Title: Fairy Tales
Author: Bri
Rating: Teen for now, although that may change in the future
Summary: After the events of Homecoming, it's obvious that some changes have to be made. Of course, not everyone may adjust to the idea of change so quickly. And just because Royal Pain has been defeated doesn't mean others won't follow her example. If four traitorous students went unnoticed, who says there can't be more?
Disclaimer/Author's Note: I own nothing! Nothing at all! And, also, although the story starts out exploring the aftermath of the movie, eventually a couple of OCs will be added. And, most likely a long way down the road, there will probably be a canon/OC romance or two. If that's not for you, then you can read until the OCs come in or just stop reading right now. Figured I'd just warn you ahead of time. Also! Flames suck. I do welcome constructive criticism, though.
Chapter One
Homecoming had definitely been interesting. Will kind of doubted any other homecoming would be able to live up to this one, but he didn't regret any of it. Not even being an idiot and taking Gwen – Royal Pain – into the Secret Sanctum and giving her a chance to steal the Pacifier. After all, if that hadn't happened, Will wouldn't have actually gone to homecoming. He wouldn't have gotten to kiss Layla, or to dance with her without their feet even touching the ground. Literally. Other people could say dancing with someone made them feel like they were flying, but he could actually do it. He smiled to himself, thinking of how strangely right kissing her had felt. Layla had been his best friend forever, he had sort of figured the transition to, well, whatever they were now would have been weird.
But it wasn't. It was just something that seemed like it had always been there, and he had just been too oblivious to see it until now. Which, really, was exactly how it was. And it wouldn't have happened if the whole thing with Royal Pain hadn't happened. Well, maybe it would have happened, but definitely not the way it did. And besides, saving the school? Not something Will was completely against. They all made a great team. Will hoped the school recognized that. They had to see that sidekicks were underrated now.
Thinking back on it, Will couldn't really imagine anyone he'd rather have known was on his side during the whole thing. Even Warren. Without the stupid Royal Pain situation, he and Warren might never have become friends. That thought made Will pause, for a moment making the smile fade from his lips. They were friends, right? Teaming up to save the school from an evil psychopath meant Warren was definitely part of their group now. Okay, so that had been a stupid question. Of course they were friends. Warren was one of them, now, whether he'd like it or not.
The smile returned, turning into a bit of a grin. Will had a feeling Warren would protest being pulled into their group. He had seemed a bit irritated that Will's friends wouldn't stop talking to him, after all. But Will had an insider's view of Warren, now. He may not know him all that well, not yet, but he knew Warren was a good person. And he knew there was no way he, or the others, were going to just let Warren go back to sitting alone at his table. He wondered if Warren knew that, or if he would be surprised when they all sat with him at lunch on Monday.
No, screw that, they should get together before Monday. Will had been half planning on calling people tomorrow – or actually, today, as a glance at the clock told him that it was just past one AM – and seeing if they wanted to come over and, well just hang out. Maybe swap ideas on what the school was going to do about having a bunch of villains in their midst. Honestly, no matter what Layla said, Will still felt guilty for being a jerk about the whole hero thing. And plus, he had missed his friends. The people Gwen had wanted him to spend time with weren't nearly as fun as they were. And Layla and the others had been the ones who had stuck by him, while Gwen had…well, yeah, been an evil old lady. Which was still so gross.
Of course, there was the whole problem of Will not knowing Warren's number. It hadn't exactly been on the top of Will's mind earlier that night. Will had just been slightly giddy that everything had turned out the way it did. And possibly a little shook up over the whole near death thing. If he hadn't inherited his mother's power…Okay, that was not even worth thinking about.
Anyway. Back to the phone number thing. Maybe Layla had it, even if Warren taking her to homecoming had only been to make Will jealous. Will doubted any of the others had it, but he could always ask. Well, if all else failed, they could always just go to the Paper Lantern and see if Warren was working. Even if he wasn't, they had to have his phone number, right? Then again, they probably wouldn't be likely to give out one of their employee's numbers. Well, even if they couldn't get a hold of Warren, hanging out at the Paper Lantern wouldn't be bad at all. Will still didn't like Chinese food, but the place itself was growing on him.
