merry christmas @lets-go-beybies !! i hope you like this short story :>
There's a claw machine next Sophie's usual coffee shop.
She doesn't normally bother with them— they're childish, and even when she was younger Sophie didn't care much for such juvenile activities. Her parents passed their sophisticated tastes down to her from the outset; while others around her remained bored to death on school trips, she alone found herself entranced by the historical sites and museums they visited as part of the curriculum. Even now, she could remember the feeling of her nose pressed up against the glass of display cases as she peered at artifacts for hours.
If it made her odd, aloof— well, she didn't mind. Wales might call her a snob for it now, but even his tastes were refined beyond something so trivial as the claw machine that'd caught her eye.
"Sophie?" he asks now, brow furrowed as she paused to look inside the machine. It plays a musical jingle as the lights flash along the display. A sign taped to the glass reads fifty cents per attempt.
"Look, Wales," she says, pointing inside.
He sighs and leans over her shoulder to see. Sophie doesn't take it personally; years of training with him had taught her that annoyed was his default emotion outside of bey battles.
The machine is half-filled with a variety of plush key chains in all different animal shapes— cats, dogs, cows, sheep, lizards, jellyfish. They're small, maybe the size of Sophie's thumb, if she had to guess,and cheaply stitched. It takes Wales a minute to realize why she'd bother pointing it out at all.
In the center of the pile, half-buried beneath a lion, is a pair of whales, squished up close together, one white, one blue. On closer inspection, it's one key chain— the whales were stitched together snout to tail, making a circle, one ending where the other began.
Sophie smiles at Wales, close lipped, mildly amused. "It's silly, isn't it? It reminded me of us." She steps beck from the machine and takes a sip of her coffee; the bitter cappuccino wakes her up easily, clearing her mind and reminding her of the schedule for the rest of the day. They were to meet Klaus and Konzern soon— one year ago to this day, they'd been the last four standing in the European Union's selection matches. One year ago, Team Excalibur had formed.
"Let's go, Wales," Sophie says at last, draining her cup, though she kept her hand wrapped around the paper, trying to catch the last of its warmth. "We wouldn't want to be late."
"Wait a minute." Sophie turns in surprise to find Wales digging through his pocket, retrieving a fifty cent coin. He pops it into the slot— the machine came alive at once, playing a short jingle as the controls unlocked. Expertly, Wales guides the claw over the whales, a small divot forming between his brows as he focused on positioning it. Sophie holds her breath as he presses the button.
The claw descends slowly, mechanically opening its legs like a spider as it reaches the bottom. One leg nudged aside the lion. Then, slowly, slowly, it sinks just above the pair of whales, going slack before suddenly snapping shut around them and rising back up, a fisherman's net filled with the catch. It hovers over the deposit area for a moment before unlatching once more and dropping the prize into the collection box.
Sophie grins, forgetting herself. "Wales, that was amazing!" she said as she kneels to collect the whales. They fit neatly into her palm, the felt soft against her skin. She glances up at her friend. "Where did you learn to do that?"
He looks away sheepishly. "It's the kind of thing that makes you seem cool as a kid. I used to spend spare change on it. Anyway— let's go. Like you said, we wouldn't want to be late."
"Wait," Sophie stopped him this time, peering into the claw machine once more. "Let's get something for Klaus and Julian, too."
Wales smiles at her, the expression colored with a hint of surprise; to other people, Wales was cocky, arrogant, prideful (and what was wrong with a little pride, Sophie thought, if we have the talent to show for it?)— but sometime in the year they'd been working together, he'd dropped the attitude. They were just teens, after all, and Wales never looked so boyish as he does then, turning out his pocket to find it empty of coins.
Sophie bites her lip to suppress a laugh and digs through her own purse, turning over the coins and peering over Wale's shoulder as he fishes out a goat for Klaus and a horse for Julian (alas, they couldn't find Perseus himself or the Pegasus upon which he rode, and they hoped this would be enough in its place).
As they finally made their way to Julian's mansion, felt keychains in hand and chatting about nothing, a certain lightness permeates Sophie's chest. Perhaps it was alright to indulge in childish things after all.
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