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Techno had finished three games of the latest angry birds spin-off before his partner for the group project ran up.
“Sorry I’m late,” he panted. “One of my friends had a computer thing, had to talk him down from panic, y’know how it is. How’re you doin?” He slid into place at the commons table and started rapidly unpacking his backpack.
Techno put aside his phone—the game made you a cartoon pig who could build a little house that withstood having an angry bird released into it, and so far he had lost every game—and managed a half-grin and a shrug. “M’fine. You got the presentation topic?”
The blond man—he thought his name was Phil, if he remembered correctly—produced a sheet of paper. “Gotcha,” he said. He pushed it across the table. “Prof. X said we could do either B or G.” Several tables down, an argument just one step down from a screaming match started up. Apparently someone had been killed in a hardcore minecraft world, and they were taking it poorly.
Techno scanned the paper of presentation topics for History of Philosophy 1001. “Bruh,” he said after a second. “This is—“ he put the paper down. “You got a preference?” He raised his eyebrows. “Did you do any philosophy classes before?”
Phil shrugged. “All those old guys believed the world was made of numbers and stuff, right? Shouldn’t be that hard.” His phone went off, and he looked at it.
“Alright.” Techno messed with the edge of the paper. This was his first philosophy class as well, but it had been the only remotely interesting option in this time slot. Skeppy had assured him it was an easy A, but now he was starting to reconsider how easy. What even was Nicomachean Ethics, and why did the professor want them to argue against them?
“What the fuck is it now, Tommy,” Phil was saying to his phone. He didn’t seem to realize he was talking out loud. “How even—“
Techno fiddled absently with his emerald earring. The Miraculous was softly warm under his fingertips, full of potential. He was idly wondering if all magical items had that sort of slight pins-and-needles effect when he heard a whistling noise behind him and ducked. A chair flew over his head and smashed into the wall. The piece of furniture fell to the ground, slightly flattened. It looked like the metal had started to melt. Techno spun around.
“You killed me!” A man with a set of shiny reflective heat gauntlets and chestplate and blue and red goggles stalked across the courtyard, wielding two long whips that dripped molten stone. He snapped one of the lava whips at a figure who was scrambling ahead of him across the commons, running from table to table. Techno thought he recognized him from the one time he’d tried to participate in a residence event this year, before the socializing freshmen had scared him off. The kid’s name was Tommy, and he already had a smoking hole in the back of his shirt where the edge of one of the whips had caught him.
The kid threw himself behind a table and looked around frantically. “Phil?” he yelled.
“I have got to go,” Techno told his presentation-partner. He snatched his phone off the table and pointed to it. “I’m getting a call—one second.” Phone in hand, he bolted out of the crowded commons. Something crashed behind him.
Techno stuffed the phone in his pocket as he ran, looking for a private spot. There, a stairwell. He crashed through the door and ducked into the corner, grabbing for his earring. “Niki, blood for the blood god ,” he said, and he felt magic wash over through him with the activation phase. A crown settled on his head, a heavy scarlet cape swirled into existence around his body. He kept his arms out to his side to let the magic fill in—leather gloves and tall boots enclosed his limbs while a long sword and a set of daggers settled on his hips. The Blood God opened his eyes behind a bone mask, grinning, and ran back towards the sound of screaming.
The man with the goggles was still catching chairs and other fixtures with his whips and hurtling them aside as he pursued Tommy. “I trusted you and you killed me!” he screamed.
“In a fucking video game!” Tommy screamed back from under a table.
“I trusted you!”
“Any hope we can figure out a solution for this that doesn’t involve this much mess?” Blood God asked, drawing his sword.
“Sure, if you let me fucking kill him,” goggles said.
“Well, let me think about that,” The Blood God said. “Kidding, kidding,” he continued, while Tommy shrieked indignantly. “Why don’t you tell me a bit more about your aims and goals and stuff, really get into a monologue while I figure out how to defeat you?”
“Look, Blood God’s here!” A voice off to the side said in relief.
“Took him long enough,” another voice said resentfully.
