The Last Day of Summer

I was an average girl with a best friend, a secret crush and a rival... until at summer's end I realized that nothing is what it seems.

The Last Day of Summer

Earth, Solar City...

Knightly residence, Mireh's Room...

"Hello world! It's another glorious day of summer vacation!" I stretch out my arms, reaching to the ceiling of my room and yawn. My alarm clock has gone off at mid day just in time for some lunch and an afternoon of fun. I can't waste a precious summer day! But why do I feel so tired? I check my clock and realize it's six thirty in the morning, what in the world?

"Mireh, time to get up! You can't be late for your first day of school!" My mother's voice calls from downstairs and I panic.

School? It's the first day of school? My summer vacation is over? I hide under the bedcovers and like a preschool child, my mother has to come drag me out minutes later. I dread the end of summer.

School Bus...

Allow me to reintroduce myself; I am Mireh Knightly, an average junior year high school girl with an average life. I have mid-back length lavender hair, pink eyes and an average body, nothing out of the ordinary. Today is no different then any other day... how I crave for adventure! My summer has ended and I didn't see a hair of Rido Royale, he's my secret crush, now a senior at my school. On the bright side, the start of school means I'll see him again... That also means I'll have to see Fala Flame, my archenemy. She hates me for reasons unknown to me and since she's such a witch towards me I of course, hate her in return.

"Mireh, you're looking depressed today, cheer up!" The girl sitting on the bus next to me is Tila. She has big golden eyes and brown hair that reaches just above her shoulders. She's a year older than me and has been my neighbor ever since we were both children; we've been best friends ever since my family moved next to hers. She has three older brothers, but they're all away at college, so the neighborhood is much quieter than it used to be. As for me, I have a little sister who's pretty independent for an elementary school student. She always rides a different bus with her friends. That kid's quite the early riser, unlike me.

I let out a breath that turns into a yawn, "I just wish summer wasn't over."

Luna Academy, hallway...

"What?" My day is off to a terrible start! "I'm in the same class as Fala and I have gym on the first period! It's so evil!"

"Aw, c'mon, it's not so bad. At least we both have the same elective, drama in the last period," Tila tries to cheer me up. "Look, Rido is taking drama with us; maybe you two will star in a play together!"

"Ha, ha, ha, ha!" That obnoxious laughter, it's Fala! Her perfect figure, bright green eyes and waist-length blond hair stand out wherever she goes. She walks over uninvited and pokes her nose where it doesn't belong. "If anyone is going to be starring in a play with Rido, that would be me!" I want to rip her head off, but I can only glare.

"Mireh has as much of a chance as anyone!" Tila growls, she hates Fala just as much as I do, though no one really knows why. It's as if something in our subconscious and hers makes us hate each other.

Then Rido walks down the hall and Fala clings to his arm, why is he allowing this? "For your information, Rido and I started dating over the summer!" He looks the same, red hair with a blue line on the right side, silver eyes and a face and body that would make a Hollywood star look like nothing, but he's acting very differently.

Both Tila and I stare in disbelief, then Rido looks at me as if he was looking through me. "It's true, so you better stay away from me, Fala doesn't like you."

Rido has never been mean to me like this, has Fala corrupted him this much over the summer? While I remain in frozen shock, Tila glares at Rido. "Idiot," she mutters before walking off fuming, dragging me away by the arm, as I am still too shocked to move.

Luna Academy, tennis court...

Here I am, running around the tennis court because I had to have gym in the first period. I would rather have it last so I can just go home to shower. I hate showering at school, but I can't very well spend the whole day all sweaty. At least I have a nice view of the archery range some distance away. Rido has gym in the first period too, with his sport of choice being archery. I tried out for it and failed miserably. Last year, Fala was in the archery team too, she had the most expensive bow and arrows like a showoff. I hate to admit it, but she was pretty good.

Suddenly, the witch in question runs past me, elbowing me on the way. "What the? Why are you here?"

"I'm in the tennis team this year, Rido will just have to survive in the archery team without me," she goes off laughing leaving me behind.

