Today marked exactly one week from the beginning of the rank wars and Fuchsia's first day at SAHS: Squid Academy High School. Fuchsia and Shiva were being driven there by Limo they're both royalty after all.
"To be honest, I'm a little nervous about this…" shivered Fuchsia sitting down in her seat twiddling her thumbs, "I didn't think I'd actually be going to another school, especially this one!" with a nervous face.
Her sister gives her a pull on the cheek with cruciform veins showing on her forehead-smiling from ear-to-ear, "This is what you wanted Fuchsia…don't get cold feet now!"
Fuchsia massages her cheek after the hard pull she got from Shiva; Shiva looks out the window and observes the buildings they pass by.
"Besides, you'll be in good hands with Sky! And you've got Zuley to guide you around the school for the week, just spend time with them and you should be able to fit in fine." sitting back and relaxing into the comfortable leather seats.
"Zuley…? Why do have a pet name for him?" in a plain tone, raising an eyebrow, suspicious of sister; Shiva winks at her.
Azule stood at the entrance waiting for Fuchsia when they arrived at the school, she got out and said bye to her sister, since she'll be staying in a dorm from now on. Shiva waved to Azule and gave her a hug.
"Ohhh Zuley!" she called out, "Please take care of my sister!" waving them off once again and leaving in the Limo.
Fuchsia walks over to him; everyone stares at them, stunned by her appearance-absolutely beautiful. They never saw an Octoling up close before and none ever thought one would attend a school specified for Inklings. She looks super nervous walking over to Azule; this was her chance for a fresh start.
"Welcome to SAHS" giving a warm smile holding out his hand for a handshake, she stares at him for a solid minute, should I…? I mean its fine in Octarian culture… so maybe he won't mind and besides…maybe this is my chance...? She gives him a hug, hiding her blushing red face in his shoulder; everyone around them gasped with shock. Azule blushed at the sudden embrace, trying to hide his face by lowering his hat. "W-what... are doing?" whispering to her; Fuchsia was clueless. I thought he would've liked that…
"What, you guys hug when you see a friend, right? It's a natural Octarian way of greeting, especially Octolings." undisturbed by the chatter among the inklings. Azule grabs her hand and they head to the guidance office to receive her schedule-and avoid any more attention.
"You'll be in the same classes as me since I'm going to be your guide, that means you'll have to sit next to me. As for dorms…cool! You'll be staying in the same dorm as Tangie!" leading her into their homeroom, Tangie? Who's that? She nods her head and holds his hand tightly, still nervous from all the Inklings that were staring at her with curiosity. As she approaches the room closer and closer, her heart kept beating louder and louder, breathing heavily and focusing her entire attention on Azule,why's this happening again? Why is is it that whenever I'm around you... They enter the classroom, all eyes turn to them.
She hides behind Azule holding onto his sleeve as the stares grew stronger. Azule gently grabbed her hand and guided her over to her seat, nearby his friends.
"You'll be sitting next to me from now on." letting go of her hand; Violet kept her eye on the two of them, looking discouraged. She's so beautiful…now I've got a love rival! No way would a girl hold a boy's hand that tightly unless there was something between them.
Azule turns to the other members of the club, "Everyone, this is Fuchsia. She'll be attending school with us from now on. She is also the newest member of our club!" Showcasing her to them; they all continue their gazes at her, making her very uncomfortable. A moment passes of awkward silence.
"COOL!" hollered Sally, placing her arm around her, "Welcome to the club, you're going to enjoy being with us. I Promise!"
"It is nice to meet you." Greeted Cobalt in a respectful tone, the others did the same; Fuchsia still held onto Azule's sleeve.
"After school, let's head to Duncan's Donuts. We should also head to Inkopolis plaza too. I want us welcome Fuchsia properly." Reice suggested, trying to look cool in front of Fuchsia.
The first day of school for Fuchsia went by with a breeze, she made new friends and was already a part of a club, although she was very annoyed with all the random boys hitting on her, but luckily Sally and Tangie had her back. Deep down inside, she was absolutely grateful to the opportunity granted to her and that she seized it.
