Unable to hold in her excitement any longer, Alicia sprang out of her seat and into the aisle. “Alright you guyyyys!” she shouted, having no trouble making herself heard over the rumbling of the moving bus. The other cheerleaders dropped their conversations and looked at their captain expectantly. She rested one pom pom on her hip and raised the other one high in the air. “Who's going to win today's game?!”

The other girls raised their pom poms in the air and shook them. “Sunnycrest!”

Alicia grinned. “Thaat's right! Sunnycrest! Sunnycrest!”

“Cacti girls cheer the best!” the rest of the squad responded.

“Sunnycrest! Sunnycrest!”

“Cacti girls cheer the best!”

“Goooooooooo SUNNYCREST!” concluded Alicia. The entire bus erupted in cheers. The driver wondered why he never got to drive the chess club anywhere.

Alicia sat back down next to Lindsey. “Feel better?” the blonde asked.

“Yeah, I think I got it out of my system,” nodded Alicia. She proved herself wrong by letting out a high-pitched squeal and punching the seat in front of her. The faux-leather made a 'whoomph' sound at the impact. “Oooh, I can't help it! I'm just so excited! Our second away game of the year! We really socked it to Northview at our first one! If we can score another win on the road, that would be awesome!”

Chase and Caitlin were sitting in the seat which Alicia had just punched. The two girls were half-turned around in their seats, so the friends could talk as a group. “Hey, Leash? Cait? Lin?” asked Chase. “We go to game, right?”

“Right,” said Caitlin.

The mountain girl looked confused. “Then why us on bus? Field in Sunnycrest.” They had been driving for about half an hour—not very far for Alicia, Caitlin and Lindsey, but already, Chase didn't recognize any of the terrain blazing past her window. She was now much farther from the area she grew up in than she had ever been in her life.

“Uh, they have football fields in other towns, too,” explained Lindsey.

Chase was shocked. “Wait! There more towns?!” She thought Sunnycrest was the only one.

It took her friends a second to wrap their heads around this question. “Yeah, Chase,” said Alicia. “There's lots of towns. Before, they were sending their teams to us to play on our field, but this time, we're going to go play on their field. That's called an 'away game.'”

This was really mind-blowing to Chase. She had never really thought about where the other football teams Sunnycrest competed with came from. Her whole worldview was expanding. “What town... called?” she asked, filled with wonder.

“Lawman Creek,” said Lindsey. “Just... don't get your hopes up.”

It was pointless to tell Chase this, though. For the rest of the trip, she was on the edge of her seat with excitement, eagerly wondering what this other town would look like.

When they got there, she found out it looked like a dump. Now, Sunnycrest was not exactly a rich town. They got some tourism dollars in the summer from people passing through towards actual tourist destinations, which was enough to fix the roads when they cracked and keep Main Street plowed in the winter (everybody else was on their own). But compared to Lawman Creek, Sunnycrest looked like Barcelona.

At first, Chase wondered why the streets were lined with storage sheds, but then, she realized they were houses. A common design element in their architecture was plain corrugated metal, which seemed to be used for anything from roofs or siding to fences or walkways. There was no chance of this road cracking, because it wasn't paved. It was simple, everyday mud. There was hardly any cement or concrete to be seen anywhere; everything outside looked very wet, and moss grew wild and untamed on every flat surface, including on the broken down vehicles that sat in many a front yard. A rocky, fast-moving creek followed the road, and tall cottonwood trees grew densely on the banks, making the whole area very dark and shadowy. The bus had to come to a swift stop as a loose, squealing pig darted out in front of them.

“I hate it when we have to come here,” said Caitlin morosely.

“It's just for a few hours,” Alicia reassured her. “All we have to do is go in and beat them, and then we can go home.”

“What wrong?” asked Chase, taking this all in with great interest. “Look fine to me! Much strange! Not bit like Sunnycrest!”

Her three friends looked uncertain. “Well, sure... It's definitely something different...” said Lindsey. “But different isn't always better. In fact, sometimes it's dirty and gross.”

“Now now, I think we should encourage Chase's enthusiasm and take an example from it!” said Alicia. “We shouldn't let this dreary, horrible place get our spirits down! If we want to bring the energy at the game tonight, we need to keep our cheeriness levels riding high!”