He rolled over in his bed, eyeing the clock and wondering if Layla or any of the others were still awake. They had only gotten home a little over an hour ago, after all. Despite his semi-invulnerability, though, Will was tired, so he figured the others would be exhausted. He could call them in the morning. For now, he had to get his brain to stop thinking so he could sleep. He could almost hear one of the others commenting that that shouldn't be difficult for him, but he ignored it and curled up under the covers, firmly planting the thought of sleep in his mind.
Warren Peace didn't have friends. It was a fact, not one that necessarily made him happy, but a fact all the same. Occasionally, people would reach out to him, but they were never the right kind of people. They were never people he could ever imagine himself being friends with. They were people like Lash and Speed, who counted on him being just like his father and wanted his help tormenting people who were weaker. Warren may have been anti-social, he may have been better at avoiding or fighting people than having meaningful conversations, but he wasn't a bully. Then there were the people who thought that by sitting with him, they'd improve their own image. That everyone would consider them tough and bad-ass as well, just by the company that they kept. And of course, there were always the girls (and sometimes guys) who saw him as something broken and were kind enough to try and fix him. None of them lasted very long.
He didn't really need friends, anyway. He might have wanted them sometimes, when he realized that his days consisted of doing homework, working, and talking to his mother, but he didn't need them. It was a lot easier without them, really. He didn't have to work at maintaining relationships, or worry that his behavior was upsetting anyone, or risk losing anyone. It may have been a kind of a pessimistic view, but it worked.
Or well, he thought it worked. But somehow, he hadn't been able to avoid getting drawn in with Stronghold and his friends. It only figured, that the son of the people who had put his father in jail would end up being the reason that Warren had the closest things to friends he had had in a long time. Well, maybe now that Will had stopped being a jerk, the others would go back to hanging out with him and would leave Warren alone. Warren wasn't entirely sure how he felt about that, but he was mostly expecting it to happen.
So he was almost surprised when the phone rang at a little after eleven the morning after homecoming. Warren hadn't gotten to bed until after three am the night before, so he had still been mostly asleep when his mom knocked on his door and told him he had a phone call. Warren hadn't been sleepy enough to miss the slightly surprised pleasure in her voice, something that made him feel almost guilty as he rolled out of bed and grabbed for his phone.
"Hello?" he asked, vaguely satisfied at hearing that his voice sounded mostly awake and alert.
"Hey, Warren, it's Will," came the entirely too cheerful greeting.
Warren resisted the urge to smack him or toss a well placed fireball. It helped that Will wasn't actually in the room. "Hi."
"Are you working tonight?" Will asked.
Warren blinked, rubbing sleep from his eyes. "No. Why?"
"Oh, good! We're all getting together tonight at my house. Order pizza, watch bad movies, whatever," Will said.
"That's nice," Warren commented. He had a feeling he knew where this was going, and he was not going to go hang out at Will's place.
"Yeah, it is," Will agreed, apparently not getting it. "Figured we could use a break after homecoming. Everyone's coming over around four, can you make it?"
"I don't know," Warren said noncommittally, then paused. "How'd you get my number?"
"Phone book," Will replied, sounding a bit sheepish. "It didn't occur to me, but Ethan told me to look it up."
Warren snorted.
"I heard that," Will said, then moved right back on to the previous subject. "If you can't get a ride, we can come pick you up."
"Stronghold," Warren started, but there was a scuffling sound and brief murmured voices before he could finish.
After a few moments, Layla came on the line. "Hey Warren, Layla here. You realize we're not taking no for answer?"
Warren didn't say anything, and she must have taken his silence as agreement.
"Great," Layla said cheerfully. "You need a ride?"
"No," Warren replied, giving in. "I can get over there."
"Awesome," she told him. "Here's Will, he'll give you directions."
Ten minutes later, Warren hung up the phone and figured he might as well start trying to get used to having friends.
