Chapter 51: SERIOUSLY!! COULD MY DAY GET ANY WORSE!?!

Aina

Aina gripped her wooden pencil so hard she thought the lead was going to snap straight through the core.

The silence of the classroom was punctuated only by the aggressive tick-tick-tick of the wall clock and the agonizing scrape of graphite on paper. Everything about the last fifty minutes had been a grueling, slow-motion nightmare.

My day literally could not have gotten any worse, Aina complained bitterly to herself, her jaw clenched as she stared down at the sea of incomprehensible numbers, Greek symbols, and complex variables filling the test page. A surprise test?! On a Sunday morning?! You have got to be kidding me!

She glared at a monstrous polynomial equation, adjusting her sleek titanium glasses with a trembling finger. Math, guys. Math is so incredibly, ridiculously bad. Who even decided that numbers needed letters wanted to hurt people?!

She forced herself to scribble down a series of random equations, blindly solving for variables she had zero faith in, purely just to fill out the blank lines. By the time Professor Nae called for their papers, Aina felt completely and utterly defeated. She slouched back in her chair, staring blankly at the dark chalkboard while Molly and her circle of friends—Delilah, Chloe, and Beatrice—chattered away in high-pitched, excited tones around her.

"I got a zero," Aina muttered under her breath, resting her forehead against the cool wood of her desk. "I genuinely got a zero. There is no other mathematical outcome."

"Oh, come on, Travis, it couldn’t have been that bad!" Delilah giggled as they all stood up, gathering their leather satchels.

The class shuffled out into the wide corridor, the chatter of students echoing off the high stone ceilings.

"Honestly, that test was so easy!" a wolf boy walking ahead of them boasted loudly to his friends, tossing his pen into the air. "Barely even had to study!"

Aina snapped her head up, her eyes flashing with absolute fury behind her new lenses. Oh my gosh, she thought, her stomach doing a violent, annoyed flip. That test was NOT easy! I am so pissed at everyone in this building right now! With these amazing new glasses, I could see every single sum so clearly, and I can tell you right now... I wrote absolute nonsense. I just wrote for the sole sake of finishing the test! 2% would be generous if I even get it!

"You okay there, Travis?" Beatrice asked, tilting her head with a soft smile. "You look like you’re about to fight the wall."

"I’m fine," Aina gritted out, tucking her hands into her trousers pockets. "Just realizing my academic future is currently in the garbage bin."

Before Chloe or Molly could offer any more cheerful condolences, a loud, heavy clutter of boots thundered down the hallway. A tall, muscular Lycan boy came skidding around the corner, his wild dark hair messily pushed back, his chest heaving as he scanned the crowd.

"Whitelock! Whitelock!" the Lycan boy yelled out, his eyes lighting up the second he spotted Aina’s blonde hair. Molly, Delilah, Chloe, and Beatrice all paused mid-stride, turning as one to look at the breathless boy along with Aina.

Aina raised an eyebrow, adjusting her posture to look more masculine. "Uh... yeah? That’s me."

The Lycan boy grinned, leaning his hands against his knees as he caught his breath. "Oh, man! You’re on the team! Coach wanted me to personally run out here and tell you that you’re on the team!"

Aina blinked, her mind drawing a complete blank. "What... what team?"

"Our team!" the boy beamed, straightening up proud. "The Valkyr-Rugby 2nd best team!"

Aina’s jaw dropped slightly. "What’s... what’s that?"

"The Shadow Fangs!" the boy announced, pointing a broad thumb at his own chest. "You’re on my team, man! The Shadow Fangs! Coach just put you right into the main roster! Apparently, he thinks you’re going to be absolutely phenomenal on the field!"

Aina’s brain came to a screeching, terrifying halt. "But... what?!"

Beside her, Chloe’s jaw practically hit the floor. She gasped, grabbing Molly’s arm. "Oh my gosh! Are you serious right now?! Are you seriously going to be playing for the Shadow Fangs, Travis?!" She looked at Aina in absolute disbelief. "Aren’t you a wolf only Lycans play for the Shadow Fangs?"

"I guess they’re bending the rules for you, man!" the Lycan boy laughed loudly, clapping a heavy hand onto Aina’s shoulder that nearly knocked the wind out of her fragile chest. "You’re going to be on a Lycan team! The first wolf in history to play on the Shadow Fangs!"

"But I never signed up!" Aina gasped out, her heart suddenly violently hammering against her ribs.

"What does it even matter?!" Beatrice squeaked excitedly. "You’re on a major team! That’s huge!"

Inside, Aina was spiraling into full-blown, catastrophic panic. I can’t play sports! her mind screamed in sheer horror. My lungs literally give up when I sprint for two minutes! When did this even happen?! How did this happen?!

The Lycan boy turned on his heel, waving a casual hand over his shoulder. "Practice is at four, Whitelock! Don’t be late!"

"Wait!" Aina yelled out. Before the guy could vanish into the crowd, she lunged forward, grabbing his wrist with a desperate, tight grip. "Dude! Take me to your coach!"

The boy stopped, looking down at her hand in surprise. "Huh?"

