Chapter Text
Pin sat on the cold steps of her front porch, leaning back on her backpack, as the September breeze ran through her hair. It was her first day of high school, so she was a bit scared. She realised she was involuntarily fidgeting with her fingers. She was waiting for a friend of hers that she knew since middle school, when she moved from her home country to America. Her friend, Leafy, was part Mexican so she used to help her with speaking English. It still came in handy sometimes. Every day in middle school she would wait in front of her house for Leafy’s family to come pick her up. Her little brother, Seed, would always scream and throw tantrums in the car because he hated school. Why couldn’t she just take the bus, now that she’s older? That’s because Pin is too used to going with Leafy every day, so she really doesn’t want anything to change. So now that Pin was starting high school, she couldn’t help but wonder what was going to change. Leafy would find new friends and ditch her, Seed would stop throwing tantrums, Pin herself would change and become a completely different person. She tried not to think about it too much, in an attempt to convince herself she was just overthinking, but the thought still lingered.
She thought of the time Leafy told her “Things are destined to change anyway, Pin.”
“Wow Leafy, when did you become a philosopher?”
“I prefer poet!” Leafy said with a jokingly sophisticated air to her.
Pin burst out laughing.
From a distance she could already see a familiar car approaching her. It was Leafy!
She stood up and waved at the car, signalling that she (surprisingly) was already there so nobody had to ring the doorbell. She could see that Leafy’s mom was in the driver’s seat, and she waved back. Next to her was Seed, looking grumpy since he was starting school, but no visible tantrum. He looked at her then looked away, arms crossed. She opened the back seat door, and Leafy greeted her with a hug.
“Pin! it’s been so long!”
“I know right? It’s so good to see you again!”
Leafy’s mom said hello to her and tried to initiate some small talk.
“Are you guys ready for your first day of school? New friends, new teachers, a new beginning!”
Leafy’s mom was always the type of person to be overexcited sometimes. But Pin liked that about her. Now she knows where Leafy got that from.
“I’ll have to admit, I’m a bit worried, but I'm sure everything will turn out just fine! Right Pin?”
There we go, optimistic Leafy. Why was she friends with her again? Opposites attract, they always say.
“I guess so!”
The rest of the drive was spent in silence, but not an awkward one. It felt like their usual drive to school, and that’s exactly what Pin hoped for. She just wanted her and Leafy’s friendship to be exactly like it was in middle school.
They got dropped off in front of the school, and Leafy immediately turned to her with wide eyes.
“Pin. You. Have. No. Idea!!!”
“Oh my God Leafy you’re scaring me! What happened?”
“You know the guy that was in most of our classes last year?”
“The guy you were going crazy over because you wanted to talk to him?”
“Exactly! I found out his name is Firey, and he goes to this school too now!”
“What OMG that’s great Leafy! Wait, how did you figure out his name? Did you stalk him or something?”
“…I have my methods!”
They both started laughing until their stomachs hurt. Maybe not much was going to change after all, she hoped.
“OH EM GEE!! There he is!” Leafy exclaimed, pointing to a guy leaning on the wall, fixing his hair while talking to another guy.
“Leafy, this is your chance! If you go talk to him now, you’ve secured at the very least a friendship with him for the rest of the year!”
“Wait, you’re right! But I'm only going if you come with me!”
Leafy grabbed Pin’s hand and dragged her towards the two guys talking, without leaving her room to protest. Not like she was going to anyway…
Leafy stopped in front of the guy, Firey, and left Pin’s hand. He turned to look at her, and so did the other boy.
“Um. Hi.” Leafy started. “I’m Leafy, This is Pin.” She pointed at Pin, and she waved. “Do you remember us from last year? We were in most of your classes.”
“I think I do, I’ve seen you guys around. It’s nice to meet you.” Firey smiled.
“Well… uhh… you guys seemed pretty nice so would you maybe want to be friends?” Leafy was clearly trying to get this over with, due to how nervous she was. But Pin wasn’t even looking at them. The other guy had really caught her attention. He looked cool, but he also looked like a nice person. He looked exactly like her type. The guy caught her looking, and he smiled at her. Pin looked away, flustered.
“Yeah, sure. We can be friends.” Firey replied. Leafy sighed with relief.
