It was nine o'clock when Gina, Zach and Paris were patrolling the area near the Nettai Park. They were guided by their host, Hunter, who was sniffing the air. The three of them carried lanterns and their Teddy's with them, all of the floor was just chattering loose leaves.

The hoot of a cat-headed owl was heard.

"Can someone remind me why I'm missing my beauty sleep to be treading in the middle of the night?" Paris asked. She was the tail of the line."I remind you you're a changer," Gina replied from the head, "and we're looking for rubins."

Zach was in the middle of them but he was distracted using his phone. A buzzing voice was heard from there.

Gina stopped. And Zach collided with her.

"What're you watching that's so important?" Gina scolded impatiently.

"I was ... It was a skyboarding race," he said disappointed, like what he was doing was shameful.

"Well, better quit that."

"I can't. I gotta practice for my upcoming competition and being here is a waste of my time."

"So is mine," Paris accompanied behind him.

"Shut the hell up, you two," Gina shouted. "Nobody asked you to come..."

"Can all of you shut up?" Hunter said. It had been leading the line and soon, it got distracted. "I can't focus on the smell if you all keep yelling at each other."

"They started!" Gina said.

"Zach," Billy Bear appeared from beneath Zach's bomber jacket, "you need to pay attention to the rubin hunting."

"Tobby, Tobby," Tobby added from Paris's handbag.

"Fine," Zach replied but he was mildly annoyed.

Hunter resumed his sniffing. "Over here," it said and started dashing into the alameda. The group of changers ran too. When the crew stopped, Hunter pointed out a big piece of meteor that shone through the night at the feet of a tree.

Gina picked it up and inspected it. "This is the biggest so far."

"Let me see," Paris snatched.

"You gonna break it, Paris Healtown!"

"That's not true!"

Gina and Paris resumed their hubbub of shrieks and Zach took advantage to play back the race he was watching. Hunter snorted and then it realized someone else was observing them. The teddysprout lifted its ears and tried to acknowledge who it was but the presence had disappeared.

"Let's go, now." It said.

---

The month started with the spring races, where the skyboarding competitions were made to choose a skyboarder champ. Zach was very excited because he finally was in the age to compete in the junior section. He just needed to win the preselection tournament and then he could be set in the big championship. That's why he was looking for ways to skip classes and set the most free time aside to practice with his old megaboard. His mom and Hunter's rubin hunting was the current impediment for this.

The last school bell rang and the trio was leaving the building. Gina tightened her backpack because she was about to fly the sky and made sure every time nothing there could fall.

"See you in the evening," she said.

"I can't," Zach stopped her before she clicked the buttons of velocity. Paris Healtown was chewing gum. "I have to clean the classroom, yeah, I ... it's my time today."

"If Zach's not going, I am neither," Paris blew a bubble.

"It's not my problem," the black-haired girl said in a surprisingly indifferent tone, "but I don't think you-know-who will be happy."

"I'll apologize after," the moloid responded.

Gina started her rocketboots and Paris's limousine came to pick her up. Zach waited for the girls to leave and called Ani, his skyboarder friend.

"I'm on my way!" The boy then dropped his megaboard to the dirt floor of the school entrance, lifting some dust. He jumped in, tap his right foot and the device let a strip slide, tying his left one, then gave some fire off through the rockets making Zach ascend the sky.

As skyboarders needed to avoid falling in the air, megaboards enabled a metal strip that tied one of their users' foot to the surface while the other one needed to be free to command the course and the velocity in several movements. The most modern megaboards came with magnetic fields and special shoes to make the attachment possible. Zach Mole craved for the Fire Megaboard, which was the greatest model so far.

The boy came to the Skate Park of Aznar and said hi to Ani. Most of the skyboarders there were actual moloid boys and defying stereotypes, Ani was a regular Caucasian girl with a grunge style. With her, there were some other Japanese grungy girls but they were shy as to try practicing with the two of them.

The Skate Park was a broad chamber without a roof where a weird serpent-like track wobbled in the air, drawing a circuit. There were also small ramps to practice short loops. When Zach could set himself free from Paris obnoxious plans, he came here to practice with Ani. He was indeed fond of this sport contrasting his sometimes cowardly personality.

The skate park was made to imitate the large circuits built in the air for big competitions where several sportspeople matched to win. Zach was not that bad but he needed to practice his stability more if we actually wanted to win. Tell his megaboard, which more than one time, cracked apart and let him bang the floor.

"I heard the circuit is rigged," "Yeah, maybe he paid to win."

Zach finished a loop and came down to ask what some moloids were talking about.