"Take me to your coach right now," Aina demanded, her voice tight with rising panic. "This is all a massive misunderstanding. I am not playing for your team!"

She turned back to Molly and the girls, offering a quick, stressed nod. "I’ll catch up with you guys later. I have to sort this out right now." Molly looked confused, but nodded slowly. "Okay... don’t be late for lunch, Travis!"

Aina followed the Lycan boy out of the main Moon side building, crossing the manicured lawns toward the massive, open-air Colosseum field on the outer edge of the campus. Tucked right beneath the grand stone bleachers was a heavy oak door marked Athletics Director & Head Coach.

Aina didn’t even knock. She pushed right past the Lycan boy, yanking the door open and stepping straight into the office. "I am NOT playing on that team!" Aina declared at the top of her lungs, stepping firmly into the room.

Coach Vane looked up from his heavy mahogany desk. He set his pen down, leaning back in his leather chair with a cool, unbothered expression.

"Greetings to you, Travis Whitelock," Coach Vane said smoothly.

Stick your greetings straight up your ass! Aina raged in her mind, her eyes glaring daggers at the older man. Because I am NOT playing for your brutal, bone-crushing sports team!

"I think there has been a terrible mistake, Coach," Aina said out loud, forcing her voice into a firm, direct tone as she stood before his desk. "I don’t want to play in Valkyr-Rugby. I don’t want to do it. At all."

Coach Vane raised an eyebrow, folding his thick hands over his stomach. "Well... you kind of don’t have a choice here, Whitelock."

Aina froze. "What do you mean I don’t have a choice?"

"The roster has already been finalized and officialized by the board," Coach Vane explained calmly, pointing a thick finger at her. "Her name is already submitted. One cannot simply leave sports after the official selection has been decided. You’ll have to wait until the next school term to drop out."

"This is ridiculous!" Aina burst out, throwing her hands up in the air. "I never once even applied to begin with! I didn’t submit anything! So it’s an error that can easily un-error itself!" ℯℯ𝘭.𝘤ℴ𝘮

"But you did apply," Coach Vane countered smoothly. He reached down into a wooden drawer, pulling out a crisp white paper file and sliding it across the desk toward her. "Is this not your name?"

Aina snatched the paper off the desk, her eyes rapidly scanning the bottom line. Sitting right above the signature line was her full alias: Travis Whitelock.

"Yeah, that’s my name," Aina gritted out, her jaw tight. "But that is not my handwriting! I don’t write like that! My handwriting is neat, not this sloppy, aggressive scrawl!"

Coach Vane shrugged his heavy shoulders, completely unsympathetic. "Well, unfortunately for you, I received this official paper, and thus you are in... maybe someone played a prank on you or signed you up as a surprise. But either way, you’re on the team now."

"I am not on the team!" Aina snapped, slamming her hands onto his desk.

Coach Vane leaned forward, his dark eyes narrowing with absolute authority. "You are on the team, Whitelock. And if you don’t show up for mandatory Valkyr-Rugby practice, then that’s it. You will accumulate a massive amount of disciplinary debits. And well... if you accumulate enough of those, you will be unceremoniously kicked out of Moonside Academy."

Aina stood frozen, the breath completely knocked out of her lungs. "This is unbelievable..." she whispered, her voice trembling with pure rage.

Oh my God, screw this! Screw this entire school! her mind screamed furious. Without another word, Aina spun on her heel, slamming the heavy office door behind her so hard the stone walls rattled.

She marched out onto the bright, open grass of the Colosseum field, having a total, absolute breakdown inside her head. Her chest was heaving, her hands clenching into tight fists as the hot midday sun beat down on her shoulders.

How did this even happen?! she panicked, pacing frantic circles near the sidelines. I can’t play rugby! They will crush my bones! They will find out I’m a girl in two seconds when I get tackled into the dirt!

And then, as she stood beneath the blazing sun, a cold bolt of clarity struck her brain. The scrawl on that paper. The sudden, mandatory assignment. The pure, spiteful inconvenience of it all.

The princes, Aina realized, her blood turning to pure fire in her veins. Malric, Vance, or Theo... they have something to do with this! This HAS to be them! They signed me up to ruin my life!

She was so blinded by pure, searing anger that she pulled her foot back and viciously kicked a heavy clump of grass, sending dirt flying into the air.

"I hate this!" Aina yelled out loud, completely forgetting to act like a quiet boy as she kicked another chunk of grass. "I hate this! I hate this!"

"I don’t believe the grass did anything to you."

Aina instantly froze.

She snapped her head around, her heart jumping into her throat. Standing a few feet away near the wooden bleachers was a girl. She had a wildly messy, unkempt ponytail, smudges of dark dirt along her cheekbones, and an oversized, torn denim jacket thrown over her standard uniform.

Aina blinked, adjusting her glasses as she tried to catch her breath. "Who... who are you?"

The messy girl tilted her head, a strange, sleepy smirk touching her lips as she leaned against the wooden post. "I’m Ally," the girl replied smoothly, her dark eyes looking Aina up and down. "Who are you?"

Aina stared at her in total confusion. "A-Travis?"