Chapter Text
The devil himself
Yoooo
Skatepark at 5??
The bet bro
OH HELL YEAH
BET
WAIT FOR ME BRO I’M On my way!
Aight cool
Jumper’s joininf too btw
oh thats tuff
SO TUFF ILL MEET U TJERE
And with that, Spoke would immediately abandon the project he was working on in the school’s art room, carefully putting the popsicle stick carousel on one of its shelves. He would shove his phone into his bag, almost running out of the room before someone’s voice stopped him from behind.
“Where are you going, Spoke?” Minute hummed from behind, closing the book he was previously reading. For whatever reason, the teacher was always assigned to be Spoke’s “supervisor” to keep the voidling out of trouble – which is ironic, really, since Minute was coincidentally also Spoke’s homeroom. The guy wasn’t even a school counselor!
Spoke paused his tracks, his white eyes widening slightly. He turned around to face his teacher, a sheepish grin appearing on his face as he scratched the back of his neck.
“I’m going to the skatepark!” Spoke would announce, slightly adjusting the bag on his shoulder. “Mapicc texted me just now, and I can’t just say no!”
With a small sigh, Minute simply looked up at Spoke, raising a singular eyebrow.
“Okay, I believe you. But if I get a call that you did something again, I won’t hesitate to tell Parrot about it.”
Spoke froze slightly at the threat before quickly nodding in return, offering the older man a seemingly reassuring thumbs up.
“Don’t worry, I’m telling the truth this time! See you later, Minute!”
Before Minute could even say another word, Spoke rushed out of the art room, closing the door with a soft click. The teacher paused for a few moments before sighing, shaking his head as he silently wished that Spoke was, indeed, telling the truth. The boy had a tendency to lie to get out of sticky situations – or even for fun, Minute has noticed. Regardless, this was just another normal day of attempting to supervise Spoke for MinuteTech.
With Minute out of the way, Spoke would run through the already empty hallways, searching for his sticker-filled locker. Why wasn’t he instead going home to get his skateboard, you may ask? Well, that’s because he somehow always has his skateboard in his school locker. He tells everyone that it’s simply for convenience, but it’s really so that it wouldn’t get confiscated by his brothers if he did anything “bad,” both at school and anywhere near the city. Either way, it isn’t technically breaking any school rules, right?
Unless he’s using it in the hallways but we don’t talk about that. That was months ago, after all!
Anyways, after a while of going around the hallways, there he was – his infamous locker, one that was known by almost the entire school. After enrolling into the school, people were already making rumors about Spoke’s lockers specifically and how it had had items that were “exploited” into the school. Why they used that word specifically remained a mystery to Spoke, but it was a funny mystery, so he never really addressed it himself.
But who really cares about that right now? After looking around the hallway one last time, making sure no one was there, Spoke would finally open his locker, immediately grabbing his skateboard and ignoring everything else that was inside the compartment. He’d quickly close it again, confirming that it was properly locked before he finally exited the school.
Spoke could feel the soft breeze instantly hit his face the moment he opened the main entrance doors, walking over to the front gate to officially get out of school ground. He inspected his skateboard for a bit, giving the wheels a quick flick to check if it was still working properly. He’s had this skateboard for years, the little doodles on its deck being evidence for it. Afterall, Wemmbu and Flame kept practically begging him to let them “make the skateboard cooler” by… well, drawing on its deck. He never really minded, though – Santa gave it to him when he was 11, anyways!
After a while, Spoke dropped his skateboard on the ground, placed a foot on top and started pushing with the other. His rainbow bandana flowed gracefully alongside the wind, the keychains on his bag jingling softly. He took a deep breath, a grin appearing on his face as excitement finally filled up in his chest.
Spoke has done this multiple times by now. Going to the skatepark with Mapicc and even Jumper sometimes, just playing around before their curfew. Both him and Mapicc were skateboard users while Jumper uses rollerskates, which Spoke thinks is relatively hard to perform tricks in as well. Nonetheless, they’d always laugh and have fun during their hangouts, even though Jumper was still one of Spoke’s relatively new friends.
Lost in his daydreaming, Spoke would pause his tracks once the skatepark was in reach, his grin only getting wider as excitement was the only thing he felt at that point. Using his leg to push his skateboard faster this time, the voidling would soon see two specific people: one using a red hoodie over his uniform while the other was wearing a pink cardigan over hers, both of the teens already having their helmets on. Safety first, kids!
The atmosphere was a bit… tense, Spoke has now realised. He wasn’t exactly on the skatepark yet, but he could see that both of his friends were staring at something inside of said skatepark – and based on their unusually quiet demeanors, Spoke knew it wasn’t something good.
