The stairs to the main building of Riverdale High looked smaller this year, more crowded, filled with unfamiliar faces, bight eyed, hopeful freshman and almost an entire school's worth of transfer students. You could tell immediately who they were, if it wasn't their outward appearance, Betty could see it in their facial expression, not one of them wanted to be here. She could understand it to a point, forced of the school they've known their whole lives and made to travel an extra 15 minutes or even maybe 45 minutes for some. Betty sighed as she watched it all unfold from the other side of the parking lot. Senior year, she thought, one more year and she was out of this god forsaken town.

She took one more breath and stepped out and moved her way through the cars to the front steps, hoping for a friendly face when she got the the top. "Betty!" she heard from behind her, Betty swung around on her heels to find an excitable Ethel waving.

Betty's mildly annoyed look turned into a soft smile, "Ethel! How are you?" she walked back to hug the ringlet clad girl, "How was your summer?"

"Mine was pretty boring, I worked at the cinemas the whole time," Ethel shrugged, "how about you?" she quizzed, "How are you doing?" Ethel tilted her head at Betty sympathetically.

Great, Betty thought, here she thought that it had been so long since everything happened that everyone would've have forgotten about it, "My summer was fine, and I'm doing fine Ethel, thank you for asking though," Betty ended with her best smile. It was impossible to be anything but kind to that woman, Ethel had a heart of gold. "I gotta pick my timetable, but I might see you at lunch and we can talk more?"

"Of course Betty! Catch you later!" Betty gave Ethel one last smile before turning and heading into the building to the front office. As she went through the doors Betty could feel eyes burning on her, familiar faces, Dilton, Trevor, and then she saw them, practically neon glowing in their blue and gold letterman jackets, huddled in a group laughing together, Chuck was the first one to see her, Reggie followed, basically the whole football went silent and stared. Betty just kept her head down as she walked quickly past them, "looking good, Cooper!" Chuck called after her breaking the silence, sending the rest of the team into snickers. Betty shook it off and kept moving, she walked into the front office, early, she didn't want to sit in a queue for her schedule.

"Morning, Ms Tate," Betty smiled to the lady behind the desk.

"Betty! How are you? Let me find your timetable."

"I'm really good thank you, how was your summer?"

"Oh, it was good," the school's receptionist looked Betty up and down and handed her the piece of paper, "you look different this year… your hair…"

Betty blushed, "oh um yeah, no more ponytail, just trying something new you know."

"I like it, suits you," the woman in her mid sixties smiled at the seventeen-year-old.

Betty tilted her head in appreciation, "thanks, Ms Tate." Betty had worn her hair in a tight high ponytail since her hair was long enough to put in one, it was almost iconic. It was the symbol of the past that no longer existed. Her hair now sat in a low bun, wisps of it falling framing her face.

Betty found her locker quickly and started to pack her things away, the idea of decorating seemed pointless at this point however, she stuck a polaroid of her and her mom that they took in a bar in New York City over the summer, using a strawberry milkshake magnet. "Betty," she could recognise that voice from anywhere, there he was making his way to her with the same fiery hair and letterman jacket.

"Archie," Betty smiled softly.

A raven haired girl, appeared from behind the football player, "Hey B," Veronica smiled cautiously.

"Hey V."

"Betty you look… you look so…" Veronica squeezed Archie's forearm.

"You look great B" Veronica corrected, "Where did you get that top? Very hipster chic."

Betty looked down at her own outfit, she never actively thought about it until now, she supposed a lot had changed about her, her style the most obvious one. She wore high waisted dark wash jeans, a loose fitted black guns n' roses t-shirt tucked into them, over the top was a blush pink swede biker jacket. "Oh this? It's actually a hand-me-down from my Mom," Betty turned to continue packed books into her locker.

"It's good to see you Betty," Archie blurted.

"Yeah, we missed you, like a lot."

"Thanks guys, I missed you too. Did you have a good summer at the Beach…"?

Then he saw it, as she put away her books, on her wrist, his jaw dropped, it couldn't be what he thought, Archie stopped Betty mid sentence, and grabbed her wrist.

"Archie!" Veronica shot, shocked by her boyfriend's sudden outburst.

"Betty what is that?!" He said as he pulled her wrist out closer to him extending her arm.

"Archie, get off me," Betty struggled.

He pushed the sleeve of her jacket up to find on the right hand side of her left wrist a small black tattoo of a twisted snake. Serpent. Veronica gasped, "Betty…"

"Are you one of them?!" Archie accused.

Betty pulled her hand back from them, "that's none of your business, Archie! You have no right to question my actions by the way. Both of you!" As if it were perfect timing the school bell rang, "Now if you'd excuse me, I need to get to class." She grabbed her calculus textbook and backpack, closed her locker and shoved between the two of them. That wasn't the way she wanted that to go. She wanted to tell them in her own time, she wanted to see them and feel okay and supported. They were the ones who betrayed her and she was exhausted of being unconditionally nice to everyone in her life, even if they didn't deserve it. It took her the entire summer to get over it. This year will be different she thought, her focus was on her and not anybody else, she would get into NYU and she would get of this stupid shitty town. No more gang rivalry, no more boyfriend drama, no more angry divorced parents… no more murder cases.

The first half of the day seemed to go easy enough, for most of it Betty seemed to feel rather invisible, none of her class mates talked to her, or even acknowledged her for that matter, she could feel the stares of some however, and small whispers from the transfer students. "I heard she's serpent blood…" "Her? Nah, that's Betty Cooper, girl next door, straight A student."

These people, that assumed so much of her but yet knew so little.

It was lunch, Betty moved hoping to find Kevin in the cafeteria in the same place they had always sat. She kept her head down walking through the hallway, until the view of some beaten up combat boots stopped her in her tracks, a little too late, crashing into the firm chest of someone else, forcing her to trip back a little. "Oh my god! I am so sorry!" He grabbed her hand to steady her.

"It's cool, the floor seems really interesting to me as all," he said sarcastically making Betty look up at him.

She stepped back, "Jughead," she stated almost shocked.

"Betty," she looked around him to find three other people standing there staring at her, all clad in black leather jackets.