"Where is Riven at?" Sky asked. The boys had just been told to meet their group for their group exercise and of course he was still a no show.
"Was he in your room this morning Timmy?" Brandon asked the mousy red haired boy.
"Yeah and I tried to wake him up but I couldn't get him up! I would barely respond and I was…well…too weak to budge him." Timmy responded.
"Well it's his own fault he's not here." Brandon said.
"We need him though, we're supposed to be a team." Sky said. "Let's go and try and wake him up."
The boys walked back to Timmy and Riven's room where they found Riven snoring loudly with a blanket thrown haphazardly over himself.
"C'mon Riven get up!" Sky said as he shoved Riven's shoulder.
Riven grunted and then turned onto his other shoulder.
"You need to get up! We have training right now!" Timmy said.
"I'm not feeling so good this morning.." Riven mumbled.
Brandon was looking around the room while Timmy and Sky were attempting to wake Riven up when he saw some of the drugs on Riven's desk.
"Hey Timmy, do you know what this is?" Sky asked when he held up the bag.
"It uh, well I don't know for sure because I've never..but it looks like cocaine."
"Yeah it is, what the hell is your problem Riven? Is this why you are never on time? You are too busy doing drugs and partying every night to get up in the morning for what you are here for in the first place?" Brandon shouted.
"God why do you have to be so loud? I'm getting up dude" Riven said. He stood up and slowly made his way over to his closet to find his uniform.
"Well hurry up already." Brandon said, lowering his voice.
"What is your problem anyway? I'm going as fast as I can, I'm not a wizard."
"Well we would be in training right now if you weren't too busy getting hung over"
"So what if I want to have a little bit of fun? Everyone here is so uptight it's hard to have any fun without a little extra help."
"When it affects me and our team, I get a little angry" Brandon said as he shoulder checked Riven when passing him the hallway.
"Stupid blondie, who cares about being on time anyways? I bet he doesn't know a thing about hardship in the first place, and can barely fight." Riven thought to himself as they walked to the training center.
Soon they slipped in and caught up with the rest of the groups. Today they were learning wrestling techniques to use while in combat with others. Most of the stuff that they had learned so far was pretty easy for Riven since he had already learned many of the basic moves and was more athletic than half of the other boys at the school.
"Riven and Brandon! You're up next! Now show much what I've taught you so far!" Codatorta yelled.
"Bring it on pretty boy" Riven said.
"Oh I'll show you how it's done Riven." Sky replied.
They began to fight with both of them not making any major advances on the other.
"I bet you've never even been in a fight before Brandon" Riven said under his breath as he tried to get around him.
"Shut up Riven, it's my job to do this. What's yours again? Oh yeah that's right, stealing."
"What? How did you find that out? " Riven said as he let down his guard slightly and let Brandon pin him down for a second.
"Everyone knows it and that you were sent here as a punishment" Brandon said.
"Shut up, blondie" Riven said as he tried to pin him down, but he just couldn't catch him.
"Make me then, thief".
Riven suddenly crouched quickly and then moved behind Brandon within less than a second and pulled out his knife. He pushed Brandon to the ground and then held his knife to his neck.
"That's enough boys! Riven a knife is not necessary, this is just practice. However good move. Next time try to stick to the lessons though since that is what you will be tested on at the end of this week." Codatorta said.
As the boys were walking back to the dorms, Brandon said "What the hell was that about Riven? Who do you think you are, pulling a knife on me?"
"I think that I just beat you and could have killed you if I really wanted to. So I would watch who you are calling names next time and who you provoke pretty boy"
Riven tried to walk past him but he stopped when Brandon punched him in the stomach.
"Now who's calling names?"
Brandon then walked off and Sky ran after him, calling his name.
"Are you alright Riven?" Timmy asked as he slowly kneeled down to next to him.
"I'm fine Timmy, just get away from me." Riven said. He got up and then began to walk the opposite direction away from the school. He didn't care where he went, he just needed to get away from all of these annoying princes and squires.
He ended up taking a bush to downtown Magix since he hadn't spent much time there yet and he needed a walk.
He was sick of putting up with people who had everything handed to them easily, people like Brandon and Sky and Timmy who actually wanted to go to Red Fountain. It felt like a prison to him and now that Brandon knew about his past, things would probably get even worse.
Somehow he ended up in what looked like a bad part of town and did not know how he ended up there. He had just been walking around, apparently for hours, and found himself lost. Riven went up to the only person who was around, a dark short green haired girl who wore maroon leggings with a black skirt.
"Do you know where the nearest bus station is at?"
"Excuse me?"
"I asked, do you know where the nearest bus station is at?" Riven repeated.
"Oh look at you, aren't you precious! A little lost puppy are you?" The girl said. Riven finally got a good look at her and noticed that she was eyeing him up and a few other girls who looked similar to her were walking their way.
"Um, no. I just need to find my way to the nearest bus station."
"Don't you want to stay here and play with us?" The green haired girl asked as she approached him and put her arms around his neck, pulling her body close into his. Riven hadn't been with many girls before, in fact only two, but he knew that he did not want girls to ruin his mood even more while at Red Fountain by being needy and clingy. Especially this girl who looked bizarre.
"I better not" Riven responded as he pried her hands off of his neck.
"I think you do" She said as she tried to get close to him again, but he slightly pushed her away. However she overreacted and fell to the ground even though he barely touched her.
"How dare you! Girls, get him!" she ordered. The other girls started to move closer to him with energy balls beginning to grow in their palms.
"Shit, these must be a bunch of the Cloud Tower Witches" Riven thought as he backed away. When he saw that they were not giving up he started to sprint in the direction that he thought he had come from. However, it turned out to be a one way street until the wall at the end all of a sudden disappeared.
He then noticed three more witches floating in the sky right above where the wall used to be and thought that he was corned as he ran right below them. But they didn't stop him. He turned around to see why they weren't pursuing him and the one wearing purple with the long brown hair turned around and winked at him. She then threw what looked like sound waves towards the other witches and this knocked them out cold.
Riven didn't know what to do but he continued to run and didn't stop for a good ten minutes until he was sure no one was following him. He finally found his was back to the main part of town that he recognized but he couldn't stop thinking about how annoying those witches were and why the one stopped to save him. He didn't care though and had had enough of the city.
When he got back to his dorm, Timmy was still up and seemed to be waiting for him.
"Riven, I think we need to talk about our team-" he began to say.
"Timmy, I'm sorry I just am not like the rest of you guys. It's hard to fit in here."
"We want you to fit in though"
Riven sat down on his bed and sighed.
"My life has been completely different and no one seems to understand that."
"Well I can try to Riven." Timmy said and he sat down across from him.
"Thanks Timmy, but I doubt you ever could. I don't think Brandon could either."
"Can you at least cut back on the parties on week days and try to show up for practices? That would help build our team morale and you know we get graded as a group on certain tests…"
"Fine Timmy, I'll try to be there, you're grade won't suffer." Riven said. He just wanted to get Timmy off of his back. He didn't hate Timmy or Prince Sky that much since they were mostly nice to him, but Brandon got on his nerves a lot and he didn't care to work with him at all. But he was stuck with him for the next two and half years and there was nothing he could do about it. There was no way he was going to completely stop having his fun, but he would try harder to work with at least Timmy and Sky so their grades wouldn't suffer too.