“Buddy it’s been like two minutes, he probably had to run from his office or something, come on.”
“Oh man do you think he’s a professor?”
“Well probably, it would be real funny if he was a student--” The voice broke off with a squeak. “Chair!”
“I’m the one who gets to give speeches!” Googles said, glaring. “It’s my turn in the spotlight, damnit, and I’ll kill him if I want to, and nobody’s gonna stop me.” He took a deep breath. “And I’m Thunder1408, and I’m going to kill Tommy fucking Innit.”
“Cringe name,” Tommy said from under the table.
“It’s a cool gamer tag ,” Thunder1408 said, snatching the table off of Tommy with a whip and throwing it into the wall. The Blood God slashed at the whip with his sword before it could catch the kid around the neck.
“Alright, I’m not gonna be able to let you do that,” the Blood God said, stepping in front of Thunder1408.
“Aw, mate,” A voice said off to the side. “Started without me?”
The Blood God glanced in the direction of the voice. A figure in green with enormous black wings had landed lightly on an upturned table, a striped bucket hat pulled down low over his eyes. The Angel of Death was here. The Blood God grinned at him behind his mask. “Bruh, took you long enough,” he said.
“Jesus Christ, man,” the Angel said. “Took me a while to find somewhere to put on the fucking costume, okay? Uh-oh, enough of that.” He took to the air in a flurry of wings and slashed at a thrown table with his sword. The furniture fell to the ground in pieces.
“Stop trying to stop me!” Thunder1408 yelled. “I’m going to kill Tommy and get justice!”
“Okay, okay, I’ll give you netherite on the fucking realm,” Tommy said, somehow still here and unconcerned with the fact that there were smoking holes in his shirt. “Will that make you happy?”
“Maybe--” Thunder1408 said, then caught himself. “No! I won’t be fucking happy!” He started ranting, snapping his whips in the air for emphasis.
“I think the akumatized object is his goggles,” the Angel said. He was balanced on one foot on an upturned fake plant.
“Yeah,” the Blood God agreed. “Makes the most sense.” He tipped his head to the side. “Think you can get it?”
“Oh you don’t even have to fuckin’ ask,” the Angel said. “Keep him distracted for me?”
“You know I will,” the Blood God said to his retreating back as his superhero partner climbed in the air in the midst of the atrium they were standing in. “And, Tactics ,” he said, feeling a secondary wash of magic run out from him, analyzing the area. A carved little turtle fell into his hand.
“Huh?” he said, staring at it. The little creature appeared to be made of soap. He glanced up, looking around the area, and the fact that Thunder1408 was pacing back and forth as he monologued.
“—And that’s why he can’t be trusted and why I, Thunder1408, should have /op in every minecraft world,” the villain continued.
“Hey,” the Blood God said. “Heads up.” He ran forwards, tossing the little soap turtle under the villain’s feet as he went by and shoulder-checked him.
Thunder1408 screamed and stumbled backwards, dropping his lava whips as his arms flailed madly. The Angel of Death swooped in from his position up by the roof, a nerve-wracking dive that ended with him pulling up and twisting in the air, throwing a pair of plastic goggles as he turned. The Blood God caught them and crushed them between his hands.
A tiny butterfly emerged from the plastic shards, wings covered in pixelated purple burn patterns. The Blood God caught it on crossed daggers. “Alright, little akuma,” the Blood God said to the little corrupted thing. “Let’s get you fixed.” A bright light washed down the blades and over the butterfly, which steadily bleached white as it purified. There was a sound like a ripple in the air, and the broken furniture and smoldering patches of floor on the commons were extinguished, everything flying back to as it should be.
“Aw, come on,” the man who’d been Thunder1408 said, shoulders slumping. “I don’t even get to kill him?”
“Dude,” Tommy said, popping upright from where he’d hidden behind a trash can. “That was pogchamp. You were a great villain.”
“Do you really think so?” He looked hopeful, then caught himself with a scowl. “Wait, get away from me. I hate you.”
“You’re weaksauce and I’m not fuckin’ sad you died in hardcore,” Tommy assured him.
