Hey everyone! Sorry this update has taken sooooooooooooooooooo long but it has been absolutely full on for me with holidays, submissions to magazines and scholarships and Christmas! Yaaaay, Christmas! Please, some authors post up some Christmas-themed Mighty Ducks fiction! I would love to read it! Who knows? If I have the time, I might just post one up myself :).
A big shout out to Brave Kid whose B-day it is today :). Happy Birthday, Brave Kid, and hope you had a great day :). Small present for you.
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'Uh, hi, Thrash.' Mallory barely held back her distaste for the human. He always had this gravelly tone in his voice like he hadn't cleared his throat since he was three, seemed to think that Batman was a real entity who would swoop down on him if someone spoke bad of the black-and-grey miscrient in his shop and insisted on substituting her name for some stupid, youthful colloquialism. However, he knew how to keep a secret, along with Mookie and the comic book shop provided a great secret meeting place for her and Nosedive.
'Dive's in the back, Mallory.' Mookie thumbed behind her back at the door which led to the room in the back.
The military duck gave the pink-haired girl a grateful smile. Despite thinking that she would dislike the human like she did her partner, Mookie had proven to have a good, though wacky sense of humour, but most of all, addressed her by her name.
Making her way around the counter, a path she had grown very familiar with, Mallory edged her way through the door, shutting it behind her as quickly as she could.
'Took you long enough. And I thought I was the unpunctual one.'
Taking a quick scan around the room, she saw Nosedive leaning back in a rocking chair. Booted foot propped on a small card table in the room and open Spiderman comic on his lap, Nosedive was right at home and casual as ever as he grinned up at his girlfriend. The position couldn't help but remind her of when she first met Nosedive all of …
'Two years ago,' Mallory answered with a respectful nod to Principal Maverick. 'I started to join my father on these visits two years ago.'
'I see,' Principal Maverick smiled, exposing his crooked teeth, only just overshadowed by the way he shifted his scrawny body continually in his seat. It was hard to see how he could have come to be the principal of one of Puckworld's most massive schools, Cravington High. The sentence, 'Behave, otherwise, I'll send you to the principal's office,' would be used as a joke rather than a threat.
Withholding a sigh, Mallory went back to her lunch tray. Why did she agree to do this visiting school trip to encourage youths to follow careers and place ideas of going to university? Oh, yes, that's right, her father guilt tripped her into it.
'Do me a favour, Mallory,' General Harold McMallard muttered in her ear hole, rousing her out of her inner grumbles. 'Don't ever date a boy like that.'
Immediately, Mallory followed her father's line of sight to spot a youth laughing at a table with two drakes who were much older than him. He looked to be only about fourteen but judging by the way he conducted himself, he was far too confident to be so young. He was getting louder by the second, animatedly telling a story, laughing before even getting to the punch line. One of the drakes he was talking to, a tall handsome white duck, was trying to hide a smile while the other, a tanned man, was rolling his eyes, trying to look annoyed but just coming off amused.
'No respect,' Harold clicked his tongue beside her. 'A child that age should be seen, not heard. At least not that loud anyway.'
Mallory screwed up her beak in disgust as the youth took a large mouthful of rice and continued talking. 'Couldn't agree with you more.' She glanced sideways at her father with a smile. 'Don't worry, you'll never catch me dead dating a boy like that.' She raised an eyebrow. 'I thought you would think I had better standards than that.'
Harold just cast her a warning glance before striking up a conversation with the nervously twitching principal. Stars, was everyone sure he just wasn't having a fit?
Mallory tried to go back to her food but found her eyes kept trailing back to the youth for some strange reason. Each time she tried to concentrate on capturing some peas in her fork, the blonde boy would suddenly be there in her vision, telling some other sort of story. She soon found she could hear what he said and before she knew it, was listening along to his stories.
'I'm telling you, with all the evidence, Drake DuCaine is real,' he was saying. Mallory started to notice that when he was talking about something strongly, his big brown eyes glittered with passion and/or cheekiness.
The white drake tried to reason the folly of the younger's statement but the teenager pushed on.
'I am telling you, Wing! With what I learned in history class today, the dude was totally real.'
Mallory also noticed that when he smiled, it had this sort of lopsided swagger to it. It was kind of cute … errggh, wrong word, absolutely disgusting!
