Rising Shards

Our hunt for club ideas, members, and backup clubs continued as we passed a stand that had a ton of bloodsabers on display, all cased in the safety foam stuff but still impressive to look at. Maia shoved Iris and me past them quickly.

“You do not wanna join the bloodsaber club,” Maia said. “They’re hardcore. It’s for like, future like spy-knight-assassins or something.”

“I named my bloodsaber Minty.” I said.

“Mine’s Sparkles,” Iris said.

Maia stared at us both. “Yeah, they’d tear you apart.”

The next table we stopped at was the master thieves club.

“How are you allowed to promote like stealing?” Iris asked the club’s representative, Carmen.

“Like…this?” Carmen said, holding up a small green purse.

“Hey, that’s mine!” Iris said. “When did you even take that?”

“When didn’t I take it?” Carmen said.

“That doesn’t even make sense,” Maia said, snatching the purse back and handing it to Iris.

“You know stealing from me really makes me not want to join.” Iris said.

Iris stomped off.

“We shouldn’t waste any more time on these D-tier ideas,” Maia said, following Iris. “Zeta, you know anybody that could join us?”

“Well, there’s…” I said, looking around. I spotted two dorm neighbors. “AIRA!”

Aira was consoling Laenie, who was crying. Laenie luckily didn’t notice my scream.

“Why, if it isn’t Zeta Faleur, Iris Arco, and Maia Oloro.”

“Full names…” Iris said.

“We were wondering if you picked a club yet.”

Laenie heave sobbed when we said that.

“Laenie, are you OK?” Iris asked.

“I just…I picked…my club…” Laenie said.

“Yes, I’m going with the gardening club,” Aira said. “Same club as Laenie!”

I looked down at the sobbing Laenie.

“…yeah, it’d be best if she had a friend with her.”

“Zeta…” Someone said behind me. I turned to see Roux playing on her handheld game system.

“Oh, hi Roux,” I said.

“Uh huh,” Roux said. “Yeah, I’m here…”

Roux clicked on her game, but she didn’t seem as impenetrably locked into her device as Elisa was.

“We’re starting a club,” I said. “Would you want to join us?”

“Wait…yes.” Roux said.

“Really? That easy?”

“…yes.” Roux suddenly looked up at me. “What did you just say?”

“You just said you’d join my club."

“Oh no I did not,” Roux said. She popped out two wireless headphone bud things from her ears. “I’m on a voice chat right now.”

“That’s…not fair.”

“I’m sure you wouldn’t understand with your level of game experience.” Roux said. “It’s a device that allows me to talk to other gamers, you see.”

“I’ve played games!” I said. “Raina Starlight’s Farm Adventure.”

“Doesn’t count,” Roux said. “Never counted.”

“Alright Faleur, let’s pull you out of this one before it gets ugly.” Maia said, as her and Iris grabbed my arms again and dragged me away.

“I saw that one coming,” Iris said. “When she said ‘Zeta, I’m here,’ she was quoting that Talon game.”

“I realize that now.”

“And yet I didn’t intervene.” Iris said. “Funny how that works.”

“Hilarious.” I said.

With that I was out of people I could think of to join. Feeling pretty dejected, we went to the lunch stand, where the fabled sandwich-making robot Kalei was talking about was being set up. There was a blond girl with short hair that looked like she was in motion despite sitting. I thought the robot was making her shake through the bar she had her elbows on, but when I put my hands down on the stand as I sat down with Iris and Maia, I didn’t feel any vibrations at all from the table.

“Latte, join our club.” Maia said.

“Please?” Iris added.

“No!” Latte screamed, putting my various yelps to shame with that mighty bellow as she slammed her fists on the stand. “I mean, wait, what?”

“Latte’s a coffee addict.” Iris said to me.

“Fitting name.” I said.

“Yeah my parents either had incredible foresight or they hated me to doom me to my caffeinated fate,” Latte said. “Stop talking about me. What is this club? Does your club have a plug for my coffee maker? I…need a coffee.”

“How should we know? We don’t even have a room yet.” Maia said.

“We barely have a club yet.”

Latte did a hard blink. “Right, that could be an issue,” She said. “Get me a plug that I can have 24/7 access to and I’m in. Otherwise, you’re out of luck.”

Latte sniffed at the air.

“Wait,” she said. “The cafeteria. They’re making some.”

With that, she took off and sprinted towards the cafeteria.

“I’m putting her down as a maybe,” Iris said. “Eh, why not a yes, the teacher won’t know.”

“So that’s…” Maia said, counting on her fingers. “Four. With like forty minutes to go before the deadline.”

“Well sheeeeeooot, partners,” A girl at the stand by us said. “That girl took off quicker’n a two bit collar stick mud rat."

“Uh, hi?”

“Name’s Tene!” She said. She had a squeaky, blaringly loud voice.

“You wanna join our club?” Iris blurted as Maia and I each restrained some form of saying “Please no.”

“Aw, shucks, well I’m quite certainly flattered,” Tene said. “This ol’ cowgirl’s got her own rodeo to go to, rodeo club. But I mightily ‘ppreciate the offer.”

Tene reached into a brown leather bag and pulled out some buttons and gave them to each of us. They had “Don’t forget the Rodeo Shards Rising Rodeo Competition Rodeo Event!” written on them.

“Take this here button, it’s a gift even if you’re not joining the club.” Tene said. “It’s also a reminder for the big rodeo the rodeo club’s doing. We’re doing a contest, y’see, if you keep the pin on your person from now until the big show, you could win a whole hundred dollars!”

“Dang…” I said.

Iris and Maia waited until Tene left to shove the buttons Tene gave them away.