AU: An Altered Tale (but like way in the past before the incident and Colle is a few years older than Orange currently is here.)

Context: Remember when Colle, Sharp, and Beef were talking about that one time Goggles got burned while they were messing with fireworks in a dumb game they called 'wizard fights'? This is the aftermath of that lol

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[Colle's POV]

The five of us walk out of the emergency room, making sure Goggles doesn't do anything to irritate his freshly treated burn across his back.

"Guys, I'm perfectly fine-"

"You are not. You just spent five hours in the ER."

"Because it was a long wait, Colle!"

"Goggles, you need to take what the doctor said seriously. Do you want that to scar?"

"Sharp, it's going to scar either way."

"I mean worse than it's already going to. You don't want that."

"Correction; I don't care."

"Goggles."

"Oh don't you get on my case now!"

"It was my fault in the first place, I feel bad and don't want it to be worse for you!"

"You got a faulty firework, Spark. That wasn't your fault, it was the manufacturer's. I'm surprised you didn't get burned yourself based off how it exploded."

"Because I use fireballs more than the rest of you do, my hands won't burn that easily."

"That and you just don't use oven mitts when cooking something and instead opt to just pull the pan out with your bare hands."

"Beef, shut up."

"Seriously, why-"

"If our color has a natural resistance to fire and heat in general, I'm going to use it."

"Goggles, stop messing with the bandages. I can see you poking at them."

"What are you, my dad?"

"Goggles."

I laugh as Goggles continues to argue with Sharp (even though Sharp's right), and Spark and Beef bicker with each other. However, it's cut short when I see a familiar face standing across the parking lot. I stop and hold out my arm, making the others stop, but Spark and Goggles run into each other.

"Ow."

"Sorry!"

And then they see what I did.

Boss is standing there with his arms crossed next to his car. The doors are open, and he was clearly waiting for us. I can't tell if he's angry or disappointed. We all just stand there and stare back for a while, until Boss calls out to us from across the lot.

"All of you get in the car." He says, his voice stern. "Goggles gets shotgun. I put a cooling mat on the back of that seat. The rest of you, backseat. Don't care who sits in the middle, figure it out."

We all nod, walking over. As we reach the car and the others start climbing in, I stop next to Boss, who's watching all of us.

"So before you get mad-"

"Get in the car, Colle."

"Yes sir."

I shut up and climb into the backseat.

Once we're all buckled in, Boss gets into the driver's seat and starts the car, pulling out of the parking lot and onto the main road.

It's a long, long while of silence. All of us are scared to speak, I think. We can't tell if Boss is legitimately mad at us or just mad we did something stupid. I don't think he knows what we did yet, but he can probably guess.

For a while me, Sharp, and Beef just awkwardly glance at each other, me and Sharp on the window seats and Beef squished in the middle seat that really shouldn't be considered a seat at all. Spark is in the back behind us, which is supposed to have two foldable seats but one's mechanism stopped working so he just gets a section to himself. Lucky twerp.

It's not until we get on the road leading back to our dorms that Boss finally says something.

"So, what were you guys doing that led to this?" He asks. He sounds so done with today.

"Uhhhh..." Beef replies, unsure of how to answer without making him mad. "Wizard... fights?"

Boss slows the car down and pulls to the side of the road.

Once he stops, he then slowly, with a look of 'Are you actually serious right now', turns around and looks at us. We're all squirming in our seats, Goggles awkwardly staring out the passenger side window to avoid the stare.

"...You were shooting fireworks at each other." Boss says, looking each of us in the eyes. He then looks up at where Spark is. "Spark. Stop hiding behind the seats."

I hear shuffling behind me and see Spark out of the corner of my eye, slowly peeking over our seats. There's a bit of total silence as Boss stares us all down for a bit.

"...We always intentionally missed each other, but this time there was an... incident." Sharp says, avoiding eye contact.

Boss motions to Goggles next to him.

"Clearly."

He gives a look, as if saying 'Go on'. Spark pipes up from the back.

"I... had one of the fireworks and was trying to light it." He starts. "But as soon as I did it start sparking weird and then it just... exploded. All of the flares from it still went out the way they were supposed to, but it was all of them at once and way too fast... and Goggles stepped into the line of fire a few feet in front of me. And they... all went straight into his back. It was my fault-"

Goggles immediately interrupts.

"Spark for the last time it was not your fault, it was an accident!"

Spark yells back.

"Yes it was, it was my fault because I shouldn't have been holding it like that while trying to light it!"

"How else are you supposed to hold a Roman candle while lighting it?! If it was anyone's fault, it was my fault! I shouldn't have ran in front of you like that when I knew you were lighting one!"

"You couldn't have known it was gonna explode!"

"Neither could you!"

Me, Sharp, and Beef just kind of look between them like we're watching a tennis match. Boss runs a hand through his hair for a minute before stopping the blame-passing.

"Okay, that's enough." He says, making the other two stop. "It was nobody's fault, alright? Just an accident. Hopefully this taught all of you to stop playing with fireworks."

No it didn't and we're totally gonna do it again once Goggles heals but anyway-

Goggles and Spark sit back down, and Boss turns back around and starts the car again. As we go down the road home, he seems to relax and stops looking so... for lack of a better word, scary.

"I'm just glad you're mostly alright." He starts. "When I got the call from Sharp that Goggles was in the emergency room, it scared me half to death and I was worried that all of you were hurt. Goggles, you're lucky the damage isn't that bad, but you're taking it easy around the facility for a while. The rest of you, you're on cleaning duty for a few weeks."

"Fair enough." I reply. Boss chuckles at that.

"I'm gonna get all of you back home, and then we're just gonna take tomorrow off, okay?" He continues. "I'll order some pizza for dinner since you guys missed lunch because of this. But seriously, don't do something like this again. You nearly gave this old man a heart attack."

"You're not that old." Beef smiles.

"Eh, handling you guys adds a few years to someone. Sure feels like it."

We all laugh. After a bit though, Sharp has a question.

"Boss, how come you're so calm about this now?" He asks. "You looked ready to ream us out back in the parking lot. Now you're letting us have a day off and ordering pizza-?"

"Well, back in the parking lot I was still scared for you twerps. But when I saw you, you were okay... mostly." Boss answers, glancing at Goggles for a second, who gives him a look. "Again, you guys got your consequences and I'm not gonna add to that."

He laughs to himself for a moment.

"Besides, I'm not really one to judge here. I did much dumber when I was your age."

"What could be dumber than shooting fireworks at each other?" Goggles snorts.

"Blew up a water tower."

"WHAT."

"I'M SORRY-??"

"NO WAY, YOU'RE LYING!"

"YOU DID NOT!"

"NAH NAH NAH NAH, YOU HAVE TO EXPLAIN THAT NOW."

Boss smirks.

"Nope, don't think so."

We all shout in unison.

"OH COME ON!"