Rising Shards

Nobody had been hurt by the tree at least, but what a freaking mess. Rain, KJ, and Amara all screamed like someone had just been violently murdered in front of them. I knew they loved that table, but it was painfully loud. Chickadee cackled with glee, and I readied a block of ice in my hands to chuck at her stupid head, but Roux stopped me.

"Why? She's right there!" I hissed.

"Your hotheaded nature is why the chief put me in charge of you," Roux said. "It's up to me to wrangle you and hopefully teach you a lesson or two."

"Ugh. Sure. Whatever. We should probably do something about all this?" I gestured at the carnage in front of us.

The love trio were hugging now and sobbing. I blinked, and their expressions shifted to neutral ones. Then Amara grinned.

"That's how we'd react...if that really was beloved big table being killed," Amara said.

"Huh?" Chickadee squinted.

"We would never let big table be harmed by such miscreants," Rain said. "Did you like our performance?"

That was scarily good if they were acting. But like...what?

"Thanks to a tip from Roux's intel, I learned about your little scheme," Amara said. "I had discretely swapped the tables after hours, putting big table safely in the school vault."

"There's a school vault?" I said.

"Now, Koridia! The net!" Roux said.

"What? What net?" I asked.

"The one I gave you! The one in the net cannon!" Roux said.

"You didn't do that," I said.

"Hm. That's troubling. Now how are we going to catch them?"

"I could just use my ice powers like I was going to do before you stopped me," I said.

"You won't catch me," Chickadee laughed. "You really, really won't."

"Ugh, she's about to do a stupid speech," I said. "Can you skip the stupid speech?"

"I too had some intel on you," Chickadee said.

"What is with everyone spying lately?" I asked.

"I don't know about you guys, but I am currently sitting at a B- in my spy class, on the cusp of getting that bad boy up to a solid B. So. Yeah." Chickadee coughed. "But, anyways. I saw Amara dragging that heavy ass table across campus, so I planned a counterattack."

"You fiend..." Rain said.

"Chumbler and the other one are at that vault now, and they're gonna mess up your beloved big table," Chickadee said. "For real this time. Not a fake replacement table."

Ignoring Roux's suggestion to not do this, I made a big ice block and chucked it at Chickadee. Unfortunately, she saw it in time and vanished, using her camouflage power. I could hear her running past us.

"This is getting a bit stupid," I said. "But we should maybe run too before a teacher sees this chopped down tree and the exploded...all this."

"We have to stop her!" Rain said. "Roux, Kalei, now!"

"I mean...are you going to pay me?" I asked.

"We'll handle things here!" KJ said. "We know someone who's an expert in plants that can save this tree!"

"Is it Oka?" I asked. "She has plant powers. I dunno if she could fix this, but she's my go to for plants."

"That's a secret for us to know, and for you to…not know,” Amara said.

"Fine, whatever,” I said. “Just confirm that you’ll pay me and we’ll go.”

"Koridia, you're just wasting time, we have to save big table!" Roux said.

Roux grabbed my wrist and led me out of the garden.

As we sped through the halls, dodging students and teachers and whoever else was around, Roux scolded me.

"I can't believe how much time you wasted," they said. "You are a liar and a fool.”

"I wouldn't have wasted any time if you just let me deck her right away,"

"But then she wouldn't have been able to explain about her plot for the real big table in the vault!"

"Sure, I guess," I said. "Where the hell is this vault anyways?"

"It's a secret only a few know," Roux said. "Luckily, I am one of those few."

The so-called vault was in one of the gym buildings. The one I played beam chasers in, too. I wondered if there was a secret gold mind hidden right under my nose. There's lots of weird crap at the school so it was possible. But then I saw what the vault really was, something I'd passed by hundreds of times.

"This isn't a vault, it's just storage," I said. "This is where they keep the Safe Silver decorations and crap like that."

"And it's where big table is!" Roux said. "Big table who is a cornerstone of this school and a historical landmark! Big table who is in danger!"

I was probably more familiar with the gym storage than Roux was, I had to bring equipment back and forth sometimes during practice. Though I couldn't count out them sneaking around so maybe we were on even footing.

"Hold it right there," Chickadee said, appearing in front of us the moment we entered the collection of sporting equipment. "Chumbler and her friend are about to absolutely wreck that table that Rain is so obsessed with."

"Yeah, and we're gonna stop her," I said. "I guess. Actually, hold on." I grabbed the bridge of my nose for a sec. "Why do you do any of this? Why are you always just being a jackass all the time messing with us?”

Chickadee winked. "Guess I'm just a little devil."

That was probably the only answer she was ever gonna give us. What came next happened almost on instinct. Before Chickadee could strike, walls of ice surrounded her, reaching almost to the ceiling. I thought Roux gave me an assist, but it was all my doing.

"She'll be alright," I said as Chickadee tried hitting the ice prison she found herself in.

"Frick, that's cold!" Chickadee shouted.

I gave her enough space to breathe, and it was pretty hot in the gym that day so the ice probably wouldn't hold too long. Still, she was bested.

“I’d like to see Blude do something like that,” I said.

“Chickadee, defeated by her own villainy," Roux said.

"What? No, I beat her," I said.

"And you're a villain," Roux said.

"You said it was her villainy," I said.

"Yeah, her being a villain led to her getting taken down by your villainous ways. The cycle of villainy is a cruel one that never ends."

"Hopefully that shuts her up for a while," I said. "Girlie has gone—"

"That's Girliepop to you," Roux said.

"You really think that's her last name?" I asked.

Roux shrugged. "I don't think Koridia is really yours. I don't think many people here have last names that are true."

I didn't wanna get into what Roux's qualifications for what a 'true' name were, so I carried on. All that was left was stopping Chumbler and Z.O.K. from busting up the love trio's table.

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