"No way!" I hate being stuck with her; though I'm a little relieved she's not with Rido. But they're dating and he's been corrupted. I wish I had spent the summer with him, who knows where he disappeared to or how Fala managed to stalk him wherever he went. To top it all up, after the warm up was done, Fala was chosen to be the team captain; it's turning out to be a rotten day indeed.

Luna Academy, behind the gym...

I need to get ready for my next class. After all this exercise I'm tired and don't feel like hitting the books. Math hates me and I hate it right back! "Excuse me!" The sudden small voice caught me by surprise. I looked around but only saw a glowing tiny person, small enough to fit in the palm of my hand and I stared. "I'm glad I got your attention," she flew around me, "yes, yes, I definitely feel it. Are you the one? Are you the lost princess who we have all almost forgotten?"

"Lost princess?" Now that I think about it, the weather still feels very much like summer. Maybe I'm suffering from a heat stroke and that's why I'm crazy.

"Oh yes, it must be you! Allow me to unlock your powers!" The fairy flies faster around me and I'm surrounded by a strong glow that makes me faint.

Mireh's dream...

"Princess!" A young man calls out. There is a lady surrounded by a light so bright that I cannot see her face. "Don't give up your life!" I feel a deep pain, as if someone dear to me is in danger.

"Don't come!" The lady shouts, "please, don't interfere, this is the only way!" The light glows brighter and I can't look at it anymore, then everything fades into nothingness. That dream... it's familiar, but something about it is out of place. The knight... the lady... there's something off about them...

Luna Academy, infirmary...

"Where am I?" I open my eyes and I'm surrounded by white.

The nurse, a kind old lady with graying hair and soft violet eyes smiles gently at me. "You're in the school infirmary. You fainted, it must be this heat. You better take some time to rest; I already excused you from your classes. When you're well enough, Rido will take you home."

"Thank you..." I conclude the fairy must have been a dream. Wait a minute; did she say Rido would take me home? I must still be dreaming. I sat up as if propelled by a spring when the young man in question appeared from behind the white curtain. "You..."

"I thought you might feel better taking the day off at home," Rido smiles kindly. He's never been mean, but he's never acknowledged me this much either. "Are you well enough to walk?" I nod dumbly and he picks up my school bag which had been set next to the bed. "Let's go then." I just keep nodding like a bobble-head toy and follow him out of the infirmary.

Solar City sidewalk...

I walked out of the school with Rido and kept walking next to him in silence. "Um... I live this way," I pointed down my street, but he didn't stop.

"We're going to my house," my face turned crimson at those words.

"Why?" I stuttered.

He gave me a charming smile and placed his arm around my shoulders whispering in my ear, "don't you want to come?"

My face turned even redder and I'm pretty sure every drop of blood in my body accumulated in my cheeks. "I-I-I..." I'm without words.

He chuckles, "relax, it's just an innocent little visit. I only want to make sure you're okay. Both your parents work, don't they? And your sister is in school. My dad's the principal; I can get away with skipping, especially if it's to help a fellow student. It's not good for you to be left alone if you might get dizzy again."

"You're concerned... that's... unexpected..." Why do I get the feeling that he knows far more than he's letting on?

Royale residence, living room...

Rido led me into his house and placed my bag on the couch, we're all alone here. "Make yourself at home, how about a snack?"

"Sure..." He disappeared into the kitchen and I observed the elegant living room in shades of white and gold. As Rido returned with some sodas and cookies a light flew through the window and positioned itself between us. It was the fairy from before. Rido dropped the food and angrily tried to catch the fairy, "stupid bug you're ruining everything!"

"Run, Mireh! Run! This man is evil!" The fairy shrieked, flying too fast for even Rido's speedy reflexes to catch her.

I don't know what's going on, but Rido's acting very strange and it's not every day that you see a mythological creature who knows your name. Maybe it would be wise to listen. "Fairy, let's go!" I dash for the door and Rido chases after me, but the fairy shoots a beam of ice at him that temporarily freezes him in place, then the fairy and I make our escape.

