CHAPTER SIXTEEN
A PRETTY CHILL DUDE

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     Thanks to her mother's new rule, early morning practices before school was no longer an option. As soon as she saw her friends, she explained to them what happened and the next day, it was still the topic of conversation when they decided to use the first half of lunch to practice a song.

     "I still can't believe this," Naomi said.

     "I can," Peyton replied as she tuned her guitar. "To be fair, my dad wants to drop me off and pick me up from school every day until they catch this guy."

     "Basically, all our parents want us to travel in groups until they catch him," Kai said.

     "And so our practices have been cut shorter than before. The only time we can practice without our parents breathing down our necks is here in the music room at lunch," Luna sighed as she ran her fingers through her black hair.

     "I don't know about you guys, but even one run through can make a difference," Maya said while shrugging her shoulders.

     "There's no lie there. You guys get better every time even if you only get five minutes to practice," Kai replied.

     "Well if we wanna get two minutes in, we better start now," Naomi said but Peyton shook her head as she looked at her phone.

     "You guys might wanna take a look at this," she said and the rest of the girls put their instruments down.

     All of them gathered around Peyton as she turned up the volume on her phone and held it landscape so they could see the full screen. In the video, there was a ginger haired boy and many other boys who were shirtless and wearing red masks. "I've seen that boy before," Luna said while pointing at the ginger boy up front.

     "Where?" Kai asked.

     "Remember the very first time we saw Jughead here and he was surrounded by a bunch of Southside kids? Three Northsiders came here and Ginger here was one of them and there was also Blondie from Pop's and Raven from the drive-in," Luna said as she crossed her arms.

     "I don't know about you guys, but this video is clearly him and the Northside taking a jab at the Southside as if we had anything to do with what happened," Naomi said with her hands on her hips.

     "I hate to say this, but I agree. There is no evidence to show that anyone from the Southside is the Black Hood yet here they are accusing us," Maya replied.

     "Typical Northsiders. Something goes wrong in this town and they automatically assume anyone over here did it," Peyton said as the video stopped playing and she put her phone in her pocket. "To be honest, if a Southsider did hold a grudge against the Northside and decided to give them hell, I can't say I blame them."

     "Honestly, I'm surprised he didn't just outright say it. We all know what they're thinking, they might as well just say it and stop beating around the bush," Kai said.

     "They think we're too stupid to understand what they think about people like us. This is why the only people we can truly count on is each other," Luna said before checking her time on the phone. "Let's eat, I'm starving."

     "But we didn't get to practice," Maya said.

     "Then we'll try it again tomorrow. Besides, all the good stuff may be gone but I wanna at least get the good scraps before those are gone too," Luna replied as she put her guitar in its case.

     "Fair enough," Naomi said as she put her bass in its own case.

     "We'll see you guys in the cafeteria," Kai said as he and Maya started packing up her drum set so they could move it into the van so they didn't have to leave it in the music room and risk it being stolen.

     "We'll save you some of the good scraps," Peyton said as she grabbed her guitar.

     The three girls headed to the cafeteria and saw Toni, Fangs and Sweet Pea sitting in front of a laptop and decided there was no harm in joining them since they were technically friends. Toni and Fangs smiled when they sat down and Fangs decided to nudge Peyton's shoulder. "We weren't expecting you lovely ladies to join us today," he said with a little smirk and Luna narrowed her eyes at him.

     "What did they put in the tuna casserole today that made you like this?" she questioned.

     "He's always like this," Toni replied as she tilted her head. "I thought you guys were practicing today."

     "We were going to but then Peyton showed us this dumbass video with these dumbass Northsiders calling themselves the Red Circle and basically taking a jab at the Southside, per usual," Naomi said as she threw her head back and groaned loudly.

     "We were just about to watch that," Sweet Pea said and Luna grabbed his wrist before he could press the play button.

     "You press that button and I will throw myself out that window. I've seen enough stupidity for one lifetime," she said.

     Maya and Kai walked in and sat down with the group and Kai looked at everyone at the table. "What did we miss?" he asked.

     "If Luna could just let go of my wrist, we were about to watch that crazy video," Sweet Pea said and Luna just glared at him, refusing to loosen her grip.

     "Keep gripping, Luna," Maya replied but Sweet Pea only rolled his eyes as he took her hand off his wrist and played the video.

     Luna sighed as the ginger's voice played out loud and more Southside students gathered around to watch. Toni, Fangs and Sweet Pea were able to find some amusement with the Northsider's antics but Luna just found it annoying. And if she was annoyed with the Northside as a Southsider, then she could only imagine what it was like for the Southside students who were also Serpents.

     "How do you guys find this amusing?" Peyton questioned.

     "Because we've seen this so many times. Some Northsider gets way in over their head and suddenly they think they're so bad when in reality, if they came face-to-face with a Serpent or anyone from the Southside, they would piss their pants," Fangs replied and Peyton just shrugged her shoulders.

     "I wanna punch his face through the screen," Naomi said.

