On Thursday morning I snapped awake and almost flew through my usual morning routine. By the time I got to the bus I was pretty wound up; Ty looked more tired than the last time I had seen him after he'd been on a Panarena adventure (not that he knew I was there).

Ever notice how when you're feeling hyper everything seems to slow down? Like really slow down? That's how the bus ride felt. Like it was beyond annoying. When we got to school at last, Ty didn't even have time to flick me. I was out of the bus and making a bee-line for my locker.

“The hell's up with you, squirrel?” I heard him call as he entered the building. I turned around briefly to give him an apologetic grin, and he shrugged, shaking his head. “Don't get in trouble without me.” he said, flashing a V-sign as he made his way to his own locker. I reached my own a moment later, and began sorting books. Someone poked me a moment later.

“What is it with the two of you always joking about trouble?” Rachel asked with the faint hint of a smirk as she opened her own locker.

“Ahh... ehh? Did I tell you how I met him?” I suddenly wondered.

“Hmm? Oh, you did! Really? That's why?” she returned, shaking her head. “Boys.”

“Y-you say that, but he's pretty much been my bes--” I started, and then suddenly halted.

My best friend. I pondered those words for a moment. Would he say the same? Neither of us really 'hung out' with anyone (or each other) that I knew of, both of us being more or less reclusive--him a bit more so. Had I ever seen him hanging out with anyone besides the basketball team? And even then, he only did so when they were practicing or playing.

“Your best friend?” Rachel said to me, playfully nudging me. “I thought you didn't have any friends until I came along,” she remarked with a wink as I stirred myself and finished gathering my books for morning classes.

“I mean, I don't think I did... I guess I feel different about it lately, though.” I replied as we went into class and sat down at our seats.

“I get that,” she nodded. “For the first time in a long time I feel like I actually fit in somewhere.” she remarked, idly playing with her hair as she gazed out towards the window.

“Me too.” I returned softly. She turned to me with a smile, and put her left hand on my right one, softly squeezing it. We stayed like that until classes began, at which point we snapped ourselves out of our little bubble to try and focus on school.

One by one morning classes passed us by, each handing us their own wonders or dread in turn until the lunch bell came along. When the four of us had gathered around my desk (well, plus Rachel's, as I should point out) as usual, we broke out our lunches and began eagerly digging in. No one really said anything until Ellie finally broke the silence.

“So what's our move tonight after school and stuff?” she said softly.

“Hmm...” Andrea mused as she leaned back, sipping her drink through a straw.

“Well if our leader doesn't know, then I certainly don't.” Rachel said with a sly grin as she looked over at me. I pondered for a moment.

“I think we'll get more detailed plans at the meeting tonight, but I think we might be doing some resource-raiding.” I said. “A lot of other players on our side were still up messing with the dungeons, especially the crafting dungeons, when I checked the forums this morning. The Garth-Fire Alliance seems pretty upset.”

“Is that what they're called now?” Ellie wondered. “Oh, I get it; Flamehearts and ⸸SOVEREIGN⸸ are the biggest guilds on that side, after all.”

“True, but I think The Tea Cupboard has a more sentimental pull with Garth somehow; did you see the way Angela was at his side like a queen or something?” Rachel remarked. I had to admit I hadn't noticed that much.

“I did see that,” Andrea nodded.

“O-M-G, yes!” Ellie added. “Like really, girl, you can do better.”

“But what kind of resources will we really be going after?” Andrea asked then.

“High profile or rare resources that don't replenish as quickly as others,” I told her in reply. “I bet they'll have people guarding them, too; they've enough people to do that sort of thing and still not worry about their PvP outposts. But hopefully any attack on the outposts will draw off support from the resource rich areas we might be targeting.”

“Most likely,” Ellie agreed. “I think I know who Wildeye is going to talk to; there's a guild in the Mountains of Heimgar called 'Gears and Wheels', a Dwarf-only guild. I heard they specialize in siege-craft.”

“Heh?” I wondered. “That sounds kind of cool.”

“They have those sorts of guilds?” Rachel said curiously.

“Well our plan is to be an all-girls guild, virtually speaking,” Ellie quipped with a grin as she looked over towards me.

“Ahh...” I looked up towards the ceiling with a helpless grin as Rachel smiled and Andrea giggled. “But I don't know that we'll really get much bigger than four.”

