“What even is that?”

“Some form of hairless otter I believe.”

“But do they have those long fingers? And that nose is more like something a dog has.” Both of them looked down upon the supposed roadkill. It had been there a while, judging from the pool of black blood that had stained the flagstones around it.

“Can you two hurry it up please? We’re going to be late.” Came a voice from a girl a few meters away, who was leaning over the canal. Her voice was strained, as though she was trying not to throw up.

“All right Iris!” The red head called back. “Well, you know the rules. Morgan, it’s your problem.”

“What?! No! You saw it first. You were even like ‘Blergh, the fuck is this?’ So, you do the honours, thanks.”

“You would make a delicate lady like me pick something this disgusting up?”

“Keira, you are many things. Delicate is far from the word I’d use to describe any of them. Now clean up the dead body so we can go to school.”

“Can’t we just leave it for the specialist?”

“Sure, and while we wait for that to happen, we’ll have a dead-“ he glanced at the body “-thing on the pavement.”

“Fine. Just because I have to walk past here on the way back…” He then passed Keira a plastic bag. “…Not even a snow shovel? Or even just a regular shovel?”

“C’mon guys, we’re going to be late!” Keira checked her watch, sighed and did her civic duty, shivering slightly as she touched the body, dumping it behind a house’s garden before making her way back over to her friends.

“Here’s your plastic bag back.”

“It’s yours now. Happy birthday.”

“Aw, man. Thanks. I’ve always wanted a bloody, slightly warm plastic bag for my birthday.”

“Warm?”

“Yeah. The body was still warm.” Morgan frowned and looked like he was about to ask something, but at that point Keira had thrown it away. He instead shrugged.

“Weird. We’re going to be late by the way.”

“We are?” Keira checked her watch and flatly said, “oh, we are.” Then she broke out into a sprint, leaving the surprised squawk of Morgan behind her. This didn’t seem to affect Iris all that much though, as she quickly pulled ahead of either of them, even sparing some energy to grumble along the way.

Thanks to Keira’s prerogative, they managed to make it to the bus just on time. Rushing was a formality really, there was no struggle for seats, due to the sparse population, and the fact that her oldest friend had been far faster than the both of them and saved her a spot. On her way over however, there was a giggling to her side. Paige and her friend Imogen were looking at her and whispering to each other. Instead of saying anything, like she had in the past, Keira just sniffed the air audibly and then side eyed Paige. Who had the audacity to look vaguely offended.

While she may have known Paige for longer than both of her friends, Morgan and Iris’ relationship with her was far better. Which was weird as in the past it had been the other way around, until for some reason Paige had morphed into a sort of mega bitch. Keira really didn’t tolerate that for long. Keira sat down next to Iris and Morgan took the seat behind them, pulling out a book as he did so. Keira took that as a cue to talk to her friend.

“How was your long break?”

“It was fun, but some of the prices for transport had gotten unreasonably high.”

“Doesn’t Tradise usually have that?”

“Yeah, but this was bad, even compared to what it was before. Apparently, it had something to do with the fact that some oil and petrol companies were haemorrhaging money and wanted to make up for it.”

“Ah… Yep. Sure.” Keira wasn’t going to pretend to know what she was talking about, but she did find it odd that companies in that industry, especially the large ones, were struggling. “Do you want to know what I did...?”

“I already know what you did! I even got the sarcastic account of the event.”

“It was not sarcastic! It was mildly humorous. And besides, don’t you want to see pictures? Or hear how much I raised from it?” The girl next to her grumbled something and moved her head from its position resting on the seat in front.

“Why haven’t we moved yet?” Keira frowned and looked to her side. Lo and behold, they were still there. It seemed like her silence wasn’t enough for Iris as Morgan was also asked.

“Hm? Oh, no clue.” Then he went back to his book. As Keira checked her watch someone stepped onto the bus. She seemed very shy, and it seemed like she did not appreciate all of the eyes looking her way. She blushed and power walked to the back of the bus, but before she reached it Paige stopped her in her tracks. They exchanged a few words and she slotted in behind them. Keira mourned for the poor girl for a few minutes before the bus set off.

“We’re setting off a little late, don’t you think?”

“Keira. You do remember that you set your watch five minutes fast so you wouldn’t be late, right?”