"I heard the winner of Downtown round just made it because the whole circuit was rigged," some boy said.

"I heard he did a good job and he had a Fire Megaboard," Zach replied.

"Who knows? Many of us aren't competing in the Aznar round."

"I am. I won't be afraid of some rumors," Zach concluded. But this let him confused. He couldn't believe someone would fake competing in a respectable skyboard competition. He indeed knew that David Junson, the guy they referred to, wasn't a bad competitor.

Some rubin hunting was made that week with the trio, usually, after school. There hadn't been a lot of homework for the guys so, they actually had time to pick up some jewels inside and near Nettai region. Hunter never revealed how much of the meteor he actually needed to create the Great Sphere but he indeed explained to Zach Mole and Paris Healtown what the importance of being a changer was – although not as straight as he had been to the Belts.

Paris was about to pick a beating blue rubin when Hunter stopped her yelling at her.

"Don't touch that!"

The 'dog' had come running and flicked the jewel away her gloved hands. The rubin rolled a bit through the grass. They were in Aznar region near the Condos.

"Geez! What's wrong with you, dog?" Paris recriminated.

"That was a fusion rubin! If you had touched it, we couldn't have known what sort of monster you would've transformed."

"The doggie is right!" Randall said emerging from Zach's backpack. "Wow, he gotta be a Supreme. Not even Billy Bear would've told rubins apart."

"I told you to stay in the backpack!" Zach hushed but the tiny teddysprout cast a handful of dirt to his eyes. Then, the boy cursed. "Billy Bear, put your brother together!" He screamed at the backpack.

"Enough. Next time, teddys that don't look like dogs stay home. Sorry, nothing personal," Gina commented in the back. "Now, could you explain again the part of the monster Paris would've become, because ... she's already one."

"Very funny, Gina Belt," Paris clapped back. "Better get a trophy for being funny because for pretty, I don't believe so, hotkey."

"The fusion rubins," Billy Bear said from the backpack, "are either teddysprouts or contact meltdowns. If a living being touches a fusion rubin that never became a teddysprout, this can fuse with their body and malform it."

"Oh cool, imagine having actual superpowers ..." Zach started amused.

"Ew!" Paris exclaimed. "I don't wanna end like that circus freak from the other day."

Paris, who selected who to remember and who not to, decided to bring back Minna Shiro to the table. Hunter had already been told about that incident. He poohed, looked at the jewel and cast a seal out of its mouth. The light sphere it threw to the beating rubin made it shrink until it disappeared.

"Problem solved. We can call it a day."

"Good, because I have things to do," Zach said.

"Zach, remember that we're going shopping to Cincinnati in some hours. You can't lose it. I got the helicopter," the blonde said putting on some black sunglasses.

"Can't. I need to practice, Paris."

"Ooosh, quit it. I can pay someone to make you a trophy. Is that what you want?"

Gina snorted and left flying with Hunter in her arms.

"I won't win doing that, Paris. Wait, Gina!!" He yelled at the almost gone girl in the air. "Come see me tomorrow at the Skate Garden. I'll compete!"

Gina waved and left finally.

"Why do you invite her?" Paris kicked out.

"Because we're a team now, you need to start embracing the idea the three of us are friends now.

"Friends?" Paris giggled. "I will never be friends with that savage. She just envies my money and my goodlookingness and she's jealous of my leading position in this crew."

"Tobby, Tobby."

"See? Even Tobby agrees."

"Hmm ..." Zach weighed carefully what he was about to say. "If someone's fairly the leader, Gina would get that. She was the first in having a teddysprout and Hunter is actually the boss of them, right, Randall?"

"I am tough!"

"See? Even Randall agrees."

Paris frowned. Some passerbys came by the area in regular bikes but only Tobby was left to be seen interacting with the pair. She came close to the moloid and said in a sinister voice.

"If you know what's good for you, you will never make me piss off, Zach Mole. You know I can splat you like you were just as

meaningless as a fly. That's what you are. Don't play smart."

Paris fished out a block from her handbag and then the scooter unfolded. She left flying. Billy Bear peeked out of the backpack and when nobody was around, fully showed up.

"Zach, why did she say those horrible words to you? Are not you friends?"

Zach took a minute to reply.

"Meh, she's like that."

The day of the Aznar route came along. The race was about to start. Gina, Mr Mitchell and Samantha were there in the bleachers along almost half Aznar and Mediterranean Region. It was a time where moloids pridefully blended in other non-Aznar people. In the start line, Mrs Molly and Alexandra were talking to Zach who had his helmet and shoulder pads on. While Mrs Molly talked about how many prayers she was saying to Usami, Zach waved at Gina who had shown up. She almost didn't catch him but Samantha did wave effusively back at him.