“True. But tight-knit groups are more my thing.” the blonde girl said.

“Yes, I do like it the way it is now.” Andrea nodded. “Maybe someday we can add a couple more, though.”

“That would be fun.” Rachel agreed.

“It would.” I nodded.

“But more importantly... our World Cultures teacher said something yesterday about an assignment he was going to give us today, right?” Ellie then said.

“I think so,” Rachel said after a moment, her expression thoughtful.

“Ugh. Let's not get into a guild-war and a major assignment at the same time again, if we can help it,” the older girl quipped with an uneasy smile.

“Agreed.” I said with a bemused grin of my own, and the other two girls nodded their assent to this as well.

We continued with lighter banter for the rest of lunch, and when it had ended the four of us headed to our lockers to get ready for afternoon classes. Of course, the top of the list for Rachel and I (and Ellie) was the aforementioned World Cultures; we sat down, in our spots, and saw that, on the board, our teacher had the assignment sketched out for us.

Assignment: ten-page report, due in two weeks. Topic: conflict and resolution. Discuss: meaningful resolutions to conflicts over ideology, resources, nationalism, or imperialism; provide examples either from current events, past events, or hypothetical events.

Bonus points will be awarded for outside-of-the-box solutions or for addressing multi-issue conflicts.

The three of us looked at each other with a satisfied smirk. What kind of ironic timing was this?

“Well, I doubt we can actually report about a video-game...” I quietly said.

“But we can dress it up for a hypothetical scenario.” Rachel noted with a grin.

“I take it back. This is some really good timing.” Ellie remarked; a few moments later, class was called to order, putting the thought from our heads for the next hour or so, and then we copied the assignment down in our notes for future reference.

The other two classes passed by without much in the way of major developments, except that our theater class was really leaning towards that romance play I mentioned a while back. And our Chinese lessons hammered home the fact that I really wanted to get out of this virtual war quickly and move on to Xuanpu. But at the same time I really did want to show up Garth for the fool he was, trying to pull something like this in a game world, of all places.

Ahh--can't think about that now, I thought to myself as I came back to the topic of learning how to describe things in Chinese. The game was pushed from my mind then, and remained out until I got home later that day and finished with homework.

***

“Someone's doing rather well at keeping up with assignments,” my dad remarked as I set my bag near the door for tomorrow. It was just after dinner; mom was out late for a change.

“I guess I am,” I agreed with a shrug. “Most of them aren't that hard, and with--” I stopped, choking on embarrassment. He let out a grin.

“No worries, pal. I get it.” he said with a silent chuckle.

Laugh it up, laugh it up, I thought to myself inwardly as I affected a wry smile.

“Your mother's still not keen about you fooling around with that thing, but you've been very responsible with it--to the surprise of both of us, I have to say.”

“Even gamers have their pride,” I returned, feeling it was kind of obvious.

“True... you go on, then. Have fun in wherever-land or so,” he said with a wink.

Panarena, I quipped back internally as I nodded outwardly, heading up to my room to enter that world once more.

The others were waiting for me when I got on; we made our way to a wayport and headed to Mount Fang. We found most of the leaders of our alliance assembled; Wildeye explained that Jannie and her guild were already off on a campaign of their own, along with a few sub-leaders of the alliance.

“We want the four of you to raid this area for resources,” he said, pointing to a spot on the map. Something in my memory prodded at me. “There's a lot of special and rare herbal ingredients that spawn here; the Garth-Fire Alliance has sent a small squad to keep an eye on it and 'preserve it' from 'thieves' and such.” he shook his head.

“A small squad?” I wondered.

“Well, when I say small,” he replied with a shrug, “I really mean about fifty or so. But that is small for the two biggest guilds in the region.”

“Pfft, we can handle fifty, I bet.” Ellie said with a smirk. “For all their 'equal opportunity' policies half of their side isn't even at level cap.” she added in a sardonic tone.

“Be careful you encounter the right half, then.” Wildeye remarked wittily.

“Sure thing!” Ellie said with a big grin.

“Easy, Wuuki,” I said to her, and she scrunched up her face in a bemused look as she caught on to the fact that I had compared her to the tall and furry co-pilot from the Galaxy Avenger films. “We'll assess the situation first, of course. I assume that's why you've sent out all these other strikes first? To keep them from reinforcing this area?”

