Chosen Sidekick: Chapter 1 [Old]

The only thing that had gone well for Valencia today was being called to the principal's office. In Geometry, they had received their tests back and upon seeing her 92%, Val had felt the drop in her stomach that always came with falling short of her parents' expectations. Then at lunch, she had spilled milk on her shirt and despite her and Mira's best efforts to clean it, there was still an unseemly stain on the front. The last straw was when she had tripped down the stairs when walking back from her last class of the day, World History, and all her books had fallen out of her backpack.

"Ugh." Valencia grunted in frustration as she picked herself up. Had she forgotten to zip up her backpack or something? Forgetting things was unlike her. How foolish.

Val winced at her scraped palms, then crouched down again to stuff her notebooks back into her pack. Just as she slid in her math notebook, she heard the crackling of the PA system.

"Would Mira Chalcedony, Valencia Heartwood, and Caleb Bornite please report to the principal's office? A new quest has been announced," a feminine voice declared.

Val's head snapped upright, startling a student who had been walking down the stairs next to her. Val's eyes sparkled, her previous misfortunes forgotten, and she just managed to stifle a delighted scream. This was her chance! Finally, the time for her quest had come!

As she shoved the rest of her supplies into her backpack and flew down the remaining stairs, blonde hair whipping around behind her, she started to visualize her parents' proud smiles as she told them that she was the Chosen One.

"As expected of our dear Val," her mother would say with a nod of approval.

"Let's have something special for dinner!" her father would boom, whipping out an apron.

Val sprinted down the hallways, skidding past classmates who called out, "Congrats, Val!" She grinned back at them. Everyone had known for years that Val would become the Chosen One for her year. After all, her parents were the most successful Chosen Ones in New Geode history. And Val was determined to live up to their names.

Val slapped a high-five with her Biology teacher as she rounded a corner and ran down the final hallway leading to the principal's office. She slowed to a walk for the final few paces, tried unsuccessfully to hide the milk stain on her shirt with her hair, then took a breath to compose herself before knocking on the door.

"Come in," said the secretary.

Val forced her manic grin to become a more appropriate smile and pushed open the wooden door.

The secretary looked up from his computer and hooked a thumb towards another door behind him, this one with a frosted glass pane. "Principal Amethyst is waiting for you."

Val nodded a thanks and walked through the second door.

The principal's office was a cheery space. The blinds were open on the window behind Principal Amethyst's desk, letting in stripes of afternoon sunlight. A few bookshelves lined the side walls, and a healthy potted plant rested on the corner of the principal's desk. The rest of the desk was taken up by a computer and stacks of papers.

Mira was already sitting in one of the chairs in front of the desk, smiling nervously at Val. Mira fidgeted with the backpack by her feet, her hands ink-stained as usual. Val took the seat next to her best friend and beamed back.

"Welcome, you two." Principal Amethyst closed her computer. Her purple eyes glittered at the soon-to-be questgoers, and she tucked a black braid behind her ear. "We'll just wait a moment for Caleb."

Just as the principal uttered those words, a student opened the door and sauntered in. He ran a hand through the waves of his sandy-brown hair and grinned at the others. "Hope I'm not late!" He folded himself into the third chair, crossing his long legs.

Val looked him up and down. If she was to be the Chosen One, this person must be her love interest. She supposed as far as love interests went, Caleb wasn't bad. Val had never really interacted with him before, as he was in a grade above her, but he seemed popular enough. She'd seen him chatting and laughing with other basketball players before, as well as people from some kind of club-- maybe the art club? She wasn't really attracted to him yet, but feelings could change throughout a quest, right? Val gave a mental shrug and turned her attention back to Principal Amethyst.

"You're right on time." The principal smiled at the three of them. "Now then, without further ado, I'll announce your roles."

She looked directly at Mira. "Mira is the Chosen One. Congratulations."

