𝒮𝑜𝓃𝒶𝓇 𝒳 ℛ𝑒𝒶𝒹𝑒𝓇
College!AU, Harvard!AU, Academic rivalry, Fem!Reader, Owl Hybrid reader, Reader has owl wings, Drinking, Alcohol, Drugs, College party, Mature Language, Smut, 18+ (most of this is in later chapters)
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Hey, welcome to part 2 of this series. Part 1 will be down below, I recommend reading that first if you stumble upon this one. Also, name reveal in the latest two episodes! That was crazy, I was actually kicking my feet so hard. Would u guys want a name reveal some time in later chapters? Thinking Flynn rider and Rapunzel style. lmk, and ofc, enjoy reading.
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
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Someone's batty today 2.2k words
After that first initial class, the anger didn't dissipate. Instead, it only seemed to grow. Bat guy or, Sonar, as I know him now, Is still just as insufferable as he was the first day of class, if not more. After that move he pulled, the drive to win and beat each other became something of a competition, a rivalry of sorts. Each of us worked to outsmart the other, answer the most questions correctly, get the better grade, win.
Answers to questions were more so blurted out, rather than us both waiting to be chosen to speak, all in an effort to beat the other to the answer first. It got to a point where the people around us would groan quietly when both of our hands shot up simultaneously, which was pretty often.
The entire class had been dragged into our competition. There was no end in sight unless one of us chose to quit, but that would mean admitting defeat. We were in too deep, and neither of us were quitters.
When I woke up today, it was with a vengeance. I technically didn't have class until 9, but I got up at 6 and went through the motions of getting ready and booking it to class. All other times these past few weeks, he had beaten me to class, and in usual Sonar fashion, gloated about it. I had been 30 minutes early at one point, and he still beat me there.
It was a stupid thing to be so worked up over, I knew that. It was also a stupid thing to wake up 3 hours early before class and miss out on valuable sleep. It's just every time I saw that stupid, stuck up, gloating smirk, I felt like I had lost. I knew he felt it too, he counted it as a win every time he beat me in anything. Every time he got to see my lips sink in a frown and my eyes narrow with a sharp glare, he checked the imaginary score board constantly living in both our heads, Sonar 9, Y/N 4. He practically lived to ruffle my feathers.
Yes, we were both actively keeping track, or at least I was. I'd write our scores in neat small letters on the corner of my notes, making a tally of each win under the respective name. He would mockingly tap my notebook every time he won. Another point for me, his three slow taps and sharp smirk would say to me. I'd tug my notebook away stubbornly but make a mark under his name nevertheless, not without making an annoyed face or a mocking comment first.
Today, I would finally work to even the score. It was over ambitious I'll admit, but if showing up to class 2 hours early is what it took to win, I'd do it. The room was unlocked, so I took my usual seat up in the front. I kicked my feet up over the arm rest, shoes dangling over his seat beside mine. He was always so put together and sharp, dressed in a fresh button up and slacks, I hoped the dirt falling from my shoes onto his seat would get a rise out of him. I sipped my coffee and brushed up on the chapter material we would cover today. I wanted to be prepared to ace any question thrown my way, know the answer before him, win.
I fell into the simple rhythm of studying. The classroom was quiet and I almost felt completely at peace, almost. About an hour and fifteen minutes in, Sonar showed up. I heard him make his way down the steps towards our usual seats, the familiar sound of his dress shoes echoing across the quiet classroom. He stopped in front of me suddenly. Looking up from my reading I saw the look of surprise on his face before he covered it up with an annoyed look. "When did you get here?" He said, glare sharp and tone hard, but I saw the way his fur ruffled and his fist clenched around the handle of his briefcase. He saw this as a challenge, he saw this as a loss on his part, and It felt good to win this time.
I slowly shrugged my shoulders, wings spreading lazily at the movement and giving him a bored look after checking my imaginary watch. "ehh 'bout an hour ago." I hummed coolly. All I wanted to do was gloat in his stupid face about this win, he knew it too, but I wasn't quite done annoying him yet.
"An hour? Try hard much?" He scoffed, his annoyance hardly covering for the fact he was butt hurt about his loss. He looked down at my crossed legs thrown over the arm rest before scoffing again and rolling his eyes. "Move," he demanded. Not giving me a chance to respond, he shoved my legs off his chair and onto the floor roughly.
I grunted softly at the sudden shove, but only situated myself again and sent him a glare from the corner of my eye. "ouch." I deadpanned even though it didn't actually hurt. Quite the opposite actually. The brief contact sent my stomach swirling with something I couldn't name. For now, I called it nausea from having to look at him for an extended period of time. "God someone's batty today. You not get enough sleep?" I cooed at him and tilted my head mockingly.
He did a double take at my words, looking from me to his desk, to me again in progressively quickening movements. His annoyance fell away into confusion and surprise as I—as he'd once done—used a stupid bat pun. "W-what?…Sorry?…Did you just…" He stumbled in his Sonar fashioned deadpan.