“She's brilliant, all right.” Magisteria smirked. “If you claim those resources they'll take three days to reset. That should make Garth and his friends rethink this idiocy.” she told us.

“We'll get on it, then.” I nodded.

“Good; Magisteria, Timidator, go on ahead of them with your own objective.” Wildeye said, and the two of them nodded.

“Of course.”

“You got it!” they replied, and headed out with their guild-mates as the four of us made our way out after them. Ariana nudged me.

“Do you know the area we're going to? You had that look on your face,” she whispered as I looked over at her.

“Maybe?” I scratched the back of my head. “I feel like I wandered around there recently, but maybe I'm mixing it up with something else.” I remarked.

“Hmm.” Ari nodded.

We made our way to the wayport, finding the others had already gone on to their own destinations. The four of us selected a wayport nearest to our objective. As we alighted on one, the strange feeling of familiarity came to me again. Deciding it could wait until we got there, I shrugged, and the four of us stepped onto the wayport for transit.

Here we go...!

***

The in-game weather got very foggy as we made our way towards the place where the herbal resources-slash-alchemy ingredients were. Not one of us made a sound; of course, I further minimized our soundless trek with one of my skills, Shadow Sharing. By the time we got to our destination (after raiding a few other promising spots) there was almost no visibility.

This is what's known as a “double-edged sword”, I mused to myself as we crept closer. We halted; Ariana and I used our detection skills to spy out the lay of the land.

“Definitely no less than fifty,” I remarked, and Ariana nodded.

“They have five teams of three patrolling the area, and three teams of two around the perimeter.” she reported.

“Leaving the rest in a couple huddled masses on standby,” I nodded in confirmation.

“On the far side, too... lucky.” Ariana said. “I can keep my spell going to keep a lookout while we gather up the herbs; it'll be like like that old arcade game!” she said with a smirk.

“Nice-- let's go, then!” Lizzy said, and we began our quiet little raid.

For the first several minutes our plan went off without a hitch. We gathered up quite a lot, but of course there was a lot more yet to go -- hopefully our friends weren't getting tired in their diversionary fights. Then I noticed something, and that something finally jogged my memory.

Wait a minute, this tree... this is that area I noticed the night I ran into Ty... these are the silver oaks!

Let me explain these a little better. Silver oaks are also a rare crafting material, used primarily in crafting things like mage's wands or staves, magical talismans or other assorted arcane items, and other things of that nature. They were found only in the Aldholt regions, and this was one of only seven I had ever seen.

“Hey! Gather up, quick!” I whispered, and we went off to a side for a moment.

“What is it?” Lizzy whispered back.

“These are silver oaks!” I returned softly, tapping the side of the tree next to us. Their eyes widened.

“So they are!” Healina remarked as quietly as she could.

“This changes things,” Lizzy mused. “The scouts thought they were just after the herbs for potions and boosters, but Flamehearts does have a lot of mages; and if they get their hands on these...”

“We need to get them first!” I replied. “They may have numbers, but we have quality-- especially Words and Sorcery!”

“You're right about that,” the Nordian halberd-wielder nodded. “But how do we clear the field? They'll notice if we start cutting down trees!”

“If it's silver oaks, I can have them down in about twenty seconds each with Mystic Saw,” Healina said confidently.

“That still leaves us a huge gaping problem!” the other girl sighed.

“I'll be a decoy,” I said. “There's only eight here who have levels on par with us; the rest I can pick off easily, so long as they don't all bunch up at once. But I think I can counter that kind of problem...”

“Use these, too,” Ariana said, transferring some flame-charms from her inventory to mine. These could be used to start fires pretty much anywhere.

“Thanks, partner!” I said, and she smiled, winking at me.

“All right, this can work,” Lizzy agreed. “How many oaks are there?” she asked.

“I count... thirty-three.” Ariana told us.

Thirty-three trees felled at twenty seconds per tree. Allowing them time to move from tree to tree and still pick up the herbs we needed would add some time as well, but of course Ariana and Lizzy would be doing their best in that regard. All told...

“That's about fifteen minutes of time we may be looking at.” Healina said to us. “We can do this, I know we can!” she said determinedly.

“Boy, you're psyched,” I remarked with a quiet awe. She smiled back.

“We're ready when you are, Lana!” she replied with a wink of her own. The other two girls nodded.