After school, they hang out at Duncan's Donuts and discussed the plan for the upcoming rank wars. The rank wars season would be starting in 8 days, next Tuesday would be the big day.
"Well, we actually made amazing progress in our ranked matches yesterday; Right now we're at B+." boasts Sally with pride; Azule was very impressed.
"Can you imagine that they did it on their own? It was 3-on-4 the entire time but they kept on playing until they boosted their rating to at least a B+, They all kept yelling every match that they can't end bad because they want you to see them doing good or something like that." added Tangie poking fun at them; the three of them look embarrassed by her statement.
Azule laughed and turned to Fuchsia, "This is why I love them all, hopefully you can truly get to see for yourself in the upcoming days."
"So guys, the rank war season begins next week, if we make our way into the top half of the standings, we'll compete in the playoffs…" opened Azule mixing his lemonade drink with Fuchsia's sweet iced tea; much to her dismay, she hated lemonade.
"Yeah, and the winners of the playoffs compete in the Fall Preliminaries." said Reice, memorizing the format.
"So what's the first objective to accomplish? We should set a goal for this season and meet it at the end..." chimed Violet; Azule thought for a minute, looking at the schedule for the rank wars. "Since this fall season will be a total of 4 weeks with 2 games each week, I'd say our minimum requirement for this season is to get at least 4 wins and to finish within the top 8, once we reach the playoffs, anything goes. It's the 3rd of October, so we have until the 11th to train for battle. afterwards, the Fall prelims begin sometime in the first week of November, so let's keep that date in the back of our heads..."-folding up the schedule-" Alright! We can do this!" with confidence. As it stands, the six of them have known each other for about a month, but they all grew so close in that short month. Now, they had a new member to the family...slowly but surely, they were beginning the growth.
They waited out by the front of the battle station as Sally helps Azule pick out a weapon that suits him; He chooses the NZAP '89 of the shooter class. This meant that the team would have incredible balance with a Shooter, Splatling, Charger and Roller each.
"So you chose a shooter class weapon…" Sally noticed, walking out the store with him.
"Yeah, I feel like it's the right weapon for me, I just hope I can catch up to you guys…" with a little worry since his teammates were already at B+ rank while he was in Octo Valley pats him on the back.
"Don't worry, for better or worse, you're our captain and we want it that way you'll catch up in no time."
"Thank you..."
"Good luck to you guys!" springed Tangie, walking with Cobalt and Fuchsia to the cafe to watch their performance.
The ranked matches were intense! Azule battled with a back and forth rise and fall from C to C+ while the others dealt with a rise and fall from B+ to a B- for most of the day, their results were inconsistent and their play was sloppy: Azule rushing in recklessly, Violet missing her marks, Reice's inability to hold down the fort while the other three attacked; Sally began getting mildly frustrated at the performance of her team, she'd been the only positive performance.
"Guys, we can't continue with the up and down performances! The rank wars begin NEXT WEEK!" yelling at them as they all meet up with Cobalt, Tangie and Fuchsia. Reice is too fatigued to argue and Violet wanted to avoid conflict as much as possible, but Azule, the captain, was ready to butt heads with his Ace.
"Relax Sally, this is our first time playing together as a full team, of course things won't go the way we want them. Look forward, we'll get the job done! This team is destined to do great things…"-lightly tapping her arm with his fist-"have faith in your family, for better or worse, we're a family." Winking at her; she calms down and accepts his words, knowing she can't go against the captain.
The next day at school, Azule and Fuchsia were out getting textbooks for Fuchsia when Fuchsia ran into someone she knew; Azule stopped dead in his tracks with his eyes widened. The girl, it was the same girl that Azule saw on the first day of school, the one with pastel green hair that was a second year.
"Pastelle...!" screamed Fuchsia in excitement running over and leaping into the startled girl's arms. "You go to this school?"-in an uncharacteristically childish voice-"I thought you left to go to a big city far away from us!" comically crying; the girl giggled, her face was as bright as the sun and her smile rivaled Sky's.