“…Look. It’s been a long holiday. And-“ Iris gave her a look that conveyed that she did not want to hear the excuses, which was fair as setting off into a run had forced her and Morgan to follow suit. It was a shame that she’d be getting them anyway.

Fortunately, the bus drive to the school was only half an hour, so when Keira ran out of things to say, she didn’t have to stew in her awkwardness for long. It was also fortunate that they were approaching the school by the time she ran out of steam. The town providing enough of a distraction, with the school easily being the largest building there, a statement which is undermined by the fact that the rest of the town were small houses and family-owned businesses. They arrived on time which left a ten-minute grace period before lessons started when there wasn’t much to do apart from standing around and chatting. A few more students walked in as they did this, probably walking from their own houses and the bell went.

Keira walked into the maths class and was immediately struck by a revelation. The new girl had to share the same classes Keira did. It did make sense as there was only about one class per year, with a minor exception for the core subjects of maths, literature and language, and PE. It made it kind of hard to learn how to socialise properly though, you could never really make new friends and even if you messed up, people will pretend that you didn’t. Truly, it was a tragedy that their village didn’t make it into the catchment area for a school in the main city, then maybe she would have had the courage, as well as charisma, to approach the new girl, whose name was apparently Naima.

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Paige, despite being in the same situation, had no trouble however and was already talking up a storm in first period. Maybe this was why she didn’t seem interested in talking to Keira, and after about an hour of literature she still didn’t seem too interested. Perhaps more apathetic than before, if there was a way to measure such things. In Keira’s mind things became clearer by the end of computing as by then she looked downright hostile. It was easy for her to guess why though. As computer science was such a great subject, the only alternative must have been Paige telling her about Keira.

The only question was which poison Naima had been fed. Since they had a twenty-minute assembly after the first two lessons, it was only until first break that she found out. With the new girl in the lead, Keira was cornered by three people.

“…Hi?” She didn’t want to be rude, but at the same time it had been a very aggressive walk.

“Give Paige her necklace back.”

“…Necklace? Oh! Necklace! I don’t have that. You should try asking the person who had it last.”

“And who was that?”

“Paige. I’m Keira by the way. I don’t think we’ve been introduced.”

“I know you’re lying, because Paige said she saw you take it home with you one day.”

“I know I didn’t though, so maybe Paige is the one lying here.”

“Why would Paige lie about that? Clearly, you’re trying to cover your tracks, because you either wanted it or wanted to sell it. So, either give it back or get it back.” Paige was looking rather smug now, and Keira had to resist the urge to punch her in the face. She was still trying to win this petty cold war when everyone was just tired of it. Keira included.

“Look, I had nothing to do with it, so I don’t know what you want me to do. Maybe Paige should keep care of her things and own up to her mistakes instead of being a spineless coward.” Naima looked like she was going to say something else, but a voice cut through instead.

“Alrighty. Back off. We have somewhere to be.” Iris had stayed behind to talk to the teacher about something, but it seemed like she was done now. Paige, Naima and Imogen, who looked slightly spooked, hung around a little longer before leaving. “Where’s Morgan?”

“Oh, he’s-“ Keira looked around the retreating forms of the trio and then quickly checked the classroom. “He’s run off.”

“I’m not surprised. That man can be fast when he wants to. Want to go and find him?”

“No, I want to get something to eat first. We can talk properly at lunch.” Iris shrugged and they headed off together. The next couple of lessons weren’t too interesting, though they were doing a fascinating case study in geography. It might have been fun if Keira didn’t know that she had to memorise all of the boring information as well as the fun parts. By lunch her brain was looking for some long due rest, but of course, life had other plans.

Keira found Morgan at lunch. He was sitting in a chair, back to the table and Keira. And upon the table? A chess set. He turned dramatically, but he was sitting in a regular chair, so it ended up being a little awkward and slow.

“Hello, Keira. Are you feeling lucky?”

“Chess is not a lucky game, Morgan.” She took the opposite seat as Morgan finished turning his chair around.

“It is when you’re involved.”

“I’m… going to ignore what that implies. Your move first?”

“Yep.” He moved the first piece. “Now for the first part of my devious victory plan, have you heard about the Xanthopan?”

“You mean that conspiracy theory that a group monitors and filters out conspiracy theories from your supposedly free conspiracy theory forums? You’ve told me. Multiple times.”

“Well have I told you about the new pieces of information that they have been striking down over the holidays?”