The first period came around, and that meant it was time for icebreakers. She hadn’t really prepared one, so she decided she would just improvise on the spot. She said bye to Leafy and got into class. The first thing she saw was a group of students pooled around the teacher’s desk, looking at the seating plan. Pin made her way through the group of students to have a look herself. She found her name in one of the desks at the back of the class next to someone called… Coiny? “Okay, cool,” she said to herself. She looked at her new desk, and went to sit on it. She wondered who Coiny was. Well she was about to find out anyway, wasn’t she?
The guy that was with Firey earlier walked into the class a second later. That meant he was in her class, at least! She watched him take a glance at the seating plan and smile. He looked at her— wait. Why was he looking at her? That’s when Pin realised that he’s probably Coiny. He sat down next to her.
“Hey. I’m Coiny. You’re Pin, right?”
“Oh! Uh… Yes! I’m Pin.” She smiled at him.
“I’ve seen you around last year before. With Leafy? You guys are close, right?”
“Yeah, we are! What about you and Firey?”
“Oh… No, we aren’t close at all, actually. We hate each other.” He started laughing.
“What! Really?”
“Yeah. Back there, we were making fun of each other.”
“Seriously?” Now Pin was laughing, too. “You guys looked like best friends!”
That's when the teacher walked in. “Good morning class!”
Coiny looked at Pin and jokingly rolled his eyes. “I really hate icebreakers,” He whispered.
“Same!” She whispered back.
Everyone started taking turns to say their name and a so-called “fun fact” about themselves. Most people talked about hobbies and sports and stuff like that because it's what most people say anyway. Coiny said something about basketball, which she thought was weird since he was short as hell.
“Do you actually play basketball?” She whispered again.
“I know what you’re thinking. No I don’t. I just wanted to be funny.”
Pin started laughing before realising it was her turn.
“Umm… I’m Pin, I’m from Spain, and I like to ice skate.”
While others said their own icebreakers, Coiny talked to Pin again.
“You’re from Spain?”
“Yeah, I am. Came here before middle school.”
“I like your accent.”
“Really? Thanks.”
“You also ice skate?”
“Uhh… yes?”
“That was a lie, right?”
“It absolutely was.”
Suddenly, they heard an agitating, aggravating voice. It was the teacher.
“Coiny and whatsyourname! Quiet down before I send you both to detention!”
“Ooh, detention, so scary. Put me in jail already!” Pin said to Coiny after waiting a bit.
They both started laughing. Again.
Yeah, she was going to be fine this year.
At the end of class, Coiny turned to her.
“Can I see your schedule? I want to see if we have any classes together.”
“Sure!”
Coiny pulled out his schedule from his backpack, while Pin was struggling to find hers. She always did have a problem with losing things, but on the first day of school? That's a new low for her.
“Sorry… it has to be here somewhere… Oh! Found it.”
It was at the very bottom of her backpack. She took it out, a bit crumpled, but still usable. She’d already managed to ruin her schedule. Coiny grabbed it and started reading it.
“Oookay, we have chemistry together and… English too… Do we have the same classes? Pin, take a look at this!”
This looked straight out of a high school rom com. Pin read both of their schedules, and they had almost every class together.
“Woah! Well, that’s great!”
“I know, right?”
At this point, most people had left the classroom. They heard a voice from above them.
“Hey Coiny. You do basketball?” It was Firey. “Basketball for mice, maybe?”
“Oh shut up, you. The joke flew over your head.”
“Just like the basketball did because you’re too short to reach it.”
“Whatever. I’m outta here. See ya, Pin.”
“Bye!” Pin exclaimed as he walked out. She got up with her backpack on her shoulders, with full intentions of getting out of there too.
“Pin, right? I know it does look like I’m bullying him. But I’m not. We just ‘hate’ each other in that primary school rivalry way. So don’t take it the wrong way.” Firey said behind her.
“Okay, I guess,” She said to him while walking out of the door.
A few lessons passed, and she spent most of them talking to Coiny or zoning out completely. Lunchtime came around, and she went to sit at a table with Leafy. She lit up when she saw Pin, and waved.
“Pin! How’s it going?”
“LEAFY. You know the guy that was with Firey this morning?”
“Oh yeah, Firey told me that’s Coiny. They’re like, crazy enemies. That’s so not nice of them.”
“Yeah, well, he’s in most of my classes, and we just spent most of the time talking. He seems pretty cool. What about Firey? Did you get a chance to talk to him more?
“Yes, kinda, in the hallways, mostly. We don't have many classes together, actually.”
“That’s fine, you’ll have other chances to talk to him, right? Since you guys are friends now.”
