Chapter Text
"Dammit. Dammit. Dammit. I can't believe those little snitches," I paid them fifty bucks each, silence money and then payment for one simple job. They were supposed to teach that little wimp John a lesson and not get caught. That's what I get for hiring out anyone from the football team. So here I am walking my 'happy' ass down to detention. You'd think the punishment would be worse for what I did, but in a prep school like this, you could almost get away with murder. Almost. Unfortunately, instead of getting expelled, suspension, or in school suspension, we get to be put to work for four hours after school.
Everyone knew where detention was, even though so few students got in trouble, but it was mandatory for every teacher to take you by the room freshman year. There's never a teacher in the room, only instructions on the white board for your chosen assignment and grouping. If you didn't complete your task by the end of detention, you would do the same thing the next day and another day would be added to your sentence. I was in for two weeks, so I hoped I could get my shit done everyday and get the fuck out. I opened the door and did a quick scan of the room. Seven people, including me. The three idiots I hired, and two idiots that never left detention. I knew Tavros from elementary school, but the other everyone knew; He was the god damned son of the freaking chairman, Gamzee.
The pair were known for being detention rats since freshman year, Tavros was physically incapable of doing the tasks for detention anyway and Gamzee didn't want to do his shit and leave him behind. I remember for months Gamzee did his share and Tavros' share, but they wouldn't validate it, mostly because the chairman hated Tavros and figured his son would give up on being his friend if he was stuck in detention, that's the power of social class for you. I don't think the chairman knows how nuts his son really is. I've been to detention once before for socking a teacher in the face, but he touched my butt and got fired when they played the video feed back, and I got out of detention without having to lift a perfectly manicured finger.
I took a seat in the front of the room, on the opposite side of the jocks. Gamzee and Tavros were seated a few desks behind me. I read the board and waited for the intercom to tell us to start our work. I felt six set of eyes drilling a hole in the side of my head, I pursed my Cerulean Blue lips and tried to ignore it. I was assigned to an area close to my 'admirers', collect trash and bring it back to the classroom. We put our names on it and someone monitors the cameras to make sure we're doing our own work. It's ridiculous, but effective. No one, no matter what social class, wants to pick up trash for four hours.
When the announcement came we got started, I walked out before Tavros and Gamzee. I have no reason to talk to them or them to me. Tavros probably hates me since I put him in his incapable predicament, but we'll never know. I turned left and Gamzee pushed Tavros off to the right. I never understood that weird friendship. Tavros was considered middle class, nothing special, here on scholarship like most the population, but Gamzee had it all, money, power, and possibly looks if he wore something other than baggy sweat pants and a deep purple sweatshirt. Who wears sweat shirts in spring? No one but him and the trolls who hang out in the computer room after school.
I made a couple turns through the corridor, they were mostly empty, and found my trash spot. Ugh. This is gunna suck, they gave me the smokers hangout no way am I going to find a whole garbage bag of cigarette butts. It'd be easier for me to smoke that many. Speaking of which, I pulled a pack of cigarette out of the front pocket of my book back and lit it, I didn't get one this morning because I woke up late. Also my first period teacher is out to get me. I sat down on the ground and leaned back on the wall. I wish I had a way out of this. I took another drag, but my break was short lived, I had company. Standing up and squashing my fag with the ball of my foot, I faced my visitors.
"We want the rest of our money, Vriska."
"Yea, just because we got in trouble doesn't mean we didn't get the job done."
I rolled my eyes at them and laughed, "You 'got the job done' did ya? Well, the job included not getting me detention for two weeks and not hitting my dear John in the face. Oh, and look, here we are, Johnny-boy had a nice shiner and I'm cleaning up trash," I clapped my hands, "Bravo!"
"Listen here, bitch, you'll give us our money or we'll give you a black eye too. I don't care if your a girl or not," he walked towards me, "I'll beat you to a pulp."
I only to half a step back, I was trained since I was four to fight like a man, and get beat like a man. This guy held no power over me, nor did he have the capabilities to beat me at my own specialty.
"Oh, if I knew how full of shit you were I would have brought an extra trash bag, that way I'd be done with today's and tomorrows work all in one shot."
His face turned red with furry, he threw two punches at me, but missed completely. So, I round house kicked him in the ribs, punched him in the nose, and took off around the corner. I out ran them easily, since they were lineman, they had no speed. I ran through trees and hopped bushed, barely paying attention to where I was going, only to how far away the yelling was. I paid so little attention, I ended up getting caught in something hard and heavy. I fell forward onto my forearms, and I'm pretty sure I dislocated my shoulder.
"Graceful landing Vriska." I looked up to meet a pair of big brown eyes. I quickly untangled my ankle from his chair, it stung a little, but it's probably fine.
"Shut up," I could hear my name being called not too far off. "What are you doing here?"
"Well, uhh, Gamzee and I usually sit out here until curfew, Umm yea, Since I can't really do any of my tasks," I think I remember his job was to fix a bench or something, he must have done something pretty insane to get such harsh treatment. "Seems like I'll never get out of detention."
"No one can really be that helpless," I started to move my ankle around, it stung a little more than I hoped. "Have you eve tried?"
"I guess I really don't have the motivation, I did, but it wasn't worth it." the voices got closer, "Vriska, uhh, who's looking for you?" The voices were mad close, too close, I had to think of something, and quick.
"Ignore them. Actually, hide me." Right as my pursuers came into view, I ducked behind a bush.
"Hey, cripple, you see that bitch Vriska?"
