KEEFER Of The Lost Cities(EDITING IN PROGRESS)

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Keefe stood in front of the gleaming, very bright, blinding gates of Everglen. He waited as Fitz opened the door and he stepped inside.

"Hi Fitz. Long time no see."

"Keefe... you saw me 10 minutes ago." And he was right. Right after school, Fitz had leapt to Everglen and changed, then waited for Keefe to come right after he changed out of his school uniform.

"Eh. It's fun to greet people like that. So... you want to play tackle bramble?" Keefe asked.

"Yep. But first, rules." Keefe groaned. Fitz glared at him(not in an evil, I-hate-you way, just in an annoyed way) "No cheating!"

Keefe grinned. "I never cheat."

Fitz rolled his eyes. "First, no time-outs. Abilities are allowed. Tackling is also allowed—but no knocking anyone into the lake. Covering the ball in anything from Slurps and Burps is definitely cheating. Pretending to be injured and then tackling someone who tries to help you is also cheating. Losers owe the winners a dare. Winners get to eat all the mallowmelt in the kitchen. Deal?"

"Um.. let me think about it.." Keefe quickly hid the Slurps and Burps bottle from view.

"I saw that, Keefe."

"Fine, fine. Deal."

***************

Soon after their game ended, in which Fitz had won, they saw two figures standing by the gate.

"One of those is Biana.. who's next to her? It doesn't look like Maruca." Fitz sounded confused, probably because Biana never called anyone over unless it was Maruca. She was bad at meeting new people. Keefe squinted, trying to see.

"It looks like.. Foster. Let's go bother them!" Keefe ran over to the gate where they were awkwardly standing. He could feel Foster's uncertainty and awkwardness from a mile away.

"I know!" Biana was saying. "We can give each other makeovers. I have all the serums to change our hair color, and we can try on some of my mom's gowns."

It felt like Sophie wanted to do anything but that, so Keefe decided to join in and help her a little bit. "Makeovers?" He scoffed. "You girls sure know how to have fun. Maybe you can braid each other's hair and giggle about boys while you're at it."

Both Sophie and Biana whirled around. Sophie started to smile, but then looked at Fitz, and Keefe felt something weird and jumpy and fluttery in her emotions.

Interesting.. Keefe grinned, though for some reason, it felt like something inside him died. "Actually, maybe that last part is a good idea. You could get the dirt on Foster, find out which guys make her heart go pitter-patter."

Foster burned bright red. "Um, that would be none." She insisted. Keefe wasn't sure he believed her, considering that her emotions went all fluttery about 3 seconds ago.

"Eh, that's what they all say. But deep down girls always have one guy they can't take their eyes off—isn't that right, Fitz?" He had asked Fitz on purpose.

"Why are we talking about this?" Fitz complained.

Keefe shrugged. "Just sayin'."

"What are you guys doing here?" Biana asked, shooting Fitz a pointed look. What was that for?

"We came to see if you guys want to play base quest," Keefe answered for him.

"What's base quest?" Sophie asked, grateful for the subject change.

"Only the most awesome game ever. I call Foster for my team," Keefe announced. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders, but she shrugged it off.

"How about we play boys against girls?" She asked. They all agreed to that.