"Hey, girls! My name is Veronica, and—"

  "Yeah, we know," Emily replied with a snark only found in her voice. Knowing who Veronica was as a person—how deceiving and two-faced she could be—she didn't take any chances. I wouldn't take any chances if I was in her shoes either.

  Veronica, noticing the snark, began making her voice higher pitched saying,

  "As I was stating, my name is Veronica, and it's a plea—"

  "Pleasure to meet you, yada-yada-yada. Believe it or not, we know exactly who you are, Veronica." Emily said,

  "Oh yeah? Then please educate me, who am I precisely Emily!?" Veronica responded. She was beginning to lose her temper as her patience withered down in a spiral.

  "Well for all I know, Veronica. You are sassy, crude, always getting your way, and frankly, a jerk to everyone you meet. Including us too." Emily stated.

  Everyone else gasped in astonishment, even Jack too, but Veronica didn't pay attention to the crowd. Instead, her face turned a dark red when she exclaimed,

  "Well Emily, I hope you can find it in your heart that I've changed—"

  "Don't give me that bullshit Veronica with your, 'oh I've changed so much look at me now!' type of crap," Emily said. I was honestly sorta impressed with how vastly Emily could interrupt her.

  "Uh, guys can we stop fighting please??" Angel tried to reply by trying to tug at Emily's shirt.

  Of course, though, considering that the crowd was actively being as loud as possible, her low voice didn't get through to Emily. Yet, it did to me. So, I walked over to Angel and tapped her on the shoulder, asking her to stand up. She did.

  However, Veronica wasn't done yet and ignored Angel.

  "Oh wow, you see! I've changed for the better people! While little Miss 'Troublemaker' can't be able to accept that since her mind is all about danger and being selfish!" She stated.

  The crowd booed at Emily, but she didn't pay any of her mind's expenses to them.

  "Call me that one more time miss 'I get zero fucking friends'. You haven't changed for shit, and I can tell because of your whole posse of attention grabbers orbiting around us!" Emily responded with the language of a sailor. Which I didn't mind considering who she was talking to in the first place.

  Jack, out of nowhere, decided enough was enough and stated to Steve,

  "I'm gonna stop them."

  "How!? It's a cat fight over there!" Steve exclaimed.

  "It might be, but I'm a bulldog!"

  I personally found that comment from Jack to be absolutely fuckin' horrendous.

  But neither I nor Steve argued with him as he walked over between Veronica and Emily. Both of them stared at Jack with bewilderment as he leaned over Emily and whispered something in her ear that I couldn't eavesdrop on.

  However, after Jack whispered into Emily's ears. She nodded and backed off from Veronica, walked back to Angel and sat down next to her.

  Jack then turned to Veronica and said to her in a sore tone,

  "Hey, if you want to butt in a conversation and be a jerk to people for absolutely no reason. Then just get out of here!"

  Within Jack's assertive tone, I could tell he must've experienced something like this before. Which sort of surprised me. I mean, let's be honest, Jack being bullied? I couldn't imagine that beyond my wildest dreams.

  Veronica abruptly acknowledged nearly everyone in the cafeteria was gazing their eyes straight at them. So, she settled to finally backing off and walking away.

  But not before saying something that would and did make Emily irritated,

  "Pfft, good luck with high school, because your little parents won't be able to break you out of being expelled next time!" Veronica said, cackling afterward like a witch.

  Jack held Emily back as hard as he could until Veronica was out of sight from the cafeteria.

  "LET ME AT HER!"

  "Calm it." He patted her on the shoulder and set her back down on the marble chair. Emily crossed her arms and puffed out a frustrated heave.

  "What a jackass," I stated, leaning on the marble desk while I closed my eyes. I slang my bag over my shoulders once more and sat down with a tense sigh.

  Now, the reason why we hated Veronica so much, even though she seemed like an okay person when she tried to introduce herself, is because that's her entire scheme. She sucks people in with kindness and when you do one thing wrong, it's over for your entire academic reputation.

  That's why so many people fear her. She holds the cards to everyone's souls within the school and she calls the shots. The reason she even has this power isn't only because she's widely popular. But it's also because of why she's so popular:

  You see, it is because she's a part of a family that is extraordinarily rich. The reason they're so rich is due to them being associated with the Redwoods. It's sort of hard to explain in full detail how her family and the Redwoods became in contact since that news has been mostly classified.