"Caleb is Companion One. Valencia is Companion Two." The principal handed each of them a sheet of paper. "Waivers for your parents. And the object of your quest is…"

Val accepted the paper mindlessly, then stared at the principal, the rest of her words flowing past Val's ears like white noise. Mira... Chosen One? Valencia... Companion Two? Something wasn't fitting right here. Val felt like the world was tilting slightly, as if she was on a boat in rough waters.

She must've misheard. Or the principal misspoke, or, or-- Val glanced at Mira, who was also staring at the principal in shock, her mouth opening and closing soundlessly.

Mira slowly turned to look at Val. In Mira's honest, startled eyes, Val found evidence that she'd heard correctly. Mira was the Chosen One.

With that, the boat capsized, leaving Val floundering in vicious currents.

Val turned back to the principal, unable to bear her best friend's gaze that was surely turning into one of pity. She clenched her fists, crinkling the waiver. Val stared at the blinds behind the principal, willing her face into a neutral mask of stone. She imagined her blue eyes as hard sapphires, her blond hair simply carved citrine.

She stiffly exchanged phone numbers with Caleb and the three of them made a group chat to plan their quest. But anything more the principal said slipped past her ears, and when they were finally released, Val walked jerkily to the door.

Still statue-like, Val stalked down the now-empty hallways and out of the school, starting the walk home on autopilot. She stared blankly ahead, barely registering the cars zipping by at the first intersection. Companion Two... Companion Two... Companion Two was the least important, the most likely to get injured, the one there for humor and moral support. Val gritted her teeth, reminding herself that statues didn't cry. She stared unblinkingly at the white stripes on the street and started to cross.

A hand gripped her sleeve and pulled her back. Val blinked, momentarily shaken out of her stupor. Mira looked back at her, panting slightly, as if she'd ran to catch up. "The... the walk sign wasn't on."

Val glanced across to the sign. "Oh."

Mira shifted from foot to foot uncomfortably. When it looked like Val wouldn't say anything more, Mira started, "I'm sorry. I-- I never wanted to be the Chosen One, and I know it was your dream, and--" She stopped. "Val, look at me."

Val turned her head towards her friend in rigid motions, back to her carved-stone state. Mira was facing her, pleading earnestly with her dark brown eyes. "Come on, Val. We've always been best friends. I don't want that to change. Please."

The two of them looked at each other for a moment. But Val couldn't bring herself to do anything more than jerk her head up and down. Then the walk sign turned on, and Val strode across the intersection, her mind filled with thoughts of crystals cracking and reflecting scattered shards of light.

Val hardly knew how she got home, but there she was, standing in front of the familiar turquoise door of their two-story house. She fumbled with her keys for a moment, then pushed the door open and locked it behind her.

Then she was standing in the foyer, crumpled waiver still in one hand and her keys in the other. Val took a shuddering breath, then slumped against the inside of the door. "I… I don't…" she whispered. This would have felt like a bad dream she couldn't wake up from, except for the fact that Val didn't get nightmares. And she could solidly feel the wood of the door against her back.

"This is no time to sulk, Val," she mumbled to herself. "Chosen Ones don't sulk. They pick themselves up and come up with solutions." But what solutions could there be to being named Companion Two? Val slumped further down the door.

Finally, after a good five minutes of giving herself pep talks, she worked up the motivation to at least stand up and walk up the staircase to her room. She'd brainstorm solutions anyways. If nothing else, she had to figure out how to break it to her parents.

In her room, Val took out a blank sheet of paper and a pencil and wrote her problem at the top. Namely, that she was the sidekick. She stared at the words, still hardly believing it. Then Val shook herself and moved on.

"The seeing pool's decisions are always final, so asking Mira to swap is out of the question." Val tapped her pencil against her chin. "But perhaps I could take care of the duties of the Chosen One anyways? Knowing Mira, she might freeze up in dangerous situations." Val wrote that idea down.

Then she herself froze as a sudden realization came to her. "Shoot, I didn't hear what our quest objective was."