"Silly, this is the big city far away from Octo Valley; it's like a 5 hour drive on a good day. I'm sorry if I never sent you a post card, I've been too busy with many things that it left my mind to send you one, I'm sure you must've been lonely." petting Fuchsia's head and turning her attention to Azule. "So Fuchsia, I see you made a new friend here and he happens to be that rude first year that called out all the seniors on the first day of school…"
Azule looked surprised that she remembered his actions.
With a relaxed look, "You're the infamous Azule that I'm hearing about everywhere? The one that's Sky's little brother?" with Fuchsia wrapped around her arm.
"Hmm… I like you. You look identical to your sister. And you have the same personality as her too. I wouldn't mind tutoring you in some one on one turf wars at anytime, you could be someone special. I'd look forward to competing against you." taking out her phone; she's so blunt.
"You... train me?" confused; she shook her head.
"I don't know why but, I feel like you...you're a special one; maybe even more special than your sister. It's a strange feeling that I can't quite describe…" Gently resting her hand on her head as Azule takes out his phone.
"Let's keep in touch after the season is over, I'll train you." holding out her phone.
"Oh...sure." fumbling his phone.
They exchanged phone numbers and she walked off after giving Fuchsia a big hug and promising to visit her dorm whenever she could.
"T-that's Pastelle!?" says Azule turning to Fuchsia, stunned by everything that just transpired; Fuchsia doesn't look happy about Azule's sudden interest over Pastelle and the fact that he got her number.
"You look like you just fell in love…" she said bluntly walking away in disgust carrying her textbooks, Azule kept denying but it was clear as day that he liked her, which prompted Fuchsia to have a disappointed look on her face as she walked away from Azule, whom was still following trying to grab some of the textbooks so that she wouldn't have to carry them all.
They meet up with the others back at the classroom; they all were waiting over at Azule's desk. Mr. Seamore, their homeroom teacher, walks in sluggish. The class hadn't done anything that normal high school classes would do: no one selected class reps, or plan any upcoming festivals or anything like that; the only focus was the rank wars.
"I have some announcements to make regarding the rank wars that begin next week Tuesday; it's been pushed to today instead. So please be ready to compete and in case you didn't know, whenever we have a game, the school day ends WAY earlier than expected. Be expected to leave at 10 am instead of our usual time and to report to the school buses that will be parked in front of the school." He filed his papers and began class like normal; the classroom was buzzing with excitement. The rest of class was just a drag, no real learning, just socializing.
At the bus stop, there were about 20 school buses to fit the entire school into. They all filed into the buses and cleared out the parking lot heading for their destination. The buses were luxury coach buses with super comfortable seats and with two people to a seat and the back seat with three; Azule sat with Fuchsia and Violet in the back, Reice and Sally sat in the row in front of them on the left, Cobalt and Tangie on the right. "Looks like everyone is going to be there after all… Do you guys know where we're going?" Cobalt asks Tangie.
"Yeah, I heard from some people in our class and around the school that we're heading to Squid Beat Stadium…"
"Squid Beat Stadium?" Fuchsia peeked at them from the corner of the seat.
"Squid Beat Stadium is the home of the Pro Turf War team known as the Squid Beats, their logo is a squid with headphones on the turntables." explains Reice, he's the smartest one there, followed by Violet.
"Nerd!" mocked Sally with a cat face.
15 minutes later, they reached the stadium. The stadium had an interior similar to the modern sports stadiums with no roof over the field, the field was a flat grassy one with little buildings and walls scattered across the 100 yard field and other assorted obstacles.
"Good Colossal Squid! This field is huge!" mesmerized Tangie, taking a picture of the amazing view of the field from upstairs level; all competing teams were ordered to proceed to the boys and girls locker rooms while all spectators had to find a seat to watch the game in the stadium.
Azule and the others went to their separate locker rooms and got ready; Azule was putting on his equipment and getting prepared when he had a flashback to when his club decided on their team name "Squidcom" or "Squid Commanders".