  But, I can tell you for a certainty that her family gains certain perks that ordinary people don't exactly have. For example, power over an entire school building like back in middle school.

  If I remember correctly, it was rumored that Veronica's older sister used this power to only get good grades. However, her younger sister used it to get automatic fame wherever she went while also doing the same exact thing as Veronica with bullying.

  Scumbags in their finest hour.

  I sighed, closing my eyelids only to open them once more. It was only the beginning of the first day and already so much had happened.

  I looked to my right where Angel and Emily were discussing why they were so upset.Then, Jack said something to Emily,

  "Hey, don't worry about it, seriously. If you have people like us, then you'll be fine. Plus, when you have me around, I can always keep you calm!" Jack said.

  As Emily blushed a wee bit, Steve stared at someone two whole desks behind us. He tugged at my shirt and asked me,

  "Hey, isn't that Fron and Robert?"

  I looked at where he was now pointing towards and I could see who he was talking about. It was most definitely Fron and Robert...

  Oh yeah, you don't know about them, huh?

  Fron is a shy person, and when I say shy, I say it since he doesn't even whisper like Angel does. If I remember him correctly in middle school, he didn't talk at all. Not even a peep. Once a teacher called upon him because his friend Robert pranked him by using a replica of his hand, and he just froze up and couldn't bring himself to answer the question.

  Ever since that day, I bet he makes sure he hides his hand from Robert.

  Even though he's indeed quiet, his problem-solving skills are incredible! When we were still in middle school, he single-handedly created a large scheming system that passed around A+ homework assignment answers and test corrections!

  He was, and probably still is, a natural genius. Not only that, but he gives you an extra boost of confidence.

  And I know that sounds sort of stupid. But because he usually communicated by writing on paper, he would give us motivational quotes he got from his uncle.

  I hoped I would meet his uncle one day...

  One day.

  Anyways, Robert on the other hand was fantastic at creating machines and inventions.

  Hell, during 6th grade, he created a machine that could automatically cut someone's hair. He made it from some basic metal, rubber bands, gears, and scissors. He said he was going to be an inventor in the future.

  Who would've thought that that dream would become a reality.

  However, there's only one bad thing about Robert that I could've imagined from the top of my head. He was horrible at planning.

  Now, when I say he was horrible at planning, you better believe me. He was disgustingly HORRIBLE at making plans.

  When our finals for seventh grade came in which rendered Fron's system of copying from him useless; Robert tried to plan for all of us to use specialized glasses he created to snatch the answers just by reading the question.

  At least, that was his plan. But because all of us the next day were wearing the same pair of glasses. The teachers immediately confronted us and some even threw up because even though the glasses did work,

  They worked just a smidge too well.

  They gave you all of the answers to a question all at once, overwhelming your brain and making you nauseous. This caused some of us to even pass out. Robert didn't plan this, got all of the blame, and automatically failed that test.

  Luckily, he barely scraped through the year because of his past good grades.

  Anyway, we saw Fron and Robert creating another horrible plan of using a carton of milk as a launcher for a toothpick.

  Don't ask why these two buffoons were trying to do this, they were incredibly idiotic in their planning.

  I tapped Steve's shoulder and asked him,

  "Wanna go talk with them?"

  "Uhm, sure? Hopefully, they remember us."

  "It's only been one full summer. I'd say they remember us just fine," I said, walking over to them while Steve followed closely behind me.

  As we reached closer and closer to them, I noticed that they were holding an object while the milk was seemingly about to burst open from the bottom with that toothpick. Steve looked at me and pointed toward the carton of milk. I shrugged back at him, not sure what to make of this contraption.

  We sat down and waved our hands towards Robert and Fron. But they were so enamored with the objects in their hands that they didn't even notice us.

  We fell silent afterwards and after some time had passed, I knew that we would have to talk to them at some point. I broke the silent air by saying,

  "Hey, Fron? Robert? Hello..?" I literally waved my hands as if I were swatting a mosquito away toward them. But they were still deeply concentrated on the objects in their grasp.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  So, I decided to do the most reasonable thing in this situation. I smacked Robert on the head with my backpack which finally seemed to gain his attention and snap his focus off of the object.