“Oh yeah? Well the feeling is mutual.”
“But I’m starting a new world and I can give you fuckin’ netherite on it if you want.”
His eyebrows went up. “Netherite, eh?”
Other people were starting to come out from where they’d hidden. There was a consistent flashing coming from the crowd as cameras went off. The Blood God ducked his head anxiously. He had to get out here before someone tried to interview him again.
The Angel seemed to have the same idea. He tossed a salute in the Blood God’s direction. “See ya around, mate,” he said, grinning, and then climbed in the air up to an empty balcony at the top of the commons.
The Blood God waved once at the crowd, spotted a familiar blue beanie, and absolutely booked it back out to a stairwell where he could become a student again.
Once the magic crackled back out of him, Techno returned to the table he’d been at. He checked his phone. There was a message from Phil—“sorry about that, something came up. ttyl”. He texted back “np” and checked the other message.
There was an update on the classroom page. Option G had been taken, which left—guess he was going to have to present on Stoicism. Whatever that was. Techno gathered up the rest of his books and decided to research that later.
There was a tiny noise from his backpack pocket. He glanced around and then peeked inside. There was a little pink creature with big eyes and long antenna curled around herself. She uncurled enough to smile shakily at him. The rest of the pocket was empty.
“Are you out of food, Niki?” he whispered.
“Um, yes,” the Kwami said. “I got hungry earlier, and the magic takes it out of me...” She trailed off, clearly trying to not be judgemental.
Techno rummaged through his backpack and came out with a roll of mints. “Uh, here you go,” he said, carefully putting them in the pocket.
Niki wrestled the first mint off the top and bit into it, chewing dutifully. “Thank you,” she said.
“And we’re going to get you some cookies,” he said, tucking the pocket closed.
“Thank you,” Niki said from the pocket, sounding much more sincere. The sound of a mint crunching in tiny insectoid jaws was heard.
Techno shrugged into his backpack and headed off in search of cookies for his magical companion. Probably chocolate chip, she liked that the best.
“And the twitter feed’s gone up to 50k followers—obviously we’ve got a mastodon feed now too, but it’s holding steady at about 2k—Technoblade, are you even listening?”
“Yep,” Techno said, staring into a point in midair somewhere over his friend’s shoulder. “Your Blood God blog. Blood Pog. It’s very successful for you.”
“Well, you’re right, but you shouldn’t say it like that ,” Skeppy returned. “It’s got fantastic engagement for our university local area. I can grab random people and they probably follow it. Like now—” he poked the arm of the guy in line ahead of them at the coffee shop. “Are you on twitter?”
The man turned around, blinking. “Uh, kinda. I’m a bit out of the fuckin’ loop.” His eyebrows went up and he half-waved. “Oh hey, Techno.”
“Hey Phil,” Techno said back. He frantically searched through his memory. Was he supposed to have finished something for their project? They hadn’t said anything about that, had they? Should they have? Was he failing the project right now? They still had plenty of time, didn’t they?
“Don’t pay attention to him,” Skeppy said, waving a hand in front of Phil’s eyes. “This is important. Do you follow the Blood Pog account?”
“Mostly follow hourly bird accounts, mate,” Phil said, smiling faintly. “My girlfriend. Some swords accounts.”
“@RealHistoricalBlades?” Techno said.
“Oh yeah.” Phil nodded. “And @DailyDaggers, they’re good too.”
“They’re trash,” Skeppy told him. “You should be following Blood Pog, for all your local superhero-related news and updates.”
Phil grinned. “I guess I do like superheroes. Alright mate, what was this account again?”
Skeppy held out his phone, showing off a screen with an action shot of the Blood God blocking a beam of ice with a sword. The words “Blood Pog” were emblazoned across the image in red glitter font. “The @ is there at the top,” he said. “You should turn on notific--” He glanced up and then abruptly stopped talking as all his muscles locked in place. Grey stone crept out from his eyes until he was transformed into a perfect statue, still holding out the phone and looking up over Phil’s shoulder.
Phil and Techno stared at each other for a moment and then dove in opposite directions.