“Hey, guys!” The voidling would greet anyways, walking up to both Mapicc and Jumper. “Uh… are we doing okay here, or –”
The moment Spoke’s eyes landed on what was happening in the skatepark, his whole body froze.
The skatepark was full of people – presumably students from another school because of their dark pants – wearing completely black hoodies with the hoods over all their heads, making their faces dark and unrecognizable. All of them were invading different major parts of the skatepark, some leanings on bars while others were outright sitting inside rinks. A small frown appeared on Spoke’s face. The number one rule of the skatepark was to never ever be in places that could potentially be used by skaters and those alike!
It wasn’t just the trio who was present in the skatepark, though. A lot of other skaters their age were also surrounding the park, clearly not knowing what to do against such a large number of people. Some were clearly agitated, ranting to their friends about the situation, while others seemingly just… accepted their fate, picking their bags up to leave and go home.
It made Spoke frown even more.
“Dude… they’ve, like, been here since we arrived,” Mapicc mumbled out, finally turning to Spoke with a visible frown on his face. “We tried telling them off, but there’s too many of them! None of them would even turn their heads when me and Jumper were speaking!”
“Like, what's their problem?” Jumper sighed, shaking her head in outright disappointment. “There’s no way they’re all just doing this by themselves, though. There- there has to be someone behind all this!”
And the bunny hybrid was, indeed, right. Dramatically emerging from the shadows, a figure that Spoke recognized would finally show himself. The person, unlike the other students, was simply wearing a light red jacket over his uniform. A white mask covered the figure’s face, with a pitch black tie – much unlike Unstable High’s – was tied neatly around their collar. Spoke immediately knew who this mysterious man was.
It was his former best friend, JamatoP, who moved to Purgatory Academy right after Spoke covered up his “drop out.” All the excitement Spoke had previously felt disappeared in an instant.
“Spoke,” Jamato greeted nonchalantly, his expression unreadable because of the mask. “it’s been a while.”
Spoke’s expression visibly scrunched up. Both Jumper and Mapicc immediately turned to him, their expressions filled with both irritation and confusion.
“Bro, Spoke, who is this guy?” Mapicc whispered, his fists gripping the edge of his skateboard. “Is he like… I dunno, do you owe him something?”
“I don’t, bro,” Spoke muttered back, Jumper quickly following up with a groan.
“I– nope, nope. I’m not dealing with this today!” She would grumble before Mapicc took her hand, silently telling her not to go just yet.
“Jamato, bro– what is this?” Spoke would ask, his voice laced with confusion and a bit of betrayal. Jamato simply stared at Spoke behind his mask, taking in a deep breath.
“Well, Spoke,” he would start, his voice calm with a tinge of impatience in it. “I’m simply… protecting the skatepark. I wouldn't want a certain someone to ruin it with their childish graffiti art, would I?”
Spoke flinched slightly at the remark, a sudden wave of memories from their middle school days appearing in his head. He was a bit of a troublemaker – well, not really a bit, but you get the point. He would just go around the city with Jamato, spreading mischief that didn’t exactly harm anyone directly, only for it to be mentioned again here, in one of his favorite places. Jamato took a sharp breath.
“After all, Spoke,” Jamato would hum. “You ruin everything you touch, don’t you? There’s physical proof all around the city after all.”
“Bro, why the hell would you say shit like that to Spoke?” Mapicc jumped in, taking a step in front of Spoke, his voice filled with dangerous fury. “Weren’t you guys, like– best friends or something? What is your problem, bro?”
Spoke seemed to completely freeze on spot at this. After months, maybe even a year of not seeing the person he once called his best friend – this is where it leads to? For Jamato to make a bad impression of him in front of Mapicc and Jumper, knowing all of Jamato’s words were true? Spoke couldn’t even lie out of this situation, there was literally evidence of his shenanigans all around the city!
But he can’t focus on that.
Right now, he has a responsibility. He didn’t want to drag Mapicc and Jumper into this situation for any longer.
He needed to do something. Quickly.
And that’s when it hit him.
Whilst Mapicc and Jamato were still bickering back-to-back, Mapicc’s voice still furious while Jamato’s had a terrifying calmness, Spoke gently nudged Jumper’s shoulder.
“Get all the other skaters out of here first,” Spoke would whisper, dropping his skateboard gently with a silent and unnoticeable thud. “I want to do something… cool with Mapicc.”
