Rising Shards

Marmalade tapped her mechanical pencil on her notebook, not really paying attention to the substitute teacher’s lecture in literature class. She was distracted by a repeating thought, one that was so loud in her thoughts she barely noticed that she clicked the entire thing of lead out of her pencil. That repeating thought: she wanted to get back on her feet. Well, she wasn’t really knocked down and out by the void trip or anything. But she did feel really bad about almost taking a Sharai Dagger for herself. And she was really sore from all the moving about, which was more action than she’d experienced in her entire life. Which her parents kindly informed her was normal for Cani life and that she should feel lucky it isn’t as dangerous as the old days.

I shouldn’t be so down. Everyone was really cool about my screwup with the daggers. I’m sore, but I’ll take sore for Cani reasons over like everything at Staverius. I’m at the gay school now! How long did I want this? Like, forever! I'm at the place I stared at the pamphlets for for hours and hours. Isn’t that a huge win in itself? Going to a school with the gay population being like. Me. And probably a few others but we never talked about it…going from that to this super gay school! I guess there’s probably straight folks here but like. It’s a lot gayer than Staverius. And I’m gay so I can do gay!

Marmalade wasn’t sure what more she could do to do gay, but just existing as a trans girl felt enough for the day.

Class ended a bit early as the substitute ran out of material and took pity on the poor students who had been through various void incidents during the prior weekend. But everyone just kind of hung around, prompting Marmalade to sit back down, not wanting to miss some potential social time. Iris was to her left, and Amara, KJ, and Rain to her right. Iris and Amara were comforting when Marmalade was having a moment, but she hadn’t talked to KJ or Rain much yet.

“Hang on,” Iris said, leaning over to look past Marmalade. “Isn’t Rain still supposed to be at Wildfire Hearts?” She gasped. “I didn’t just blow your cover, did I?”

“Oh, no,” Rain said. Her face was a bit swollen. “While I’m not technically supposed to attend classes with everyone just yet, the incidents caused by Wildfire Hearts have given us some more leeway. I fully intend to be a regular student here once more as soon as possible.”

Michi sat a row in front of them and turned around hearing their voices.

“I got the sketch done,” Michi said, showing their big art notebook to the trio, who reacted positively.

“Splendid work, Michi,” Rain said. She slid money over to Michi.

“You know,” Rain said. “I wouldn’t react well if they told me to head back after we were caught and hypnotized by what I’m told was a large, mythical lady.”

“We wouldn’t react well either,” KJ said. “I’d put out a tell all documentary or something.”

“I’d fight them with violence.” Amara said.

Rain beamed at her dear friends, then rubbed her sore cheek. “Somewhere in that fracas I was struck, if you’re curious about the swelling.”

Some of the students had started to head out now. Oka passed by right as Rain began talking about her sore face and shot Marmalade an anxious wince. Marmalade was present as Rain was hypnotized, and when Oka slapped her to un-hypnotize her.

“Ah…” Marmalade said.

A few seconds later, Marmalade got a notification on her Dynne chat.

OkaOhri: Marmalade, for the love of gosh please don’t tell Rain that I smacked her.

MarmaladeLine: Don’t worry, my lips are sealed!

Kalei_the_Tyrant_Ranger: whyd you send this to the group chat lol

OkaOhri: I DON’T KNOW HOW TO USE THIS OKAY?

Kalei_the_Tyrant_Ranger: chill LMAO

OkaOhri: I AM CHILL I JUST DON’T KNOW HOW TO UN CAPITALIZE

OkaOhri: Wait there we go!

OkaOhri: WAIT the love trio aren’t in this chat, are they? I didn’t just majorly screw this up, did I???????????

Kalei_the_Tyrant_Ranger: why would we have them in our chat lmao

OkaOhri: I can’t tell is this the roommate group chat or the video game group chat?

Kalei_the_Tyrant_Ranger: roommate. It says roommate at the top dude

OkaOhri: WELL

OkaOhri: OK IN MY DEENSE

OkaOhri: *DEFENSE

Kalei_the_Tyrant_Ranger: caps lock again

OkaOhri: THEY COULD BE ON THE VIDEO GAME CHAT GROUP AND I COULD’VE SENT IT THERE

Kalei_the_Tyrant_Ranger: why would we have the love trio in the gamer chat do they even play games

OkaOhri: ...

OkaOhri: LISTEN

Kalei_the_Tyrant_Ranger: im so gladyou got dynne oka im dying here

RainaStarlightFangirl: Oka’s trying her best!!!!!

Kalei_the_Tyrant_Ranger: you need to chill too zates lol

RainaStarlightFangirl: I AM CHILL! I AM VERY CHILL! THE CHILLEST EVEN!

CadenceEmpress: Shouldn’t you all be in class?

While they weren’t the same kind of fun on Dynne as Marmalade’s other online friends, they were fun in their own unique way. Kalei had invited her to one Dynne group just called ‘roommates,’ which they were joined by Lillia, Oka, and Zeta, and another called ‘Gamer Zone,’ which had a lot more people Marmalade didn’t know yet from class.

By the time that exchange finished, the love trio had left, and Michi was getting their things together.

“Hey, why did Rain hand you money all…mobster style?” Marmalade asked.

Michi shrugged. “They commissioned me to draw them at one of their tea parties.”

“Oh, cool.” Marmalade said.

Michi left before Marmalade could say anything else, which kind of bummed her out.

Michi’s one of my fellow newbies, so we should like…bond, maybe? They seem cool so I dunno.

As she wandered between classes, Marmalade was tempted to try and catch up to Michi and try to do better at starting a conversation. She decided that if she couldn’t now, at some point soon she’d try and talk to Michi more.