“There will be no more accidents ,” someone said dangerously. Heeled shoes tapped across the floor. “Because there will be no more free action . You’re all petrified, it’s Majesty time.”
A supervillain was here, and he hadn’t even gotten his coffee. Techno took a deep breath.
Skeppy had been hit by the magic that petrified him when he looked up. Probably he was going to have to keep from making eye contact. He kept his gaze firmly on the floor as he crawled towards the bathrooms. There was the strangled noise of screams and gasps cut off suddenly as people were petrified. He tried to crawl faster.
Techno ducked into one of the stalls, and The Blood God ducked out, back into the shop. He pulled out one of his daggers and tried to use the reflection in the blade to take stock of the situation.
The Angel of Death was already there, perched on the pastry case. “Alright mate, you’re plenty mad,” he said. “But turnin’ everybody into statues? Sure that’s the best way forward?”
“Angel, are you a student?” the one remaining person in the shop not a statue said. A tall figure with a long cape and a crown perched atop their head, and strange luminous eyes—Majesty.
The Angel coughed into his hand. “Uh,” he said. “Maybe? Maybe I work here, y’know?” Techno took note of that as he slipped around the edge of the coffee shop, behind the big table the people with laptops liked to work at. Somehow he’d never thought about the Angel being a student too. That was fun. Maybe they even shared classes? That would be kinda weird, considering how long they’d been working together stopping villains cursed to cause problems on campus, if they’d been meeting each other and hadn’t known.
“Well even if you aren’t a student now, you were,” Majesty said, and the Blood God’s attention snapped back to them. “Which means you will understand what I mean when I say I had my entire honours thesis ruined today when someone spilled a coffee on my laptop, and why I say that must never happen again . There will be no more spilling, no more mistakes!”
“Why didn’t you have it backed up?” the Angel said. “If that was your whole thesis.”
“My dropbox subscription stopped syncing!” Majesty yelled. “And you need to stop— talking .” They rushed forward, and the Angel had to dive out of the way.
“Hey, stealin’ my look?” the Blood God called. “I had the crown first.”
The villain turned around slowly. “I’m wearing it better,” they said.
“Hey, there’s no need to be like that,” the Blood God said, circling and keeping his eyes on his opponent in his dagger blade. There wasn’t a lot of space to move in this coffee shop. A bell over the door rang as it opened, and Majesty spun around.
“No movement,” they hissed, and the person in the doorway froze in place, eyes wide with surprise in a grey stone face.
Taking down this villain without looking at them was going to be a challenge. “Hey, come on now,” the Blood God said. “They coulda turned around and left! You don’t need to freeze everybody. And don’t you have an older version of your thesis you could go back to?”
“I’ve done substantial structural changes!” Majesty said, baring their teeth.
“Aw man, last semester I lost my final project when the hard drive on my computer corrupted, had to go down to get the 5heads at Student Services to pull the fuckin’ thing apart. Maybe the computer isn’t totally lost!” The Angel crept forward across the counter. “Even if it is, man, think of all the final projects that you’re stoppin’ now by petrifyin’ people.”
“So you are a student,” Majesty said triumphantly.
“... Shit,” the Angel said. “Forget I said anything.” He gracefully stepped backwards onto another counter, out of the range of Majesty’s sudden grab. “Whoops—Jesus Christ man.”
The red-cloaked figure was trying unsuccessfully to snatch at the Angel, fully focused on the task. The Blood God put a hand on his earring and said the magic signal word Tactics . Magic burst out from him and scanned through the shop, highlighting a laptop on a table right next to him, and the hand-sized mirror materialising out of thin air and dropping into his hand.
Okay, Tactics always showed a logical course of action, but sometimes it took a moment to see the connection. The Blood God bent over the laptop and poked at it. Coffee was still dripping from the keyboard onto the table. “Hey,” he said, not looking up. “This your laptop?”
“Yes,” Majesty said through gritted teeth. “It was a laptop, and now it’s an expensive, slightly damp paper-weight.”
