|| Wings Of War And Silver || A Wings Of Fire Applyfic

7 | That's me, champion of the ridiculous

Alstroemeria:

Life was hard when you were the popular girl - not even popular because of her personality, just her looks. Just her pretty scales and her pretty eyes, never her kindness or generosity, oh no.

Alstroemeria fluttered her vibrant wings as she waited for her Clawmate in their dormitory. The sunlight filtering through the canopy above cast a warm glow on her leafy green and starry scales, as she checked her timetable repeatedly.

Literacy with my WHOLE Winglet.

She put it away and seconds later, pulled it out again furiously.

Still literacy. It's not going to change anything if I pretend I haven't seen it.

It wasn't that she hated literacy itself, but more the task she knew they were going to have to do. Group. Freaking. Work. With her WHOLE Winglet, INCLUDING Ferret, against the Gold Winglet.

We stand no chance. Alstroemeria thought dejectedly. Beside her, her SilkWing roommate grumbled and rolled completely off of the hammock onto the floor with a loud thud.

"Morning, Brook." Alstroemeria muttered, trying to inject enthusiasm into her voice.

Brook rubbed her eyes and stared back, upside down, from the floor. "OH, M-morning, Alstro!" She looked down at herself, spread eagled on the stone floor, and back up again. "I am NOT a morning dragon, apparently. Makes sense. C-considering I don't like mornings, or dragons."

Alstroemeria nodded, her eyes twinkling with amusement. "So what can I call you, a night dragon?"

Brook paused sarcastically to think, a forcefully strained expression on her face. "You can call me.......... Brook." She finished, with an audible gasp. "No way, that's my name. What's yours?" She grinned.

Alstroemeria laughed along with her, and they prepared to get to their lessons.

"So. I'm guessing you've heard about the fight, I mean, rumours get around pretty fast here, all the young whippersnappers trying to catch the trend, you know, so I'm sure this isn't news to you, but maybe it is because I actually can't imagine you listening to rumours and being all ohmahgawd about them, and anyway, have you heard about the fight?"

Alstroemeria's eyes widened in surprise. "No, what happened?"

Brook leaned in closer, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "I heard... That Koi hit Allure."

Alstroemeria, used to the joking quality of her voice, punctuated it with a fake gasp. "Oh. My. Moons. What happened next?"

"Well..." Brook lowered her voice again. "I heard... That Allure hit Koi! And then, y-you'll never guess. Really."

"Koi hit Allure again?" She said, raising her eyebrows.

Brook gasped and nearly fell over backwards. "Oh my good golly gosh, you, Alstro, are a living genius! O-or, if not, you're doing a very good job at simulating one."

"You." Alstroemeria wheezed between laughter. "Are ridiculous."

Brook took this as a compliment, and would not stop bragging all the way to the literacy classroom. "That's me, uber ridiculous." She flexed to a passing NightWing. "Champion of the ridiculous, certified by hers truly, here."

They arrived at the literacy class in this manner, where everyone of the Quartz and Gold Winglet were already waiting for them. They sank into their chairs moments before the teacher, Elderberry, took to the front of the classroom and began explaining the task.

Group work. Just as she'd thought. And they were supposed to out-debate the Gold Winglet, which quite frankly would be impossible. But you have to stay positive, Alstroemeria, you have to stay positive.

"This is completely useless, we're never going to win." A brown RainWing by the name of Coriander sighed as the classroom fell into chatters. Secretly, Alstroemeria had to agree.

"Well of COURSE not, they have ALASKA!" Koi waved emphatically, leaning back on his chair to catch his princess' eye. "Love you, Princess!!" He called. There was no way she hadn't heard him, but she obviously pretended not to and didn't even spare him a look. Alstroemeria even thought she looked quite pleased to be away from him for once, and was talking in elevated voices to a bright blue RainWing.

Methuselah, their leafWing, sat fidgeting with a loose tassel of her bag. "Don't say that. We'll be fine if we just do the work, right?" She stuttered.

"ABSOLUTELY." Came an overly confident voice. "One hundred percent we will, Sel! Come on, have some POS - I - TIVITY, you lot!" Alstroemeria beamed at Sunspot, the SkyWing, as she sat down on her other side.

Brook was, unsurprisingly, the only one who continued chanting "POS - I - TIVITY" whilst banging her claws on the table.

Their brown SandWing, meanwhile, sat quietly analysing the work they were supposed to prepare. "Anubis?" Alstroemeria asked, edging closer to peer in over his shoulder. "Whatcha thinking?"

He looked a little startled to see her lingering so close to his head, and then quickly recomposed himself, and withdrew his claws so she could see. "R-runes." He muttered, flushing. "They're kind of my - hobby, I guess, you could call it."

"Oh, that's pretty interesting! Do you know what they mean?" She said, pointing at the symbols on the page.

"Well, that one is the Greek symbol Theta." He explained, moving his talons across the page and speaking with a passion Alstroemeria hadn't heard in him before. "Then we've got Alpha, followed by Beta."

"Hey is that where the word Alphabet is from?" Astrophile interrupted, who had been sitting silently until now. Anubis blinked, and then nodded.

"Actually, yeah. It is."

"Well, we'll be fine then, if we've got rune master over here for our group." Methuselah grinned awkwardly.

"YAY FOR RUNE MASTER!.... Rune master?.... No.... Okay...." Brook yelled, and then receded back into her seat, much to Sunspot's entertainment.

"Okay - but what's this one?" Alstroemeria asked, pointing to a squiggly little line with a dash. "And this one?" She said to what looked like a trident.

Anubis laughed. "We can arrange a time, and I can teach them all to you if you'd like."

"I would like that." She smiled. "Wait. Was that a date invitation?"

"Do... Do you want it to be?" He stammered.

Alstroemeria paused. Anubis is nice. More than nice, really. I've only known him for about three weeks, but, who knows where this could lead? Besides, it's not like, a marriage proposal or anything. You know... I think I do want this.

She said so, and he smiled back at her. A questioning, where-could-this-lead sort of smile. But a smile nonetheless. And then she turned back to the rest of the Winglet, and exhaled in determination. "Okay. We've got to beat the Gold Winglet. Come on, let's study this."

"So, tomorrow at afternoon, then?" Anubis leaned over. "I've got a free period then."

Alstroemeria nodded. "Me too. So, it's a date then!"

Anubis blushed a little, and seemed to bury his head in the work again, making both Alstroemeria and Sunspot laugh (altough, Sunspot would laugh at anything, given the right circumstances)

Yeah, the Gold Winglet beat them. And yeah,  they still had a whole rest of the day to go. But Alstroemeria went about it with a light in her heart. And if I'm right, Anubis did too.