Mischievous Function

About twenty minutes later...

"...So ultimately, that's why the Yoyle state can sustain its current economic budget," Fanny explained to the Mountaineer captain as the latter nodded in understanding. "If Yoyles conquered the entire world, we'd have to rely solely on productivity to generate our wealth, as opposed to simply exploiting profitable trade deals from other independent nations."

"Oh!" the captain exclaimed. "So that's why, despite the insanely large Yoyle military, we haven't had a large war ever since the Yoyle War!"

"Yeah," Fanny sighed. "But I think we should stop this conversation here, or else the readers might think this story's going to get too political for their tastes."

"What readers?"

"I...I don't...know. Wait, why did I even say that? What?"

Suddenly, the music coming from the stage stopped. A few moments passed before they heard cheers and applause from the audience. "Give it up for Compass Rose!" the receptionist announced. "Wow. Now I feel like digging holes. Anyway! Next up, a group who actually was raised right here in the safety of our mountain home: Y.M.D. High's Mountaineers!"

"That's your cue," Fanny said as the Mountaineer captain shot up to her feet and did some last-second checks on her dress. "Good luck!"

"Thanks!" the captain called out behind her as she rushed to join her group, who were already gathering near the curtain. "You, too!"

Fanny watched as the YMD group all lined up before breaking through the curtains and waving to everyone as the audience cheered. After several seconds, which the group took to get in position, music started playing.

Nearby, the sound of the music playing snapped the pondering Test Tube out of her trance, and she glanced at the curtains briefly before taking a deep breath and exhaling, her limbs shuddering for a moment. Suddenly, she gulped and started trembling in nervousness. "Oh, boy..." she thought to herself. "All right. We're actually doing this. I'm actually doing this. Okay. Okay, whoo. Everything's going to be fine. I'm going to do great. What the heck was wrong with me when I decided to do this—NO. No, no. Positive thoughts. Think positive. You got this."

Ding.

She heard her phone go off and glanced beside her at where it was lying on the bench before reaching over to pick it up. It was from Fan.

"Hey"

Test Tube raised an eyebrow. She would have thought that he'd send a longer message than just "hey." Shrugging off the thought, she swiped on her phone and began to text back.

"Hey, what's up?"

Soon, she saw the familiar animated ellipsis on Fan's side of the screen and waited patiently for his reply—yet none came. Several seconds passed, but he was still writing. She fidgeted nervously as she contemplated what to do. She didn't want to interrupt him and make him delete everything that he had been writing or make him lose his train of thought.

The seconds seemed to tick by painfully slowly, but finally, she heard the text tone and looked down at the screen.

"I'm sorry. If you don't want to come and watch the show with me, you can just tell me. I don't want to make you feel pressured or anything"

She gasped lightly as she remembered telling Fan that she would be there fifteen minutes ago. When she skipped straight to backstage to get herself ready, she hadn't even thought of how he would feel when she didn't keep her promise; she had been too focused on keeping her appearance in the show a surprise to him. Quickly, she texted back to try and remedy the situation.