Knightly residence, Mireh's room...

The fairy and I ran all the way back to my house, but I left my keys in my bag, forgotten at Rido's house. Fortunately, the fairy knew a spell to unlock doors. Once inside, I locked the house from within. With my heart still beating wildly, I looked at the fairy in puzzlement, "explanation please?"

The fairy nods and I take a moment to take in her appearance in detail. She sure is tiny, with long ivory hair and icy blue eyes. Her wings are a soft pale blue and her glow is translucent between white and blue. "My name is Feri and I come from the kingdom of Magica..."

Feri then tells me her story. "Once upon a time, in a planet far from Earth, there was a prosperous kingdom called Swordan. The king turned greedy and oppressed his people, so the royal council of mages abandoned him. The head mage formed another kingdom, Magica, in a desolate land, using the power of the Core Crystal to turn the desert into a fertile garden. The Core Crystal was a gem about the size of a fist, said to have been extracted from the planet's core, containing the life force of the planet itself."

"The head mage feared that just as he had taken the Core Crystal from the evil king, one day another would dethrone him and use the Core Crystal for evil. He casted a spell upon the crystal and made it so that its power would respond only to him and his direct descendants. Many generations passed and the descendants of the evil king of Swordan tried to avenge their ancestor. They murdered the king and queen of Magica and left the princess as the only direct descendant of the mage. The princess had her knights retaliate and the battle was fierce, for the power of the Core Crystal was weakened, leaving Magica exposed."

"The princess went to battle and defeated the evil villain with her magic, at the cost of her own life. Some of her loyal knights were caught in the fight and vanished along with her. The villain never came back, so he must already be dead. The Core Crystal will not accept a new master and without someone who can strengthen it with their own energy our planet will die. The fact that the crystal won't accept a new master means that the bloodline of the mage still exists. Only a direct descendant can control the Core Crystal and save our world, the oldest child of the oldest child for each generation."

"Probably as a side effect of the princess' suicidal spell to defeat the evil king of Swordan, her memory became blurry. No one fully remembers her in the land. The knights must have been forgotten too because they were so close by when the spell was finalized. Getting back to the purpose of my visit, I'm on a mission to find the princess; she must have survived if the Core Crystal wasn't released from her bloodline. I've traveled from far away and I finally found you. I sense a strong power in you. It has to be you, you're the missing princess! Please allow me to finish unlocking your power. That man interrupted me before, but I won't let him catch me off guard this time."

As the fairy finishes her story I can only stare. "I'm a magical princess?" Is this the adventure I've been wishing for, or a sign that I'm losing my mind? "Do it! If there's any magical power in me, please unlock it!"

"Right! Here I go!" Feri is once again surrounded by an intense glow and so am I. I can feel a deep power hidden inside me, then it all turns black.

Royale residence, Rido's room...

I open my eyes and find unfamiliar surroundings. I turn my head to the side slowly and find Rido, Tila and Feri. "Where am I? What are you guys doing here? The fairy! What happened?"

"Take a deep breath and allow the memories to come to you," Tila instructed.

I closed my eyes and evened my breathing. There was a magical kingdom, a knight captain, a knight apprentice, a princess... no, there was no princess, there was a prince and the knight was a girl. "I'm... I'm a knight... I remember, but how?"

"Organize your thoughts," Rido reveals the truth, "we come from a planet far away, a planet full of magic, so it would seem. The story Feri knows, the story she told you, it's only partly true. There was no princess, only a prince who wanted to escape his responsibilities and a lady knight who refused to go with him."

"Refused to go?" I'm still confused, my memories are still unclear. I'm not from Earth, my past on Earth is a construct inserted into my mind. I'm from that planet, the planet called Eternal Summer.

"Feri, the password is, summer vacation is a world of joy that should last forever," as soon as Rido spoke those words, Feri's icy blue eyes glowed a darker blue as she floated in place motionless. "Show them the truth, Feri, show them Eternal Summer..."

