about it already, so it wouldn't really be a surprise if you showed up."

It was humiliating having my attempt at menace go over like that. Unable to hold in my anger, my reflexive move was to try and break my lunch tray over my leg. It was stronger than I expected though, the light plastic material apparently more durable than it initially looked. And I ended up spilling mashed potatoes, chicken, and some veggies on the ground. I tried to give an intimidating stare to Zeta and the devils as almost a defensive maneuver to hide how embarrassed I felt, shuffling away sheepishly. I returned with paper towels to clean up my mess, but I kept glaring the whole time.

"Well. I'm going to go play with my band," I announced.

"Want us to come with?" Sai asked.

"What?" Why?" I asked.

"I…think you could maybe use the support?" Sai said. "I am curious to see how practice goes."

"You can't just sit in on practice, you're not in my band," I said, finding the paper towel struggled to get mashed potato off the ground.

"Well, we don't have anything going on, so maybe we'll just come with and find something to do around where you play," Esther suggested.

"I…hm…" That was harder to argue against, I couldn't really stop them from being near my practice.

"I won't go to your band practice," Zeta announced. "Gotta hand out the rest of these cards and all." Why the hell was she so smug today?

"Obviously!" I said.

"But I think it'd be cool to hear you play sometime, maybe?" Zeta said. "Stella and I don't play anything, well I did play the recorder in elementary school, but that's about—"

"Enough!" I said. "Enough. I'm going now. So if any of you wants to come with…"

"And any of you not meaning me, right?" Zeta said.

"Yes," I said, resisting the urge to kick her.

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