Chapter Text
“Shrimpy-chan~” Floyd whined. “Why don’t you come to the Lounge anymore?”
The tweel supported himself on the lunch table with a palm, glowering at her with a pout. Elwin, sitting across from Yuu, mimicked the odd posture, looking more like a confused cat, snuffing whatever menacing impression Floyd was trying to leave on her. Yuu took another bite of food.
“I thought you guys didn’t like her,” Ace commented.
“What gave you that impression?” Jade hummed, sneaking a seat next to Deuce. He flinched at the sudden intrusion.
“Not like you two make a point of stalking her,” Grim pointed out, ears flat. “Like Floyd and Riddle.”
“-senpai,” Yuu amended.
“You don’t even call him that anymore,” Grim huffed. “At least not all the time.”
Yuu stole a bite off his plate.
“You make us sound like desperate deplorables,” Jade sighed into a bemused smile, watching as Grim flailed in protest over such blatant thievery. “We are simply doing our job.”
Ace cringed. “That makes Azul sound even creepier.”
Elwin blinked, eyes darting between the two. “Oh, is this what an open secret is?”
Yuu really, really didn’t want this to go any further. “I’ve been busy,” she finally answered. “I mean, we just got back from Fleur City, and now it’s the Starsending. I haven’t really had a chance to do anything.”
Floyd frowned. “What if we had a Wish for you, huh?”
Deuce blinked. “Well, do you?”
Ace snorted. “Azul’s whole wish-granting business must have really gone downhill!”
Yuu shot him a look of warning before returning to Floyd with a sigh. “Do you have your Wish?”
On cue, the boy pulled his from his bag. With it, several crumpled papers fell to the floor like discharged leaves in autumn. Elwin opened his mouth to tell him, but Floyd ignored him all together.
Grim blinked at the jagged spikes of the Star. “Eh?! He had one?!”
“Everyone gets one,” Floyd reminded him condescendingly lowly, as if mocking him (he was). “I feel like if I give it to Shrimpy-chan, then it actually might come true! I mean, the Boss is great and all that,” he waved off the idea, “but the way he solves stuff like this is boring nowadays.”
“Legal,” Jade amended.
Floyd repeated, “Boring.”
“I don’t think I really have any say in whether your Wish gets granted or not,” Yuu responded tactfully. “I mean, I don’t even have Magic.”
Floyd rolled his eyes as if it was obvious. “Since when has that mattered?”
“He’s got a point,” Ace agreed.
“I don’t think that applies here,” Deuce disagreed in a murmur.
“But anyways,” the tweel balanced the Star on his finger and whacked it with his other hand, giving it a good spin like it was a basketball. “I wish for it to never be boring!” It lit up while spinning.
Yuu winced. It’s like a disco ball.
Grim visibly twitched, trying to resist chasing the dancing lights cast on the floor.
Ace cocked a brow at his clubmate. “I thought you were planning on asking for some shoes. Or did you flake-out on that idea?”
He stopped the spinning Star with a swift snatch. “I didn’t flake out. Yeah, those Ténèbres are hard to come by, but if I really wanted them, the Boss could get me ‘em easy.”
Deuce nearly choked on his food. “But aren’t they, like, over 3,000 madol?”
“So?” He didn’t even look at the freshman as he slid off the Wish to Yuu.
How much does Azul even pay? Yuu had to wonder, accepting the lit Star. “Do you have a Wish, too, Jade-senpai?” She asked him, attention drifting to the aforementioned vice.
The quieter of the tweels hummed for a moment. “Nothing comes to mind immediately. It’s as Floyd has said: Azul-san can fulfill most material desires.”
Grim’s ears flattened. “Then why are you here?”
“Don’t be rude,” Yuu scolded him, deadpan.
“I guess that would make things hard to wish for,” Elwin empathized in a hum. “Imagine not wanting anything! That sounds heavenly! I’d be so happy!”
Jade blinked, before tapping his fist on an open palm in a sudden revelation. “Ah, then perhaps I should wish for happiness.”
“Happiness?” Ace cocked a brow. “That’s like, super vague.”
“Perhaps,” Jade chuckled. “But money cannot buy happiness. All I Wish for,” he decided, pulling the Star from his bag with his nimble fingers, “is happiness without compromise.”
The Star slowly awoke to a blue glow. Yuu smiled as she took it. “That sounds like a good Wish to me.” If not a bit innocent for an Octavinelle student, Yuu had to think. Especially one of the tweels.
“Lilia-san’s one of the Starsenders, right, Silver?” Kalim asked, voice muffled by the ruffling towel.
The steam of the gym showers was still somewhat unfamiliar to him, but gentle! Normally, the noble would be allowed a separate time in the case of a surprise assailant. He didn’t even tell his parents he had started showering after phys ed with the other boys. It was thrilling, in a way— keeping secrets!
Also terrifying. How was Jamil so good at keeping them?
Silver was wringing out his hair with his embroidered towel. “Yes. Why?”
“Did you give him your Wish yet?”
“Yes. I wished for my father to live a long, healthy life.”
Kalim’s laugh unsteadied the hand threading the needle of his earring. He steadied it with another, clipping it through as he replied, “That’s so like you, Silver!”
“So like me?” His brows furrowed slightly. A small expression most would miss on such a pristine face, but Kalim knew better. “How so? It’s normal to want your family well, isn’t it?”
“No, you’re right.” Kalim watched Silver comb out his damp locks. “I’d Wish for the same thing, too, but my parents have everything they want. I could Wish for happiness or good health, but that feels kind of pointless?”
“I understand,” he hummed. “In that case, why not wish for yourself? Surely, there’s something you’d want.”
“You think so?” Kalim, despite it all, laughed.
Secrets were terrifying. In truth, Kalim Al-Asim did have a wish. He had it all. He really did. He never had anything to worry about or want. Everything was readily available. But if he were being honest, the hunger that gnawed at him at night?
He wished it had never happened.