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“Oh man, check this out!” Crafty says turning to his right, only to find that Amy and Mars are no where in sight. “What? Guys?” He steps away from the stand that caught his attention. Looking over the crowd trying to spot Amy’s purple hair.
It takes a few minutes, but he finally spots a familiar head of hair and starts heading in that direction. His nerves calming as he spots Mars as well. “Crafty!” Amy shouts happily once he’s closer to the two. “Glad you could find us!”
Mars looks up from her phone, giving Crafty a smile, “I’m writing in discord to find the others.”
“Good idea,” replies Crafty. “I’m kind of surprised how packed it is for a Sunday.”
“Well, it is the last day of a Con,” replies Amy. “Everyone’s probably doing the same thing we are.”
“Spending all of their remaining money on stuff,” Mars says in a dry tone. Both of her companions eye her two large bags, filled with purchases from the Con. Not that they could blame her, as they both spent money on some dumb stuff, but to a more limited extent.
“Are you going to be able to fit that in your luggage?” Amy asks, wondering if she won’t have the same problem as well.
Mars glances down at her bags, frowning. “Probably not, I might just have to buy a bigger luggage or send it to myself in a package.”
“Oh, a package is a good idea!” Crafty chimes in, “Might end up doing the same if I get anything else.”
“Found you guys!” A familiar voice interrupts the conversation as an exhausted looking CJ joins the group.
“Welcome to the horde!” Amy says. “Did you manage to buy everything you wanted?”
“Ugh, no!” CJ replies frustrated as he runs a hand through his hair. The brunet has even more bags than Mars. “I really wanted to get a couple of cool Hollow Knight prints from one artist, but the guy in front of me bought the last one!”
“Damn, that’s unlucky,” says Amy, nodding her head in understanding. “I had the same situation with a poster I wanted to get.”
“I’ve gotten everything I wanted,” Mars smiles cheekily at CJ, causing the boy to roll his eyes.
“It’s probably cause you’ve been here since the doors first opened.”
“First come, first serve. And who knows when I’ll come back here again.” Mars says unapologetically, “Crafty, have Fir or Smant wrote anything?”
“Nope,” the taller answers typing away at his phone. “It’s a bit loud here, so they might not have heard their notifications go off.”
“Or they have them off,” adds Mars.
“That too,” sighs Crafty. “So, what do we do?”
“We could just split here? Since we all have our own plans for the evening.” Mars suggest.
“Ya, but it feels weird not saying goodbye as a group, plus we were supposed to get lunch together,” Amy adds in, not wanting to just ditch her friends like this.
“I’m with Amy on this one, I’d rather wait for Fir and Smant,” says Crafty with a small frown on his face.
“CJ what do you think?” Mars turns to the other boy who’s been quietly scanning the crowd this entire time.
“I think…,” CJ starts speaking, before he stops letting out a long sigh and a few curses, after seemingly spotting something.
“Well, that was a strong reaction.” Amy says, looking at her other friends who nod in agreement.
“What did you see?” Mars asks, looking around the Con, but not seeing anything that could cause such a reaction from the boy.
CJ lets out another sigh, “I know where Smant is, so we can go over there and grab him then look for Fir.” The rest of the group is still confused, but nod grabbing their bags from the floor. “Alright follow me.”
They form a single-file line with CJ leading the group to the back southern corner of the space. At first it isn’t clear which booth they’re heading for, but soon it becomes obvious when there are only two options presented before them.
“No way, Smants a Warhammer fan?” Crafty says shocked as they get closer to the booth.
“Nope, he’s an even bigger nerd.” CJ chimes in from the front of the line.
This cause Amy and Mars to laugh, but Crafty’s just confused. Seeing he’s missing the joke Mars quickly explains, “He’s talking about Magic: The Gathering.” This still doesn’t seem to clear it up for the boy, causing her to huff. “I’m surprised you haven’t heard of it. It’s a popular card game that people claim is for super nerds.”
“Oh,” the boys eyes go wide in understanding. “I think some of my friends play it, but they always just call it Magic. I’ve never really taken an interest in it though.”
“That’s understandable,” Mars nods eyeing up the two ‘nerdy’ booths. “Still, I’m surprised these are here. They feel a bit out of place.”
“Well, I know there is a fairly large Warhammer streaming community,” Crafty chimes in. At this point the group has stopped in between the two booths, with Crafty chatting with the girls while CJ tries to spot Smallant.
“Huh, that’s kind of surprising, but it sort of makes sense,” says Amy. It looks like she’s about to add something to the conversation before she starts bouncing up and down. “Guys, I found Fir!”