  "Bro, come on! Don't you see I'm working on something over he—"

  "Oh, hey George. How long have you been there?" Robert asked me.

  "Fifteen hours. What do you think, you dumbass!? Ay, ay, ay..."

  "What are you guys doing anyways?" I asked him back.

  "Uhm, sure! Drumrolls, please!" Robert exclaimed. Frons' attention on his object was knocked right out as he saw us, waved, and realized he was supposed to do something. Robert cleared his throat with a brief 'ahem' and said again,

  "Drumrolls, please!"

  Fron provided a light tapping with his hands tapping the marble table. Robert lifted their two objects high into the air and then promptly placed them down onto the table.

  "TA-DA! I and Fron made a contraption that acts as an answer reader! It answers all your questions on any paper!" Robert replied.

  I also forgot to mention that he was horrible with grammar. Remember that final test I mentioned earlier? It was for ELA. He would've failed it from the start even without his ridiculous glasses stunt.

  "Well, can't you just get your answers from a random website in the school instead of some machine?" I asked him. He stuttered for a moment before reacting with a snappy response,

  "Yeah..."

  "But where's the fun in that?!? And that robot provides answers much quicker!"

  I told you he had horrible grammar.

  "I can use the speak feature on a computer in the library to get my answers way quicker. Have you ever used a computer, dude?" Steve asked him.

  "Why, of course, I have!" He exclaimed.

  "Alright, what does it look like?" I asked him now, curious whether or not he actually knew what a functioning computer looked like.

  "Uh. Big screen, keyboard?"

  "Good enough, Robert," I said, slapping my forehead. I soon noticed what they were wearing after Robert wrongly guessed what a computer was.

  Robert was wearing a purple shirt with black pants. Fron was just wearing white sweatpants with a white t-shirt on. Steve also noticed what Robert was wearing as we both looked down at his shirt.

  "Purple?" Steve asked him. Robert looked down at his own shirt and said,

  "What? Don't you guys know about the school's color? It's purple!"

  You know, I never noticed it, but he was absolutely right. There were purple banners nearly everywhere around us and better yet, there at the entrance was a huge welcome symbol with a purple shade engraved on it.

  "He's right, it is the school's color," I said. Robert made a malicious face to Steve and he expressed a vicious face back.

  "What's the uh, milk carton for?" I asked him, not finding the right words for a moment.

  "Hm? Oh! Well, to even make the machine we're making work, we have to create an implosion of some kind which will give us the energy needed to start the machine."

  "And you choose the messiest option out of every other option!? Like maybe stomping that stupid machine would make it work?" Steve asked him.

  "No, of course it wouldn't work like that! What are you, stupid?"

  "I was being sarcastic you dumba—"

  "ARGH! You're so unbelievably annoying." Steve said.

  "And no, we couldn't have chosen any other option as they weren't enough for the machine to power on," Robert said.

  "So, what are you calling this answer reading machine thingy?" I asked him with a slight smile on my face. I hid it almost immediately, not wanting him to know how ridiculous I thought this contraption was.

  "This 'thingy' is called the envisionary!" He exclaimed. Fron clapped silently next to him.

  "Uh-huh, interesting," I stated. I noticed Steve messing with the carton of milk on the verge of imploding. Robert asked Fron now,

  "Ready?"

  "Mhm!" He replied.

  "Alright, let's do this then!" He exclaimed.

  He placed the two objects that looked like the penny Emily threw at my face earlier in front of the milk carton. He grabbed the toothpick from the milk carton and in one swipe, slashed the mark carton and caused it to explode right in front of our faces.

  Milk spattered everywhere around us, even to the poor students right next to us. As we were drenched in milk, one of the robotic teachers rolled over to us and shouted in my ear,

  "LOOK WHAT YOU'VE DONE! CLEAN THIS UP THIS INSTANCE!"

  I could barely hear anymore, but I nodded as Steve grabbed napkins from his bag and handed them to me. I wiped the table and seat right next to me as Steve asked him,

  "Couldn't you have given us a warning?"

  No response back.