“All right,” I nodded back. “Give me a ten count after I split, and then go.” I told them, and they nodded in affirmation. I took off, entering Shadow-world almost as soon as I stood up.

Instantly I downed one of the patrols, and then quickly downed another. None of the three had any sort of clue what had hit them. Then I tossed one of the flame-charms way off to the side of the area, near to one of the huddled groups on standby. They reacted instantly, trying to figure out what they should do (especially considering the fog) as they looked around. I scrambled up one of the other trees in the area and got my bow ready. Within a few moments I was ready, and I fired my first arrow.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“Borkanator! Borkanator's down!” someone said as my first arrow struck, only to be downed themselves by my next shot.

“All groups! Reinforce the north side! The north side!” another voice cried out. I managed to take down a third patrol, and then one of the three guarding the perimeter, and then I changed positions, exchanging my bow for the daggers as I slipped into Shadow Veil.

“Where are they?!” my next target said just before I got them; he squawked, and burst apart into nothing.

“Goober? Goober!” another voice shouted.

At least he lived up to his name, I thought with a wry grin. I looked at the time; three minutes had passed. No one seemed to have noticed the others. I set off another flame-charm, this one behind a group coming up from the east. Two of them fell to my blades soon after, and I ducked into Shadow Veil again as the others spun on their heels.

“The east! The east!!”

“Call for reinforcements!”

“They're all tied up with the Silver Tigers!”

“The Silver Tigers are here, dang it!!”

“Where's that sneak?!”

Our opponents began dashing around wildly trying to find me; I unleashed another flame-charm to the northeast, disturbing one of the more composed groups. They came to life and almost started attacking each other before they realized what they were doing.

Wait, are these two different guilds? I wondered to myself, and then smiled mischievously. I quickly darted into Shadow-world and sprinted as fast as I could for a drive-by framing. There was just enough space between my target and my scapegoat. Before anyone knew what was happening my target was down, and my scapegoat whirled around in a defensive position; however, it also looked as if he had just killed my target.

“What the--”

“Why you--!!”

“Traitors!”

“Don't we have enough problems right now without cowards like you turning on us?!”

“No, wait!”

“Who are you calling traitors?”

“Don't play dumb with us!!” the other players shouted at each other as a brawl broke out.

How in the world did that work out so nicely? I really wasn't expecting it to. I guess I was getting better at what I did--which … kind of isn't saying much, honestly. But it's a game!

I continued on to my next targets, taking down three of them before heading off to distract them with another flame-charm deeper in the woods as I checked the time. Another eight minutes had passed by.

Four minutes left, I mused to myself as I scampered about in Shadow Veil. Now there was a brawl breaking out between the survivors of the first and their “friends” who had raced over to see what was going on and why people from their alliance were turning on each other. I picked off a couple others with my bow, and then one of them managed to blow a horn. He had a ⸸SOVEREIGN⸸ guild emblem on his shield. I took him out next. After that they called a pause to their in-fighting and tried looking for me again.

“I bet that sneak is the one who started it anyway...” one of them growled.

Oopsies. He sounds mad.

“Then they're a damn good sneak.”

“Wait, you don't think...?” another of them suddenly said.

“What?”

“Is Lana Windstrider around?” the other voice said hoarsely.

“Oh, snap!” someone remarked adventurously.

“There's only a few here who could take her on, though,” yet another person said.

Heh. Personally I'd like to think none of you could actually beat me, I thought to myself as we continued our cat-and-mouse game. Fourteen minutes had passed since I split off from the others. Healina and the others had to be pretty much done by now; and of course, between the smoke and the fog, no one had even noticed. At that moment, another horn sounded. It was a horn of answer. Suddenly, I got an IM.

We got what we needed, hurry on out! Lizzy recognized that horn -- Ari. Nodding to myself, I slipped away quietly and went to rejoin the others near the wayport.

“What's up?” I said when I reached them.

“That was Humphrey's horn; he's Garth's second.” Lizzy told me. “I've never seen him fight, but everyone who has fought him says he's pretty invincible.”

“Gotcha.” I nodded back. “Well, since we're done, let's get out of here.” I said, and we made our way back to Mount Fang to report in.

When we returned, we found the other groups--or at least their team leaders--starting to report in as well. Jannie flashed us a victory sign, which we returned.

