After having returned home to do your homework, getting a snack and then leaving again, you were now on your way to meet up with Jim and Toby by the bridge that crossed the canals.

That place was usually pretty dry so lots of people used it as a spot to skate, spray graffiti or learn how to drive a car. You had played there as a kid plenty of times and you remember how much fun it was to pretends that the canals were some kind of castle's secret path.

But should it rain, then the whole canal would be filled with wildly flowing water masses due to the earth being so dry that the rain couldn't sink in and instead gathered in puddles and flooded whole areas. Luckily the canals were designed to catch these little streams and guide them to a lake not far away. On its way there, the water grew more violent with each passing second, washing away some of the graffiti and anything that was left in the canal.

You once saw a bike getting pulled down the current so you were quite careful not to slip or stumble when you crossed that bridge while it rained.
It wasn't exactly that you were scared to fall since that was a bit unlikely but rather that you had a lot of respect for the forces of nature.

Who knew how many people had already died because they didn't pay attention to the weather or acted disrespectfully in a dangerous situation?

It could happen quickly.

A wrong step on a mountain could cause an avalanche, threatening not just your own life but that of everyone that lived there.
Too little fear during a thunderstorm in open areas and the bolts of electricity could fry your brain.
Be distracted for a split second, be it your phone or lack of sleep, and the next, your car is skidding down a mountain slope and all you can do is scream and pray to not be crushed by your own car.

…

Whew. 

Those were some pretty dark thoughts for someone who's about to visit an arcade with their friends and play some silly fun games.

Probably should think about something less depressing.

How about bees?
Bees are adorable! 

Oh. Oh, no, wait. 

Bees are dying and leaving hundreds of plants to go extinct because they can't be pollinated anymore and doing it manually would require the expensive work of way too many people.

Next topic!

Nearly breaking into a nervous sweat, you racked your brain for something to think about that didn't contain the fear of death while pedalling down the street. 

Damn this anxious brain of yours!

The sun was still up. With winter slowly passing and spring coming, the days were now getting longer again.

Of course, that also meant that you had to wait longer until Kanjigar could come since trolls and sunlight didn't mix, but that also meant you had more time to yourself.
A bit of relaxing on the couch might do you some good. Maybe to keep studying in your 'Notebook for Trollspeak', which you had begun to create in the past few nights.

After all, you needed some material to work with so you could properly learn this ancient language. Kanjigar always took the books he brought back with him but never told you where he got them from in the first place.

Driving around a hole in the street, you asked yourself if trolls had libraries. It would only make sense, right?

Perhaps you could ask Kanjigar to take you along some time? 

He'd probably deny though, considering how hard he tried to keep this mystical stuff away from you -and yet still failed miserably.

Looking up from the ground in front of your bike's front wheel, you noticed that you had taken a wrong turn and let out a curse. 
There you went again, getting lost in thought and messing up.

You slowed down and threw a look over your shoulder before turning your bike around in a U-turn to pedal the entire street back up.

If only your bike could already be fixed. 
To think that they hadn't even started yet! It was so frustrating to know that the only thing missing was your father's approval. And money but he had enough of that so the approval was a bit harder to obtain.

Thinking about it.. what exactly was your father doing?

You knew that he came home while you were in school since you always found dirty dishes that definitely weren't yours in the sink but you hadn't actually seen him in about three weeks now.
Even for him, that was strange.
Usually he'd be home around the evening, leave shortly after midnight and return for lunch before disappearing until the evening again.
Kind of a weird schedule, wasn't it? But then again, what did you know? Not like you ever actually had a job.

Maybe he had some special urgent business to take care of with his work that required more of his time.
Hopefully he'd soon get himself to pay the bills for your motorcycle so that you didn't have to use this rusty bike any longer.

Although, all this pedaling was a nice workout. Not nearly enough to replace your taekwondo lessons but still better than nothing at all.

Finally reaching the point where you had spaced out and taken a wrong turn before, you now drove into Delancy Street and soon spotted the shapes of Toby and Jim standing in front of a sign that read 'Alex's Arcade', which was the name of the place you had promised to meet at.

Jim was the first to spot you -Toby had his back turned toward you and needed to turn around first- and he raised his hand to wave, which you returned with a wave of your own while still driving toward them.
Once you had stopped and secured your bike to a tree, you joined the duo and gave a small sigh.

