Monday – 7:55 AM – St. Helena's High
Adriana Bogdan didn't do mornings.
She did midnight deals, coded transmissions, and covert operations—but waking up at 6:30 for homeroom? That was cruel and unusual punishment.
Vincent leaned against the brick column near the school gate, sipping a convenience store coffee and trying to look like he hadn't also woken up late, sprinted four blocks, and nearly face-planted into the math building.
"You're four minutes early," she said, squinting at him.
"I ran here," he replied, breath still uneven. "Like a lovesick dog."
She raised an eyebrow. "You're admitting that?"
"Just thought I'd get ahead of the insults today."
"You're improving." She smirked, then handed him a folded piece of paper. "Dead drop."
"Uh… what now?"
"It's a message," she said, voice low. "From Alex."
Vincent frowned. "Your brother?"
She nodded. "Apparently he's alive. Ish."
-
School Hallways, Somewhere Between Chem and Detention
Vincent unfolded the paper while walking—immediately colliding with two underclassmen and knocking over a stack of test tubes. No one screamed, but one of them did mutter, "Watch it, Lurch."
He ignored them.
Because the note said:
"Tell the girl with ice in her blood and scars on her back that the Serpent is awake. The past is uncoiling."
Vincent stopped in the middle of the hallway.
"That's not even cryptic. That's a Bond villain monologue."
Behind him, Mina peeked over his shoulder. "Oooh. Sounds sexy."
"It's not."
"Well, you sound jealous. So something's working."
-
Detention Room 3B
Rafi had landed himself in detention for "accidentally" setting off the school sprinkler system during gym.
When Vincent found him, he was balanced on the back two legs of a chair, chewing on a pen cap like it owed him money.
"You get the note?" Rafi asked, barely looking up.
Vincent nodded. "It's… weird. And ominous."
"That's how Alex communicates. He thinks the world is a Cold War novel."
Vincent sat beside him. "Do you think he's watching us?"
Rafi laughed. "Oh, he's always watching. The question is: is he protecting us or planning something nuclear?"
Vincent didn't like either option.
-
Cafeteria Chaos
Meanwhile, Adriana walked into the cafeteria like it was her personal runway.
But before she could reach her usual table, she spotted something that stopped her cold.
Tristan.
Smiling.
Laughing.
With Natalie Fiero—the girl who once tried to start a "Queen Bee" club and had a perfume that could stun a horse.
Adriana's lip curled.
Not because she cared who Tristan flirted with. Not really.
Okay, maybe a little.
But it was more the timing. Something about the casual way he threw his arm over Natalie's chair set her teeth on edge.
And then Natalie said something. Tristan laughed—and touched her knee.
Adriana didn't even remember walking over.
But she was there, standing in front of them like a storm cloud in lipstick.
"Hey, Adriana," Natalie said with an over-practiced smile. "Didn't see you there."
"Of course you didn't," Adriana said coolly. "You were busy pretending to be interesting."
Natalie's smile twitched. "Is there something you need?"
Adriana tilted her head. "Only a moment of your time."
Then—calmly, elegantly—she dumped Natalie's pink smoothie onto her Prada flats.
Gasps erupted from every table.
Vincent, halfway into the room, nearly choked on his muffin. "Oh god."
Tristan stood up, shocked. "What the hell—?"
But before he could say more, Adriana spun and walked off. Not a hair out of place.
Natalie shrieked something about "her dad suing everyone," but nobody was listening.
-
Principal's Office
"Miss Bogdan," Principal Waters said with all the weariness of a man who had aged twenty years in the last two months. "Do you enjoy being on first-name terms with detention?"
Adriana crossed her legs. "If it's any consolation, she did deserve it."
"You can't just dump smoothies on people."
"I can when they start sniffing around my ex like they want to be the sequel."
"That's… not how school works."
Adriana smiled, all teeth. "Good thing I've never played by the rules."
Principal Waters blinked twice. Then sighed. "One week of lunch detention. And an apology letter."
"To her shoes?"
"To Natalie."
Adriana made a face like she'd been told to swallow bleach.
-
History Class
Adriana slipped into her seat beside Vincent, who was still reading the note from Alex for the tenth time.
"I think it's code," he muttered. "Like, 'the Serpent' could mean someone specific."
Adriana whispered, "It's a warning. Alex never talks in code unless something dangerous is resurfacing."
"From your past?"
She nodded once.
"My father used that word—Serpent—for a rival network. One that tried to erase him during the Sicilian raids. We thought they were extinct."
"And now?"
She looked him dead in the eye. "Now I think they're using our high school as a testing ground."
Vincent blinked. "Like… for mind control?"
Adriana raised an eyebrow. "No, dummy. For influence. They infiltrate slowly. Make it look like harmless cliques and sudden popularity spikes. Then… control the power lines."
He leaned closer. "What do we do?"
She whispered, "We start playing dirtier."
-
Library – Operation: Gossip Trap
The team assembled in a secluded corner between dusty encyclopedias and a broken chessboard.
Mina brought donuts. Zara brought a taser. Rafi brought himself and nothing else.
"Okay," Adriana said, leaning over a makeshift map of the school. "We need to figure out who's feeding info to the outside."
Vincent asked, "You think there's a mole?"
"I know there is. Too many things have been timed too perfectly."
Zara munched on a cruller. "So what? We spread a fake story and see who leaks it?"
"Exactly," Adriana said. "We manufacture a lie so specific, so juicy, that the mole can't resist repeating it."
Rafi grinned. "Can the story involve alien twins and a secret government bunker under the gym?"
Mina rolled her eyes. "We're not writing sci-fi."
Adriana smirked. "But we are writing bait."
-
The Bait Drops
Within the next hour, four different versions of the following "secret" had been planted via whispered conversations, hallway texts, and strategically overheard phone calls:
"Adriana Bogdan is getting shipped off to Europe by the end of the semester… but not before she hands control of her family's estate to her secret half-brother."
By lunch, the rumor was everywhere.
By last period, someone had texted the exact wording to an encrypted number Adriana had planted weeks ago.
Bingo.
-
The Roof, Again.
Vincent sat beside her, wind tousling his hair.
"I'm going to ask you something," he said slowly, "and I need you to tell me the truth."
"Go on."
"Are we… in over our heads?"
Adriana looked at the skyline. Then back at him.
"We're teenagers," she said softly. "We're supposed to be in over our heads."
He smiled. "That doesn't scare you?"
"No," she said. "What scares me is the day this all ends and we have to go back to being normal."
"Not gonna lie—I don't think either of us were built for normal."
She leaned on his shoulder. "Good. Because the war's just beginning."
-
Elsewhere
Inside a luxurious hotel suite halfway across the city, a woman watched drone footage of St. Helena's cafeteria.
She sipped champagne and whispered into a phone, "They're activating faster than we thought."
A voice replied, "Then initiate Phase Two."
She smiled.
"Let the games begin."