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9/17/2115, Downtown Sapphire City, 3:20 Am
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The sounds of footsteps made the woman clung on to her bag. Oh god, the cold air of the night filled her lungs. It's been five minutes, only five. The man in the back wasn't going away. Still, the sounds follow her.

The man had his hood up, and she couldn't glance at him without freaking out, she had to call someone. Even if she gets kidnapped, at least she could make a witness.

She pulls out her phone and begins to dial a number and stops. She expects him to stop too. But she doesn't hear anything, no more footsteps.

"What the- hell!" A voice shouts as she looks over her shoulder to see the man, gone.

He's not there anymore, but she does see a weird black tendril flopping around with white eyes, the woman gasped in fear, but the tendril didn't reach out or attack her.  It simply waved and pulled back as she blinked and turned a corner.

She may have drunk too much.

The man in the alleyway grunted as six vigilantes in costumes, a few feet away from him, holding weapons.
The one in the electronic mask titled her head, the visor made her eyes closed and looked happy as she cracked her knuckles.

"We need to talk!"
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The girls looked down at the knocked-out man, not moving one bit. Shockwave did big puppy eyes at everyone. "Can I leave a card? Please, please please!!"

The girls glanced at Sugar Devil. Who glanced at Shadow Veil. "Uh... fine. But this is the last time, okay?"
"Totally!" Shockwave pulled the card out of the pocket and left it in the man's hoodie, then Starfall smirked and conjured a portal to send him away to the police.

The girls scaled the wall as Shockwave threw little happy punched in the air. "Oh my gosh! That was amazing! Shadow, your tendril thing was so cool!"

"Oh thanks." Shadow gave a thumbs up as Shockwave grinned, Faustina blinked. "Oh, I forget. I didn't come up with a code name."

"Ooh, me neither." Poppy swayed as they moved above rooftops, Shockwave gasped. "Oh yeah! Yeah! You bed some right away! But what? What?"

The girls paused on a rooftop to think of this. "Mm, what about Eridania" Sugardevil suggested, "Oh and Battle-Bae?"

"Mm, no. It sounds too long." Faustina replied, Poppy shrugged and shook her head. "Besides, don't all the code names start with S?"

"Yeah, they do..." Shadow Veil nod her head. "But it doesn't have to start with an S, you know? Like maybe Faustina's code name is Miss Icicle and Poppy's code name is Strain Breaker?" Sana placed the idea out; the girls stared at her slowly.

"Miss Icicle...." Faustina tapped her chin. "That's a good one."

"Yeah, Strain Breaker sounds cool!" Poppy smiled, Shadow Veil smiled small and bowed her hair. "Thank you."

"Alright then, Miss Icicle it is." Miss Icicle smiled as Strain Breaker cupped her chick, Sugardevil smiled and double checked her watch and yawn. "Okay, it's around 3:45. Let's wrap up this patrol, alright?"

"Yeah!"

The girls stood back up and quickly moved across the rooftop, looking around any chaos or crooks to defeat as the cool wind of the night was filled with their jumps and quick movements.

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"Ugh...."Kandi blinked as the sunlight got in her eyes. She snuck back inside of her room at 4:13? 4:55? Whatever the time was, there needed to be more hours in the day to sleep. 

"Kandi! Get up! You're gonna be late for school!" Mom called out as she looked at her phone.

7:16 Am.  

Fuck.

Kandi hopped out of bed, dragging her feet like a zombie and opened the door as she sees her mom in a panic, buttoning up her shirt and fixing the tie. "Kandi, you're not even dressed?" Mom asked as Kandi snatched her lips.

"Ugh, I'll get ready soon!" Kandi whined, blinking, "What's up with you?"

"I have work. Jabir is already out of the house and I can't have my daughter out here not dressed, so go get dressed!" Mom stained every work and pushed Kandi back up the stairs.

Kandi groaned and bonked her head against the closet door of her room, Cookie popped out of her watch and smiled. "Don't worry, Kandi."

"Worry about what? How exhausted I am? Because that's a no go." Kandi quipped as she began to look for some clothes to wear.

Cookie turned around in the air. "I meant last night. I heard your mumblings."

"You can hear me inside of the watch?" Kandi questioned, Cookie nods their head. "Yeah, and also you're a loud talker."

Kandi rolled her eyes and grabbed a hoodie. "Yeah. Okay. But how did you think I did last night? With the gang and all."

"I think you did well. But of course, you need to train and practice more to really hone your power." Cookie plopped on the bed as Kandi yawned and fixed up her braids.

"Yeah, I get the message." Kandi huffed, rubbing the crust out of her eyes as she gets ready for the day and splashing cold water in the bathroom. 
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"Hey, did you hear about that guy from yesterday? They found a letter of the cutesy bruisers on him!"

"I did, I did! I heard he had tons of bruises on his face when the cops send him to the hospital."

The girls yawned and stretched against the lockers, the rumors of the cutesy bruisers have been spreading like wildfire, Kandi popped a lollipop into her mouth and chewed on it. "They're talking about us."

"Yeah, it's great..." Tricity gave a tired smile, Andromeda leaned her head against her wall and snored a bit, Sana sighed and tapped her shoulder, Andromeda jolted up and yawned. 

"Ugh, can we not do late patrols like that again...?"

"Andromeda! Shush! Don't talk in the open." Tricity grit her teeth. Andromeda glanced over at a empty classroom. "Can we eat there for the day?"

Faustina furrowed her eyebrows. "But... that's," Faustina clench on to her doll, "Ms. Debra's old classroom."

The girls stared at that door. Nobody's been in there since she passed away, the teachers would be scolding them, and students would consistently create rumors about it, saying how she's still haunting the room.