The rest of the group turn in her direction and find Fir paying at the register of the Warhammer booth. It’s surprisingly easy to spot his light blond hair among the crowd. “Hey Fir!” Crafty shouts, raising his hand and waving it so he’s easier to notice.
The other boy looks confused for a moment, before zoning in on the group. His eyes go wide for a moment as he realizes pretty much everyone is there, so he quickly makes his way over to them. “Hey guys,” he says with a smile. “I was just about to head over to the spot you guys wrote about...”
CJ interrupts the shorter boy, standing right in front of him. “Fir, how could you?!” He says in a bit of a dramatic tone as he glances down at the medium sized bag, very obviously marked with the Warhammer logo. “I thought I only had to deal with one of you.” He hangs his head and sighs loudly, “Smallant converted you somehow. It’s the only way!”
At this very comical outburst, the group tries their hardest to keep themselves from bursting into laughter at CJ very obvious non-existent problem. Fir bends himself a bit to the side, so he can get a look at the others. He’s trying very hard to keep a straight face, but everyone except CJ who is still muttering to himself staring at the floor, can see his lips twitching.
“So, uh what?” Fir seems to be at a loss for words as he decides to take a step back from his dramatic friend and stands next to Crafty, who is openly smiling at the scene. “Anyway,” Fir says drawing out the word, still very confused but ignoring CJ for now. “Smant should be done in a minute then we can go grab lunch?”
Mars opens her mouth, ready to steer the conversation back to something more normal, but quickly gets interrupted with a shout from CJ.
“I KNEW IT!” The older boy straightens from his depressed slouch and spins aggressively towards the Magic booth, twisting his body in different ways to try to spot his friend over the crowd.
“Who are you looking for?” A smooth voice says from right next to him, causing the other boy to flinch.
CJ turns into the new voice’s direction, poking the taller boy in the chest. “Smant!”
“Yup, that’s me,” Smallant replies cheekily. At this point the rest of the group loses the small control they have and burst into laughter, even Fir who’s a little confused about this entire situation.
“No! Guys, this isn’t funny!” CJ says to his still giggling friends. “I blame you,” he grumbles at Smallant, before grabbing the boy’s arm and dragging him away from the ‘nerd’ booths. “Guys, lets get out of here.”
“My fault?” Smant says, trying to rile his friend up more. “CJ, I just got here! How is this my fault?”
“Because Fir was clean before we came here and now look at him!?” replies Cj, letting go of Smants arm and pointing at the blond boy.
“Clean?” Fir whispers, looking at Crafty, confusion back in full force. The curly haired boy just shrugs, also unaware of CJs problem. Amy though breaks back down into laughter, holding onto Mars for support as the group finally exits the stuffy building.
“CJ, you do realize that if it was my fault then Fir would have been in the Magic booth,” says Smallant.
“Excuses!” CJ interrupts, “Everyone knows that those things exist in the same sphere. So, if one isn’t interesting then you go for the other.” The other boy crosses his hands, practically pouting, “Dang it, Smant this is your fault.”
Fir stops this argument before it goes any further, although he gets the feeling this is a conversation they often have, judging by Smant’s grin. “CJ, I was into Warhammer before I meet Smallant.”
This doesn’t seem to be the right answer as the other boy seems to crumble in on himself, hands hanging at his sides. “They keep multiplying,” he whispers to himself horrified.
“CJ are you ok?” Crafty asks, hoping to be done with this conversation, but still worried about his dramatic friend.
“He’ll be fine,” Smallant answers instead rummaging through his Magic bag. “This happens every time, just ignore him he’ll be fine in a few minutes.” CJ grumbles something at this comment but continues to sulk. “Here you go Mars.” Smallant hands over two gold card packs to the woman.
“Thanks,” she smiles. “I’ll cash app you later?”
“Ya, no problem.”
“I’m surrounded by nerds!” CJ comes back to life, jumping up and grabbing Crafty and Amy by the shoulders. “We need to get you out of here, before they contaminate you too!” The two follow along, giggling at the entire situation.
“So, lunch I guess?” Fir says as he starts walking after the trio. The stragglers quickly join him, Smallant stopping to grab one of the bags CJ dropped and hadn’t seemed to notice. “What’s so funny Mars?” Fir asks after noticing the large grin on her face.
“Oh, CJ thinks he’s saving them, but they’re already contaminated.” This causes the other two boys to start laughing, knowing that CJ is in fact surrounded by nerds.