Rising Shards

Kalei watched her breath in the cold. She had done a few powerwalk laps around the campus to try and clear her head. But even some slight exercise couldn’t get the thought of Nikki out of her head. As she sat on a freezing bench, she tried to push the thoughts away of how Wildfire Hearts treaded Nikki since she arrived. How many people there are in the Order of Terina? All of them? Even if it’s just a few, if they try their crap on her….

Kalei got out her phone and loaded up her last messages with Nikki. She had done this a few times since Fang Moon Web, and each time after staring for a while she’d give up even pretending she was gonna type something and chucked her phone somewhere. This time though, as she stared at her phone, she felt someone’s eyes on her.

“Uh. Hey?” Kalei said as Lillia approached. She didn’t say anything. “Did I…break the rules somewhere?”

Lillia sat down beside her, not breaking eye contact.

“OK, I don’t like this quiet thing you’re doing.” Kalei said. “I’m kind of in the middle of something. Can you just—”

“No. Because I want to help you.” Lillia said. “You’re upset about the raid, right?”

“I mean, who isn’t? Not that hard to guess.” Kalei said.

“Right. But it might be harder to guess the specific person getting sent to Wildfire Hearts that’s upsetting you more.” Lillia said.

“What? Oka or Zates didn’t tell you that—wait, I mean. I didn’t. Say that?” Klaei said. “Phew, sure is cold out, huh?”

“I’m fine.” Lillia continued to stare. Both of them weren’t wearing jackets, but Lillia hadn’t been moving around like Kalei was, and yet she looked like the cold wasn’t affecting her at all.

“Oh, right, you have a fire power,” Kalei said. “I bet that warms you up. I wonder if my ice power makes me feel less cold—”

“I’m not here to talk powers,” Lillia said. “Though it is an interesting topic, our reactions to climate with our different powers, so I would be interested in picking that up some other time. I’m here to talk about who you’re missing.”

“Are you gonna…bug me about this?” Kalei asked.

“No,” Lillia said. “I don’t know who specifically you’re missing, nor am I going to pry. I just want you to pick yourself up, because you aren’t the type to mope.”

“I dunno, I mope a lot.” Kalei said. “This is pretty normal.”

“I disagree,” Lillia said. “Did you take the Total Karting DLC fiasco lying down? No. You got online and started complaining immediately. And what did that complaint campaign get us all?”

“A…discount on the DLC when it finally came out?” Kalei said.

“That’s right. When we were playing against those people hacking the game online, did we turn over and let them beat us in races around the candy course over and over?” Lillia asked.

“Uh, no.”

“Right, we reported them over and over until they got banned. We won that day. And we’ll win this one somehow, too.”

Kalei didn’t know if Lillia was right. It wasn’t like they could even do anything but wait. And it was easier to mope while waiting.

“So don’t give up.” Lillia said, holding her fist out. “It’s unbecoming of you.”

Kalei bumped her fist back. “Right. Thanks, Lillia.”

“Give me your phone.” Lillia said.

“What—” Kalei said as Lillia swiped her phone. “Hey!”

Lillia stood up quickly and started typing.

“How’d you even unlock it?” Kalei said. “Give it back!”

“Here.” Lillia said, holding out the phone. “Happy?”

Kalei felt her stomach drop as she saw Lillia had the messages page open. “What’d you just do?”

“Just helping you not give up.” Lillia said.

Kalei felt like she’d just stepped off a roller coaster when she saw that Lillia had texted Nikki. Just one word and an emoji, but it was more than Kalei had managed over a week.

“Hey :)”

“Uh, you said you weren’t going to pry?” Kalei said. “This feels like prying? Like a lot? Help?”

Lillia smiled wryly. “You’re welcome.”

Kalei was torn between panic and anger that Lillia had just pulled that, but she left too quickly for Kalei to even retaliate. Now she found herself staring at her phone again, with the staring circumstances completely different.