That's when Firey decided to walk up to them. “Hey Leafy. Pin. Mind if I sit here? Coiny’s coming too, unfortunately for me.”
“Sure!”
“Mhm,”
He sat down next to Leafy. They were talking about something, but Pin wasn’t really listening. They were 100% going to get together in a few months max.
After a while, Coiny appeared.
“Hey guys! I’m gonna sit here.”
“Just like that? You don’t even give us a choice?” Firey said.
“What do you guys want to do then? Vote if I should sit here or not?”
“Oh, absolutely. It’s called democracy, Coiny. Power to the people.”
“Okay then. Raise your hand if you don’t want me to sit here.” He was already sitting down anyway, but he probably just found it funny. Only Firey raised his hand.
“Will you look at that? Apparently the majority is fine with me sitting here. Big thanks to democracy!” Coiny said, looking smug.
“Do you guys ever stop fighting?” Leafy complained.
“I don’t fight Firey. I just defend myself!”
“You do not!” Firey said back.
“Do too!”
“Just eat your food guys!” Pin said. She took a bite of her burger. “Eugh. This is disgusting. I take back what I said.”
“Oh come on Pin, did you expect a 5 star meal? I personally like it.” Leafy said.
“It’s better than the so-called ‘smoothies’ your brother made for us once.”
Leafy burst out laughing.
“Leafy, you have a brother? What’s his name?” Firey asked.
“Oh, his name is Seed. He’s 7.”
“I have a younger sibling too,” Coiny interrupted. “Her name is Penny. She’s 11.”
“Wow, I feel so left out. I’m an only child.” Firey said.
“Same, don’t worry. Not so left out anymore.” Pin laughed.
They spent the rest of lunch just talking and chatting, making fun of each other and whatnot. That was, until Pin suddenly heard a deafening BOOM.
“...Did you guys hear that?” She asked.
“Yeah, what was that?” Coiny replied.
“I didn’t hear anything.” Firey scratched his head.
“Me neither, actually… Are you guys hearing things or what?”
“No, Leafy, I swear I heard a boom!” Pin exclaimed.
“Same here… should we go check it out?” Coiny asked her.
“No. I’ll go.” She got up, and ran towards one of the classrooms, where she heard the noise come from. The relatively short hallway suddenly seemed endless. And then— BOOM. Another noise. And laughing? At this point she could tell she was getting closer. She stopped in front of a classroom. It had to be that one. The door was closed, so she tried to look into the keyhole first. She couldn’t see much, but she saw something moving in there.
“I’M GOING TO GET OUT OF HERE! GO ON, TRY TO STOP ME.”
Pin felt like she was about to pass out. That voice sounded like something out of this world, something that definitely couldn’t be natural. Was it an alien or something? She took a deep breath. She was about to do the most stupid thing she’s ever done in her life. She was going to open the damn door. Without thinking about it too much, she yanked the door open.
“Holy sh— … cow.”
There was a cage. A BIG cage. But that wasn’t the problem, although a cage bigger than two drumsets stacked on top of each other would’ve intrigued her anyway. The problem was the creature inside. They looked somewhat humanoid, but they were made out of pitch black scales and had two giant dragon-like wings growing out of their back. On their hands and feet grew claws, like a tiger’s. They looked at her and bared their fangs, giving her the world’s longest hiss. She might just have to sign them up for the Guinness World Records. That’s when she noticed. The creature was halfway out of the cage, and they just kept getting out more and more.
“Oh my God. Easy… Easy…” She tried.
“NOBODY CAN STOP ME!” At this point, they were fully out of the cage.
Now, Pin was always the kind of girl to love this kind of supernatural thing. The problem is that she only liked them when they were fictional.
So how did everyone in her favourite TV shows defeat a hybrid creature that could potentially kill her? Oh right, they had crazy powers and could just blast them to death. Maybe Pin had powers too. Very unlikely. When she was younger she convinced herself she had powers, so her mother decided to have a long talk with her about how it's “impossible”, crushing her hopes and dreams of becoming Ladybug. Well, now that she had this human-dragon-snake thing in front of her she wasn’t exactly sure what was deemed as “impossible” anymore.
The creature turned their head and stared straight at her, eyes widening.
“WHERE IS HE.”
“Uh…” Pin wasn’t sure if she should've answered the question or not. “Who is he?”
“THE ONE THAT TRAPPED ME.”
“I’m sorry, I don't exactly kno—”
She was cut off by a loud screech. The creature immediately pulverised, along with the cage. There was no more trace of them. Pin rubbed her eyes.
