The London airport looked exactly the same as it had the year prior.
Aurora, Alex, Schlatt, Darryl, Zak, and Clay arrived at seven am UK time, all dying of jetlag, to meet SBI, Niki, Toby, Fundy, George, and Nick.
Clay leaned heavily on Aurora's shoulder, nearly knocking her over because of the height difference, searching vaguely for Techno and the rest of their group.
Keyword there being vaguely. Ninety percent of his focus was on not passing out. Staying up all night on the plane instead of sleeping was probably the worst decision he'd ever made.
Schlatt was swaying on his feet, Alex was mumbling things in Spanish to himself, and no one could even see Dar's face because it was buried in Zak's shoulder. The only one who seemed unaffected was Aurora, who was texting Niki with a dopey smile on her face.
"Stop flirting so we can go," Clay said, slightly slurring his words. "I need coffee, like, yesterday."
"I'M NOT FLIRTING!" she barked, but her ears turned a bright shade of crimson and sort of ruined the impact of her words.
"Mhmmm," he said dubiously.
"Fuck off," she mumbled.
"AYOOO, IS THAT A DREAM CAPTA I SEE?"
It was Wilbur who yelled across the terminal at them, but Techno reached them first. The pinkette scooped Clay up in one big gesture, both of them giggling like idiots. Wilbur went for Schlatt a second behind him. Tommy and Toby, taller since the last time they'd seen them, were hopping about the whole group chirping greetings and questions.
"All right, all right, everyone calm down," Phil laughed, coming up last with Niki and Fundy. Niki and Aurora hugged briefly, both pulling back with slight blushes spread across their cheeks. "How are you guys? How was the flight?"
"Oh, terrible," Zak answered immediately.
"Zaaak," Darryl chided tiredly. "Hi, Phil. The flight was just long, I guess. None of us slept."
Phil smiled and ruffled Zak's hair. "Well, I'm sorry to hear that," he said. "But unfortunately, we have some shopping to do. Starbucks on the way?"
"PLEASE," Clay chimed in, still in Techno's arms. The two of them had been conversing quietly, but at the mention of coffee, they both snapped to attention.
Aurora grinned. Yeah, that was her idiot brother, alright.
"Wait- Tommy, that's a road! Toby, do not follow him, I'll be right there- TECHNO! WIL! WOULD YOU GRAB THE BOYS-?"
"I've got Fundy!" Wilbur yelled back at Phil, balancing his bag on one hip and the little fox boy on the other.
"On it." Niki followed Techno around Phil's van, where Tommy and Toby were playing dangerously close to London traffic.
The group of them had parked outside of the familiar bar on the west side of the city about thirty seconds ago, and then before anyone could stop them, the two littles were running off.
Aurora sighed. It wasn't unusual for chaos to ensue within the group, but this early in the day?
Niki's surprised yelp from the far side of the vehicle caused everyone to whirl towards the noise, but then her voice turned to laughter and Techno's roar of excitement told them all that everything was fine.
So the two came back around with Tommy and Toby- plus two new people.
"Illumina?!" Rora and Clay exclaimed simultaneously.
The ninja was holding the hand of an unfamiliar boy their age, but otherwise, everything about him was about the same.
Purple eyes glinted with either power or humor from behind a mop of curly black hair that fell into his face slightly. As always, his mouth was curved upwards in a good-natured smirk. The boy next to him was a little taller and sporting bright green hair, and he for some reason had a sticky note with a bracket smiley face stuck to his cheek.
Kye dropped the boy's hand and opened his arms for a hug, which clay and Aurora happily obliged to.
"How've you guys been?!" he asked happily. "Sorry we couldn't talk much over the summer, I was super busy. What were you up to?"
"Not much," Rora giggled. "Minecraft and Florida, lots of the neighborhood pool."
"So much of the neighborhood pool," Clay agreed.
"Over in Canada, there's not a whole lot of pool action," Kye mused. "Oh, guys! Meet my boyfriend, Fruit!" He stepped back and took the other boy's hand again, and they both grinned.
Aurora crossed her arms and smirked, "So you were busy. Hey, I'm Aurora. This is Clay." She stuck her hand out for Fruit to shake, which he did.
"Y'know, I hear a lot about how he kicked your ass in front of the entire school," he said. "Are these rumors true?"
She shot a glare in Kye's direction. He grinned back. "No chance. I won. Maybe you'd be down to watch a rematch?"
"Oooo, yes-!"
"Aurora, you're not challenging strangers to fights, are you?" Phil asked, coming up behind her and laying a hand on her shoulder.
"THAT'S MY JOB!" Techno hollered from some distance away, trying to wrangle Tommy back into his arms.
"Nope," Rora said cheerfully, "challenging someone I already know. I'm just inviting someone else to watch!"
"I accept," Kye volunteered.
"You can accept in Diagon Alley. In case you hadn't already noticed, most everyone else has gone through," Phil chided.
Aurora realized, a moment late, that other than Clay her American friends had indeed already made their way through the bar with Niki, Fundy, and Toby. Only Wil, Techno, Tommy, and Aurora's conversation participants remained.
To be fair, she thought as she continued talking to Clay, Techno, Kye, and Fruit, everyone likes watching stuff like that fight.
Maybe they should do it more often...?
Is this chapter not great? Yea. Is it because I'm out of practice? Probably. Am I gonna waste more time and rewrite it? Absofuckinglutely not.
Hey guys! In Thomas Sanders' words: STORYTIME!
So I've realized something: my gay awakening was not any of the hot Marvel ladies, nor was it any form of Maze Runner, Harry Potter, etc characters. No.
It was a fucking Mighty Ducks movie.
Damn right, the little 12yr league of straight male hockey players from an old movie. That film changed me.
It was actually in the second one, where they're in NYC or wherever. When the kid is having the models in the department store do a bikini fashion show?
I was way too invested in that shit for it to be normal mkay idk I just remembered this and I feel like I should point it out
Anyways! Thanks for reading ig idk why y'all are still here but thanks for it❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️✨✨