"Uhhhh, I don't think so," he caves so easily I could tell he was lying just by his voice, I could only wonder what his face looks like. I gave him a little nudge through the bush, "Oh! Uhh, she tripped over my chair and ran into the trees, uhh, that way," he pointed off to the side.
"Thanks dweeb," and they ran off.
"Yea, thanks dweeb," I crawled out from behind the bush and bumped my shoulder to his, "no really, thanks, I couldn't take all three of them." I smiled at him and he blushed, turning away when he looked at my eye. I forgot I lost my glasses. Now a few people know about it, too many for my comfort.
"Yo, Tav, what the fuck's goin' on here?" Gamzee had walked up from behind us and surprised me.
"Oh, hey Gamzee, did you get me a water?"
"Sure did mother fucker, and Faygo, and something extra special too," He pointed a toothy grin at his friend, with pointed K9 teeth. Whatever, when you have money you can pretty much do whatever you want with it. He looked over at me with mild curiosity, curly hair covering his forehead. He was even wearing face paint, to me he looked like a vampire clown, but I'm no one to judge, I look like the fucking terminator. I was a little jealous of his purple pajama pants, it would have been nice to have worn something more comfortable today. I looked down at my jeans, grass stains, and a lovely hole now adorned my favorite pair.
Everyone wore the color of their class, I got lucky with a nice blue, while poor plain Tavros got brown, like his hair and eyes. It's not like I want to wear blue everyday, so I colored my hair blue. I generally stick to black clothing. "How do you get Faygo on campus?"
"I have my connections," He winked at me, "Motherfuckers will do anything for money."
"Seems like it," I glanced off in the direction the jocks went, I'm sure they won't be back anytime soon. "It's a pity people are so easily manipulated," I chuckled. Money's never an issue to everyone Green class and up are generally spawn of lawyers, politicians, CEOs, drug cartel, you know, the 1%. Everyone else got in on scholarship by grades or extracurricular activities. Of course being from a high class family gives you extra privileges, like my allowance. I could only guess how much Gamzee's allowance was, since his father was the principal, and he was a higher class than I was. Not that it really mattered, I didn't want to spend any more time sitting with these morons, they might think we're friends.
"Hey Vriska, wanna hit," I didn't notice, but while I was stuck in my own thoughts Tavros had rolled a joint, a pretty good one at that. This wouldn't be my first time smoking, hell sometimes I put a little bit at the end of my cigarettes when I was nauseous, but I only smoke with people I like. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad to hang out in the bushes with these idiots.
"If you don't mind the interruption, sure."
"You're not interrupting us, Vriska, it'll be, uhh, really nice if you joined us," Tavros smiled at me, I thanked him and took a hit. The paper was blueberry and tasted really nice, after a few minutes I could barely feel my ankle throbbing.
It was actually kind of nice hanging out with them, getting past Tavros's bad jokes and Gamzee's ridiculous taste in music (what the hell is ICP?). Eventually we all just decided to lay back onto the grass and stare at the sky.
"What the fuck's up with your eye?" Gamzee paused his music and leaned up on his elbow. He definitely surprised me, only Kanaya knew about my eye (well, and probably Jade, my roommate, but I'm not sure) and now a few jocks know and these two.
"I upgraded," I hoped he would just let it go, and I'm pretty sure I sounded a bit irritated.
"What's that mean?" Tavros spoke on the other side of me.
"It means, instead of staying fucking half blind, I got rid of my eye and upgraded to something better and stronger," I know I sounded irritated now, because I was. Incredibly.
"No need to be mean, mother fucker, I was only curious."
"Well, before today only my best friend knew about my eye, and by tomorrow the whole school will probably know, and that irritates me. So sooooooorry for being mean." I started to get up, hoping I could leave before my anger got the best of me. Gamzee decided it was quite amusing to make me angry, but he grabbed my wrist.
"Now now, no need to be embarrassed, everyone here's unique," He smiled at me, a kind of goofy natural smile. It showed his pointed cuspids, and right now it didn't look strange, just natural for the Gamzee I got to know in the last hour. He's incredibly insane, but he looked out for Tavros, so he had to be at least a little sane.
My own thoughts made me laugh, "And you're one of the most unique people I know. So let me ask you a question then, what why do you paint your face?"
"Why do you?" His question made me laugh louder than I have in quite a while, I never figured he would have such a simple answer, but it made so much sense.
"You say the weirdest things, I wanna see way you look like without face paint." I pulled my sleeve over my palm, "Can I?" He just smirked a little. So I started with his forehead, he was almost as pale as his paint. And his skin was smooth, he must have to wash his face pretty often considering there's literally a pound of makeup covering his pores. With only his lips, and my sleeve covered in grey and white face paint, I worked a little slower. His lips were thin and pale pink, but somewhat mesmerizing. He was pretty much perfectly symmetrical, with only a slight crook in his nose, but he had a strong chin, high cheekbones, and rounded eyes. "You're pretty handsome underneath it all," I spoke without realizing and watched his cheeks turn pink. He looked away, and I could only chuckle.
"Uhh, Gamzee, it's almost time for curfew," I had almost forgotten Tavros was laying behind me.
"Oh shit, my roommate's a big snitch, well, it was pleasant wasting time with you," I stood up, my ankle hurt, but it held pretty well. I started to walk of, hopefully without a noticeable limp.
"See you tomorrow, Vris." I turned back to my new found friends and smiled.
"Yea, see you guys tomorrow," I walked the back way to the girls dorm, since I lost my glasses. I entered from the back and took the back stairwell. I pulled my hair down over my eye and made my way to my dorm room. Jade's light was still on, but she was asleep at her desk. I quickly changed and wrapped up in my comforter, almost looking forward to tomorrow. Almost.