It was really hard to fight the impulse to look up and make eye contact. The Blood God held his dagger at eye-height and nodded vaguely in the direction of the villain by the counter. “This’s one of the library’s computers.”
“Wait,” Majesty said. Their voice was choked up. “Does that mean—”
Behind them, the Angel crept closer across the counter.
The Blood God shrugged. “Yeah, earliest you got this was this morning. Maybe you lost today’s work, but it can’t be you lost everything.” He paused. “Unless you stole the laptop, I guess. Kinda cringe to steal from a library, that would be.”
“I didn’t lose it all,” the villain said, hands pressed to their mouth. The Angel was right up behind them now.
Techno tossed the Angel the mirror, and the other hero caught it out of the air. He lunged and held it out in front of the villain, who made a strangled noise and froze in place as their magic turned inwards.
There was a pause.
“I really fuckin’ hope the akumatized object is something we can chip out of the statue,” the Angel said. “Or this just became permanent.”
“The crown, you think?” the Blood God offered.
“Oh gotcha, look here.” The Angel bent over the statue’s shoulder and pointed to their hand. On the villain’s hand rested a gold ring, not turned into stone with the rest. “Betchu that’s it.”
The Blood God flipped one of his daggers around and hit the ring with the pommel. The green gemstone shattered, and a burnt purple butterfly burst out of the fragments.
“Awww,” the Angel said. He grinned broadly behind the shadow of his hat. “What’d you think’d happen if we just let one of those guys go? Never cured it?”
“We’d have a bunch of statues , Angel,” the Blood God said reprovingly. He caught the butterfly on one of his daggers. “And property damage.”
“But then we’d know more about whoever’s sending out these fuckin’ guys,” the Angel said, still grinning. “And it’d be fun, wouldn’t it?”
“Sometimes I’m really concerned about your definition of fun, actually.” He concentrated on the dagger and it pulsed with light. “Alright, little akuma.”
“Awww, it would be fun, come on now,” the Angel coaxed from where he was perched on the counter.
“It might be a bit of fun,” the Blood God allowed, as a wave of magic spun outwards from the now-healed butterfly. Furniture straightened itself, bodies skidded back to where they were, and people started moving again. A senior student in a red sweater and long skirt picked up the soaked laptop and turned it upside down. Liquid dripped out of it.
“This is a library computer,” they said, face transfigured by joy.
“Heads up, cameras,” the Angel said, somersaulting backwards off the counter and vanishing.
“Oh no.” The Blood God looked up in a panic, seeing several figures with cameras out. One of them was wearing a familiar blue beanie, and was scrambling to pull out a ring light to go with it. He frantically waved at Skeppy and dashed towards the bathrooms.
Techno emerged ten minutes later to a busily gossiping coffee shop, and his friend sitting at a table with two coffees in front of him. “I got you a drink,” Skeppy said, nodding to the other coffee.
“Mm, thanks,” Techno said, then paused. “Did you—do anything to it?”
Skeppy grinned at him. “I don’t know what you mean—”
Techno sniffed the drink. “Is that fruit? Did you put fruit in my coffee?”
“—it’s just a black coffee with maybe some flavour shots in it, no big deal.” Skeppy continued. “Maybe I thought you deserved some excitement. Maybe I remembered that you said that you missed blueberry picking, so I made it up to you. Maybe.” He grinned broadly.
“Bruh,” Techno said. He sipped at the drink and then made a face. “That was one time, I—” He sighed.
“Aren’t you grateful?” Skeppy said. He took a sip of his drink, which Techno noted had an order label that stretched down onto the table. The instructions included Add Heavy Whipping Cream, Extra Carmel Drizzle—was that 15 shots of vanilla? Skeppy nodded virtuously, despite the probably-lethal drink he’d just taken a sip of. “I did it for you because I’m a good friend.”
Techno sighed again. “Thank you.”
Skeppy took another sip of his drink, sighed the satisfied sigh of the just, and flipped his phone around. “Wanna see the photos I took of the Blood God?”
“I see you’re already showin’ me,” Techno said, as his friend scrolled through the images.
