Chapter 5

"We're doing what now?" Ivex crossed his arms, his eyebrows jumping up. "Repeat that, because I think I misheard you."

Jai grinned sheepishly. She had gone back to Mrs. Swarven's room that day just before lunch and told her that she and her team would do the spar. She had waited to tell Ivex, Lior and Wenara until they were in their dorm room that evening. "Well, we kind of have a spar with team QRTZ, and we have one week to prepare for it."

Ivex began to pace the room. Lior and Wenara just watched their two teammates. "It'll be a good learning opportunity," Jai said with a slight shrug.

"As in, they'll beat our brains out, and we'll be made fun of," Ivex snapped.

"Losing to someone is a good way to learn," Jai stuck her tongue out at him.
Wenara put her hands to her head. "Oy, Jai. Give us a confidence booster, why don't you?"

"Mrs. Swarven gave me the info on what the spar will look like, if you guys wanted to know," Jai avoided her teammate's eyes. "Ugh, sorry about all this. I couldn't let him get away with all the stupid things he's done! He's so cruel to Ruth, and treats the other two like servants!"

Lior leaned back. "So, he's a bully then."

Ivex froze, and glanced over at Jai, who solemnly nodded. "The worst kind of bully."

Ivex groaned. "You manipulating son of a bastard!" he flopped down on the floor. "Now I can't say no!"

Jai shot a grateful smile at Lior. "Wen? What's your feeling?"

She cracked her knuckles. "Well, I want to break Zoe. She's so, I dunno," Wenara gestured her hands down her body. "Voluptuous. People like that tick me off for some reason."

Ivex smirked. "Probably because you're so flat."

Wenara threw her pillow at Ivex. "Shut your face, you perverted jerk!"

Ivex laughed, putting his hands up in his defense. "Hey, I wasn't the one who said she was voluptuous, was I?"

Lior's face blazed red and he clapped his hands to his cheeks. "Aaah! Wenara! Why? I will never see Zoe the same ever again!"

Wenara snorted. "I guess you've never gotten your official 'guy' card if you haven't checked out-"

Jai cleared her throat. "That's enough, you three. Voluptuous or not, Zoe is not our biggest problem on that team."

"Because that place is taken by Quincy," Ivex said, rolling his hand. "Yeah, it's pretty obvious."

Jai pulled a piece of paper out of her pocket. "According to Swarven, we'll be doing a one-on-one spar, and we'll be graded on individual performance, and our performance as a whole team. Until the day, we won't know who we'll be up against. Plan for any eventuality."

Lior swallowed. "Whoever goes against Quincy will end up dead."

Jai snapped her fingers. "Give me ways that each of us can combat him. Go!"

"I know when he'll attack," Ivex said, raising one shoulder. "Doesn't help much if he's faster than me, but I would be able to do something."

"I can throw anything at him, and give him some flying lessons," Wenara pumped her fist up. "Whoosh, bye bye Quincy!"

"You could stop time and give yourself time to figure out what your next step would be," Lior nodded at Jai.

"And you, Lior?"

He shrugged. "I guess I can sneak up on him."

Jai pointed. "There we go! We can do this guys!"

Ruth frowned at her team leader, watching him pace back and forth in their dorm room. "Zoe," he nodded at the other girl. "You're in charge of finding out that little brat's semblance. Tir, find out her team's weaknesses. I'll be working on watching how they fight."

Ruth pressed her lips together, scowling internally at Quincy. Once again, he leaves me out of the planning. Ever since Jai had spoken to her, Ruth had felt less scared of Quincy and more resentful of him.

Quincy glanced over at her. "Oh, and Zoe? Make sure to tell me if she gets in your way."

Jai walked beside Guy down the hallway. "Well, I never expected to see that in weaponry class!" Jai shook her head, laughing. "I mean, really? How did you not know it was going to explode?"

Guy rolled his eyes, sighing. "I don't even know. I have a question for you, though."

Jai raised her eyebrow at him. "Yeah?"

"How did you stop it before it consumed the room?" Guy raised his own eyebrow at her. "Is that your semblance? Some sort of super speed?"

Jai smirked. "Nice try, but no," she half-turned to him. "Oh, and the next time you mimic Guy, you might want to practice his accent a little more, Zoe."

Guy's face melted into Zoe's scowling one. "How did you possibly know that, brat child?"

Jai closed her eyes. "As I said, you need to work on your accent. Oh, and Ivex said that you have a completely different Aura than Guy."

Zoe threw her hands up in the air. "He sat on the opposite side of the room and you didn't check your Scroll even once!"

Ivex came out of the classroom and glanced between Jai and Zoe. He grinned. "What possessed you to think that we aren't telepathic, Zoe?"

Zoe clenched her fists and stormed off down the hall. Ivex watched her go, the grin slipping off his face. "Why do you have to mock people like that, Happy-go-lucky?"

Jai raised a finger. "Technically, you were the one mocking her this time."

Ivex sighed. "Only because you told me to," Ivex stiffened, turning on his heel. "Okay, come out you little spy!"