But Chase didn't find it dreary or horrible at all. In a way, the earthiness reminded her of her old home, out in the woods. Although she had become acclimated to life in Sunnycrest, she felt reinvigorated to be close to nature again. She realized part of her would always belong there.

The bus stopped in front of a large, rusted Quonset hut, and it took Chase a second to understand that this was the school. A sign on the front read “Swallered Opossum High.”

“I've always meant to ask,” said Caitlin, as the cheerleaders filed off the bus. “Why do you think they named their school Swallered Opossum High?”

“I'm guessing an opossum got swallered here once long ago, and somebody felt it was an event worth commemorating,” said Lindsey.

They found the football field behind the school. On the side of the field opposite the group was a corn field with huge irrigation sprinklers running. There was only one small set of bleachers, with a maximum capacity of about twenty people.

“Yup, still no gym and no locker rooms, I guess,” said Lindsey, looking around. “Good thing we remembered to change before we came.”

“Wow! It true!” remarked Chase. “Whole new field!” The lines looked like they hadn't been repainted in a while and the paint on the uprights was more peeled than unpeeled, but to her it was beautiful. She got so excited she did a few cartwheels to warmup. “Woohoo!”

Right as she did, the opposing cheerleaders walked out of the school and onto the field, unknowingly right into Chase's path.

“Ack! Chase! Look out!” called Alicia.

But her warning came too late. Before Chase could hear her and react, she plowed into the girl who was leading the pack, sending them both tumbling to the grass.

A sense of dread settled in over the Sunnycrest squad. “Oh, no,” said Alicia. They rushed to Chase's side. The blonde was sprawled, dazed, on her back, with the girl she collided with face down beneath her. “Chase!” Alicia cried. “Are you okay?”

Chase gingerly sat up, rubbing the back of her neck. “Am fine.”

She figured this would reassure her captain, but Alicia still looked scared. Eyeing the enemy squad nervously, the redhead grabbed Chase's hand. “C-come on, Chase! Quick, get off her!”

Confused, Chase let herself be pulled to her feet. “What wrong, Leash?” She looked at the Swallered Opossum squad, surveying them for some clue as to Alicia's unease. The whole squad had gathered around Chase's victim, who was beginning to stir. Their uniforms were colored a jet black and vivid red.

None of them really looked particularly scary in Chase's eyes, but they did seem a little rough around the edges. Her squadmates, and all the other cheerleaders she'd ever met, were very appearance conscious, paying considerable attention to their makeup, hair, and so on. Under Alicia's tutelage, Chase was learning to do the same. These girls visibly did not put much stock in such things. They were a bit more...she supposed the word would be 'natural,' but they were natural to a somewhat unnatural extent. They were a bit wild-looking, untamed and unpolished. Not as much as Chase was when Alicia, Caitlin, and Lindsey discovered her and welcomed her to the twenty-first century, but enough to make her curious about what their story was.

“G-gosh, Mary Rose! Are you okay?” asked one of the Lawman Creek girls.

The girl Chase hit sat up, looking disoriented. Her face was doe-eyed and innocent, and her hair, blonde with red kitchen-sink highlights, was pulled into twin ponytails, one on each side of her head. “What hit me?” Her voice was oddly hard, a strange combination with her sweet appearance.

“It were this fool Sunnycrest chick, Mary Rose,” said one of the girls, pointing at Chase. “She just came chargin' right at you. We all saw.”

Mary Rose looked at Chase and stood. “Is that so?” She looked Chase up and down, then narrowed her eyes. “Reckon she's looking for a fight?”

“Reckon so,” confirmed a girl with a trucker hat, spitting on the grass.

Another one said, “Want me to hold her?”

“H-hey now, that's not necessary!” Alicia panicked, jumping between them. “L-l-let's all just calm down. Chase didn't mean anything by it, it was an accident. Isn't that right, Chase?”

Chase confirmed, “Was axe dent. Not mean to thump girl.” She decided to introduce herself and start over new. “Am Chase! Who you?”

“Ain't nunna your damn business who ah am!” replied Mary Rose. “What confounded concern is it o' yours?”

A little bit offput by this answer, Chase nonetheless answered, “J... Just like cheer! Much like meet new cheer!”