"What took you so long, (Y/n)?" asked Toby, sounding rather impatient but not exactly angry, "I already ate my first spare taco while waiting!"

You rolled your eyes with an amused smile, "I'm sure the nine remaining spare tacos will last for another hour, if you hold back."
Jim gave a small 'hah' at your response, joining in on the teasing. 
"Don't overestimate him, (Y/n)," he said, throwing his friend a smile to which you both received a challenging grin in return.
"More like don't underestimate me!" Toby called out, "I'll have these nine tacos gone in half an hour!"

After a moment of theatrical silence, all three of you broke into a light giggling fit at the simple but still amusing exchange.

"Anyway," the chubby boy next to you began, "now that you're here, we can start the games!"
You had just wanted to enter the arcade when Toby held you back, flashing his metallic smile.
"Not so fast there, (Y/n)! Since this is kind of like a little celebration of our reunion," that sounded as if the short boy was planning something wicked. You wondered what it might be, "we'll be holding a competition."

Glancing over to Jim, you noticed that he too seemed surprise. Looks like this was all on Toby for once.
But.. what kind of competition?

"Competition? What sort?" As if Jim had read your mind just now, he asked the question that had been on the tip of your tongue.
The brown haired boy with the green eyes showed a confident smirk, straightening out his red vest and smiling up to you so broadly that you were nearly blinded by the sun reflecting in his shiny braces.

"Whoever gets the most tickets today gets to dare the others to do something and they must, I repeat," Toby made a serious face, holding up a finger into the air,"must do it!"

Both you and Jim glanced to each other again, exchanging a doubtful look for a second before turning back to look at your short friend.

The sun was still beating down on you with its warm rays.

"So if I were to win, for example," you said, putting your hands together in a thoughtful motion, "I could technically dare Jim to ask Claire out?"

The lanky boy immediately turned a deep shade of scarlet, spluttering over his own words in shock before letting out a nervous, obviously forced laugh. 
"W-w-what are you s-saying!? That's, uh..-" the two looks of 'we've known for ages that you're crushing on her' that were thrown his way made him stop mid-sentence and flush an ever deeper red, creating a heavy contrast with his blue eyes.

"So as I was saying," you picked up your question again, ignoring the blushing boy next to you, "the winner gets to dare the two losers something and they have to do it. No excuses?" 

"Absolutely right. Whadda ya say?" Toby looked pretty excited about that competition idea, giddily smiling up at you and the still red faced Jim.

You weren't sure if you'd be able to beat Toby or Jim with the amount of tickets when it came to arcade games since it had been a while since you had last been here.

But then again, the temptation was large. 

Just thinking of all the embarrassing things you could make them do, made you suppress a chuckle. Of course, it could also work the other way around. If you lost, then you'd probably be in for it. 

What a hard decision to make… 

"I'm in," announced Jim next to you, his cheeks having calmed down to a light pinkish hue, "it sounds like a little bit of adventure."

Adventure, huh? 

You were fairly sure you already were neck deep in an adventure with all this troll stuff. 
So why should you be afraid of some puny little dare?

"Me too," you followed suit shortly after, showing a small smile on your face as you nodded.

Toby did a small victory shout and grinned broadly at you once more, this time actually blinding you with the reflected sunlight.

Once the white dots in your vision had went away, you prepared to enter the arcade Alex and start this friendly competition, determined to win and not be embarrassed by some stupid dare.

---

Oh, this wasn't looking good.

This wasn't looking good at all.

How come you only had a few pairs of tickets when Toby had, like, twenty, or something? Was he cheating? 
It didn't feel like the chubby boy would cheat though. 
So maybe you just sucked at these games big time.

Jim also had more tickets than you did but at least not that many. 

Letting out a frustrated groan, you stuffed the one ticket you had gotten from the machine into the pouch of your hoodie and went to look for a game that appeared like it might suit you. There were so many new machines around that you were barely able to orientate yourself in the neon lit space.

If this continued, then you'd surely lose.

Turning a corner with your eyes glued to your feet in thought, you didn't notice someone standing right in front of you and ran into their back, causing whoever it was to stumble forward.

"Oh! Sorry, I wasn't pa-.." you began but halted in confusion when you saw that the person you had bumped into was none other than Thomas.
The dark skinned boy looked at you with a surprised, nearly shocked expression as if he hadn't expected to run into you here.
The same could be said for you too though.