“Nice!” she said as we shared a high-five.

“Can't wait to see the forums tomorrow,” I quipped, and she snorted with laughter. As soon as we were assembled around the table we shared a round of applause for the success of our various schemes, and then the resources were laid out.

Now Sean, how exactly did you pack up thirty-odd trees? I know it's a video-game, but still, there's a certain limit to carrying things, right? True, but there's a backdoor for mage-types like Ariana and Healina: Mystic Storage, where they can store nearly an infinite amount of arcane or arcane-related items, including--you got it. Silver oaks. And when the two of them set down the pile of silver oaks we had collected, there was quite a lot of murmuring.

“Oh-ho...” Wildeye remarked with a fierce grin. “Now I understand.”

“Damn, boss, that's a lot!” Tyman said as he looked over at the logs. “They could have had all their damn mages and stuff ready to go by tomorrow with that load,” he added.

“And now we get to do so.” Wildeye clapped his hands together. “Any crafter who can make use of these, please do! Thank you all for what you've done tonight; we have yet again frustrated Garth and his friends, and deserve a rest for our efforts. Don't forget that tomorrow some of the dungeons are resetting; we'll have to be on top of them for any reprisals that may come along!”

“'May'?” Magisteria said with a raised eyebrow.

“You know what I mean.” the other guild leader returned with a fierce grin as scattered clapping broke out again. “Oh, by the way; we got a message back from the outlaw guilds.” Wildeye then said. “They are open to the offer, but as we suspected they warned us that if the other side offers more, we should beware.”

“Kind of what we thought then, huh?” Jannie frowned. Well, there was nothing more we could do about that any way you slice it.

After that we divvied out what we had nabbed in our raids, and then went our own separate ways for the night. Well, most of us did. Some of them went back to go and harass any Garth-Fire members still online while they still could--no doubt Garth himself was fuming at all the reports coming in. As for the four of us, we made our way back to Cloverbell and worked on crafting for the rest of the night. Lizzy and Healina were the first to sign off for the night; Ari and I sat with each other on the couch, looking out at the stars and listening to the soothing sounds of night-time.

“This will be over soon, right?” she said to me after a while.

“I think so. Unless he's more determined than he looks. But I think even he won't be stupid enough to push the neighborhood around like this for much longer.”

“Hopefully.”

She sounded blue. I looked over at her; she stared out at the stars, seeing them but not seeing them. I put an arm around her, and she smiled back at me.

“It was fun, though. Maybe next time we'll be in a more honest PvP battle.” she then said.

“Yeah, definitely.” I smiled back at her.

A moment of silence enveloped us again. I looked at the real-world time; it was almost nine. Heh, all that rampaging and running around was shorter than we expected, I thought to myself.

“We have about an hour; wanna try and so something?” I asked Ari, who looked over and nodded, a smile on her face.

“There is something I wanted to try with you in another area I heard about... I even saved a wayport for it a few days ago.” she said as we stood up.

“When did you--ah, oh, right... that day I got held up with chores...” I said with a faint smile.

“Change into something a little nicer, hm?” Ari told me as she switched into a green áo dài with interweaving floral patterns of red and yellow.

Wha--snaaaapp, you're hot...

“Oh right! You probably don't have anything... that's why I got you this!” she said with a smirk, transferring a yukata to my inventory.

“H-heh...?”

“Put it on!” she nudged me, and I obliged her.

Fwa--ehh?! It matched her áo dài almost perfectly. I looked up at her with a mixture of feelings; she continued smiling, and gently pulled me along. The destination she selected at our wayport was somewhere in Belledown, southeast of Aldholt City. Wait a minute, this is a -- well I guess that's expected, since Lana is a girl... but still... eh? What's that? A coastal town? Well... here we go! I thought to myself as Ariana pressed the console, and we shimmered away.

We materialized in a coastal town that had a very peaceful atmosphere to it. There was a sign nearby the entrance to it that read “Floraline”, which I guess was its name. Still leading me along, Ariana made her way through the streets to a destination she had obviously wanted to take me to for a while now, judging from how prepared and excited she was.

All along the pathways of the town I saw endless varieties and colors of flowers; I'm not a flower kind of guy, so I can't tell you exactly what they were (or even if some of them were made up, which some of them no doubt had to be), but I'm pretty sure I recognized some daisies and tulips--or were they roses? Anyhow, I guess this is how the town got its name.