“Forget her, Chase,” said Lindsey warily. “You don't want anything to do with these cheerleaders. They're known for fighting dirty. And not just because Lawman Creek doesn't have any running water.”

Some of the Sunnycrest girls laughed, but Alicia could not have been further from laughter. “L-L-Lindsey!” she said, panicking even further. “Don't say such things! That's incredibly mean! Of course Lawman Creek has running water!”

“Runnin' water? That's th' stupidest thing I ever heared of,” Mary Rose said with a chuckle. “How're you supposed to wash in water that's always tryin' to run away from you?” Alicia stared at her, unsure whether she was joking.

“An' as for fighting dirty, we resent that,” said one of the Lawman Creek cheerleaders. “We ain't never hit a girl in the face who had no looks. Only ones what could stand to lose some.”

“An' ah would never hit a girl with glasses on,” concurred another. She removed her glasses and folded them up. “Figger if I take 'em off, it makes it a fair fight.”

One of the girls who spoke earlier, a tall one with long, brown hair and somewhat tired eyes, cleared her throat. “Now then. Back on the matter of me holdin' her.”

“Only if you want, Louise,” said Mary Rose, cracking her knuckles. “Ah don't think it's p'rticalarly necessary, as she don't look like much in the way of scrappin'. Ah see no call for ya ta go ta all that trouble on mah account.”

“T'ain't no trouble at all, Mary Rose. Holdin' people so's they can be hit is one o' mah favorite past times,” said Louise.

The Sunnycrest cheerleaders could not believe what they were hearing. “Alright, alright, everybody settle down,” reasoned Caitlin. “Let's be civil, here. I think a fight is the last thing any of us want.”

“Oh, now YOU'RE threatnin' me?” Mary Rose demanded. “You really got some nerve. Louise, think you can hold two girls at once?”

“Ah always wanted to try.”

Caitlin stepped back from them, terrified. “Wh... Hold on! I didn't threaten anybody! That's not what I said at all!”

“Tryin' ta weasel out of it now, are ya? Fat chance!” accused Mary Rose. “You distinkly said a fight is the last thing I want. Implyin' that when you're done with me, ah ain't gonna be in any condition to want nothin' ever again.”

“That is kind of a leap,” replied Caitlin.

Mary Rose raised her fist, and Caitlin flinched. “Yer about ta leap into a hospital bed! Maybe you'll get a room next ta yer squadmate, Veronica!”

“Who's Veronica?” asked Alicia.

One of the Lawman Creek cheerleaders scratched her head. “Uh, Mary Rose? Weren't that Veronica gal from Northview?”

“Oh yeah, we played them last week.” Mary Rose remembered. “Ah've put so many cheerleaders in hospital beds it's hard to keep 'em straight.”

“Why do that? You cheer, she cheer... is cheer hurt cheer!” said Chase, horrified. She had never heard anything so taboo in all her life.

“Aw, she started it,” said Mary Rose. “Ah was havin' a nice day, mindin' mah own business, just braggin' to her face about stealin' her boyfriend, and she went and started hollerin' at me an' insultin' me. Ah wouldn't expect anyone to just stand there an' take that kind of abuse. So ah didn't.”

“That really doesn't sound like something she started,” said Caitlin.

Alicia noticed an armband on Mary Rose's sleeve, with the letter 'C' sewn into it. “Oh, are you the captain?” she asked, trying to lighten things up. “That's great, I'm a captain too. What happened to, um...” she tried to remember the name of the girl who was captain the last time they played Lawman Creek, “Claire Sue?”

“Her? Oh, she died,” said Mary Rose.

The Sunnycrest girls were shocked. “Oh, no!” said Caitlin. “I'm so sorry!”

They didn't really know Claire Sue well, and what little they knew of her did not really indicate that she had been a very nice person, but this was still an alarming and tragic thing to hear about somebody so young. And a fellow cheerleader, at that.

“Yep, the Davis-O'Leary feud claims another victim,” said one of the Swallered Opossum cheerleaders grimly. “She didn't go down without a fight, though. She took three O'Learys with her, including the eldest boy.”

“You can't be serious,” said Lindsey. She looked from face to face, then realized, “Good lord, you are.”