Scales & Tales - The Tales of Mystic High - Book 1

Chapter 16

Aquamarine had gotten to work as soon as Cigamly possible. She quickly went to the local food store right on the edge of Mystic High's campus, bought her ingredients, before heading back to the dormitory. She realized that Electra was still in her dorm, probably still fizzing with anger at her. Aquamarine immediately got to work.

After some time, Aquamarine had her stuff ready to be boiled. She quickly got it ready, and turned on the stovetop. She was going to start cooking, when she glanced outside the dorm. Immediately the lake caught her attention, causing her to zone out once more. She headed over to the window, leaning as close as she could, staring at the lake, losing time as a concept all together.

Aquamarine was only snapped out of her daze when she heard her door burst open. She turned around with a jump and quickly realized that while letting the stovetop boil as she zoned out, she had accidentally started a mini fire. Smoke was filling up the dorm room ceiling, and Aquamarine quickly covered her mouth. She saw through the black haze that Blackout was there. He had probably smelled the smoke, and ended up breaking down the door, trying to get in. In a worried frazzle, not thinking about covering her identity, she quickly pointed her finger at the fire, shooting a drizzle of water at the fire. It quickly cooled down, and Aquamarine took a deep, shaky breath as Blackout helped clear out the smoke.

"What were you thinking?" Blackout snarled, seemingly unconcerned with Aquamarine's water powers at the moment. "You could've burnt down the whole entire dormitory!"

"I-I don't know! I was cooking, and then I just... zoned out..." Aquamarine glanced back at the window, not daring to look directly at the lake that seemed to be a big problem to her.

"Of course it's your dumb zoning out. Like- why do you keep doing this? It's stupid, and you need to break out of this crappy habit of yours."

Aquamarine's shoulders stiffened. She opened her mouth, about to shout meaningless insults of Blackout, before quickly stopping herself. She wouldn't yell at Blackout. Not while thinking, at least. She told Atlantic she'd try to be nicer to Blackout, and she was going to keep that promise. Anything for her cousin. "I... I'll try, okay?"

Blackout looked at her oddly, as if he were expecting her to scream at him once more. "You... you're agreeing with me?"

Aquamarine hesitated, before sighing and nodding. "Yes. I am. It honestly is a bad habit, and I'll do my best to break it... Okay?"

"O... okay?" Blackout blinked in confusion, before looking at Electra's bedroom door, which was still shut. "Is your roommate gone or something? I would've assumed she'd come out as soon as she saw smoke filling her dorm..."

Aquamarine hummed, turning to face the door. "Yeah, you're right... I thought she was in there?" Confused, Aquamarine walked over to the door. She opened the door, surprised to find it unlocked. When she entered, she saw Electra's messy room. Her window was wide open, and there was a light yellow dust covering the windowsill. Curiosity won over Aquamarine, and she walked over, and got some of the dust on her finger. She felt it, and it felt like sugar, but more powdered. Fined down to tiny little microscopic crystals.

"What the..?" Blackout walked over, looking at Aquamarine's finger that was covered in the yellow powdery substance. "I think I know what that is..."

Aquamarine sniffed her finger that contained the dust. "It... It smells like straight up sugar. Do you think it is sugar?"

"No, it's-" before Blackout could get a word in, Aquamarine licked some of the dust off her finger. Immediately she was filled with this fun, jittery feeling. Her spirits were immediately lifted. "... It's fairy dust. It must've been Stella, since she's a space fairy or something of the sort.

I'm pretty sure that if you digest it, it'll make you temporarily... uhm.. Hyper." He saw the way Aquamarine was now bouncing the slightest bit. He sighed. "Yeah... I am not babysitting miss hyper over here. I'm getting your cousin."

"Wait!" Aquamarine grabbed onto Blackout's arm as he turned to go get Atlantic.

"What?" Blackout turned around, looking at Aquamarine, who's eyes were now slightly dilated, and she had a silly grin on her face.

"Who's your favorite color of the alphabet?" She questioned with a little laugh.

Blackout looked at her as if she had three heads. "I- what!? Okay, you're insane when you're hyper, I guess."

"Hey!" Aquamarine hissed with a fake pout. "That's not very nice!"

"Cool. I honestly don't care." Blackout shrugged his arm out of the water creature's grip. Before she could grab him and ask him any other bizarre questions, he quickly left the dorm room, heading to his own.

Aquamarine was left in the dorm, with a fun little mindset, much unlike her normal anxiety-ridden one.

"And then she tasted it... And now she's just..." Blackout trailed off – Atlantic to his side – now seeing Aquamarine was on the kitchen countertop with a silly grin. "What are you doing now?"

"I wanna see if I can fly!" Aquamarine cheered. Seeing Atlantic there, she smiled, adding, "hi, Atlantic! Do you want to join me?"

"Heck yeah I do!" Atlantic smiled brightly, climbing on top of the counter next to Aquamarine.

"What have I done..." Blackout mumbled to himself, mentally face palming. "Can you two at least put some pillows or something at the bottom in case you can't fly?"

Aquamarine sighed overdramatically. "If you insist... You're so boring... Wait, I know! We can use my pillows!" She climbed down from the counter, as Atlantic sat down on it, his legs

swinging off the marble edges. Aquamarine came back with an assortment of pillows. Most of them were shades of teal, blue, and white, in shapes such as water droplets, seashells, clams, and starfish. She plopped all of them down on the floor in front of the counter. "Is this good?"

Blackout sighed heavily. "Yes, that's good."

"Yippee!" Aquamarine and Atlantic squealed in sync. Aquamarine climbed onto the counter, and she grabbed Atlantic's hand. "Are. You. Ready!?"

"I. Am. Ready!" Atlantic cheered back.

"Three!"

Blackout watched in annoyment but also slight amusement as the two got ready to jump,

to test these miracle 'flying abilities'. "Two!"

"This is going to end badly..."

"Shut up!" Aquamarine snapped at Blackout, who shook his head knowingly. "One... go!" The two cousins took a leap of faith, before crashing into the ground. Atlantic had landed

on the pillows right in the center, but Aquamarine had only landed about 75 percent on. Her elbow hand scraped against the wooden floor, and she frowned.

"And... I knew it," Blackout said with a low chuckle of amusement. "Aww, did you get hurt?" Atlantic frowned.

"Yeah..." Aquamarine whined, lifting up her scraped elbow.