The two of us ended up at an open-air gazebo where some musicians were playing, and a few people dancing. Ariana looked at me with a smile, squeezing my hand gently.

Oh, I get it... okay! I thought to myself as I smiled back, nodding at her. We headed on to join in, and soon the two of us were swaying together in time to the music. There were a few other players there who noticed us, but they only smiled and returned to their own dances, or to whatever they were doing. I felt my cheeks coloring, but looking back at Ariana... soon, I was only focused on her.

“Homecoming dance is coming up in a month or so. I didn't know if you wanted to go to that, so I was planning to save this for then... but I want to do it now.” she told me.

“I would've asked,” I replied to her, and she smirked.

“Then think of this as practice!” she winked.

“Except for the yukata, sure,” I said with a grin, and she giggled. “Are those NPCs?” I wondered as we caught sight of the musicians again.

“I think so; they're exactly the same as last time.” she nodded.

“Wow.”

“Are there musician players?” Ariana wondered, and I nodded.

“There's a couple forum threads where they chat, and I've seen recipes for instruments, but they're way up in a specialized part of the crafting skills.”

“Cool!”

“Right? I mean, none of them are contemporary instruments, but people are probably trying to work out how to play modern music with them anyway. Or maybe their own stuff.”

“That'd be fun to listen to,” she said.

“Maybe next time we'll find a player-concert to go to.” I smiled back.

“Definitely!” she smiled back.

Nope. I can never get tired of that smile, in this world or the real one.

I don't remember too much after that; all I could think of was her. I know we eventually began making our way back to the wayport, and that there were a couple people wandering the streets who seemed suspicious to me, but nothing out of the ordinary befell us and we got to Cloverbell in one piece, so I let it go for the time being. We made our way inside, after which Ariana kissed me as we hugged, and then we logged out for the night.

***

In the morning I took a look at the forums. Sure enough, there were all kinds of angry threads about the various things that had happened last night, and it kind of didn't surprise me to see that our raid on the silver oaks was among the top of the rage-posts.

Silvernight Queens: the silver oak raid!

Why does this dungeon keep getting locked?!

⸸SOVEREIGN⸸ and Flamehearts planning retaliations!

How did she do it?!

Captain Jannie Brooks and crew seize Fort Heartstone from ⸸SOVEREIGN⸸'s clutches!

Can we agree that Timidator might be overpowered?

So... did anyone see that hot dance last night in Belledown?

This last post almost made me spit out coffee. I mean, sure, okay... but really. I shook my head, and continued scrolling, then saw something that caught my eye. It was kind of a rage-post, but it looked... wonky. Are those typos or nonsense words? I clicked; there were a lot more of them, interspersed among words that were intelligible.

Wait a minute... are these... coded messages?! I took a more careful look. There was an odd pattern to what I thought were typos. It was suspicious. Wondering if the others might know anything, I printed out a copy and went to pack it for school that morning.

That bus could not get to school fast enough. Ty didn't even have time to quip at me when we did get there; I sorted out my things at my locker, and just as I was finishing Rachel opened hers.

“You're quick today,” she looked at me with an amused smile.

“A little bit,” I agreed.

“What's up?” she wondered.

“I think I found something that could speed up the end of our little war in Panarena,” I told her softly, and she looked at me with surprise. “Maybe.” I said again.

“Wow. That'd be nice!” she smiled as she sorted out her own books, and then the two of us went inside for homeroom. “What do you think it is?” she asked as we sat down.

“I think they're coded messages; I know, weird, right? But weirder still they were on the forums...” I said and she adopted a more thoughtful look.

“Let's wait for Ellie and Andrea,” Rachel said, and I nodded.

“Right.” I agreed. “Oh...” I then said, and she looked at me curiously. “Ahh... I think we're on the forums...” I said to her with a nervous laugh.

“For the raid, right?” she said with a faint smile.

“Eh, that too... but the post was about dancing...” I remarked, and her expression exploded with amusement as she put a hand over her mouth to keep from laughing. “I love you, too...” I quipped. She took my hand after she had regained control of her laughter, gently squeezing it.

“I know. I love you.” she told me. The bell rang, and homeroom began.