  Me and Steve both looked up at the table to see the coin-looking objects transforming into a pen with a red-dotted laser sticking out of it.

  "Whoa," Me and Steve said at the same time.

  "Ahahaha! It worked baby!" Robert exclaimed, still drenched in milk spilling. Fron fist-bumped the air in excitement as I cleaned up the rest of the milk in our vicinity.

  "Congrats bozos. Now, here are some napkins. Clean the milk that you spilled everywhere before I have to hear another robotic teacher yell at our ears." Steve said, handing over the napkins to them.

  ?????°? ☆ ?°?????

  After they were done cleaning up the entire table as well as themselves from the volcano of spilled over milk. Robert wanted to test out the machine that he had just created. I, on the other hand, didn't want to do that considering what created this machine was a mess that I had to clean up.

  But Steve reluctantly agreed to use one of his crossword puzzles as a testing ground.

  So, as he laid down the crossword puzzle in front of Fron and Robert. They grabbed their pens and scanned the puzzle using their miniature lasers.

  After the lasers scanned the puzzle, they pressed the pen on the puzzle. They then automatically wrote down a slew of answers without the use of Fron's or Robert's hands.

  As a result, the pens crafted the answers to the crossword puzzle in a split second. Me and Steve were both left dumbfounded.

  "Wow," Steve said. I was in complete astonishment as the pens flew back to Fron's and Robert's hands.

  "I told you it's worth it," Robert stated, a little less enthusiastically since he just had to scrub off milk from every possible surface in the cafeteria. Even the ceiling. Fron continued to smile brightly at the machine's massive success.

  "So, it can solve anything?" Steve asked him.

  "Yeah, basically! Maybe not Veronica's attitude but still, nearly everything." Robert stated.

  "You noticed her too?" I asked him. It looked like Steve had the exact same thought.

  "Of course we did! We want to go help you guys out but if we did, we would not be able to create this anymore." He stated.

  "I get it. This looks way cooler than some stupid argument with a psycho," I said, standing up to stretch.

  "When are we gonna go to the auditorium again?" Steve suddenly asked us for a reminder.

  "Uhm, I don't have Scruplot on me. Fron?" Robert asked with little grammar. Fron shook his head, signaling that he didn't have his Scruplot either.

  "I have one, lemme check," I said, taking out my Scruplot from my backpack. I looked down at it, noticing that the time was a quarter past—

  8:15 AM. And the auditorium meeting is supposed to be in..,

  "Fifteen minutes. We have fifteen minutes until we have to go in there." I stated.

  "Ah, sweet! That means we can relax for a little bit." Robert said, putting his head down on the table as Fron sighed.

  I looked behind me, seeing that Emily, Jack, and Angel were in a deep debate about whether or not robotic teachers were good for the school or not. I would've argued for something more important, like which person I would most likely beat the hell out of.

  The answer: Veronica.

  As Robert and Fron continued to fidget with the pens and tried to write them on the menu screen on the table. It, quite obviously in retrospect, didn't work.

  I remembered that Fron usually doesn't like to talk to people since he doesn't even talk to us. I wanted to test if he still didn't want to meet new people. Yet, I felt like I couldn't just ask him straight up if he wanted to meet Angel, Jack, and Emily.

  I needed to ease him into the idea. So, I tapped Steve's shoulder and asked him,

  "Wanna go?"

  "Hmm..? Sure. I don't want to be bothered looking at Robert and Fron's pens and how they touch them anymore."

  And he was right. The way they touched their pens was so weird. As if they were microphones and had stage fright which I bet Fron had.

  Although, that gave me an idea,

  "Hey, Fron?" I stated. He looked at me with a questioning glance.

  "Do you have stage fright?" I asked him. He looked at me for a second, looked at the pen, and shrugged.

  I'm going to take that as a yes.

  "Ready to get over that fright?" I asked him.

  "What are you thinking?" Robert asked me.

  "Why don't we all go to Emily, Angel, and that other guy over there?" I asked them both, pointing behind me with my thumb.

  "Uh, sure. We could do that. Isn't Angel the girl who wasn't liked by her parents though?"

  "So?" I asked him.

  "So, won't we have to be a bit touchy on the subject of family?"