The room changed with a holographic projection and we were in a mechanical environment as Feri spoke automatically. "Eternal Summer is an artificial planet created a hundred years ago on Earth inspired by the virtual worlds that many enjoy visiting. This world was design to be a prosperous paradise of fantasy and adventure. The few who completed this secret project, used their memory modifying technology to erase all traces of it and enjoy their world without the interference of those who wished for an overly complex world, rather than a world based on fantasy and fun. The founders of Eternal Summer then erased their own memories of Earth and its boring ways to live in their ideal fantasy world."

"Log out," when Rido spoke the command, Feri's eyes returned to normal and she seemed unaware of the speech she just gave.

"Wait a minute, you're telling me that all the magic that the royal family had was really super advance technology?" That's quite a shock given that I lived in that magical world believing it to be real without further explanation. "Then the Core Crystal is..."

"Kind of like a master remote control that recognizes the royal bloodline's DNA, though only the first descendant," Rido revealed. "It was weak because the system was buggy. We spent so much time playing around our fantasy world that we forgot to do maintenance. It was the duty of the royal family, the few who knew the truth, but it was already too late. The planet became too unstable and began to decay. The queen of Swordan, an android made to watch over the land, tried to evacuate everyone back to Earth."

"The royal council and their leader, my ancestor, did not wish to end the life of adventure and return to the hard working monotonous life of Earth. He overrode the Core Crystal and reprogrammed the planet; he abandoned Swordan and established Magica with his followers. The android queen was supposedly destroyed, but she was still functional and repaired herself eventually. Later, she returned with a malfunctioning artificial intelligence unit, believing her mission was to eliminate my family to carry out her plans of evacuating the population back to Earth. Eternal Summer is no longer sustainable, it's literally falling apart and the people believe that if the monarch returns, the Core Crystal will magically fix everything."

"Then Fala isn't really evil, she's just doing what she was programmed to do," Tila realized. That's right, I remember now, the villain was a woman who looked just like Fala. She was an android all along? I knew she looked too perfect to be human.

"I was fed up with everything, being the only one left who knew the truth, knowing that I couldn't help my people. Knowing that to save them I have to break it to them that their world had to be abandoned. I decided to run away to Earth. Fairies are the voice command systems of Eternal Summer, they are advanced androids that can use the technology that we came to know as magic. I sent Feri to tell you to meet me so we could run away from it all, but you never came, so I decided to go by myself," Rido confessed.

"I intended to be teleported to Earth, where I would use Eternal Summer's power to modify a few people's memories and find a place for myself. I was supposed to have destroyed Fala in the process. Tila was helping me fight, though she had decided to stay behind at Eternal Summer, she was caught up in everything when you suddenly jumped in and messed up the program, after I thought you wouldn't show up at all. So much for running away."

"You wanted me to join you?" My face turns red at the thought, "Feri never came to me, I was worried and I went to find you!"

"My duty is to protect the prince above all!" Feri cheerfully declared.

"I guess that's why delivering my message was left for later," Rido breathed in exasperation, then he seemed to realize something. "Just out of curiosity, Mireh, would you have come?"

"Of course I would run away with you! You'd have to be an idiot not to notice I like you!" I immediately slapped both hands over my mouth, face crimson.

"That's good to know," Rido chuckles.

"What about Fala?" I inquire, trying to change the subject.

"When we teleported to Earth and people's memories were overridden, hers was too. The program was set up to work on less people as I wasn't expecting you and so your interference affected the result, but overall it turned out alright. It's just that I didn't know when Fala's defective AI would go crazy, so I wanted to keep an eye on her. I guess I was feeling guilty about having abandoned my kingdom and didn't want to involve more innocents in this," Rido explained.

I pouted, "you could have been nicer to me."

"I was still kind of bitter about being rejected, okay?" His tone hints that he wants to drop the subject. "Anyway, it seems the overwritten memories of Tila and Fala were backed up in your subconscious along with your own, so that's why Feri sensed something in you. The memories of the people of Eternal Summer were also modified, they were supposed to forget about me and take Tila as their princess, but things got messed up, Tila ended up here and they ended up with a mysterious missing princess."