The Belts weren't enthusiastic about the race. They barely know the rules. Gina only needed to be somewhere else rather than at home on Saturday afternoon. Hunter was there in the bleachers wearing sunglasses.

"Take that off," Gina whispered. "Act like a dog or I'll leash you."

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Soon, the voice in the speakers prevented the competitors to take their positions. The Moles needed to leave for their spots back in the bleachers. Alexandra was annoyed by being there but she showed nothing in her face. Along Zach, there were other seven skyboarders who went by his age. Ani, who was in the presenior section, would compete in the race after this one but watched her friend from the changing room of the Sport Garden.

The place, the Sport Garden of Aznar, was an open stadium of 160 ft diameter. A snail circuit elevated to the sky had been built in the middle of the court for this event that sectioned in three races: the junior, presenior and senior. After that, the three winners will have to compete against one another and the victor would be designated as the Aznar champ and then sent to compete to the Skyboard Tournament with all the regional champs.

If Zach wins this race and so does Ani, they both have to compete against each other.

Mr Mitchell was zooming in with some binoculars waiting to see some fine women to flirt with but his daughter snatched them and used them to observe Paris Healtown somewhere but she wasn't. Unfortunately, she could see Cindy Junson in the bleachers of the other side of the court with her family.

"Why's Cindy Junson here?" She let say aloud. She was praying not to run into Waldo.

"Doesn't her brother compete too?" Samantha said petting Hunter in her lap.

The buzzing of the so many conversations made them rise their voices.

"Oh, Junson," Gina snapped a finger still with the binoculars on her eyes, "that's why it rang a bell. The kid who stayed as champion in Nettai is his brother."

"Gina, I want to use the binoculars too!"

"Shut up, dad. There are no cute women to undress with the eyes."

Gina was alert. She had been informed of the strange cases that happened during the races in this place. Hunter hinted it might be associated to a rubin activity and they both were active to catch it if that was the case.

'If I'm right, the last three races for the regionals have been made here. And some skyboarders reported their megaboards malfunctioned live during the races. If this is the blame of a teddy, it might be interfering with the magnetism of the track,' Gina thought.

"The first show," the voice in the speakers announced, "is a demonstration. Each skyboarder will exhibit their tricks and grip of the megaboard at the same time..."

Zach needed to showcase some fair tricks for the first stage before moving to the actual race. He had rehearsed several times and was pretty confident. But he forgot all of the others will do the same at the same time and people needed to choose on which competitor to focus. So will the judges of the first part. The exhibition points were added to the development of the skyboarder's entire career and Zach was about to be known officially as one so, he needed extra exposition.

The hong was heard and Zach jumped on his old megaboard. Apparently, he was the only skyboarder with a rocket megaboard as the rest were rolling on magnetic ones that acted with the magnetism of the very circuit tracks. Points in, he would be seen as an old-fashioned competitor and wouldn't need to use the magnetism of the tracks to perform. Points out, his old-fashionedness would play against avantgarde comments and some tricks would be affected for not sliding on a magnetic device.

"It doesn't matter!" He screamed, feeling the wind on his face.

The eyes mustered on Zach as his maneuvers seemed fresh and effortless, like he meant to have fun and not win. With every loop, Mrs Mole whooped and Samantha shouted happily pulling Hunter's ears.

Zach was happy but Paris wasn't around to see him. One more loop and he would finish, he heard a slap and some noise but he couldn't see what was happening. When all of the skyboarders were over by the finish line, they found out one of the boys had fallen down the megaboard and started bleeding out of his nose. When he was taken out to first aid, he mumbled there was an obstacle on a part of the track that made him crash.

Zach could catch these declarations from where he was but nobody paid attention to what the boy said. They just unregistered him off the race.

When the hong for the race of the junior section finally ranged, Zach's heart was tottering. He was nervous but he needed to win. The boy surfed the snail track giving fire off from behind, he shrank his chubby body so it won't stagger while other boys seemed to have no inconvenience and almost looked like ghosts floating over the floor.

'It can't be fair having a magnetic megaboard,' Zach thought but he needed to think straight.

The first curve of the snail was reached. He tilted his body and the megaboard gained velocity. He was competing side by side with a boy who looked almost exactly as him but dressed in brown. Suddenly, that boy's megaboard stopped working and he fell down. Zach couldn't understand what had happened.

By the third curve, something similar happened to another skyboarder past him. He could outrun him in a jiffy after that.