“He ran away like he always does, but I think I got some action shots, with the cape, you know,” Skeppy said. “With the action shots you got, I think it’ll make a great photo set.”
“Uh,” Techno said. “What shots?”
“Technoblade.” Skeppy stared at him. “Tell me you took some photos.”
“I forgot my phone,” Techno said, and then cringed reflexively.
His friend stared at him. “I got turned into a fucking statue and you didn’t take a photo ?” Skeppy’s voice was low and dangerous, and then abruptly turned into a shriek as he continued. “You are the worst friend!”
Techno checked his phone and then put it down, closing his eyes for a moment. “Bad news.”
Phil didn’t look up from the list of books he was going down with a highlighter. “We’re up today?”
“They’re going in order of assignment,” Techno confirmed. “So we have however long until class, and then however long the first presentation takes. Which gives us--” he checked his phone again. “About an hour.”
“’m good in a time crunch,” Phil mumbled around the pen in his mouth.
Techno fumbled around the table for his energy drink can and drained it without looking away from the laptop he was opening powerpoint on. “I build slides, you start in on question period?”
“Gotcha,” he said. “Greece.”
“Greece,” Techno agreed, dragging a map onto a slide. They fell into a library silence, hyperfocus only broken by the absent muttering of things like “some guy named Zeno” and “prick named it Meditations, of course.”
Phil pushed his chair back from the table. “I’ve got to go get a book downstairs,” he said.
“Mmmhmm,” Techno said, not looking up. He kept going, switching between wikipedia’s citation page and the powerpoint. Some time later, he jerked back into reality, belatedly aware that there had been screaming in the library for a minute or more.
“A glorious dawn, a new day, a day of independence, a new and independent nation!” Someone announced from a floor down. He sounded on the verge of either laughter or tears—it was really hard to tell. Techno scrambled over to the edge of the balcony, hand already going to his earring as he looked down. There was a figure in a long colonial-style jacket and tricorn, pacing the open space. The doors of the library were barred by a big chain. People were huddling nervously in the corners.
“A new nation, a perfect nation,” the person said, at a normal volume, except that it seemed to carry by magical amplification. “And if it’s not perfect, this Revolutionary’ll blow it all up.” He ran a hand in a fingerless glove along a shelf, and where his hand touched the books turned into stacked TNT.
Well, that was enough of that. Hand on his earring, Techno turned around with his transformation phrase on his lips.
“Do you think we’ll get out of finals?” said an undergrad who was right there , part of a crowd of students pressing forward to see what was going on. Techno sighed and started elbowing his way past the crowd.
By the time the Blood God made it back to the centre of the library, most of the shelves on the first floor were stacked high with TNT, and the figure in the coat was starting to approach them with a lighter and great ceremony.
The Blood God threw a dagger, putting out the flame. “Nah,” he said. “None of that.”
Revolutionary turned to look at him. He was wearing a black half-mask under his tricorn, and a broad grin. “What’s this?” he said. “Dissent?” He crooked a finger. “Come closer.”
The Blood God stayed firmly where he was, hanging over the edge of the second floor balcony, thank you very much. He didn’t like the look of that glove. “Ever thought about running elections?” he offered. “You look like you’d enjoy a good election.”
The figure hopped up on a table and spread his arms wide. “An election? To be esteemed in the court of my peers? I am already there, I’m already motherfucking recognized. Do you see this coat? This hat? These stacks of TNT? I’ve been tried and tested by the gods themselves, and out of it I received these powers and nothing but pain from the universe, and I will be taking this miserable place with me!” He snapped the lighter again, and then stared into the flame for a moment.
So it looked like this was a villain to get monologuing, not to talk down. He needed to keep him occupied, and he’d really like to get him away from the explosives. Further into the library would be good.
“What’s that,” Revolutionary said on cue, whirling around and staring into the depths of the shelves.
“Hey, you didn’t think I worked alone, did you?” The Blood God told him. “Don’t you pay attention to the blogs?”
“I’m not on twitter,” the man in the coat said tersely, striding off into the shelves.
One of the students on the balconies snickered.