Surprisingly, Warren wasn't the last one to show up. He wasn't even the second to last one. Ethan arrived a few minutes after he did, and Magenta a little bit after that. Will and Layla had set up bowls of popcorn, chips, and pretzels and bottles of soda on the coffee table in the living room, and there was a stack of DVDs next to a couple of board games and a few decks of cards. They had dragged in an extra sofa from somewhere so there was enough room for all of them.
Warren sat down on the end of one of the couches and Ethan promptly joined him, although he left enough space that Warren didn't have to immediately request that he move. Will and Layla took up another couch while Zack and Magenta claimed the last one.
"Where are your parents, Will?" Ethan asked.
"At a real estate convention," Will replied. "For now, anyway."
"For now?" Zack repeated.
"Yeah, it's a Saturday night, they'll probably get an emergency call soon," Will said. "Either way, they'll be gone for awhile."
Warren couldn't help but feel slightly relieved. He may have felt almost comfortable hanging out with them like this, but he wasn't really ready to face Will's parents. There was a moment of silence, and Warren had the sudden unnerving feeling that they all figured what he was thinking.
Then Will held up a paper pizza brochure. "So! Who wants what on their pizza?"
Once the pizza was ordered, there was a brief skirmish over what movie they were going to watch first, then they finally settled on Mirror Mask. Magenta cheerfully described it as a movie on crack, and Ethan said it was a cult classic. Layla loved it and Will agreed that it was good, although how much of that was his own opinion and how much was because Layla was beaming over it was up for grabs. Warren and Zach, who hadn't seen it before, exchanged wary glances but went along with it.
It started out slow, but by the time the pizza came, they argued quickly about who would have to get up until Ethan grabbed the remote and paused the movie. Feeling sheepish, Will padded over to pay the girl delivering the pizza, grinning slightly at the look on the girl's face when he easily balanced the four pizza boxes in one hand and offered her the money with the other.
When the movie had ended and the pizza was more or less gone, Will stretched and glanced around at his friends.
"What's on your mind, Will?" Layla asked.
"I dunno," Will replied. "Well, school."
"Hmm," Magenta said. "I vote we not think about school. It's Saturday night, I don't have to think about school for at least another twenty-four hours."
"Yeah, I like that idea," Zach agreed. "Least they didn't give us any homework this weekend."
"If they had given us homework after Homecoming, I would have refused to do it," Magenta replied.
"Not homework school," Will said. "School school. What do you guys think they're gonna do about Homecoming?"
"Pretend it didn't happen?" Magenta suggested.
"They can't do that," Ethan said. "Sky High was almost destroyed. And it was because they had traitors in their own school, they have to do something about that. For all we know, there could be more."
"No way," Layla told him. "If there were more on Royal Pain's side, they would have helped her at Homecoming."
"They don't have to be on her side," Warren spoke up. "If one person thought of going undercover at Sky High, more might have. Or more might follow her example."
Will grimaced. "You have a point. Who knows, people might have thought of it before her. We've had super hero schools for a long time, she might not have been the first person to want a super villain school."
"Even if there are more people at Sky High who are really villains, what are the teachers going to do about it? Interview us all one by one?" Zach asked. "Bring in telepaths or something to read our minds?"
"If they did, I doubt they'd tell us about it," Magenta said.
"They'd have to, wouldn't they?" Layla asked. "They can't read our minds without our consent."
"Sure they could," Magenta told her. "As long as no one found out."
"Yeah, but some of the students are telepaths. They'd notice," Layla said.
"Student telepaths aren't going to be able to pick up adult telepaths," Zach replied. "The adults are way more trained. And powerful."
"Well, they wouldn't notice them just being there, but some of them would notice if anyone was trying to read their minds," Ethan told them. "So they'd have to at least tell us they were doing mental scans. They wouldn't have to say why, though."
There was a moment of silence as they all considered that, then Layla asked, "You guys think they'll do anything about the sidekick thing?"
Magenta snorted. "Why would they?"
"Because a bunch of sidekicks just saved their lives?" Layla replied.
"I wouldn't count on anything, hippie," Warren told her. "They might promote you all to hero or something, but I don't think the whole system's going to change after one battle."