Zach got to the finish line, shut his megaboard down and stepped down, turning around to see who had won. However, he was the only one. Some other skyboarders came after him with a clear mad face. The wave of screams and applauses sang Zach's name but he wasn't sure of what was going on.

"Congrats, dude," one of the other boys said patting his shoulder. "You just won the race."

"Wait. Why?"

Zach really didn't understand what had just happened but he had been the victor of the junior race. He received a medal and took a picture but there was no joy. He didn't feel he had competed at all. When Jini Seiseki, the tv reporter, interviewed him, he could ogle Gina Belt talking to some skyboarders in the bench down the court but she wasn't allowed to be there.

'Something's happening.'

He left the reporter with a bunch of gossips in her notebook and walked towards Gina.

"What're you doing?"

"Just asking some questions," she responded.

"Is there something I need to know?"

"Not quite ... Congrats. I guess."

"Yeah, well, if you're working with your dog, I need to know."

"..."

"I'm a changer too."

"Where's Paris Healtown?"

"I guess she didn't come. Is there a rubin or something?"

Gina grabbed Zach's left arm and led him far from the people around, they were under the circuit tracks that cast a shadow over their conversation.

"The last events here have reported unusual glitches with the circuit. Some skyboarders blame it on the magnetic field that the tracks work with and Hunter believes a rubin may be the cause," Gina explained. She was talking with so much calm, like it was an everyday topic. "Your friends over there," she resumed pointing at the boys on the bench, "said their megaboards just stopped hovering for a moment and others affirmed something blocked their ways."

"I don't know how all of that means a rubin can be involved."

"Hunter says it could actually be a teddy's fault."

"How so?"

Gina pointed out the fact that with every teddy, something extreme occurred. Tobby and the blackout, Billy Bear and Randall with the rubin hailstorm, even Hunter and the burst of the meteor.

"How couldn't it be possible a magnet-eater teddy?"

Zach heard the voice in the speakers declaring the start of the exhibition for the presenior section.

"I wish you are wrong," Zach said. "I need to win this race..."

"I thought you already did that."

"I mean the final one," Zach hinted. "And I want to do it without any interruptions."

"Just for the record, I'm just doing my job," the girl continued, "as you said, we're changers."

An explosion was heard. Everybody started screaming and the noise was unbearable.

"What's that?" "Everybody run!" "Call the police."

Gina turned her head around and saw the people in the bleachers run like a bunch of ants, she turned her rocketboots on and ascended over the snail track. Zach ran over the court to see what the bombing sound was.

It was an uncontrollable mess! The security staff from the Garden tried to take the competitors outside the court and get them in the dressing room along the judges and the reporters. The people above, in the bleachers, started a stampede while there was fire and smoke coming out of the snail track in the middle of the grass.

When Gina finally danced against the smoke shapes in the air, she could see someone over the track with grenades.

It was Minna Shiro.

"Hey, you. What're you doing?"

"Oh you came for the fun, flying girl?"

"Don't do that!"

The orange-haired girl dropped the grenade over a section of the circuit and exploded a part of the track to their cracks.

Gina screamed in surprise. "What do you want? Why are you here?"

"We want the rubin," the bulky shadow behind her responded in a horrendous voice.

Gina opened her violet eyes greatly. Zach on his megaboard came hovering.

"It's Troubles!" He said.

"Where's your doggie, little girl?" The voice taunted. "Won't it party with us?" Then the voice laughed.

Gina, as 'Troubles,' were floating in the air being perfumed by the smoke of the explosions the other girl had caused.

"Now what? You too are a team?"

"We're also looking for rubins," Minna said. "Let's compete, shall we? Ha ha ha!" Her contagious laughter followed the stretching of her orange hair trying to cut Gina in the air.

The flying girl looped in the sky, navigated and evaded the whipping. Zach remembered he had claws and without hesitation, he advanced on his megaboard and drew his nails to trim some hair off but the imposing figure showed up in his way.

Zach froze.

'I can't fight this guy!'

'Mode 2,' Gina's gloves said and following, a volley of blue spheres knocked on Troubles' body, sending him off the circuit. "Take that, you black ass," she menaced.

Minna threw herself down the circuit and Zach and Gina got together to talk in the air.

"Is there a rubin here?" He asked.

"It seems so but I don't know where." Gina figured out it would be inside the processor box that commanded the circuit. She asked Zach where that was and the boy explained it normally was located beneath one the first tracks of the entire circuit.

Gina flew to the beginning of the snail track and her action was stopped.

"You leaving so early, flying girl?" Minna said. She had used her hair to tie one of Gina's foot.

