Twisted Wonderland

Fire Igniting

The next day, you and the boys are in the gym during your lunch break. You sit on the bleachers while the boys get ready for practice. Ace and Grim mutter under their breath as they stretch.

"Your moves are all utterly unchoreographed. It's embarrassing to watch frankly, and woefully inelegant, to boot." Ace quotes what Vil said to them.

"You get a five out of one hundred!" Grim kicks at the ground. "Oooh, he makes me so mad! I'm gonna wow 'em at the audition with my slick moves and dulcet tones! They'll be all like, Please, o Great Grim, you have to represent us! Just you wait and see."

Ace rolls his eyes. "Yeah. Totally. Sooo... Deuce." He turns to the blue haired boy. "You changed your mind about auditioning. What gives?"

"I'm not taking all that smack talk lying down!" Deuce folds his arms. "Besides... I'm a little worried about that guy."

"You mean Epel?" Ace tilts his head.

"Yeah." Deuce nods. "He didn't seem like he was taking part in the SDC because he wanted to."

"I noticed that too." You add. "He seemed pretty scared of his Housewarden."

"Back when he and Y/N bumped into each other, he was crying." Deuce puts a hand to his chest. "As an honors student, I can't ignore someone being forced to do something against their will."

Ace puts a hand to his hip. "Y'know, a real honors student wouldn't refer to themselves as one. Epel's clearly faint of heart. I mean, just look at the guy. Forcing someone like that to compete just seems mean. That's why I say we put on a better performance than Epel's. We can knock him out of the running for the contest ourselves."

Ace looks to Deuce with a grin. "You said it yourself, right? It's not appropriate to audition on a lark when you're not serious about gunning for the top spot. If he doesn't want the spot, we'll take it for ourselves."

You rub the back of your neck. "I don't know if that's the right motivation..."

Grim ignores you. "Sounds good to me! Let's start with some dance practice. Y/N, cue the music!"

You roll your eyes and hit the play button on your phone. An upbeat pop song plays and the boys get in place.

"Okay, let's run through the whole thing once first. You up to this, Grim?" Ace asks. "I can't imagine you having any dancing experience."

Grim chuckles and waves him off. "I'll show you what my hind paws can do!"

"I practiced as much as I could, but I wonder if I can pull it off." Deuce looks to you. "Could you help us stay on the beat by clapping your hands, Y/N?"

"Sure." You start clapping your hands to the beat.

The boys start dancing though they're nowhere close to being in sync with each other. Ace seems to be getting the moves sometimes right, but Deuce struggles to keep up and Grim is doing a completely different dance.

"Hold your right hand out as you back up, and... Wait, which foot do we use?" Deuce confused himself.

Grim strikes a pose. "How 'bout a peace sign right here? Not that my front paws can really do that..."

Ace rolls his eyes. "Dude. This is the easy part, and you're already having this trouble?"

Deuce narrows his eyes. "Just you watch! I'll get the hang of this in no time!"

After a few more attempts, they're still not any further than where they started. Deuce trips on his feet and lands on the hard wood floor.

Ace clutches his sides as he bursts out laughing. "You can't even pull off basic baby steps, Deuce."