     To be fair, pretty much everyone on the Southside would want to punch this boy in the face for this video. If he had an issue with someone from the Southside, keep it between them but there was no need to bash an entire community, especially when there were plenty of people who haven't done anything wrong. People like Luna, her friends and her family who never broke any laws or got caught up in anything dangerous. They were just trying to make it one day at a time. Luna just wanted to play her music and be with her friends. Was it too much to ask for one day without being persecuted by the Northside?

     "I suppose we're not watching funny cat videos," Jughead said as he stood in front of their table.

     Luna scoffed as she looked at him. "I don't usually watch cat videos but right now, I wish we were," she said while Sweet Pea turned the laptop around to show Jughead the Red Circle video they were watching.

     "Some sick-in-the-head Northsider posted this crazy ass video and we were just talking," he said.

     "About what?" Jughead questioned.

     "Fogarty wants to earn his Serpent stripes," Sweet Pea said as he grabbed Fangs' shoulder and the boy just smirked. "I say bring us that Northsider's head and you're in."

     "I'm down with that," Fangs replied while Toni smiled.

     "I may not be a Serpent but I can hold him while you punch," Peyton said with her own lopsided grin.

     "Oh, maybe I could get a good punch in as well. I got a wicked right hook," Luna laughed and found herself smirking at how appalled Jughead looked.

     "Listen, I know this guy. He's a milquetoast, a football player. Seems like a lame target," he said. "If you wanna prove something, why don't you go after the Black Hood yourself?"

     "And why would we do that? The Black Hood is targeting Northsiders who do nothing but blame us for everything that's wrong with this town and we're sick of it," Sweet Pea said.

     "I'm not saying these people deserve to die, except maybe that child predator, but think about it, Jonesy. Me, my friends, my sister, my mother, we just live here and we don't bother anyone yet we still get treated like common criminals when all we wanna do is mind our business. And there are lots of other people like us," Luna said with her arms crossed.

     If the Northside wants to declare a war with a stupid video, so be it.

༻✧༺

     "Are you up for a little mystery solving with me and Jughead tonight?" Toni asked as she leaned against Luna's locker holding the newest copy of the Riverdale Register.

     "I do song lyrics, Toni, not creepy cryptograms," Luna laughed as she closed her locker and adjusted her bag. "Besides, if I joined, I would have to bring Rosalie with me and trust me, you do not want her on this job."

     "Your mom is still worried?" Toni asked.

     "She doesn't show it or let us know, but she is beyond worried. She's lived in the Southside of Riverdale for pretty much her entire life and she has seen many horrible things here. I hate having Rosalie breathing down my neck but if it keeps my mom from losing her sanity, then fine," Luna said as she started walking towards the front doors of the school.

     "Well, I guess I'll see you tomorrow then," Toni said with a small nod and Luna smiled.

     "See you tomorrow, Tones."

     "See you tomorrow, Lunes."

     Luna waited right outside the entrance for Rosalie to show up and looked around at everyone else who was either leaving out hanging out in groups. If the Black Hood was only targeting Northsiders, then maybe the Southside kids didn't have anything to worry about. But on the other hand, he was targeting sinners and hypocrites and Luna would be lying if she said she didn't know anyone who sinned or was a hypocrite, including herself. They all did at least one thing that was considered a sin and there was no way that no one in the entire world has sinned so that would make everyone, including the Southside, fair game.

     "Wanna go to the gas station for snacks?" Rosalie asked and Luna scoffed.

     "Who are you and what did you do to my sister?" she questioned but her sister just rolled her eyes.

     "Is that a yes or a no?" she questioned and Luna smiled as she nodded.

     Maybe being stuck to each other's hip wasn't the worst thing to happen and it was that brief moment where they weren't at each other's throat. If only their mother could see how well they were getting along but Luna knew it would be over soon. When they got to the gas station, they went inside and started looking for their favourite snacks along the shelves. Once they were ready with everything they wanted, they put together whatever loose change they had in their pockets and left the store.

     "You know, it's a nice change to not be fighting over stupid little things for once," Luna said as they started walking home.

     "Yeah, I guess," Rosalie replied while chewing on a chocolate bar. "I uh, I talked to Sweet Pea today before I met you outside."

     Luna looked at her after taking a sip of her soda and bit the inside of her cheek. "What did you guys talk about?" she asked.

     "About our breakup. He's not mad or anything like that but it's better for us to go our separate ways," Rosalie said and Luna tilted her head.

     "Does that mean you apologized for letting Southside internet trolls demonize him for the call you made?" she questioned and her sister sighed as they turned the corner.

     "I did. As you can imagine, he wasn't very happy about that but it's been some time now," she said and Luna nodded.

     "That's good. Sweet Pea is a pretty chill dude," she laughed before finishing the rest of her orange soda.

     Once they got home, Luna went up to her room to put her stuff down and looked through her phone. Naturally, that stupid video was everywhere and people kept sharing it. The scary thing was that a lot of people agreed with him and were pushing for a violent attack against the Southside. People already blamed the Southside for what was happening and the Northsider and his Red Circle gang were only adding fuel to the flame. With the Black Hood attacking people and the Northside threatening violence against her, her friends, her family and her entire community, it was no wonder her mother wanted her and her sister to stay close when leaving their house.