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“Rizbert!” says Fig over video call during lunch. “I have a huuuuuge favor to ask you.”
Riz rubs the bridge of his nose and closes his eyes. “No, Fig. Why aren’t you here?”
“That’s what I’m calling about! I need you to go to class for me.”
“What? No, that’s stupid! Go to class yourself! Remember, now that we’re in a pass-fail system, if you fail your class and get expelled, then all of us are screwed!”
“I know, I know, and that’s why you need to show up as me so I don’t fail! See, today there’s mandatory attendance in bard class, and if I don’t show up I’ll fail!”
“Then! Show! Up!”
“I’m in Leviathan right now. It’s Ayda’s birthday and I promised I’d spend the whole day with her!”
Riz can feel his blood pressure spike. “You’re going to jeopardize my entire future for kisses?!”
“You’ve got this! I’ll just zip over there, Polymorph you into me, and zip back here before Ayda notices I’m gone!”
“Just. ‘Zip.’ Over. Here. And stay!” he bites off through gritted teeth.
“No can do!”
“And what about my class, huh?” he hisses.
“I know that you have your rogue class that period and the whole point is to not be seen. What better way to hide than be disguised as someone else!” she says, waggling a finger at the camera.
“Don’t bother bringing any sort of logic into this, because it’s absurd, asinine, insane!”
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes~!” she says, chipper as ever, and ends the call.
“She’s going to be the death of me,” Riz says to no one as he stares at the Call End screen. “I’m going to die of a heart attack at age seventeen and it’ll all be her fault!”
Fifteen minutes later Fig finds Riz in the library where he’s been studying while inconspicuously eating lunch. “Hey, nerd, ready to be cool for once?”
“I’m not going to do this-!”
“Yes you are, because you’re my friend and I really, really need this favor. I will owe you, like, ten thousand times back. Plus you’re going to do it anyway.”
Riz’s shoulders sink. “Yeah, I’m going to do this anyway.” Resigned, he stands up and holds his arms out in a T-pose. “Go on, do your thing,” he sighs.
“Aw, Riz, you’ll have fun as me, I guarantee it!”
“It’s only for an hour, it’s only for an hour,” he mutters to himself as the cinnamon-spice kick of Fig’s magic tingles all over his body as the magic wraps itself around him, transforming his very molecules into those of Figueroth Faeth.
Fig looks over her duplicate and nods her head. “Looks perfect. Alright, I’ll see you later, ‘Fig!’ Have fun! Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!” She pauses. “Oh! And here’s my bass!” she says, thrusting the instrument into Riz’s hands.
“Why would I need your-” he starts, but he’s cut off as she vanishes, teleporting away to Leviathan and leaving Riz standing uncomfortably in someone else’s skin.
“Ok, I’m a bard, I’m a bard, I’m a bard,” Riz repeats to himself as he paces inside the bard classroom, waiting for the bell to ring and class to start. “But that doesn’t matter, because I’m just a face in the room today.”
“Hey, Fig, nervous about today?” asks an elf girl who steps into the room.
“What? Why’d I be nervous?” Riz asks, trying to not make his voice squeak.
“The demonstrations today, of course!”
“...Of course,” he says weakly. “‘Scuse me, but I’ve got to make a quick call before class starts.”
“No time, girlfriend, here comes Ms. Lucilla,” she says as the bell rings.
“Fuck.”
“Oh, Figueroth!” says Lucilla as she checks names off of a list. “You actually showed up! Oh, I could weep!”
“Please don’t,” Riz replies.
“Well, before you run away from me again, I’ll have you go first.”
“...Seriously?”
Lucilla flinches. “Does it upset you to go first? Will you leave if you go first?”
Riz waves his hands in front of him, flustered by the conversation and the overall mopeyness of the teacher.
“N-No! It's fine! First is fine!”
Lucilla claps her hands together. “Wonderful! I’ve always wanted to hear the world-famous Figueroth Faeth perform!”
“Oh boy, wait until you hear this,” Riz mutters under his breath as he steps into the middle of the class, the Infaethable Bass in his hands. “I’m a bard, I’m a bard, I’m a bard,” he repeats to himself like a mantra.
“If you could play the spell on the sheet in front of you, please,” instructs Lucilla, taking a seat front and center of the room.
Riz looks down at the music sheet in front of him and squints; runes and music notes both occupy the sheet and while he recognizes the notes from his time in the Music Theory Club, the runes baffle him. Well, time to do what he knows and secure Fig a passing grade in her class.
He finds his fingering on the frets and plucks out a single note. It’s deep and low, just like a bass should sound like. And then his dextrous fingers fly across the neck of the bass, plucking the strings and creating music. He can hear it, the song of the spell, and he plays with all his heart, his fingers expertly picking out the notes he needs. He gets lost in his playing, and he begins to noodle away on the bass, improvising as he closes his eyes and gets lost in his playing. At last Riz finishes his playing, panting, and looks up expectantly to see a small thundercloud appear before him. It farts instead of a thunderclap, and then not a single other sound is heard.
Everyone looks blown away in the worst sense; sure, the song he had played wasn’t bad, but it was awkward and stilted, a result of Riz’s lack of charisma.
“Well,” says Lucilla, glancing down at the clipboard in her hands. “That was certainly… musical. Yes, very musical indeed, Figueroth. Exceptional skill with the shredding, I must say, but you’ve completely missed the assignment, I’m afraid. You were supposed to cast a Major Illusion spell at a fifth level, but you gave us a, er, ‘Thunderclap.’ As such, I shall have to give you a…”
Riz holds his breath, his heart is in his throat, his blood pressure once again spiking. This was it, he’d failed Fig and therefore himself…!
“A ‘D.’”
Riz punches the air and whoops. “D’s get degrees, that’s all I care about!”
“Yes, well, I expect better from you next term,” says Lucilla, but Riz doesn't care. He’s out the door and on his crystal, calling Fig to chew her out.
“How’d it go, ‘Fig?’” she asks when she picks up.
“You. Had. An Evaluation. Today!” he snarled through his teeth, eyes aflame.
“Can you forgive me? I knew you’d say ‘no’ if you knew!”
Riz hisses into the phone before hanging up, causing Fig to wince. “I’ll take that as a ‘no.’”