"It was a lack of communication rather than a real rejection," I humor him and change the subject after that final statement. "So now what do we do? We have a virtual reality artificial planet the size of the moon that's full of people in peril, who believe in a magical power that's full of too many programming bugs to be of any help. Wait a minute, it is the moon! Eternal Summer is a virtual artificial planet, not an actual artificial planet. It exists within the hollow center of the moon in secret."

"Yes, I gave you access to the full truth so that information that only the royals used to know should be in your head now," Rido confirmed.

Tila let out a breath of awe, "the technology of Eternal Summer is really something, it's the perfect virtual reality adventure that makes the players believe in it. The only problem was the lack of maintenance."

"Okay, I get it, play all the online games you want, but don't forget to scan for viruses regularly. I'm not running away any more. I'll see this through. I'm going to find a place on Earth for everyone from Eternal Summer, they'll be rich or famous or both, they'll be happy. It's the least I can do for them, to give them a new home. As for their memories, adapting will be difficult, so I'll temporarily lock their memories and let them figure things out slowly when they're ready to face this." Rido sounded determined.

Tila looked exasperated, "this is what you should have done from the start!"

"I know, I just didn't want to take it away from them, I didn't want to end their vacation. Next time the human race makes a virtual world, if I get a say in it, the anti-viruses and debugging programs will be much better, then we can have a real virtual paradise of adventure with reliable technology as it should be. For the time being, let's just save their lives." Tila and I nodded, agreeing with Rido in this priority. "Feri, teleport us back to Eternal Summer!"

"Right! Here we go, by the magic of the Core Crystal, the origin of all fairies... teleport!" Feri's voice became an echo as Eternal Summer received the command and drew us in.

Inside the moon, forbidden chambers...

The structure all around was mechanical and in the center of it all, there was a glowing glass orb, the Core Crystal. "These are the forbidden chambers, a place that previously only the current monarch of the kingdom was allowed to access." Rido explained. "From here, I can put the plan into action. I feel bad taking everyone from their home and brainwashing them, but it's their easiest hope of survival."

"Wouldn't it be better to just give them a new home and let them keep their memories, like us?" Tila suggested. "We have a role, a history in this world, we know who our characters are, but we also know the truth."

"Humans are creatures of evolution and advancement. Going backwards will be painful, maybe too painful. They won't accept it and they might try to rebuild Eternal Summer. There was a reason why our ancestors hid it from the world. Those left on Earth would become jealous of those enjoying the virtual world and there are still not enough resources to build a fantasy paradise for everyone. It was keeping it to themselves or not having it at all, but in their despair to get their home back, the people of Eternal Summer may not realize that. All hope to revive it will really be lost then." As Rido spoke, he inputted commands on a large keyboard in front of a massive screen behind the Core Crystal in this large metal chamber. "There... now everyone from this world will be placed in their new lives on Earth..."

I sighed sadly, "so that's it... the adventure I craved for, the adventure I once had... it's over again."

"Well done humans," that annoying voice... Fala? She stepped out of thin air! "As the android queen of this planet I too have the power of the fairies and more. My AI might have been damaged, but now I remember my mission, I know you must be destroyed! Prince Rido, for the crime of endangering the population of Eternal Summer even though I, the queen, ordered an immediate evacuation, I sentence you to death!"

"That's not fair!" Tila yelled, "Rido made up for his past mistakes and for his ancestors. The people of Eternal Summer have new lives now, they'll be okay!"

"Judgment will be executed!" Fala went on the attack, her hands turning to cannons that shot an array of missiles at all of us. I guess she counted Tila and I as accomplices.

We jumped out of the way and the small missiles hit a metal column that cracked and bent, setting off a warning on the large screen. "Danger! Danger!" Feri yelled loudly.