"One huge battle that almost took apart their whole system," Layla pointed out.
"Which might have been avoided if the whole sidekick assignment didn't exist in the first place," Will agreed. "Royal Pain might not have been so pissed off if she hadn't been labeled a sidekick. And more people might have decided to help if they had hero training. Obviously not everyone's as brave as you guys."
"Or stupid," Zach added, but he, and the rest of the sidekicks, were smiling in a 'thanks for noticing now shut up' way.
"Okay, that's enough school talk," Magenta said, leaning over to look through the DVDs. "Time for another movie."
Monday morning, just after everyone had arrived at their normal class, an announcement sounded asking everyone to report to the school gym for an assembly. Magenta, Zach, Ethan, and Layla searched for Will and Warren as they walked towards the gym, but the hero classes were closer to the gym and were probably already in there. Sure enough, when they went in through the doors and stood a little bit off to the side to scan the bleachers, they spotted Will making his way up to the top, where Warren was sitting. Will must have been looking for them, too, because he paused briefly to wave at them until they started up as well.
Warren was surrounded by his usual berth of empty seats, but they decided to pretend like he had been saving them seats and all plopped around him. Warren stared at them for a moment, then apparently accepted that they wouldn't be moving and lifted his hand in a wave.
"Hi guys," Will said cheerfully, and the others gave various greetings of their own before turning their attention to the group of teachers gathered together at the side of the gym.
"Guess they are doing something about homecoming, after all," Magenta commented.
"You think that's what this is going to be about?" Zach asked.
"What else would it be about?" Magenta said, giving him an 'you're an idiot' look.
Zach shrugged. "Coach Boomer's finally realized his passion in life isn't teaching gym, it's ballet and is retiring to try and make it on Broadway?"
"Broadway is musicals, not ballet," Layla told him.
"Yeah, well, they both have dancing," Zach said. "Close enough."
Will glanced over at Boomer and tried to imagine him in a leotard, dancing and singing. And then really, really wished he hadn't. "Thanks for the bad mental images, Zach."
Zach grinned. "No problem, Will."
Warren followed Will's gaze, then shuddered. "That was something I could have lived without."
"Man, I got Will and Warren. I'm on a roll," Zach commented cheerfully.
"Hey, Principal Powers is starting," Ethan told them.
Sure enough, the principal had separated herself from the other teachers and had stopped in front of the podium set up at the center of the gym. She waited until people had stopped talking, then said, "By now, I'm sure many of you know what transpired during Homecoming, whether or not you attended. Undoubtedly, though, the events have not quite managed to spread to everyone's attention. For those of you whom this is old news, please bear with me. Sky High was attacked. In fact, it was very nearly destroyed," she paused for a moment until the people who had started murmuring had settled down. "I apologize for the abruptness, but it is the best way to make you see how serious the situation is."
"Yeah, because none of us realized how bad it was when it was actually happening," Magenta muttered under her breath.
"Shhh," Ethan said.
"- the actions of a few of your fellow students that saved our school," Principal Powers was saying. Although she didn't name them, many of the students turned to sneak looks at the group. "Sadly, it was the actions of other students that placed Sky High in jeopardy in the first place. And that is the reason for this assembly. You students are here to be taught how to use your powers for the good of mankind. How to be heroes. It seems, though, that our current methods of teaching are not entirely successful. We have realized that it might be time to re-evaluate our curriculum. And yes, that means the school, and your classes, will be undergoing some changes."
This time, the murmuring was louder, and Boomer finally had to shout for silence before Principal Powers could continue.
"We don't expect you to have to jump into things. You will continue your classes as normal for the remainder of the semester. This should give you a bit of time to adjust to the idea. At the beginning of the new semester, you will go through power testing receive your new class schedules," Principal Powers paused for a moment, looking over the students. "I realize this may be difficult for many of you, but I expect you all to remember that heroes will have to be ready for unexpected changes and deal with this accordingly." There was another pause to let this sink in, then she nodded. "All right, dismissed. You may all return to your classes now."