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Frak stared at the ceiling. Again. It’d become routine at this point. All cozied up, tired from a long day of training, yet he was wide awake the second his scales brushed his pillow and his eyes met the plain ceiling once again. Frak knew why he had this problem, he was just too shy to admit it. You see, during the first few weeks Frak resided in the monastery, he’d developed a bit of a crush on Sora, one of his fellow ninja trainees. Most of the time he spent around her he tried to act cool and smart. When asked about this, he said he was trying to not seem like he wasn’t just Ras’s stooge. While that was partly true, it was also in an attempt to impress Sora. After all, she was one of if not the smartest members of the team (at least in Frak’s eyes) and he thought the only way to get Sora to like him back was to impress her by acting like he knew what he was doing, even though he was internally panicking whenever he was around her. He’d had the same issue of sleepless nights when Sora was still in the monastery, but those were caused by Frak panicking and overanalyzing every interaction he’d had with Sora that day, and dying of embarrassment any time he’d try to get her attention by grabbing her arm instead of talking to her. He truly was a hopeless case.
Naturally, when one loses sleep over a long period of time, it will affect you in the daytime. Today however, Frak was feeling extra tired. And unfortunately for him, it was showing in his training.
“Frak, are you okay? You seem a little…” Frak quickly shot up just before his head smacked on the table. “out of it.” Kai finished.
“Huh? Me? Oh- uh- I’m fine! Totally! There’s nothing to worry about, why wouldn’t I be fine? I’ve been getting plenty of sleep and totally haven’t been staring at the ceiling for hours on end!” Frak knew Kai heard through his lie the second it came out of his mouth. Kai raised an eyebrow, giving him an “are you sure?” look. “Okay, maybe I have been losing some sleep recently, but not much! I am totally fine, fine as a Friday night- man I am a really bad liar.” Frak said, shivering at his cringey world play.
“Do you wanna talk about it?” Kai asked.
“I mean, if it helps, yeah. But you have to promise not to tell anybody.”
“Why would I-“
“Promise?”
“Fine, I promise, now chill.”
——————————————————————————
They were now sitting at an old table they’d found amongst one of the many piles of lost things. They both picked a piece of junk that looked like you could sit on it, positioning themselves across from each other.
“So, what’s troubling you?” Kai asked, resting his elbows on the table and folding his hands.
“Well…” Frak took a deep breath. “I… may or may not have… a bit of a crush on Sora…” at that point Frak was barely whispering.
“What was that?” Kai asked.”
“I said I may or may not have a CRUSH ON SORA!” This time it came out way louder than he intended. Thankfully the finders were in the rookery, helping Geo bake, meaning only Kai was there to catch his confession.
“What?! You and- I mean- congratulations???” Frak looked at Kai deadpanned. “What? What was I supposed to say?”
“I dunno, give me advice?”
“Trust me, you do not want advice from him.” Cole walked over to them, standing beside Kai.
“Uh, excuse me? I have lots of experience with this.” Kai said, stroking his hair.
“Yeah, lots of experience in being no contact.” Kai’s face turned red and he punched Cole in the arm.
“We were talking. I mean, we haven’t really since the merge, but that’s better than you could do! When was the last time you spoke to Vania? Huh? What about her?”
“You know very well I was aware of my preferences when I met Vania. And besides, she said to only contact her for emergencies. We were always just friends.” Kai looked defeated after that.
“Well, who else is he supposed to talk to?” Kai asked, motioning to Frak.
“I could talk to Lloyd-“
“DON’T!” Kai and Cole both yelled simultaneously.
“Why not? I’m sure he-“ Frak was cut off by Kai grabbing his shoulders.
“Listen to me.” Kai was staring into Frak’s soul. “If you want to live to see tomorrow, do NOT ask Lloyd for dating advice.”
“W-why not?” Frak asked, practically trembling from intimidation.
“He… hasn’t had the best experience with women.” Cole said, scratching his head.
“What, catfished one too many times?”
“Something like that.” Kai said.
“Could I talk to Nya instead?” Frak asked.
“I mean, she gives good advice, and is probably the best person to talk to.”
“If you wanna know what a woman wants, talk to a woman.” Kai chimed in.
“But one, she’s off on a mission right now, and two, accompanying her on said mission is uh…” Cole trailed off.
“Oh- yeah, that’s… not the best idea.” Frak said, realizing she might not want to brush the subject of romance at the moment.
“Just talk to me. I give great advice.” Kai said once again.
“Great is a bit of an overstatement.” Cole said, pulling up another makeshift chair beside Kai.
“Well, in order to impress a woman, you gotta act cool. Say something smart sounding about a subject. Then you’ll look cool, like you know what you’re talking about.” Kai said.
“But I’ve been doing that- at least, I was.”
“And?”
“I’m pretty sure that only made her hate me even more.”
“Hate is a strong word. Sora is just a little… on edge.” Cole said.
“You know who we’re talking about?” Frak asked, panicked, wondering who else heard.
“I heard you yell Sora’s name five minutes ago, so I assume that’s who we’re referring to?”
“Ok, well, my next piece of advice is to talk about yourself a lot, that way she can get to know you!” Kai said.
“That’s not- no…” Cole sighed.
“I would talk to her, but she’s currently who knows where doing who knows what!” Frak said, now panicking, worrying about her current whereabouts.
“Okay, first off, don’t listen to him, he really doesn’t know what he’s doing. Second, you need to understand that Sora’s fine, wherever she is.” Cole said.
“You really think so? She’s with Ras. If she’s accepting training from him, who knows what kind of torture she’s going through. I should know, I’ve experienced how brutal he can be firsthand.” Frak said, recalling his experience training under Ras. His time away allowed him to reflect, leading to the epiphany that Ras’s techniques were messed up. The physical and verbal abuse, it made Frak shiver imagining Sora going through that.
“Well, one, you don’t know Sora if you think she’d accept training from Ras. Two, you have to remember that she chose to go with them to keep an eye on Arin, and make sure he’d be okay. Sora can handle herself. If anything goes wrong with Ras, she and Arin will bolt at the first given opportunity.” Cole said reassuringly.
“Yeah! She’s really tough. And smart! She’ll instantly recognize when something is fishy with Ras.”
“I guess you guys are right.”
“I’m always right! Especially when it comes to dating advice.” Kai winked, causing Cole to roll his eyes.
“Speaking of which, the best thing to do is be yourself. If Sora’s the one for you, she’ll like you for you. That’s all it takes.” Cole said.
“Is that how you and Geo got together?” Kai teased, making Cole’s face turn a beet red.
“Speaking of which, I should go check in with him before he burns down the kitchen.” Cole hurried off back to the rookery.
Meanwhile, in a far off part of the merged lands…
“Achoo!”
“Sora, that’s the eighth time you’ve sneezed today.” Arin said.
“What, you keeping track?” Sora asked.
“Just trying to pass the time. I wonder which one of the ninja is talking about you.” Sora couldn’t help but roll her eyes.