Chapter Text
It was the first day of school.
Rubika, known to most people around her as "Ruby", walked through the halls of her new high school.
Ruby had a secret, however.
She was magic.
Pulling off into a corner, she closed her eyes.
There had to be other students here who had magic too, right?
And soon, she could feel it.
A few other kids did have magic!
With a smile, she decided to approach them.
Ashlynn Rose set her pile of notebooks down and adjusted her black dress. It was the first day of school, and she was determined to make it a normal year.
That went out the window as soon as she was approached by a girl wearing green, who looked at her and said "hey, I know you have superpowers".
"Oh, I- I wouldn't really call them superpowers...it's a long story, I-"
"My name's Ruby, by the way. What about you?"
"A-Ashlynn Rose."
"Wanna join my girl group?"
"Your...girl group?"
"I'm making a secret club called The Wannabe Girls, but it's only for the girls in our grade that have powers. The rules are that you can't tell anyone else you have powers, we HAVE to meet up before school, after school, and at lunch every single day, and you can only use your powers for good. Wanna join?"
She thought for a moment. "Sure!"
"Really?"
"My parents always told me not to tell anyone about my abilities, but...I've kind of wanted more friends like me, you know? It's hard being alone."
"Yeah, sounds tough. Anyway, there's another girl here that has powers too, wanna go see if she'll join?"
"Of course!"
Lilac brushed her curly purple hair behind her and opened up her locker. It was the first day of school, and she was determined to make it a normal year.
That went out the door as soon as she was approached by a girl wearing green, who looked at her and said "hey, I know you have superpowers".
She squeaked. "How did you know-"
"It's cool, I've got them too. I won't tell anyone. I'm Ruby, and this is my new friend Ashlynn Rose. What about you?"
"Uh...Lilac."
"Wanna join our girl group?"
"Your girl group?"
"We're making a secret club called The Wannabe Girls, but it's *only* for the girls in our grade that have powers. The rules are that you can't tell anyone else you have powers, we HAVE to meet up before and after school and at lunch EVERY day, and you can only use your powers for good. Wanna join?"
"I don't know...no one else in my life except my boyfriend knows that I have powers. Not even my parents! I don't really even know how I got them, they just showed up one day over summer break last month."
"That's alright, you don't have to know. What's important is that you have them, so you might as well embrace it, right?"
"You're right." She grinned. "I'll join your girl group. It sounds fun. Just don't tell my parents, please!"
"We won't."
"Well, it's settled then. See you guys at lunch?"
"You know it!"
"Alright, so the first order of business..." Ruby had found the three of them a corner table at lunch that no one else was sitting at. "Tell me about your superpowers. I was born with them, my family has magic too, but I wanna know about you guys."
Ashlynn Rose went first. "Well...when I was a toddler...I pissed off some old neighbor lady, I guess I was playing outside too loudly or something...I guess she was a sorceress too, because after enough times like that...she cursed me."
"What kind of psychopath curses a toddler ?" Lilac asked in horror.
"I don't know, but from then on...any time I tried to speak or move, it'd send out a burst of magic...my bedroom got destroyed in minutes, and the rest of the house looked pretty rough within an hour too. My parents had no idea what to do, which I picked up on, and so I got scared to do just about anything. Eventually, though, after a few years of absolute torture...I got it under control. I learned how to only send out bursts of magic when I want to. But my parents, they were still disgusted by it, because it reminded them of what some asshole did to their 'little girl', so I'm not actually allowed to use my powers at home...or at all, ever."
"That's horrible!" Lilac told her. "Your powers are a part of you."
"I've...wanted to be more proud of them, but...it's just kinda hard, you know? Given the circumstances..."
"Completely understandable." Ruby turned her attention to Lilac. "What about you? You said that you have no idea how you got your powers, right? How can you just not know ?"
She looked down. "Before I was born...something awful happened to my parents. I don't really know the details, we're not allowed to talk about it at home, but I think that might be part of it...? Anyway, I can't even explain it. I was at the park one day, which I know I'm getting a little too old for, but no one else was there...so I just kinda sat down, pulled out my journal, and did some drawings...and I got thinking about this one time when I was a kid, where someone brought a bunch of bubbles to the park and let all the other kids run around popping them. But then, I looked down, and my journal was wet. And there were bubbles coming out of my hands."
"That must have been horrifying if you didn't know you had powers. So it's some kind of...water magic?" Ruby asked.
"Water and ice. Ice is pretty much just...water that's really really cold, so I guess it makes sense. I wanna tell my parents, I really do, but they already have so many problems...I-I don't mean that in a bad way, they're great parents! But they go through a lot, and I don't want to give them more to worry about...it's not their fault though, really, they don't want to involve me in their problems, but I ask a lot of questions and do a lot of snooping anyway and I- ...it's complicated, okay?"
"Sounds like it." Ruby turned her attention back to Ashlynn Rose. "So...what's your superhero name gonna be?"
"What-"
"Pretend you're gonna be a superhero, pretend you're gonna take your superpowers and fight crime. What would your superhero name be? Mine would be Rubika."
"Uh...I don't know, maybe Ros...aria? Rosaria?"
"That works. What about you, Lilac?"
She thought for a moment. "Eteria."
"Why Eteria?"
"My middle name is Etheldreda. It means 'noble strength'. And Eteria is just a shortened version of that. I had time to think about it while you were asking Ashlynn Rose."
"That's cool." Ruby nodded. "I think that someday, I'll be an actual superhero. Not because I wanna help people or anything, I just think it'd be cool to have an excuse to punch people and get famous for it."
"Ruby!" Lilac said with a scolding tone. "Why wouldn't you want to help people?"
"It's just too cliche...but so is being a supervillain. The only difference is that one will get me in juvie and the other will get people throwing roses at my feet. And I would not look good in a prison uniform. So I might as well be a hero instead."
"Well...I wanna be a hero like my parents." Lilac lowered her voice. "Between you and me, my parents are heroes too. Not superheroes in the same sense, but I want to be like them. They're really cool. What about you, Ashlynn Rose?"
Ashlynn Rose shrugged. "You guys are the first people who ever suggested my powers might actually be cool. I'm just gonna go along with whatever you guys do. You wanna fight crime? Cool. You wanna kill a man? Cool. I really don't have anyone better to hang out with, since my crush goes to a different school and all."
"Oooh, you have a crush? Ask them out!" Ruby told her.
"I don't know...she's way out of my league. She's tall, I mean like six feet tall...she's pretty...and she's way smarter than me. That's why she goes to that fancy private school, you know the one a few miles away? But she lives just across the street from me, so I see her all the time."
Before any of them could continue chatting, the bell rang.
"Dang it, it's time for class again..." Ruby sighed. "Good luck to you guys. See you after school?"
"Heck yeah!"