Now, feeling increasingly embarrassed for saying the phrase out loud, I denied ever saying it in the first place. I had made fun of him previously for saying something similar. Originally, I meant for the phrase to be mocking, but with how easily it came out—and how long I'd spent practicing it—It sounded less like a joke and more like I meant it. "What? N-no?" I said with wide eyes, though it sounded more like a question, as I started to panic. "What are you talking about? You're crazy!" I denied, getting defensive and turning the attention to literally anything else to save me from my increasing embarrassment. "Fuck off! It's that lack of sleep catching up to you." I grumbled, turning away from him and using my book to cover my face and wings to shield myself in an odd way. I didn't want him to see how flustered I'd become, though, with those big ears, I wouldn't be surprised if he could hear my heart beating like crazy.
There was a long moment of silence before I heard a soft scoff and a barely muffled laugh. I put my book down, arms falling dramatically to my lap to look up at Sonar. He had a hand over his mouth muffling his laugh, but his shaking shoulders fully gave away that he was laughing. At me. I could only stare blankly at him, jaw dropped and mortified that I was being laughed at by Sonar. If that's not a punch in the face I don't know what is. He looked over at me and straightened up a bit. "That was…actually kind of good…hadn't thought of that one." He said after clearing his throat, the praise coming out strained like it hurt him to say.
I rolled my eyes and buried my face back in my book. "Shut up, whatever," I grumbled, still defensive. The praise, though unwanted, made my embarrassment lessen and I almost felt better about the whole situation.
We soon fell into silence, each of us working on or reading material for class. Those last 30 minutes until class started went by quick and soon the lecture started. The previous, and strangely nice, moment we shared before meant absolutely nothing to either of us now as we fell into the usual competition we held during class.
Our professor, a small and quiet man, would look nervously from mine and Sonar's raised hands whenever he asked a question. Both of us were practically out of our seat at this point, and the professor, trying to avoid an argument, would hesitate to pick someone to speak before one of us inevitably just said the answer to the question. The class became a place for open debate. Well, if open was just counting myself and Sonar, then sure, an open debate.
Currently, we were having one of those open debates. We had began talking about some of the greatest business scandals in recent history, how they functioned, how to spot them, how to avoid them. That's when we began covering Bernie Madoff and the greatest Ponzi scheme the world had ever seen. What was an informative lecture, snowballed into a full on debate as we went back and forth on the matter. Students groaned at each rebuttal, extending the argument, and the professor looked nervously between us, his attempts to settle the debate unheard. This, of course, was not noticed by either of us. We were in the thick of it as Sonar argued that the Madoff case was brilliant, while I argued it was unethical.
"You cannot be serious. You do know he lost all his money by the end of it right?" I deadpanned, turning almost fully in my seat to face him. "He went flat broke when he was caught. It wasn't brilliant, it was stupid." I said with an annoyed scoff and a sharp roll of my eyes. Things were getting heated, and I found that usual burning anger building up in my stomach. At this point I wasn't sure if he was serious about his argument or just doing it to fuck with me.
"Oh please, he made billions. It may have failed, but it was bound to, he had a good run." Sonar said smoothly with a shrug, leaning back in his seat with his arms crossed over his chest as he looked at me. Clearly, he was less fazed about the argument than I was, enjoying it even, that only served to annoy me further.
"A good run? That's what you think that was?" I said, a humorless laugh leaving my lips. "He made a bad deal, that's what started the whole thing. In an effort to cover his tracks, he only made more bad decisions. It wasn't a stroke of genius, It was pure dumb luck and carelessness. He lost himself and his investors billions of dollars."
He rolled his eyes and scoffed, his cool and composed exterior cracking as I picked his argument apart. He sat up in his seat, arms uncrossing as he turned to face me, a sharp glare on his face. "Did you come up with that yourself? Or are you just regurgitating Wikipedia again?"
I scoffed loudly at his claim. "Don't get defensive on me just because you're losing an argument. Not that anything that comes out of your mouth is really an argument anyway. For someone who talks so much you say surprisingly little." I insulted with narrowed eyes and a hard glare. The fire between us was blazing hotter then ever as our simple competition morphed to something harsher; a contention of insults and slander.
At this point, we were halfway over our chairs getting in each other's faces. The whole class was quiet with horrified shock. Sonar's eyes shut for a moment, an unnaturally calm huff of air leaving his nose before he opened his eyes again. There was a cutting look in his eyes as he spoke in an equally biting and an unsettlingly cold tone, "Look, you don't have to hate on another genius just because you're brainless and unimaginative. Not all of us can be great, you'll just have to live with that."
My mouth hung open with a half thought out argument before it dissipated completely from my mind. The room went silent for a long moment as I just sat and stared at him. The hard furrow of my brows, riled up feathers of my wings, and sharp look in my eye softening slightly with a strange sense of discomfort. Ouch. That should not have hurt as much as it did, but his words stung. Was that really how he saw me?
I saw the briefest wince of regret on his face before he turned away from me sharply. It was barely there in the first place so, I convinced myself I must have been mistaken in seeing it. It took me a moment longer, but soon, I too turned back towards the front of the class, eyes fixated on my hands in my lap.
With that, the professor awkwardly dismissed class early and I took the opportunity to bolt out of there as quick as I could without looking back. I could feel my throat and eyes burn uncomfortably with the familiar sting of tears. It only made me more mad. If anyone else had said something like that I would have just brushed it off or laughed in their face. I didn't understand why I couldn't just do that this time. Even thinking back to my previous win and the first actually kind of nice conversation we had didn't help reduce the hurt I felt.
Whatever, It didn't matter. He was just a pretentious asshole, I told myself as the first tears began to fall.
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