“Nope.” Keira really didn’t want to listen to Morgan’s fringe theories, she was starting to lose ground quickly and wanted to go out with dignity.

“Well, it’s about that new section of tunnels they opened up in Mictepeh, the city of the dead, the cultural centre of-“

“Check.”

“Shit.”

“The cultural centre of shit? That doesn’t sound too fun.”

“You knew what I was talking about. There, checkmate mate. I win. Ya git.” Keira sighed as she looked down at the board. It seemed like her play hadn’t gotten her very far. On the other hand, though she had managed to snag a queen.

“Well done. Want to try again without those distraction tactics?”

“No! Are you kidding? If you beat me at this, what will I have left? My amazing sense of humour?”

“That competition before the holiday?”

“Ah… that. You didn’t want to tell me what you got, because it was bad apparently, but I already knew I got better. I got better than the whole school.”

“Wow, yes. You beat ten whole people. Now make the move or I will walk out.”

“So boring. Whilst I do that, second distraction tactic deployed. How’s your cardio going?”

“Oh hey, would you look at the time? I’ve got to get going and beat the… rush. Bye!”

“Ah yes, to beat the rush of ten whole people. Running from your problems doesn’t count as exercise, you know.”

“Gods, I wish it did. I would be the fittest woman alive.”

Thankfully the last class was one she liked and the distance to the bus stop wasn’t far, so the day ended in a short metaphorical and literal sprint. Then they were on the bus for a little while. Keira decided to use this quiet to check up on her friends and their messages. She had mostly been texting someone from her gaming group. He was still in the area thanks to the fact that his university started back up later than her secondary school. At the moment she was on the receiving end of another one of his rants against Archer Hamilton, an old ex-friend of his. Despite these rants giving a deep insight on Archer’s character, it was still frustratingly vague on the details as to why Isaac thought this way.

It seemed fortunate that Archer decided that coming back to the village was a bad idea and kept his distance over the holidays. At least that was what the messages said, and Keira was inclined to agree with him as it seemed that another person didn’t seem to want to come back. Amelie Cross, someone who both Keira and Iris had personal history with and could be considered a bad person, had also failed to return over the break, and they had both expressed their profound gratitude for that.

She looked outside to watch the landscape change. Keira preferred the way back to the village, appreciated the way that farmland morphed into the heavily wooded area around their village. Found it more enticing than the opposite. Once the bus had arrived only a few of them got off. Morgan, Paige and Imogen lived in the other direction to Keira and had to walk in a tense isolated group together until they could finally go their separate ways. She had laughed at him in the past, as she and Iris lived close together. Now, she was not. As Iris peeled off to walk into her house, Keira came to the brief realisation that her and Naima lived in the same direction. She walked quicker to pull ahead of Naima, but it seemed like the other had the same idea.

The world’s most awkward race ended when Keira reached her front door and when she looked behind her, she noticed that Naima was walking further. Away from the edge of the town. Up the hill to the old church… Where an old man lived. She knew of him from when she helped clean the church on some weekends. He liked to call everyone heathens a lot, but other than that he was pretty nice. Keira wondered what Naima’s relation to him was.

As it was the first day back, she didn’t have much work to do, and the work that she did have to do was in for the next week. So, instead, Keira decided to finally start a workout routine. For the first time in her life, she decided to go out on a run. There was a nice woodland trail that she ran across when she was doing hiking with scouts. Apparently, her dad found this strange though.

“Are you sure you want to do this? You don’t have to put yourself through this pain daughter! Please have mercy on yourself!”

“I’ll be fine Dad; I’ll call you when I’m late or in trouble or lost.”

“Like that time we went out for a walk and you walked way ahead of everyone, then got lost, then had to be found by Grandad?”

“Okay, first of all, no. Second of all, if I did get lost, you wouldn’t be able to find me. I’m really not sure how he found me…”

“Magic, probably. In any case, you have your phone on you right? And you have-“

“Let her go for her run, she knows how to look after herself.” Her mother cut in before he could say any more.

“I know but look at her. Going out by herself. How quickly they grow.” He wiped a mock tear out of his eye as Keira fastened a strand of hair out of hers.

“I won’t be gone too long.”

Her last sentence turned out to be a lie though. Maybe it was the fact that she was wearing headphones and couldn’t hear the rustling behind her. But when the blow to the back of her head came half an hour into her run, she was not expecting it.