Jumper paused for a few moments, taking in Spoke’s request before shrugging and simply nodding, skating away with her rollerskates. She gave Spoke one last look, one that told him she trusted him and to not mess this up.
Spoke nodded back, his eyes filled with determination.
Turning his head around to the sound of Mapicc and Jamato, he’d skate over to Mapicc, nudging his friend’s shoulder. Mapicc instantly paused his argument, lifting an eyebrow at Spoke, before silently tilting his head in confusion at the sight of Spoke…
…Smirking?
“Yo, Mapicc,” Spoke giggled, putting a hand on his lips as his right foot lazily sat on top of his skateboard. “Why don’t we show these people how good we really are on our boards?”
Mapicc blinked.
Stared for a few seconds.
And smirked back.
“Good idea, Spoke,” he’d chuckle, carelessly dropping his skateboard, catching it with his foot so it wouldn’t roll away. “Let’s show these guys how it’s done.”
And before Jamato could even say another word, the two students clicked the locks on their helmets, both of their feet pushing in different directions. Under the mask, Jamato’s expression was only filled with a singular emotion – confusion. What could these two possibly be doing in a skatepark that didn’t even seem to be usable anymore?
Then it snapped.
Spoke had amazing aim, able to move any moving object he’s controlling precisely when there were multiple obstacles in front of him. Jamato vividly remembered the small detail back during their robotics club in 8th grade.
Shit.
Before Jamato could even say another word to the students he somehow convinced to do this for him, his eyes widened at the rather spectacular sight before him.
Spoke and Mapicc were playing on their skateboards normally, dodging every single person in the rinks and rails, as if they weren’t there in the first place.
Chills went down Jamato’s spine.
On the right side of the skatepark, Spoke was seen smiling and laughing, jumping on rails while doing a full-on 360° ollies on them, his board jumping precisely just to barely miss any of Jamato’s minions’ heads. On the left side, Mapicc would be seen skating in the deep rinks, going at full speed at the people sitting in it – only to jump and do a kickflip whilst smirking at Jamato, as if chasing away his minions wasn’t fun if he couldn’t flex in the process.
Both Spoke and Mapicc did this on every part of the skatepark. Jumping and doing a perfect 180° spins on the ramps, landing on ledges with momentum that could scare anyone who was sitting on it away, and seemingly launching themselves into the air every time they had the chance. The moves were timed and positioned so flawlessly, their skateboards possibly hitting Jamato’s minions if it were just an inch closer to them.
And this seemingly stupid plan worked.
In the span of maybe just a few minutes, almost all of Jamato’s minions had already scrambled to get their bags, running away from the skatepark’s main areas almost fearfully. Spoke and Mapicc had somehow scared all of them away just by having fun.
It made Jamato’s blood boil.
“I– how did this even–” Jamato would frantically stutter, only to see Spoke and Mapicc fist bumping each other while laughing. “You two…!”
“What, bro?” Mapicc giggled, putting his hands inside his hoodie’s pockets. “We’re just playing on our skateboards, man. Isn’t that what a skatepark’s for?”
“Looks like I've improved since we’ve last met, Jamato,” Spoke whistled almost mockingly, taking a step towards Jamato. “Don’t you think so too?”
“I… I…!” Jamato struggled with his words, taking a step back, his shoulders tense. “Who… who even are you, Spoke?”
Spoke blinked at the question, the sudden change of atmosphere throwing him off guard before noticing that Jamato had disappeared within a second, being replaced with a sight Spoke has never seen before.
Skaters walking back inside the skatepark, all with a smile on their faces, the air shifting into something… warm. Everyone seemed happy with all of Jamato’s minions gone now, and with no one invading the skatepark anymore, they could ride their boards and rollerskates in peace! Hell, some were even clapping for Spoke, which made his cheeks burn red slightly.
“Glad we could read each other’s mind,” Mapicc grinned as he tugged on Spoke’s sleeve, trying to get the voidling’s attention. “Man, we’re so goated at skating.”
“You two were awesome!” Jumper suddenly appeared behind both of them, putting a hand on both of their shoulders. “Wow, I knew where it was going when Spoke told me to get all these people away from the skatepark, but I didn’t expect that great of a show!”
“Well, what can I say? You could say me and Spoke are a little… devious,” Mapicc agreed, turning his gaze towards Spoke again. “Yo, are we still up on that bet, dude?”
Spoke, who didn’t notice he was blanking out the entire time, immediately spun his head towards Mapicc as the word “bet” was said.
“Oh, hell yeah!” Spoke would laugh, a smile appearing on his face. “That ice cream is gonna be mine, bro!”
He silently pondered what happened with Jamato.