I thought the bus went slowly, but classes seemed to drag on forever. By the time science came along I was sure I had given up the ghost. Come on... I know it's relevant somehow, but the coded message is more important! When lunchtime finally arrived I perked up again, and began eating eagerly as we waited for Ellie and Andrea to show up--which they did about three minutes later.

“Hiya, lovebirds!” Ellie said as the two of them sat down with us.

“Hey!” Rachel said with a smile.

“What's new?” the older girl asked as she and Andrea set out their own lunches.

“Well...” Rachel said with a sly look in her eyes as she looked over at me.

“Huh--wait, don't tell me you're...?” Ellie said with a shocked look on her face.

“Wha--no! I'm not!!” Rachel retorted in a panicked voice, and I vehemently added my support.

“We've never even--!!” I started, but then Ellie began guffawing as Andrea shook her head, letting out a sigh.

“You two are too easy for her,” the red-haired girl remarked. I softly grumbled, and Rachel gave Ellie a pout.

“Okay, okay, I'm sorry! Girl, don't give me that face or I'll cry!” Ellie pleaded, and Rachel smiled again. “But seriously, what is it?” she asked, and I set the printed sheets down on the desk.

“I think it's a coded message. It was on the forums today; I'm not sure why, though.” I told them. Andrea looked at it, and turned it around for herself. She took a few bites of her lunch as she stared at it, and then picked it up.

“This looks oddly familiar.” she said.

“Leave it to you.” Ellie said as she took a drink.

“Sellav aralc serolf... it almost sounds like...” Andrea mused aloud, then set the paper down and borrowed one of Rachel's pens, writing the words down backwards... or... forwards...? “Valles Clara Flores; 'Valley of Bright Flowers'. It's Latin, spelled backwards.”

“Hey, there's an area called the Vale of Bright Flowers in-game; it's kind of in-between Aldholt, Woody Heights, and Varkstania, if I'm remembering the map right.” I suddenly recalled.

“I've been there; it lives up to its name.” Ellie said.

“There's a lot more, and I don't remember a lot of my Latin off the top of my head... can I take these, Sean?” Andrea asked me.

“Of course,” I said.

“It'll add to homework, but I'm guessing this could help us tonight.” she said with a smile.

“It may also be a trap.” Ellie pointed out. “It was out there for anyone to find.”

“Or they're desperate and not thinking straight after last night.” I suggested.

“That's true also.” she agreed.

“Either way, there's a clue in here somewhere.” Andrea said.

“I'm sure you'll find it for us, Andri.” Rachel smiled, and the other girl nodded back.

“I'll do what I can!” she replied.

Andri? I wondered.

“By the way, I read the forums too this morning.” Ellie remarked. “There's this super-cute in-game photo of you two in Belledown...” she continued with a smirk.

“Aw, thanks!” Rachel beamed happily. I looked out the window absently.

“I said of you two.” Ellie repeated.

“Of Rachel and... Lana?” I returned with a disingenuous smile as I turned back to her.

“I wonder who Lana could be.” Ellie quipped back at once. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Rachel and Andrea exchange a weary grin.

“I wonder too. I'd like to meet her sometime; maybe I should get on Panarena too.” I said at once.

“Ah, so you don't have any mirrors in your house, then?” Ellie smirked.

“Now, Ellie, you of all people should be more considerate of Lana's mild-mannered alter-ego,” Andrea said as she held a finger up.

“I'm being very considerate; I haven't said their name once, have I?” the other girl replied.

“I didn't see the picture...” I then said in a softer voice, and she turned to me with a wink.

“Teasing aside, it's really good. Honest. I have it on my phone... maybe I should send it to every--”

“Please don't!!”

“No!!” Rachel and I both said at the same time.

“Relax, dorks. I'll just send it to both of you.” she said with a mischievous smile.

“And me?” Andrea wondered.

“Of course, love!” Ellie remarked.

Ahh... I was so revved up for lunch today... now I just want it to be over...

“Aww, how cuuute!” Andrea said after a moment. My own phone buzzed. I opened it.

Okay. They're right. That is... really good, I thought to myself. Rachel smiled over at me; I knew she was thinking the exact same thing. A few moments later we put the game aside for the time being, and talked instead about things in real life (such as the encroaching homecoming dance and Rachel's home situation--which was tensing up again) until lunch was over, and then we went to ready ourselves afternoon classes.