Permafrost

Chapter Nine

When they walked inside the school building, they were immediately bombarded by questions from Tubbo and Ranboo.

"Where did you guys go?"

Are you okay, Purpled?"

"Yeah, what happened?"

Purpled shrugged. "Nothing. I thought I had forgotten something outside, and so I had to go check. I didn't, though."

Their skeptical faces mirrored each other, like Purpled knew they would, but he didn't elaborate. Instead, he just walked off, feeling refreshed like he had just taken a plunge into a pool on a hot summer day. "Anyway, great fight! I'd love to do that again," he lied.

Tommy flicked his eyes on him, perplexed, but he didn't show much except by pinching his lips together.

Tubbo, though, ever the innocent one, relaxed and nodded, bounding on his heels while Ranboo accepted it with some level of suspicion. "When would you guys like to have our next spar?"

"Whenever we're able to," Tommy cut in, playing off with a smile. Purpled could only imagine what was going on inside of his head now that he had the weight of keeping a superpower a secret. But, it felt just a tiny bit easier to deal with, now that he knew he wasn't going to have to lie to everybody.

"Okay!" Tubbo said, happily linking his arm into Ranboo's. "Just let us know when that will be. In the meantime, what do you guys want to do? We could hang around the playground, or play hide-and-seek tag."

That actually sounded interesting, and Purpled smiled. "You guys play hide-and-seek?"

The trio all shared glances at each other, wearing wide grins. "Oh, heck yeah! You definitely need to play a game! Everybody gets super competitive in it!"

Tubbo unlinked his arm from Ranboo's and now began dragging Purpled somewhere. "Let's go, you're going to love it!"

As Purpled followed along, he began to feel a sense of excitement, but also fear. "Who's 'everyone?'" he asked politely.

"Oh, only the entire school," Tubbo answered, leading him around the twists and turns.

Glancing back at Tommy, who only smiled encouragingly, he felt himself relax for the second time in the school.

Like a beacon of fun and energy, Tubbo and Tommy would call out to the random students, asking who wanted to join the game. While some of them politely declined, most of their faces lit up with a bright beam and they nodded, tagging along the group that quickly swelled.

And when they thought there were enough people, the few Winters went around, freezing a brooch which was pinned ti everybody's chest so that whenever one of them were found, the seekers would know it.

After three seekers were picked, they went off into a room to go count, and the excitement spiked up even higher than before.

"Come on, let's go!" Tommy cried out, dragging Purpled's hand and yanking him away. "I know of the best hiding spot!"

Grinning, he ran after, trusting in Tommy's ability to keep them safe. "You guys play this game often?"

Running around a corner, he shook his head. "Not too often. With school work being as time consuming as it is, it's kind of hard. But we try to play it as often as we can."

The patter of feet that had been loud was quickly diminishing until it was just Tommy and Purpled. Often, students would look up from their school work to smile at them, wishing them good luck before disappearing behind their backs.

The twists and turns were still confusing to Purpled, who tried to map everything out as they ran, gulping in air as fast as they could before the seekers found them. Their blood pulsed, and even though it was a simple game, Purpled couldn't help but feel excited about it.