“What the hell just happened.”
“PIN!!!” She turned around. It was Coiny, who had apparently gone to look for her. “There you are! Where were you, anyway? Lunch is almost over!”
“Oh! Well, I just got a bit lost,” She lied.
“Did you figure out what that noise was? Leafy and Firey are still insisting that we’re hearing things.” He rolled his eyes, smiling.
“It was probably something outside, I guess.”
“Oh, good!”
The bell rang, and everyone started to hurry in the hallways to get to class so the teacher wouldn’t yell at them. Pin wasn’t in such a rush, after what she saw at lunch. She needed time to process everything. She checked her schedule, she had History, and she was in the same class as Leafy. She probably would’ve noticed her absence if she skipped. Thinking about it, she’d have slept through History anyway, so it didn’t make much of a difference. She pushed through an overflow of students toppling over each other and locked herself in a bathroom stall. She sank to the floor, recollecting everything she saw. A strange creature… Maybe a monster? Inside of a cage… Someone, a “he” had trapped them in there… They didn’t seem to want to hurt her… And then they just disappeared? Nothing made any sense. She thought she could enjoy her first day of school like a normal human being. Maybe Firey and Leafy were right, maybe she was hearing and seeing things. But Coiny had heard it too, apparently. Was their school haunted? Were she and Coiny having a collective hallucination, if that’s even a thing? She had so many questions, but no answers at all.
“...Pin?”
“Leafy?”
She stood up, still inside the stall.
“Are you skipping class? That’s not very nice.”
“No! No, I’m not. I was… uh… feeling a bit sick. It’s nothing.”
“Oh… okay then. You know, History is sooo boring. I pretty much only asked for the bathroom to pass time and to see if I could find you.”
“Yeah… I imagined it would be boring.”
“So you are skipping!”
“Am not!”
“Are too!”
“I told you, I just felt a bit unwell.”
“Okaaay, sure!”
She could hear Leafy’s footsteps, meaning she went back to class. She always was a goody two-shoes. She didn’t expect her to change much over the years in the first place. She’s just not that kind of person.
She heard footsteps again, two pairs of heels clanking towards the bathroom. And she could smell cherry lip gloss. Not a good sign.
“Oh-em-gee Matchy, did you hear what happened at lunch?”
She knew that voice all too well. It was Pencil. During all three years of middle school, Pencil had spent her time with her little friend group with a stupid name to make Pin’s life a living hell. One day she snapped, and beat up two of the girls in her friend group, Ruby and Book. That’s when they started hating each other even more.
“No, Pence-pence, like, what happened?”
“Like, remember Pin? From, like, middle school?”
“Yeah, like, duh.”
“I heard she was, like, seeing things in a classroom.”
Holy pin factory, they were talking about her.
“She goes to, like, our school?”
“Unfortunately, yeah.”
“You do know that now we, like, have something to make fun of. Like, about her.”
“Oh-em-gee Matchy, you’re so, like, right!”
The scent of cherry lip gloss got fainter and fainter, as did the sound of their footsteps. Pin sunk to the floor again, knees to her chest, trying to squeeze herself in the limited space of the stall. There was no way Pencil and Match went to her same school again. The same girls that caused her so much unnecessary pain until that year. She had hoped that maybe they’d change in high school, that she’d never have to see them again. But she was wrong. First, she sees a monster in a classroom, and next, she overhears the girls who used to bully her. Well, she had been pretty mean to them too, but that didn’t really change much. She heard the bell ring, a sound that in that moment felt deafening. She forced herself out of the stall, and attended the rest of her classes sleeping through them. She knew she was going to have a bad reputation with the teachers because of that, but she had bigger problems on her mind. When the final bell rang dismissing them for the day, it felt like freedom. “Finally,” She sighed. At the exit, she met up with Leafy, Firey and Coiny.
“Hey guys!” She called out.
“Hey Pin!” Leafy greeted. The other two guys waved at her.
“We were thinking about exchanging numbers,” Coiny said. “You know, to keep in contact, make a group chat—”
“I am not going to be in a group chat with Coiny.” Firey argued.
“I’m adding you anyway. What do you think, Pin?”
“Okay, sure!”
“Here, I have a piece of paper with everyone’s number, including mine. I’m sure you already have Leafy’s, though.”
He handed her a crumpled up piece of paper from his notebook.
“Thanks! I’ll see you guys tomorrow then!”
“See ya, guys!”