As good as the girl in the hoodie was, she couldn’t struggle against three bodies at once and she was soon pinned down, the side of her face pressed against the sand. Two cheerleaders held her arms outstretched behind her back, with one knee each pushed against hoodies’ back. The crony hoodie had had in a chokehold was kneeling to the side, holding her neck weakly.
Dae looked around. The crowd’s murmuring had shifted, and the Cheering had died down. Even though hoodie had lost the fight, her actions had done something to change the mood. What that mood was, Jon didn’t know. But it felt like being knee deep in gasoline while someone waved a candle around you.
“Oh, you can fight,” Dae said, cleared her throat. “You can fight us. But there’s more of us, little rebel. You think your fancy moves will do you any good? Fighting is for the weak. A true cheerleader fights with… hmm…” She turned around to the crowd, snapping her fingers as if she had forgotten the words. “Oh, someone help me here…”
“A proper Cheer!” The girls in orange said in unison, their eyes manic.
Dae pointed at them, snapping her fingers. “Yes. Exactly. Thank you.” And then she turned to hoodie. Dae kneeled, grabbed the top of the hood, peeling it back to reveal a girl with hair as dark as a story of war and an ear heavy with piercings.
The girl in the hoodie spat at Dae’s face. Dae recoiled even as her cronies pushed hoodie back into the sand.
“Oh, what the fuck! This is… Eugh! Disgusting rebel bitch!” She screamed.
“Time to go,” Jon said, hand tight on her shoulder strap, starting away from the crowd.
“But I want to see what happens,” Zoe complained. Mikayla had turned around, clearly upset.
“Nothing to see, Zoe. We already know who won.”
Zoey, was smiling. “I know, right? Dae really showed those rebels!”
Jon’s little sister had obviously not noticed how the mood had changed. One moment that Cheer had been insidiously chanted with an energy Jon had only ever seen sports fanatics have. Or evil cults in a fantasy novel. The next, the crowd had grown tense, more trapped by morbid curiosity and onlooker syndrome than by a celebratory situation. They had come to see four rebels humiliated, and while they had seen two girls seemingly, well, Jon didn’t know what to call it other than converted, they had also seen one of them escape Dae’s notice altogether, and another not only best her Squad, but spit on the whole affair. Metaphorically and physically.
“No, Zoe,” Jon said, looking over his shoulder to see the girl in the hoodie helping the girl in the top hat up. Dae had her arms around the two girls in orange as she disappeared past the crowd. Soon, the other cheerleaders started to disperse. Some, like Jon, stared at the two women left in the sandpit, but Jon didn’t know enough about this world to know why they were doing it. “Sandra just scored a massive victory.”
“Sandra? You know that girl, Jonatha?” Mikayla said quietly.
Zoe gasped.
Jon stopped for a second and thought about it. He shrugged and gave his sisters a half-smile.
“I guess I do. Now, let’s go to class. I have the feeling we are all going to be late.”