"Affirmative, fighting here is unacceptable," no sooner had Fala spoken those words, we were teleported away.

Inside the moon, Magica Kingdom ruins...

We were seemingly on the surface of a land, but this was truly the inside of the moon. The virtual atmosphere was all around us, but it wasn't a happy picture. The land was dying, reflecting the state of the system. My home was truly doomed, but we had other dangers to worry about, such the android and her small but dangerous missiles. Fortunately, she ran out of those quickly, unfortunately, two long laser blades took their place originating from her wrists as she tried to chop us to pieces and we did our best to dodge.

Rido picked up a rock and threw it at Fala, "it's me you want, so come get me!" He went on the run with Fala in pursuit.

"Now's our chance!" I urged Tila.

"To do what?" Tila brought up a good question that I didn't have an answer to.

I looked at Feri, "can you use your ice beam on Fala?"

"That is not possible, the Core Crystal is using its magic and cannot spare any for me," Feri replied.

"It must be because of the process of moving everyone from Eternal Summer to Earth and arranging Earth's memories and databases to make it as if they were always there. The system can't spare any resources," Tila concluded grimly. "That means that the Core Crystal won't respond to Rido either. We're powerless against Fala!"

"We need to help Rido!" without a second thought I chased after them. When I caught up to Rido and Fala, she had him cornered in the castle ruins. I picked up a rusty sword off the floor and charged at Fala, remembering my knight training. "Stay away from the prince!" The rusty sword shattered upon impacting her head, serving only to remove the human disguise.

The mask of fair skin, green eyes and blond hair came undone. Seeing it as a hindrance to trip on, Fala finished removing the tattered covers herself, revealing a being of metal with glowing red eyes. "The knight shall perish along with the prince!"

For a second I thought I was doomed, until a bolder fell on Fala. "Not if the knight captain has a say on it!" Tila stood atop the ruin walls on higher ground. "Guess what? I found a catapult."

Just as I was starting to think we could breathe easy, the boulder began to be lifted. Rido, Tila and I scrambled to sit on top of it, hoping that our combined weight would crush Fala for good, but we knew it couldn't be that easy.

"Rido, are any of the relics of the royal family useful? You know, as in not dependant on the Core Crystal?" I remember the royal family having many useful treasures, but most of them worked with magic and the technology of the Core Crystal, of Eternal Summer, is the source of that so called magic.

"There were two, but only one is left, I have to do something in the system. Mireh, head to the royal treasury in the basement of these ruins. Tila, distract Fala, I'll go get everything ready. The Core Crystal won't be needed as a power source for what I have in mind, but it will be needed to undo the lock upon the weapon's programming, after that it will respond to you in its own emergency power. There should be just enough system resources to spare to do that much. It's the queen's scepter, go find it Mireh," Rido explained hurriedly.

"Go, leave the rest to us!" Tila insisted.

Rido jumped off the boulder and ran back to the forbidden chambers. Fala was finally able to lift the boulder off herself and threw Tila and I along with it. Fortunately, other than a few scratches and bruises, we were okay. Tila picked up the pieces that came off the boulder and started to throw the rocks at Fala, I knew she was creating a diversion, so I ran for the treasury in the ruins' basement.

I made it to the bottom of the stairs surrounded by darkness and stumbled around tripping over spilled chests of golden coins and precious gems. Then at the end of the large treasury chamber I saw a glow illuminating the gray stone walls. There were two scepters the king's scepter, once wielded by prince Rido after his father's death, was broken, its light gone. It was destroyed by the enemies led by Fala in the past, before we went to Earth. The queen's scepter is still glowing. I picked it up and ran back to the surface where Tila was in a jam. She was exhausted and couldn't dodge the laser blades of the mad android any longer; I knew I wouldn't be able to get to her on time.

Rido appeared from behind the ruins, having made it back from the forbidden chambers, he was always quite a fast runner. He grabbed a rusted dagger from the ground and tossed it at Fala. Her attention turned towards him, her primary target and she went on the attack. The laser blades on her wrists vanished to be replaced with cannons, that this time shot chains. Tila and Rido were wrapped by the chains and rendered immobile. The laser blades appeared again and Fala lifted them over Rido as I dashed towards them.