Tir slowly removed himself from the shadows. "You sense Auras," he stated.
"Not exactly. Beat it, and tell that dumb ass leader of yours that if he's that scared of us he shouldn't have challenged us to a fight!"

Ivex sighed as Tir left. "You shouldn't have agreed to fight those psychos."

Jai laughed. "It sure has made our week more interesting, you have to admit."

Wenara rested her head on her desk, glaring over at Jai. "Okay, the battle is in fifteen minutes, and we know basically nothing about them."

Jai leaned back in her chair. It had been a week since Mrs. Swarven had told Jai about the spar, and now, they were in her class, preparing themselves for demise. "Well, they know less about us. I at least know what all their semblances are."

Wenara shot up. "You do?"

Lior chuckled. "Did you really think we couldn't find that information? They're fourth-years, and popular ones at that. All it takes is a little asking around."

Wenara's eyes widened. "Oh, I didn't think about that. Quick! Tell me all of them so I'll be prepared!"

Ivex slid into his seat next to Jai. "What did I miss?"

"Nothing of importance," Jai raised one shoulder. "We were about to tell Wen about QRTZ's semblances."

"Quincy has something that people have named air force," Lior pulled up something on his Scroll and showed it to Wenara. "See? He can propel through the air and send air forces of high magnitude at his opponents. What makes him dangerous isn't his semblance though. He's extremely proficient in hand-to-hand, and can read his surroundings better than anyone. Good at keeping his emotions to himself during a fight.

"Ruth's was a little harder to find, but she can basically increase the size of something. If you ask Jai, Ruth is the most powerful teammate, but anyone else says that Ruth is easy.

"Zoe flaunts hers, so it was easy to figure out. She has a localized illusion technique. She mostly personifies other humans.

"And then there's Tir," Lior sighed. "Question, Wenara? How good is your telekinesis?"

"I can lift pretty much anything but myself," Wenara puffed out her chest a little. "I've practiced a lot."

"Tir also has telekinesis, but his is slightly different than yours. He has to touch the object before he can control it. If you're paired with him, keep your guard up."

Wenara frowned. "Okay, after hearing all that, Jai? What would be the best pairing?"

Jai tapped her desk. "Me, Quincy. You, Tir. Ivex, Zoe. Lior, Ruth."

"Wow," Ivex muttered. "You hold Lior's battle skills over everyone else's?"

Wenara heard someone sit down behind them. She turning her head to see, and looked right at Ruth Fey'La as she sat down. "Hello, JWIL," she smiled at them. The other three turned to see her. "Now, if Quincy trusted me with anything, you four would be in a deep hole right now," she pointed at each of them in turn. "You sense attacks, and attacks on others you've linked your aura to," she said to Ivex. "You have insane telekinesis," Wenara. "You can turn invisible, but it also has its limitations to you, such as limited vision and an unstable aura," Lior. "And finally, you can freeze time. Quite an OP semblance, Jai."

The four first-years stared at her. She smiled again. "Quincy doesn't know any of this, and won't. Don't worry. I wouldn't give him anything."

Jai's shoulders relaxed. "Right. So, how do these spars usually happen?"

Ruth shrugged. "Mrs. Swarven changes it every time. Sometimes it's one-on-one, other times it's the whole team, or two-on-two or one-on-three, or something else completely."

Jai sighed. "Oh well. I guess I can't mentally prepare myself then. Boo."

Mrs. Swarven slammed something on her desk, getting the attention of everyone in the room. "Good morning, students. We will be doing something different today, as I hope you have already noticed. We have a fourth-year team here to spar with a first-year team from my class."

Several students scooted down in their chairs. Mrs. Swarven glared at them. "I have already chosen the team, and if I hadn't, I would most definitely choose the cowards in the room," she sighed and waved her hand. "Quincy and Jai, bring your teams down here."

Jai nodded at her team. "We can do this you guys."

Wenara swallowed. She didn't feel like she could do this, but she wanted to trust Jai. She glanced back at Ruth to see her jog down to her team, accepting a high-five from a first-year in the front row. Wenara smiled a little. It was nice to see your enemies human side. Though, Ruth was much less of an enemy than Quincy or any of the others.

Mrs. Swarven watched the two teams over her glasses as they stood before her. "You will be fighting one-on-one today, and before you ask, I have already decided whom you will fight," she walked over to her board, her heels clicking. She wrote 'QRTZ' on it, and then put 'JWIL' beneath it, the letters lining up with each other. "Team QRTZ, your opponent will be the one beneath your initial, and team JWIL, yours will be above. We will start with the last two. Zoe, Lior, please enter the sparring ring. The rest of you, stand off to the side. You will be allowed to communicate with your teammates, but no aiding them with anything but words."

Lior shot a glare at Wenara. She pressed her lips together to keep from laughing. Well, the person who was most opposed to it got stuck with the voluptuous girl.

A/N: Sorry, but it's short this week because I was dealing with some holiday things, so I didn't have much time to write this week. The actual fights will be in next week's chapter, which will be a nice challenge for me.

Sorry as well for any errors I may have missed! /Kronos\\