Val frantically fished her phone out from her backpack. She tapped out a message to the group chat. "Hey guys, could you remind me what our quest objective is? Sorry, I zoned out for a bit."

Three dots immediately appeared as Caleb typed a response. "we're stealing the vernal pearl of eternal illumination from mineral metropolis."

He quickly followed up with, "wait no, not stealing. "acquiring.""

Val stared at her phone. Mineral Metropolis? The Mineral Metropolis? Aka the mega-city that was the center of entertainment, finance, technology, and pretty much everything else in their region?

"sorry, wut?" Mira sent a shocked-face emoji. Apparently she'd zoned out too.

"yea. hahaha. let's try not to die."

Val groaned. Oh, this was not good. Not good at all.

That little revelation drained Val of her remaining energy, and it was all she could do to stagger down the stairs at dinnertime, after her parents came home. She waved weakly as her mom set down her briefcase and her dad went to wash his hands. Val clutched the waiver in her hand, suddenly wishing she could run up the stairs and hide it in her room, but it was too late.

"How was your day, Val?" Her mother kicked off her heels and walked towards Val, beaming at her. "Did you get your math test back?"

Oh, thought Val dimly, her school day already seeming distant. "Yeah. 92." Did Val's voice sound far away, or was it just her?

Suddenly her mom was in front of her, frowning in concern. "What's wrong? You look a bit ill."

Val gulped. Slowly, she held out the waiver, her hand trembling imperceptibly.

Her mother glanced at the paper, then at Val, then back at the paper. Val saw the moment she read the words, "I acknowledge that I am the guardian of ____, and that said student will be going on a quest as Companion Two…"

Val's heartbeat sounded loud in her ears. She thought she could hear the clock ticking in the living room. Was that disappointment in her mother's face, or simply concentration?

Finally, her mother spoke. "Oh, Val…" She enfolded her daughter in a hug, her curled hair tickling Val's ears. "Let's talk about this at dinner, okay?"

Val nodded, breathing in her mother's perfume of eucalyptus. She closed her eyes for a moment, shutting out the soft blue walls of the house and imagining for a moment that she was young again, when she was free to imagine anything as her future…

"Now go and set the table, will you?"

Val opened her eyes. She nodded again and headed to the dining room, even though she wasn't sure if she could stomach any food right now.

Her dad was already making a salad, washing lettuce and cutting up wedges of cucumber and tomato. He looked up when she came in. "Hey there, Val! Think I should add blueberries, or would that be too much?" Her dad's blue eyes twinkled at her.

Val shrugged and went to get some utensils from a drawer. Behind her, her mother came in with soft footsteps. Val didn't see her mom and dad exchange a glance, but she knew they did.

There were a few awkward moments at the beginning of dinner, when everyone was cutting some slices of chicken and scraping salad onto their plates. Val felt a moment of unexpected connection with the chicken. We're similar, in a way. She considered the poultry on her plate. You're a bird, but you can't fly very well. I'm supposed to be a hero, but I ended up being a sidekick. Guess we both don't live up to expectations.

She felt a little bad eating the chicken now. But before she could ponder a complete shift to vegetarianism, her mother cleared her throat.

"So, Val. You're going on a quest, huh?" She delicately placed a piece of chicken in her mouth.

Val picked at her salad and nodded.

"Hey, congrats!" Val's dad raised a hand for a high-five. "You've been wanting to go on a quest for forever, haven't you? Aww, my little Val's all grown up now, questing and all."

When Val didn't slap the high-five, her dad furrowed his bushy eyebrows. He glanced between Val and her mother. "What's… what's wrong?"

Suddenly Val couldn't take it anymore. She set down her fork and said, "I'm going to excuse myself. Lots of homework… and preparation for the quest…"

She dashed from the room, her socks sliding on the wooden floor. Val hurried up the stairs and shut the door to her room, catching it a moment before it slammed.