The power of the scepter, even if it's working on a backup battery, I can still feel it. "This is your end!" I will the energy of the scepter to be released with my mind and the advanced machine responds sensing the brainwaves' command. A massive amount of electricity shoots out from the scepter and impacts Fala, whose armor has been cracked by the boulder.

"Eternal Summer Core Crystal, save my data! Eternal Summer! No... it's not responding, insufficient system resources!" Since the Core Crystal's systems are busy, her request goes unheard. Finally, Fala has been destroyed for good. The backup battery from the scepter fades and the electric outburst ends. It's over; I free Tila and Rido from their chains.

"We better make sure..." Rido takes a lighter from his pocket and ignites the remains of the android. The fallen machine melts into an unrecognizable blob and I feel relieved.

"Warning! Warning! The process of Eternal Summer's evacuation has been completed, but the system is overheating. Too many errors, the system is out of control!" Feri's alarmed voice gets our attention as the moon begins to quake and fall apart on the inside.

"Feri, get us out of here!" Rido yells.

"Core Crystal, grant me one last wish, lend me your power a final time!" As Feri spoke those words, we disappeared.

Royale residence, living room...

Rido, Tila and I were seemingly alright, safely back on Earth while Eternal Summer collapsed within the moon, unknown to everyone but us. Feri was a different story, her glow was gone and she lay motionless like a lifeless doll. "Feri?"

"With Eternal Summer destroyed, Feri is no longer functional," Rido explained. "I wish I had acted sooner."

"It was a lot for one person to carry; at least we saw the last of Fala, even if we also saw the last of Eternal Summer. It will probably be a long time before a similar world is built. I hope people take good care of it next time." Tila gently picked up Feri's motionless form.

"Take care of her as a reminder of our home," Rido voiced and Tila nodded. "It goes to show that no matter how good the technology is, it will still need maintenance and backups. At least everyone made it out alive; they should have been integrated into their new lives on Earth just fine. I'm also really glad all that teleportation didn't kill us, it was buggy so it was a risk."

"You're rash and disregard the consequences as usual," Tila half scolded.

"And you're always there to back me up as usual, captain," Rido smiled in return. "I reset all the world clocks by one day, today is the last day of summer vacation. I also took the liberty to change our schedules a little, and of course I had to erase Fala from all memories and records," Rido explained.

I pouted, "you could have made it the first day of summer vacation. Though I suppose that would mess up the seasons..."

"At least we don't have gym first thing in the morning, last period, kendo team, all three of us," Rido grinned, "because now you're a senior too."

"Really? You made me a senior? Awesome! I get to skip a year!" I'm really happy with the news, then another thought enters my mind. Wait, that means math will be that much harder... Tila!"

"Don't worry, I'll help you," Tila smiles reassuringly. "By the way, I just realized something; I remembered that the king and queen's scepters were only for the king and queen. Technically Rido became king, but even if it would have been useful he couldn't activate the power of the queen's scepter after the king's scepter was damaged. Which means..." I'm not sure where Tila is going with all this or the reason for that amused grin she has.

"Okay, you got me," Rido confesses, "I had to trick the system into believing that Mireh married me so it would unlock access to the queen's scepter to her. Can we postpone any further discussion?"

Tila laughs while I turn red yet again. "Fine, I'm off. I've been putting off scanning my computer for the whole summer, so I might as well do it now, I'll see you two later!"

After Tila has left Rido's house, I am left wondering what to say. Rido breaks the silence, "I don't know about you, but I'm really in the mood to eat some lunch now. How about we go get some pizza, watch a movie and later get ice-cream in the evening? It's the last day of summer, so we might as well go on at least one date."

"Date? Alright, let's go! If this is my last day of summer vacation for the year, I intend to make the best of it!" Though I'll have to wait a long time, I know that one day summer will return...

End

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