Sana bit her lip. "Uh, well. Maybe we can break the rules...? Just this once?" The girls looked at her, Kandi let out a shocked laugh. "Woah, what's with the guts?"

"I know, I know. But maybe? I mean, getting mad at us for being in a classroom is a bit of a contradiction because they're always telling us to be in class, right?" Sana bowed her head in embarrassment.

Kandi wiped out a fake tear and held her hands. "Aww, I taught you well. But uh, yeah. I wanna go in there, besides, they couldn't have changed that much in like... 3 years, right?"

Oh, how wrong Kandi was. When lunch rolled around and everyone was in the cafeteria, the girls snuck inside of the old classroom, and when Poppy closed the door, the girls just stood there. The old spinning chair? Gone, the pretty little wind chimes and bows? Gone. Any sense of a personality and love, it's all gone and clean.

The space was filled up with white and blue desks, some old computers and some wires pushed into the back behind a big oak desk. Kandi smacked her lips and took out her lollipop. "Yeah, they can change things in 3 years. Fuck."

"Wow, it's like Ms. Debra didn't even exist. Like, phew! It's all gone..." Tricity hung her hands in front of her as Sana walked near the windows, the image of the cute little plants that she always watered in the corner disappeared.

Poppy sat down on the ground crisscross and felt the hard scratchy carpeted floor. Faustina moved towards the wooden desk, brushing her hands against the texture. It used to be covered with stickers, Ms. Debra's old desk.

Tricity sat down at one of the desks as Kandi placed her lollipop into her mouth, leading against the wall, the place just seemed too, different.

"Oh shit, I found it." Andromeda replied, the girls turned their head towards her, Andromeda apparently made her way around the drawer, Kandi got there first and leaned over the desk. "Uh, found what?"

"Old picture." Andromeda held a little photo between her fingers, the other girls moved quickly. "Is it-" Poppy asked, Andromeda nods her head. She hops over the desk and leans against it, the other girls gathered around to see it.

The photo consisted of Ms. Debra holding a small trophy cup as the girls back in 7th grade pose next to her, smiling big. Faustina held on to her doll and sniffled a bit. "I thought they took it out."

"Looks like we lucked out." Kandi smirked and turned her head; Poppy held the photo next and hugged it a bit. "She still looks like an angel."

"Angels wished they were her. They just look like eyeballs." Tricity laughed. Sana looked at Poppy and gestured her to have a look at the pictures. As the girls kept smiling at the photo, the spirts came out of there.

The girls looked up. "What are you doing? You can't be out here..." Sana whispered, Cat shrugged their shoulders. "Oh whatever, living in your ring all day isn't as fun as you think."

"Besides, listening to your conversations and not being to interject is boring."  Flurry placed their paw on their chest dramatically. Poppy smiled. "Okay, sorry. We're just talking about an old teacher."

"We know, we kept hearing it." Rambo responded, Cookie floated up to the top. "Who is Ms. Debra, anyway?"

"Uh, she was all of our mental health teacher. Anytime we'd have problems or issues, she'd let us crash here and we'd hang out and talk." Kandi smiled, her eyes droop down. "But then she passed away... freak car accident."

Cookie floated over Kandi's head; their eyes widened at the woman in the picture. The spirts quickly moved around Kandi and gasped. "Madam?"

The girls paused and turned towards the spirts, Kandi raised an eyebrow. "What? Uh, yeah? That's Ms. Debra?"

Cat's three eyes closed and blew a dark puff cloud in the shape of a skull; it stretched its jaw and got on Sana's lap. "That's Madam. She, cared for us..."

Sana looked at Cat and held them up by the hands, "What did you just say? You knew Ms. Debra? Like, knew her as a friend?"

"Well, not friends? But yes, we knew her. Only for a year." Cat replied. Andromeda narrowed her eyes at the spirts and crossed her arms. "Okay, any one of you? You better start explaining. Now." 

Bun-Bun held their baby paws and sat on their butt. "Well, Madam had us in a special room. After a long, long time of being barren and empty, we were placed in amulets to have forms."

"Madam always muttered of giving us to people she deemed worthy, but she couldn't find anyone she could trust with us. But around 3 years, she mentioned a group of girls she thought would be perfect, but she mentioned they were a bit too young."  Cat kept going, but their fur spiked up. 

"But, then. One day, she destroyed the necklaces we were trapped in. And as we began to float up, she started running before we were gone..."

The girls looked at each other, as the spirts bowed their heads in shame. Before any of them could ask any more questions, the spirts just zipped back inside of their items without a word. 

"O-okay..." Sana sat down at one of the desks and held her head in between her hands. "So, Ms. Debra knew about the spirts?"

"Yeah, that's super weird!" Tricity huffed, "I mean, she was totally into magic and stuff, but how could she even know about that stuff? I thought the only people who really knew about magic and powers were the savior syndicate."

"Maybe, she worked with the savior syndicate?" Poppy suggested. "That could be a reason."

"But if that's the case, why would she need to be a teacher? The savior syndicate pays well." Andromeda guessed and crossed her arms. "This all feels super sketchy."

"I agree." Faustina nods her head. "Also, how are we sure the spirts are telling the truth? Maybe they're mixing things up because they're still confused. I mean, it had been over a year."

"I don't know about all that. I mean, what would be the point in lying to us?" Kandi asked, "I mean, we'll probably figure it out later down, so might as well be honest now.

The girls sat down and though for a moment as Kandi stood up tall. "Okay, how about this? After school's all done, we're gonna go do some patrolling. I'm not sure what we'll look for, but let's just keep an eye out for anything that seems a bit odd, alright?"

"Yeah, sounds good." Andromeda shrugged and brushed back her hair as Kandi gave a huge grin. "Cool, let's do it." 

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