Okay, he deserved that. The Blood God jumped down to the first floor and followed the villain at a careful distance.
The trails of TNT on the shelves led down to the basement, where endless shelves stretched under humming lights. Revolutionary seemed to be keeping up a running commentary, several aisles ahead.
The Blood God saw a flash of green and black and turned. The Angel of Death was crouched in front of a shelf, looking at the books mournfully. The Blood God squinted at the titles. Why was his superhero buddy looking at the works of Marcus Aurelius? He tilted his head at the Angel, who spotted him looking, jumped slightly, and then flashed him a grin.
The sound of muttering was heard from several aisles over. The Angel pointed in that direction, pressed a finger to his lips, and then leapt across the aisle, wings gleaming. There was a thunk as Revolutionary reacted.
“Where are you?” the villain yelled. “What do you want?”
“Maybe he wants you to take a chill pill,” the Blood God called back as he edged forward. “Seems like you’re getting really worked up.”
“I am not worked up!” Revolutionary yelled. “This is a rational response to finals, and if it isn’t, I’m still the one with all the TNT, so I win! Wait.” He paused, an even bigger grin becoming audible in his voice. “You’re trying to distract me, which is clever, I’ll give you that.”
Blood God hurried forward, trying to stay silent as he moved. Revolutionary was standing in a little cove between shelves, transforming the books around him as he talked. He ran a hand along a shelf. “But if I just go forward with the goddamn plan, you’re stuck. You’re trying to keep me off-track.”
“Actually,” the Angel said, appearing at the end of an aisle. “I wanted to get you down here. Nice try, though. Death Watch ,” he said, and touched a shelf of rolled up posters with a hand suddenly seeping black energy. The shelf collapsed, magic bringing it to the point of death instantly, and the posters broke outwards in a wave, slamming into Revolutionary and burying him in cylinders. The villain vanished with a startled “eep” sound.
Blood God darted forward, throwing a hand out to catch whatever magic formed when he said Tactics .
A set of handcuffs fell into his hands. Blood God raised his eyebrows.
“Sometimes it’s not very creative magic,” the Angel contributed, shaking the shelf to knock more posters down on the villain. The man in the coat was making a miserable noise from under the cases. Something about the end of his career.
“Sometimes it’s not very creative, yeah,” Blood God said, grabbing one of Revolutionary’s arms and clicking the handcuffs into place.
“My great unfinished symphony, a grand percussion of violence,” Revolutionary said, miserable as he emerged.
“Bruh, I think you need some sleep,” the Blood God told him.
Once the akumatized object was destroyed (it was his hat), the butterfly cured (all the tnt turning back into books left a smell of dust and cordite in the air), the miserable junior student under the coat was escorted back up to the main floor (Blood God bought him a latte at the coffee kiosk, because he looked like he was on the verge of tears).
“I tried to start a new country,” the junior said miserably to, of all people, Tommy, who was holding his arm.
“I saw, big man. Fuckin’ pog country, too.” Tommy said soothingly.
“He tried to blow it up,” another freshman said to Tommy.
“So?” Tommy said indignantly. “Maybe it fuckin’ sucked.”
The junior made another miserable noise. “And it didn’t even work.”
The Blood God heard his phone start to go off from his backpack pocket. He’d had a timer set for the beginning of class. Oh boy. “I’ve got to go,” he said.
Techno slipped into class in the middle of a presentation by Squid Kid. They had so little time left. He tiptoed down the aisle, looking for a seat. There was one by Phil, who was rapidly scrawling out notes on several sheets of paper. Techno slid into place next to him and pulled out his laptop. Maybe Squid would go long on his presentation?
“And that’s why the book of Ecclesiastes, despite its age, actually presents a good philosophy for the modern age,” Squid said. “We are all dust in the eyes of the universe, it’s time to embrace that. Any questions?”
So he would have to type very fast. Techno swiped rapidly through the shared powerpoint. He got to where his slides had left off, but there were more there, now. Techno stared at the presentation, then glanced sideways at Phil. “Heh?” he said very quietly.