'You actually took notice enough that you realized you were in history class?' the tanned duck taunted, leaning his elbows on the table in a superior gesture.
His answer was a face full of mashed potatoes, expertly cannoned off the youth's spoon.
'Food fight!'
The words echoed through the cafeteria, creating a mass reaction.
'Stars!' Mallory screeched, as tomato sauce poured down her hair while her father jumped to his feet with an indignant gasp as broccoli landed perfectly on his general's hat.
'Bullseye!' someone yelled.
'Students! Behave yourselves, we have guests!' Principal Maverick tried to shout but it more sounded like a scared squeak.
'Alright, that's it!' Mallory snarled as potato salad slapped her on the side of her face.
Grabbing her plate, she leaped into the foray of arms, legs and food. With one mighty heave, the food went splattering all over six students.
'Way to go!'
Eyes angry slits, Mallory spun around to come face to face with the blonde teenager.
He grinned, despite her obvious annoyance, and held out his hand, like he was making her acquaintance in a park rather than a cafeteria full of food-encrusted students and flying food debris. 'Name's Nosedive. I so have to be on your team! Where did you learn to food fight like that?'
'You!' Mallory screamed in his face. 'You started all this mess!'
His grin widened, not at all perturbed by her accusation. Instead, he actually looked … looked proud! 'Yep! The one and only Nosedive Flashblade starts an epic food fight at Cravington High. Sounds like a good header for a newspaper doesn't it?' Taking no notice of Mallory's dropped beak and angry, incredulous eyes, he struck a pose, standing like a superhero on top of a mountain, amongst bits of food flicking into his face and hair. 'Do you think I should do this pose for the front cover?' He threw back his head and laughed as his whole stance dropped into a typical teenager slouch. 'Nah, just kiddin'. What's your name?'
She was angry. No, actually, she was way beyond that. She was rabid. How dare he be so flippant about being such a rebellious, disrespectful brat? But most of all, what annoyed her above everything else, was when he struck the pose, she had actually found herself staring at his obviously muscular arms and handsome, smiling face.
'Get the hell away from me!' she snapped, shoving him in the chest, succeeding in making him stumble.
She almost choked in annoyance as he once again, didn't get annoyed but only shrugged.
'That's cool,' he said while for some reason, his hand reached behind and to the table behind him. 'That's usually the reaction I get from girls I talk to.'
And her beak was hanging open again. Stars, didn't this kid know what 'Get the hell away from me' meant?
Suddenly, his beautiful, brown eyes took on a mischievous gleam while his beak tweaked upwards at the corner. 'Oh, well, you know what they say. If you can't beat them, feed them.'
'Oh, Stars, you must be the most—'
Mallory's retort was cut off by the pile of mashed potatoes that Nosedive rammed into her face.
'Earth to Mallory.' Nosedive's laughing face was suddenly right in front of her and he bent low so he was directly at her level. 'Have my amazing looks left you speechless—'
He was cut off as Mallory threw her arms around his neck and kissed him so hard, her beak hurt.
One of the things she loved about Nosedive was when she did something erratic, he never acted shocked. Like now, he simply wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed her back, sighing in pleasure as they continued. She couldn't help but grin in the kiss at this. It was like he was sitting back after an awesome meal, giving a satisfied sigh. It was so Nosedive to react to her like he did to food.
After awhile, Mallory slowly eased back and rested her head on his slim but muscular shoulder.
'Well, I … um … hmm …' Nosedive mumbled along.
Mallory giggled, practically able to feel the hotness in his cheeks. 'Who's speechless now?'
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The third chapter is going to take me awhile to get up but in the meantime, Merry Christmas to all! Oh, and before I forget, could everybody sign this petition wwwDOTchangeDOTorg/petitions/walt-disney-home-entertainment-release-the-disney-afternoon-era-shows-on-dvd?share_id=hjeRRVVvnY&utm_campaign=signature_receipt&utm_medium=email&utm_source=share_petition to get The Mighty Ducks (and a heap of other cartoons that were on the Disney Afternoon Block) released onto DVD. If they get enough signatures, it just might happen! Now, that would be a nice Christmas present :).
Everyone, have a very safe and Merry Christmas.