"So, how come you told us that you two weren't dating yesterday?" Biana asked, spooning some more starkflower stew into her mouth. The seven of us were at Havenfield, eating lunch prepared by Sophie, Biana, and Edaline.

"I didn't want to give Fitzy the satisfaction of exposing us," I answered, popping a toasty turnover into my mouth. I crunched down, relishing the savory taste.

Marella's eyes widened. "Wait, so . . . Fitz knows? I'm surprised he hasn't killed you already!" she joked.

I laughed. "No, he'll be the one getting severely injured. He already has a broken nose, I think."

"Ohhhhh, so that's why his nose seemed off," she realized, then turned to us with a gleam in her eyes. She always had that gleam whenever she had gossip to share, so it's safe to assume that's exactly  what happened. "Anyways, did you hear that Monet Parrino asked Mille Alamani to come with him to the Celestial Festival?" *fyi these are just names i got from a random name generator

"Wait, really? He's been crushing on her like crazy for the past six months!" I exclaimed.

"Mille Alamani is in Level 5, right? I ran into her once. Quite literally. She dropped the books she was holding, so I helped her pick it up. I told her that I was rushing to meet you and Monet after school, since he was coming over to Candleshade, and she started blushing. I'm like, 'Does this girl have a crush on him?' So I tried to make friends with her, but she just said something about needing to go to the bathroom and ran out of there, her face beet-red. It was really weird, but also really cool, because now I get a chance to make Monet and Mille end up together!" Sophie gushed.

Marella slammed her hands down on the table, making all the silverware rattle. "Do you know what this means?" she demanded.

 "That I can start eating in peace again?" Tam asked hopefully. He probably wasn't paying attention to any part of this conversation except that.

"That Mille is probably going to say yes, and they'll start dating?" Biana squealed delightfully.

Marella rolled her eyes. "No, Tam. Biana is right. That could happen. We need to follow them to the Celestial Festival next week and see what happens!" Marella shrieked.

"You need to calm down, Marella. You're being too loud," Dex said. "Everyone in the world could've heard you."

"Besides, isn't that basically being a stalker?" Wylie pointed out.

Marella pouted. "But this is so exciting!  It's like watching Sophie and Keefe fall for each other, but 10 times better, since it doesn't take three (i think) fricking years for them to get together!" She pointedly glanced at us. We shrugged, blushing.

"Ok, we need to devise a plan to spy on them," Maruca said, standing up and placing her hands on the table. "We have to make sure we have them in view at all times."

"They'll probably have their Imparter with them. Dex, could you try tracking their Imparters?" Linh suggested.

"Sure. I'll just have to hack into the main database and find their names. Then I'll have to bypass their security systems . . ." Dex continued to mumble about some weird Technopathy stuff that none of us really understands — except maybe Sophie, if she decides to get yet another ability and manifests as a Technopath.

"Mmm — wait!" Sophie exclaimed, swallowing a particularly large bite of brattail. She ran upstairs and returned with a pen and a clean sheet of paper. She wrote "Dex hacks into Imparters to track" then turned back to us. "Anything else?"

I smirked. Leave it to Foster to be the secretary of the silliest, most unnecessary meetings.

"CAMERAS! We need cameras," Maruca added. "To capture the moment, you know." Sophie jotted that down.

"We also have to plan positions and roles. Like who'll be in charge of the cameras, who'll be in charge of the trackers, who'll organize where we'll hide. Stuff like that." We all stared at Tam, who was the one who spoke. He just shrugged. "Hey, just because I want to eat peacefully doesn't mean I wasn't paying attention." Sophie shook her head and scribbled something down.

And back forth that went, planning and scheming about getting Monet and Mille together. Soon after lunch, we decided to go outside and practice with our weapons, just in case the Neverseen 2.0 decided to spring up on us. We continued our spying scheme there, with Sophie taking a break sometimes to record anything important, her dagger Hope lying next to her. It was fine.

At least until Fitz showed up.

"What are you all doing here?" he demanded, storming over to where we were throwing daggers and knives and whatnot into painted targets about 8 yards away. "How come I wasn't invited?"

"Because we didn't invite you, Fitzy. Use your brain," I commented, turning back toward the row of small daggers I had next to me and throwing another one.

"Why?" he yelled, then narrowed his eyes. "You told them, didn't you?"

Sophie rolled her eyes. "Honestly, for Alden's 'golden boy', you're pretty stupid. Why else do you think everyone would be here?"

"But I  was supposed to tell them! I  needed to be the one who exposed you both when you didn't want anyone to know!" Fitz exclaimed.

"See? Told ya," I said to the rest of the group, then turned back to Fitz. "Ok, you're done. Now you can go home. Good–byeeeee!" I pushed him far away, then walked back to where I was standing. Fitz, being Fitz, just ran back here.

"Give Sophie back," he growled, pushing me over.

"Dude, Sophie's not yours. She gave you up like a millennium ago. Dumped you like a sack of kernalfruit," Tam interrupted. Everyone doubled over, laughing.

Fitz snarled and knocked into me, pushing me to the ground. "Sophie is mine," he hissed in my ear, pushing his arm against my windpipe.

I pretended to go limp. It seemed to work. Fitz slowly lifted his arm. Quick as a viper, I flipped us over, so now he was at the bottom. I hissed back, "Lay a finger on her, and the next thing you know, your finger is flying away." Fitz grabbed at my arm, trying to free himself from the position he was in. It's working!

But Fitz  had one last trick up his sleeve. One thing I didn't notice when I flipped us over was that his legs were positioned right under my stomach. He kicked me off as hard as he could, which made me suspect that he used his mental energy. Fitz must've anticipated this all along.

I flew across the field, hitting my head on one of Havenfield's glittering walls. I slid down, groaning in pain. Through my hazy vision, I could make out Fitz walking over to Sophie. "Don't touch her," I yelled weakly. Since Sophie was trapped by Fitz, the others tried to reach me, but it was too far for them to get here in time.

Scratch what I said earlier. Fitz still had another trick. Sophie groped for Hope's hilt, keeping her eyes on Fitz. But he just smirked, saying something inaudible and holding Hope up.

Before anyone could get within 6 feet of me, Fitz threw Hope.

I screamed, collapsing in a black cloud of agony.

MWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! cliffhangers are the best >:)

besides that, i hope you guys enjoyed the chapter. also, 200+ FOLLOWERS?! TYSM GUYS!!!!!  i literally never thought i'd get here!!!! tysssssssssssssssssss(...)m everyone <3333333333

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