"Let me go, you freak!" 'Mode 1' Gina expelled a blue sphere straight to Minna but she dispersed it with a strand.

The girl used her stretching orange hair like a cobweb to fly and levitate gripping from all the snail circuit, like a spider webbing a table. Suddenly other strands of hair grabbed her arms and stretched Gina's body like a cross in the middle of the air.

"I wanna play with my new toy."

"Leaver her alone, Minna!" Zach shouted drawing his claws out.

Troubles grabbed the boy from behind and asphyxiated him.

"Her name is Venciello now, chunky boy." The awful shadow said. "Now, where's the rubin?"

Gina's extremities were being pulled like she was about to lose them and Zach would faint if the monster didn't stop clasping him. Both Troubles and Venciello laughed, amused in their cruelty. A flapping sound was heard. Hunter had arrived fluttering its ears in an erratic wobble. The teddysprout cast a seal from its gaped mouth and hit Troubles on the back forcing the figure to grip off Zach and taking the robe off frenetically.

The clothes that covered him shrank slowly until they disappeared. The leaving creature was a buff man-like body made of bone. The head was a skull with two red horns, one of them cut at half. A strange symbol was tattooed on the forehead.

Zach fell to one of the circuits, coughing. He recovered and with a slow tilt of his head upwards could observe the floating skeleton in the air and Gina still being attacked by the Medusa. The boy jumped on his megaboard again to go help the girl.

Troubles knew that annoying moloid boy could be a threat for his henchgirl but Hunter wouldn't allow him to accost Zach again.

"I won't let you move," Hunter said, flapping.

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Troubles was amused by the dog's words and soon, he cast something black out of his bony hands. Then, both teddysprout and skeleton threw spells and seals at each other in a constant attack.

Zach cut Venciello's hair. She yelled and receded. Gina was set free.

"You'll be dead by the sunset, you ..."

"Gina, cut it off," Zach advised. "Be smart. I'll fight against her while you search for the rubin."

The black-haired girl was pissed off against Venciello but Zach was more useful this way than herself. She did. She flew in direction to the processor box somewhere beneath the starting tracks. Gina started checking every single metal box that she found underneath the metal structure but there was no more than panels and wires once open.

She felt like searching for something under water. The smoke invaded the air and it was suffocating and the noise produced by the fights above zoned her out from time to time. Then, she could witness below the third track, how the box beat like humming.

Gina Belt understood there was a rubin inside that processor that corrupted the entire circuit. But ...

"It's cracking down," she let say. She checked the metal she was touching and the entire snail shape above her and how they were humming and spitting electric shocks. Besides that, there were sections blown by Venciello's grenades.

Gina couldn't reach out for the rubin. She flew upwards, like reaching the surface, and yelled at her peers.

"This is about to blow! Hunter!"

The dog got distracted and Troubles could hit it with a spell that sent the teddy off. Zach, stopped attacking the orange-haired girl and moved his megaboard to pick the falling dog.

"Venciello, look for the rubin!" The horrible skeleton commanded.

When the girl was about to say yes, a giant metal thorn pierced the body of the skeleton in the stomach. Everybody saw the shape of a spike just appeared from the surface of a track and then retracted until disappearing. Troubles was left with a big hole in the middle of his body but he said nothing.

Venciello screamed.

Paris Healtown showed up in her scooter, joining the party in the air.

"Take that, you monster! Tunky, use your thorns against the monster girl two!"

Another thorn was spitted from the track in direction to Venciello but she was stealth and moved quick before it pierced her. The girl of the elongated orange strands got close to her boss and dropped another bomb to the floor.

"Let's see if the rubin survives this one!" She said like a maniac.

Gina recommended everybody to leave now. When the trio moved a millimeter, the bomb made everything explode to pieces. The enormous roll that followed was deafening. If Hunter hadn't been caught by Zach, its body would've been torn apart by the explosion. The center of the Sport Garden had been blown to ashes.

"Where is Tunky?" Paris asked alarmed.

The trio was outside the event. There were police cars in the distance and an ambulance. The had been in the air for so long that the grass felt newfangled upong treading.

"Who the hell is Tunky?" Gina asked.

"Oh there you go!" Paris was referring a new teddysprout she was now holding. "I found it inside that metal box you were watching, Gina Belt. It's my second teddy, Tunky," she announced happily.

"How the hell did you...? And why didn't you...? Aaaargh" Gina wanted to take Paris Healtown's neck and squeeze it while she was all smiley.

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"I don't like it," Zach said kneeling on the floor with Hunter. "I lost a race because of it."