mutated

chapter thirty two: world war III - the twig vs the midget

Let's just say that the situation everyone was in right now was not chill.

Fingers drumming on their laps, fidgeting feet tapping on the floor in a rhythm; shaking knees; nervous glances across the room to see what everyone else's reactions were, and tried to fit in; fingers tapping on lips or biting relentlessly at their nails (now this is targeted specifically at some people who I will not name).

Why so tense, you ask? Well, it was probably because the upcoming cage match was going to be the last cage match of the topaz tournaments. One more match would decide who else would be promoted to a rank of Gold, to join and receive one of the highest ranks that you could get. Before, back in the quartz tournaments and so forth, we had been determined not to lose.

Now, we were determined to win.

The final cage match of Topaz Tournaments was Ryan Lam against Anson. The bean-pole against the tiny one, or as Hass used to call him back in junior school, 'mini torpedo.' I never got why he called him that. It had no context, no correlation to Anson as a person, and overall confusing. This was a pretty popular match since the guys actually bothered to support their friends. The girls - I'm referring to Abby, Karyn, and Meredith - thought Anson was the cutest little angel ever to be blessed upon this unholy city.

Me? I thought he was a pain in ass. He was an asshole. The other girls didn't really get that; they had only known Anson for what, three years?

I've known him for six, and he was the tiniest little bully anyone could have known. Spazzing me when I was forced to sit next to him in my year three class. Whacking me with chalkboards. Throwing chalks at me. Those unbearable school days where I was actually tempted to throw him off a building: I guess I was a murderous little psychopath ever since I was a kid.

Ryan... I didn't know what to think of him. The skinny-ass malnutrition dude who looks like he hasn't eaten in a couple of months. The guy who made the irritating memes, made inappropriate jokes once in a while, abused his status as server admin on discord. 

Basically, I didn't really care about who won or lost. I was here because a) watching how others fight was interesting, b) the food is better at the tournaments, c) I had a sprained wrist and didn't want to hurt it before my next cage match and d) I was bored out of my mind. Throwing people off buildings wasn't that fun anymore now that people were learning how to fly. Or levitate. Or whatever they could do to stop themselves from falling off a building.

Shuffling into my seat, I crunched happily on my pack of chips, earning strange looks from everybody around me as the crackling sound shot through the silent room like a bullet shattering glass.  I raised my eyebrows at them, a soft glare in my eyes, and they looked away, before beginning to chatter among themselves.

The lights flickered, and the two fighters appeared, their faces covered by the shadows. Ryan's face was angled towards someone in the corner, not the boys, while Anson simply had a cheeky grin on his face. He had the right to: this was not the first time these two boys were in a cage match, and Anson had emerged victorious last time.

Following Ryan's gaze, I noticed it was latched on a certain twiggy girl in the corner. Of course. Alyssa. The two had become friends after a little prank I had played on Lyss which ended up with the two starting to get to know each other. I smiled a little. Maybe I should get back to customizing the hallways with pranks and traps.

"Jadie, where's the bathroom?" Alyssa had asked. I pointed at a room with a devilish smile, telling her it was in there. Alyssa asked again with a level of uncertainty. "Are you sure it's in there? Isn't the girls' bathroom normally pink?"

Keep in mind that this was in the first few weeks we were here. No one was completely sure where everything was, even me. But even I could tell the differences between toilets.