"What are you doing here? Didn't you say you had vocal lessons today?" 
With a tilt of your head, you looked at your taller friend and waited for an answer.
Thomas seemed to need some time to actually understand that you were speaking to him before he nervously shrugged, looking away from you and toward a random machine with glowing metal cherries on it.
"Uuhmm.. Y-yeah but the teach got sick so.. you know, I went here to relax a little instead."

"Aw, I see," you answered in return, making an apologetic expression at him.
You knew how much he loved singing so he must've been trying to cheer himself up after his favourite part of the day had been canceled.
A sudden thought came to your mind, which made you part your lips into an 'o' shape before halting again and then taking a small breath as if to say something.

Thomas looked down to you in a confused manner while you were trying to put the right words together.

".. So," you began after a moment, looking at your black eyed friend with an unreadable face, "you'll be here for a while, right?"

"Yeah?"

"And you'll be playing games a lot, correct?"

"Well, that's what you do in an arcade, yeah.."

"You don't happen to have any spare tickets you could lend me?"

Thomas looked at you with an even more confused expression as he rubbed his elbow and raised an eyebrow, clearly not following.
He didn't look opposed to giving you tickets though so you threw him a small, mischievous grin and moved closer to the curly haired teen, ushering him into a less open corner.

Letting out a row of awkward noises, the boy did as you wanted him to and shuffled nervously on the spot while you took a quick look around the arcade, thankful for the loud music and the sparingly placed neon lights.

Once you had made sure that neither Toby nor Jim were around, you turned to the now slightly giddy looking Thomas.

You didn't notice it back then but he had been expecting something different from what you actually had in mind for him.

"Ok, here's the deal…" beginning to explain the small competition Toby, Jim and you were hosting, you told Thomas about the goal and how you were struggling to keep up, making sure to put emphasis on how hard this was for you.
Thomas listened, his expression going from the confused nervousness to a thoughtful understanding.
"… and I thought maybe you'd want to help me out? I'll treat you to some ice cream later, if you wanna."

Having ended your small speech, you were now impatiently awaiting a response, standing so close to the slender boy that you could see the colorful light reflect in his obsidian eyes like fireworks in a dark sky. 

Thomas didn't take long to answer after a short moment of thought.
"I'd like that," he said, returning the smile you were showing him.

You gave him a playful nudge on the shoulder, glad that you had gained an accomplice in this game, and quickly took another look around to make sure you were still alone.

"Awesome," taking out your tickets, you showed him how many you had, "Toby has about triple the amount of those so I'm counting on you, Toms."

The dark skinned teen smiled and nodded. He looked a lot happier than he had just a moment ago. Perhaps he was glad to have a friend to play games together with? That was certainly a lot more fun than losing by yourself.

A few moments later, the both of you had settled on a relatively old machine, which needed two people to work so it was perfect.

While you were playing, you almost forgot all about the competition and just enjoyed spending time with sweet sweet Thomas. The same seemed to apply to him as well, seeing how he was giggling like a little schoolgirl all the while.

You let out a small laugh as the game screen showed the word 'VICTORY' in large, blinking letters and an uplifting music played.

"Nice work, Toms!"
Giving the thin boy a clap on the back, you smiled at him.

Thomas' face appeared to redden for a moment but that could've been the lights of the arcade switching color as well.

He returned your smile and took the tickets that the machine was spitting out, handing them to you.
You now had more than ten but you knew you'd need way more than that to catch up to, let alone pass Toby.

With newfound motivation, you and your tall friend set out to gather more wins, both your expectations and hopes high.

---

You were not disappointed.

You still had about half an hour left and your amount of tickets had only increased since you teamed up with Thomas. The question was if you had managed to pass both Jim and Toby in order to score first place.

The only way to find out was to keep winning games until time was up and you'd meet with your current rivals and compare your amount of tickets.
Till then, you were quite busy enjoying your time with Thomas though.

Even though he had to skip his beloved vocal lessons, he appeared really happy to be spending time with you now, seeing how he was smiling all the time and laughing alongside you.

Just as you had finished another successful game, you heard Jim's voice sound over the arcade's music. It seemed really close. Too close for your liking.

Looking around a corner carefully, you spotted the thin boy and saw that he was talking with Toby while walking toward where you and Thomas were.

You pulled back and thought for a moment.
If they knew that Thomas was helping you, would they deem it cheating? I mean, not to tarnish your reputation or anything but it kinda was. 

