"Try to Blow Me because I'm a S|ut Like You!" Colette yelled, causing dozens of heads to turn in he direction as she walked down the pathway leading away from the school.
"Excuse me?" Colette's best friend, Videl, asked, confused.
"So What? Just Raise Your Glass when you know The Truth About Love!" Colette pumped her right fist as she jumped a yelled her last statement.
"Oh . . . you're making sentences using P!nk songs again," Videl stated. "You should stop that."
"Oh, but Della, it's so much fun!" Colette adapted a twisted smile as she bent down in a bow, scaring away a few more students. She laughed aloud and ran down the pathway, flying down the hill that marked the end of the school campus. Videl had to run to keep up, and she nearly ran into Colette when Colette suddenly stopped at the bottom of the hill.
"Well how do you do, strangers?" Colette asked, sneaking up behind the last two of their little group.
"Wha-?" Wyatt reeled around to look at the source of the voice, startling Jason, who had been in the middle of trying to give Wyatt a kiss. "Don't sneak up on us like that!" Wyatt blushed, indignant and incredibly jumpy at what he believe to be a rather sensitive moment.
"Oh, don't be so shy little Wy-Wy. It's not like you've got anything to hide from us!" Colette beamed.
"And if you did, chances are we would already know about it," Videl added.
Wyatt just stood there, mouth gaping. He wasn't always so easy to startle, but Colette took any opportunity to do so when he was with Jason. When Wyatt's mind was absorbed in Jason, he became about a thousand times easier to startle. This was something Colette did just about every day.
"Well, anyways," Jason intervened, placing his arm across Wyatt's shoulders. He was a head taller than Wyatt, with short brown hair and his trademark soul patch. He was the athletic one, whereas Wyatt was rather short and scrawny with short black hair and a dark outfit to match. "What are we to do today?" Jason finished.
"I have no idea," Colette said, placing unnecessarily long pauses between each word. "Maybe we can get our Duel Monster on later? Or perhaps run around on Cloud. I don't know. Oh! That reminds me," Colette pulled out her phone and opened her email. Just as she thought, there was a new one waiting for her.
Colette,
How has your day been? From what I hear when we correspond, your days at your school are abnormal and I do wonder from time to time what sort of shenanigans you have come up with.
My day has been well, school has been going great and the kids at my Karate class have been great. Most of them are fairly rowdy and there may be a few that disrespect me, but Miharu-sensei has been putting a stop to it. After all, how can you learn without respecting your teacher?
I am not sure if you had heard, but there has been a rumour going around, saying that if you logged in between 00:00 and 00:01 here a week before the update, that we will get a special...what do you call it, sneak peek?
I hope to hear from you soon, my friend.
Katsumi
Colette read the email, along with the rest of her friends who were peering over her shoulder.
"I think I heard about that," Jason said, obviously unconvinced about such rumors.
"Sounds fun! We should try it!" Colette stated, a grin on her face. After a moment, the grin faded as a thought occurred to her. "But it's at midnight . . . I don't feel like logging on at midnight. I won't remember!"
Videl took Colette's phone and looked over the email once more. "Well, actually, if it would be midnight in Japan, I think it would be about two in the afternoon here. So, it shouldn't be too difficult . . . ," Videl looked up, glancing about her friends. "But just in case, I'll be sure to remind you."
* * * * *
Colette pressed down the "log-in" button on her monitor. The screen changed, and suddenly she found her daemon in an odd arena. Next to her stood the daemon's of Videl, Jason, and Wyatt, the fact that they were on each other's friends lists and did so much together on Cloud probably causing them to spawn near each other, as it often did.
Colette's daemon glanced at Videl's daemon, they nodded and turned towards the center of the arena. As the last few seconds counted down, a daemon appeared in the center of the arena and began to speak.
"Greetings, players! My real name is not important, but you may call be by my username, ICARUS. As you may already know, the tenth year anniversary of CLOUD will soon be here. Many have been excited about the news of a 'revolution' and your enthusiasm is not in vain. Tonight's announcement grants all users present a secret item and a hint at what the anniversary celebrations will be."
Suddenly, Colette received a message, from Icarus no less. She opened it and received a silver key with "Lady Raptor" etched on the side. The key resembled a guitar with a raptor motif. Colette glanced over at her friends, noticing that they had their own individualized keys as well.
"CLOUD has always affected our lives in a positive way and it's time to take the online experience to the real world. Or is it time to take it the other way around? It really depends on how you use CLOUD. Whatever the case, this new revolution will change the way you perceive the world around you, both on and offline. That is all I will reveal. Have a nice morning, day, night and evening."
As Icarus finished, he logged out, which forced Colette and, presumably, every body else to log out as well. Colette stared at her computer screen for a long moment.
"Daheck just happened?"