  "Oh. Yeah, of course." I stated. Steve nodded and picked up his huge ass backpack.

  "You know, I've always wondered. What the hell is in that backpack? And why do you bring it to school all of the time?" Robert asked Steve.

  "Because he's an idiot," I replied back to him.

  "It's not because I'm an idiot! My aunt usually prepares a lot of things for me since she's afraid of me getting hurt all of a sudden." He said.

  "Your aunt? You don't live with your parents?" Robert asked him back. I signaled for him to drop the subject by swiping my right hand across my neck and wincing. But it was already too late. Robert was so focused on the answer from Steve that he didn't pay any attention to me or Fron who was doing the same thing I was doing.

  "Uh. H-Have you heard the news?" Fron asked him all of a sudden. Steve, teary-eyed, was astounded by his sudden voice peaking above his shell. Robert snapped his neck to Fron. I was also rather surprised and my mouth was left open in awe.

  Now, don't get me wrong, Fron does talk sometimes. I remember one time when he talked in front of Emily after she had tripped over a rock and scraped her knee.

  He asked her if she was okay. But Emily being Emily, she brushed him aside and told him that she was 'just fine' even though her knee was bleeding.

  However, this time was a bit different. Instead of talking because of basic human nature. He talked because he wanted to, which I found astonishing since he never, ever, ever, did that.

  "Did you just say something?" Robert asked him. His eyes were wide in anticipation as he stared straight into Fron's soul. Fron stuttered a little before saying one little word,

  "Yes,"

  Me and Robert were now taken aback. He never replied to anyone! Steve took a deep breath, used his sleeve to wipe his tears away, and stated,

  "Of course, he can talk. He has a voice, you know!?"

  "Yeah but, no offense to you at all Fron, he barely used that voice," Robert said.

  "The keyword is barely. He can use it sometimes," Steve said. Fron nodded as he took his pen and put it in his pocket. He pointed at Robert to put his pen in his pocket.

  "Why..? Oh. Yeah, of course, my bad." He stated, putting the pen in his pocket. Steve and I were a little confused. So, I asked them,

  "Why are you putting the pens in your pocket? They seem to look like just ordinary pens if you're wondering if someone is going to steal it or something."

  "Unfortunately it isn't as simple as that. Anyone and everyone has heard about our reputation for inventing things. And if me and Fron have the same pen show at the same time. Who knows what many would do to us just to figure out how our pens worked exactly?" Robert said back.

  "Well, are you planning to sell those pens anytime soon?" Steve asked him.

  "Eventually! When midterms happen. But of course, I know my reputation of my plans failing so I'm not even sure about that. Fron, what do you think? Should we sell the pens sooner or later than the midterms?" Fron swayed his head from left to right and got out his pen, flipped over the finished crossword puzzle, wrote down something, and passed it to us.

  "After, huh? That could honestly work!" He exclaimed. Fron put his pen away as I passed the crossword puzzle to Steve.

  "What am I going to do with a finished crossword puzzle?" He asked me.

  "I don't know! You stuffed the one I finished, so I thought maybe you wanted this one!" I exclaimed back at him.

  "Well, yeah. But I stuffed it for a different reason. Just throw that one away in the trash can over there." There was a trash can in the middle of a table not far from where we were.

  I proceeded over to the trash can where I heard from behind me,

  "Those kids that stood up against Veronica are gonna pay for that. One way or another."

  "I'm saying they might just be killed!"

  "Oh come on don't be so harsh! They don't look like they're a day over fourteen." She wasn't wrong about that.

  "Oh man, just wait! They'll disappear like that teacher! I cannot wait until I hear that news."

  They walked away from behind me soon afterwards. I sighed, leaning over the gaping hole of the trash can. I wanted to puke into it, but I kept my guts inside me and walked back to where I sat.

  "Hey Fron. Want to go meet my other friends over there?" I asked him, pointing behind me towards the table where the rest of my friends were sitting.

  He nodded immediately like he'd been waiting for that question forever. Steve and Robert looked a little aghast, but they picked themselves and their backpacks up with Steve struggling over the amount of stuff he was carrying in his large backpack.

  They began walking, with their envisionaries in their pockets, to Emily's table.