However, if they never knew about it… then they couldn't complain about it.

They also never did say anything about rules that forbid you from taking the gracious help of friends nor that the tickets you would bring had to be your own.
You were fairly confident on that topic but the approaching voices of your rivals still made you nervous.

Would you really take any chances after coming so far?

Hell no.

So it came that you snuck up to Thomas from behind and poked his arm, making him squeak in surprise until he saw that it was just you. Before he could say anything you put a hand over his lips and made a 'shhhhh' motion with your own, telling him to be quiet.

Even with the music blaring, you could now hear Toby's steps coming closer, which meant they were just about to round the corner you had previously spied around. 
And that meant you were about to be caught red handed.

In order to avoid that, you just grabbed your taller friend by the shoulders and promptly pushed him into a narrow gap between two machines so that his back hit the wall.
He looked confused at first but soon rather panicked, even flustered, when you followed by squeezing your body into the gap as well. The two game machines to both your sides were enough to make you disappear from view.

Throwing up your (c/o/c) hoodie's hood for a complete cover, you pressed yourself to Thomas, still covering his mouth.
The moment you had hidden yourself fully, the voices of Jim and Toby grew clearer and closer. They must have entered the game alley you were in now.

As you were practically pinning Thomas to the wall, you could feel his quickened heartbeat thump against your chest. 
He must be feeling the thrill of hiding from enemies in close proximity as well.

You were right about the close proximity, just that it wasn't the enemy's that got him so nervous.

His body was shaking and shivering like a leaf in the wind so much that you were nearly afraid it might be audible. So to keep him from bumping into anything, you took one step closer, using your own body to keep his quiet.
It worked, seeing how he suddenly grew very tense and still.
Being so close to him, you couldn't help but notice that he smelled of vanilla and caramel. A rather pleasant combination, like some kind of tea.

"-ve you seen (Y/n) around anywhere?" You heard Jim ask his shorter friend as they strolled past the games, unaware that you were hiding between two of them with Thomas and getting you back into reality from tea-land.

Toby's voice answered, sounding even closer than before, "The last time I saw her was when we entered the arcade. I mean, it's a pretty big place and she might be in a totally different area."

"Yeah, I guess you're right, Tobes. We'll see her in twenty minutes either way," said Jim as he was walking right past the gap you were in, making his voice sound as if it were directly behind you.

You instinctively froze, tightening your grip on Thomas' shoulder and unintentionally pressing him to the wall even harder.

Would they see you?

It was quiet for a moment -aside from the energetic music blasting constantly- and then you heard their voices sound further away again. 
Relaxation immediately washed over you and you took your hand off of your dark skinned friend's mouth, which you had held shut the entire time, letting him take a deep breath.

To make sure they were really gone, you wanted to wait a little longer but Thomas seemed like too much of a nervous wreck to do so.
"(Y-y-..Y/n)," he stammered out your name, not even trying to push you off but rather trying to sink into the wall behind him, "can you.. g-get off now? Pl-please?"

"Hm? Oh, yeah," you hadn't noticed it yet but his face was almost on fire, "sorry. I didn't mean to startle you."

Releasing your hold on him for good, you slowly moved back from him and peeked around the game machines to check if anyone was near.
Seeing how the alley you were in was clear of other people, you slipped out of the narrow gap and took a few steps back to let Thomas out as well.

You had wanted to say something to him but found that he was staring off into space absentmindedly just before mumbling something among the lines of 'need to use the bathroom' and rushing off with wonky steps.
Looking after your friend, you sighed and scratched your head.

Why didn't he say anything sooner? 

Oh, well.

Like Jim said, you still had twenty minutes so there was enough time to relax a little. 
But you weren't going to slack off so you just picked one of the games to your right and began playing to pass time while waiting for Thomas to return.

Would you be able to beat Jim and Toby?

Or would you end up being the one embarrassed by a dare?

Only time would tell.

-----
-----

Heya! Chapter 10 is finally done and a tad longer than usual cause I wanted to give Thomas some attention ^^
((I also made a doodle of him, which you can see up there uwu))
I hope you don't mind that there wasn't much with any of the other characters this time.

I have some stuff planned for the continuation already so no worries uwu I just don't know when I'll be able to write it so stay tuned!

Thank you for almost a 100 votes btw, I'm very happy to see that people enjoy my silly imagination! 
Don't forget to vote~

-Jade