Sophia Jackson
Stories
11
Chapters
5,834
Words
1.6 M
Comments
0
Reading
5 d, 14 h
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131 ******** The bus was less than half full on the way back to campus, so Alden had taken two seats. The lights were off, and he was letting himself sprawl, watching the city pass by as they approached the north shore of F and The Span. A motorcycle zipped through traffic, its rider accelerating to pass the bus before they reached the long bridge, and a police drone up ahead flared yellow in warning. Behind him, Haoyu was leaning out of his seat to talk to Kon. “Jeffy’s standing in the parking lot…-
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130 ******* After their dinner, the class broke up. Some people left to head back to the dorms, meet up with friends, or get an early start on weekend family time. Principal Saleh and most of the instructors took their leave, while Torsten Klein was stuck with the job of seeing the bus safely back to campus. The vehicle drove itself, but the school required it to have a babysitter. “The mall closes at midnight!” he called after the students as they scattered. “If you’re not on the bus five…
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129 ****** The chatter in the MPE building’s laundry room was energetic when Alden walked in with his gym suit over his arm. “After we eat, we could all go do something at the mall together.” “It’ll be late. We won’t even make it to the restaurant until after eight.” “It’s Friday! Who cares if it’s late?” “Marsha’s team is “They weren’t cohesive before, but that last run was too far, don’t you think? They completely broke down.” “We could go to the…
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128 ******* From the very beginning, there was something ugly about it Alden’s team was missing a core piece. They were worried, nervous, and not sure what they were supposed to be doing now that all of their plans had been upset. And the personalities of their opponents added an additional element of tension that hadn’t been present in any of the previous matches. The members of Team Vandy/Marsha who had been grim from their earlier losses suddenly felt like they had a chance. Maricel’s…
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127 ****** Winning felt good. No surprise there. But the jubilant, giddy atmosphere among the members of the team kept ratcheting higher and higher, and everyone was behaving like they’d accomplished something much grander than winning a race against their classmates. They grabbed a spot together on the bleachers while the other two teams prepped for their own runs, and Alden basked in the victory right along with the rest of them. “We need to figure out how to make the pipe into an even stronger…
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126 *** “Now my brother’s flying. He looks happy!” “I think he looks a bit bored,” said Finlay, watching Lexi cling to a hoop of fluorescent yellow paracord that was swinging him upwards in a steady arc toward the top of the wall. “Especially for a person dangling from a string that high in the air.” “No, that’s one of his happy faces.” Kon was standing. “Look at the drone view footage and zoom in instead of watching from here. There’s this tiny smirk.” Despite the fact…
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************ 125 ************ Somewhere, in a different part of the universe, an Artonan child who’d been born at the same time as Alden Thorn was excited. Maybe too excited. “Stop.” Alden shook his head as he watched the Opposite stone on his desk glow a soft white for the fourth time in the past fifteen minutes. “You have to pay for those.” He finished making note of his very first successful casting of the wordchain in his ledger, using the Palace of Unbreaking’s official name…
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****** “I don’t understand.” Jeffy was standing at the back of the study room, watching Reinhard pronounce a string of Artonan words for the tenth time. The wordchain was supposed to increase energy, and the archer said he wanted it for tomorrow. Lute listened to him from his perch on the edge of the conference table. “You don’t go to class sometimes?” Jeffy asked Lute. “And the teachers don’t mind?” “They’ll mind if you don’t go to class,” Lexi told him. “Get over here and…
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123 It was four in the morning, and Alden’s fingers were flicking through the new spell. He focused on the shapes his auriad made, pushing himself outward through them in that specific way that made magic happen. Casting excited him, like always, but he wished there was someone around to answer his questions. Following the instructions in But can I do things to make the spell work better? Can I do things to make it worse? Different? He was sure the answers were all ‘yes.’ Instructor…
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122 Alden had a suspicion that the day might be a bit different before he even left the dorm that morning. Jeremy didn’t usually video call him from inside a bathroom stall at seven thirty AM. “Hey! It’s good to see you instead of getting a text, but shouldn’t you be in second period?” Alden asked. He’d just pulled on a long-sleeved shirt, and he was tucking his laptop into his messenger bag. “People have been talking about you all morning,” Jeremy said. “I didn’t call earlier…
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