Phil looked up from his massively-highlighted list of notes and flashed him a thumbs-up. “Saw you were late,” he said under his breath. “Threw together an ending. Hope that’s okay?”
The random bullet points he’d had on the last slide were all now individual parts. Techno raised his eyebrows. “Well I’m not gonna delete these.”
“Didn’t get transitions done,” Phil whispered.
“Oh woe is us,” Techno said. “I’m deletin’ all your slides because of the lack of transitions, we’re definitely failin’ this, and it’s your fault.”
Phil flicked him in the shoulder. “Shut.”
“And next up, a team presenting on the Stoics,” the professor said in a forced-cheer voice. “Technoblade and Philza, if you would.”
Phil drained half his energy drink and handed the rest to Techno, who finished it. He gathered up his laptop and Phil folded his highlighted notes tiny in his hand.
“Let’s do this,” Techno said.
“So, downside, I did get distracted and started talking about Diogenes,” Phil said, as they emerged from the class. “Which the professor wasn’t keen on. Plus side, absolutely killed it on the questions about Diogenes, so overall I think we did okay.”
“Maybe not my best work.” Techno shrugged. “But I don’t need this class for my degree, so—“
“And now it’s fuckin’ done,” Phil said, satisfied. He pulled out his phone and looked at it. “Oh shit.”
“Mmm?” Techno politely made an inquiring nose.
“I fuckin’ forgot to eat lunch.”
“Oh,” Techno said, realising the same thing. He looked at Phil’s phone, which declared it to be four o-clock. “Hmmm.” He glanced in the vague direction of the dining hall. “Do you think they have dinner out yet?”
“The salad bar is usually stocked,” Phil offered. “I think I’m gonna try it.”
“Yeah but,” Techno waved a hand in a way he hoped would encompass the horrors of the dining hall salad bar.
“Aw, how bad could it be?” Phil grinned at him.
Techno found himself smiling slightly back. He raised his eyebrows. “Pretty bad. I have self-preservation instincts, so I’m going to go to the bookstore and get a coffee and one of their egg sandwiches.”
“Oh come the fuck on,” Phil said as they emerged outside. “One of the bookstore sandwiches? There’s no way that that’s better than whatever we can get at the dining hall.”
“Last time the only thing available was cottage cheese and grapefruit segments,” Techno said dryly. “I’m a growing boy, Phil.”
Phil laughed. “Okay, maybe. But usually there’s that weird pasta salad too—” He broke off suddenly as a boom rang out.
They both looked in the direction of the sound. A pillar of smoke rose from one of the residence halls, magic sparkles visible in the smoke. A brightly-coloured figure standing on a disk rose into the air, arms lifted. It was too far away to hear, but they appeared to be monologuing.
“Actually I just remembered that I have ramen in my dorm,” Phil said, starting to jog towards the residences.
“Yeah I think, I’m, I need to go water my cat,” Techno said. It looked like Phil was heading in the direction of the explosion, so he’d have to break off. He’d go turn into his superhero form in that stand of trees, and then he could head towards the disaster. “I’ll see you around!”
“Yeah, nice to work with you we should do this again sometime!” Phil yelled over his shoulder as he ran.
Phil seemed like a decent guy, maybe he would see if he wanted to hang out some time, Techno thought, heading for the trees. If he ever saw the guy again. He grabbed for his earring. Blood for the Blood God, he said, and magic washed over him. Tall boots and gloves swirled into being on his limbs, a crown and a mask fell into place on his head. A hand on his sword, he emerged as the Blood God and approached the scene of the villain’s chaos. The Angel of Death was already there, circling in the air.
The winged figured flipped him a salute. “You’re late.”
“Bruh, I am not late,” the Blood God told him, falling into banter with his superhero partner, like he always did.
“You’re both fucking late to Big Man Inc’s fucking debut— job— starter-thing.” the villain said. “I’m here and I’m gonna fuck things up and everybody’s gonna love me.”
“Your hat’s on backwards, mate.” the Angel told him.
“Huh?” Big Man Inc clutched at his head.
The Blood God laughed.