Stel had her hands firmly grasped oeering wheel when I found her in the front parking lot of the school, and sped off as soon as I shut my door.

  "Uh, hi to you too, Stel," I said.

  "You got your day pass right?" Stel asked. "Well, if you didn't, it's too te now."

  "I did," I said. "I had to meet with the principal for it. He's...iing."

  "I'm sure," Stel said.

  Once we made it to the highway, Stel calmed down a bit.

  "Sorry if I freaked you out," Stel said. "Just...when you see these prices, Zeta."

  We made it to LE, and the traffic was surprisingly low. I was expeg more than the usual pace for a like this if this sale was so good.

  "We're not going to Twin Wolves?" I asked as we passed the mall I knew.

  "Nope," Stel said. "Like I said earlier, this one's in Lil' Haven."

  "What exactly is this sale?" I asked. "Why is it so...like, frantic?"

  "Trust me," Stel said. "I have a friend of a friend in my ag group that lucked into some tickets for the Lil' Haven sale. They really surprised me my giviwo, and I'm not gonhis opportunity pass me."

  Stel pulled into a parking garage that had a sign on it for something called the "Bright Light Wonderment Shopping District."

  "So Lil' Haven is in here?" I asked. "Hey, isn't Haven that wrestling league thing?"

  I had enough of Haven already just from my gym teacher's stant videos of it.

  “Trust me. We won’t be doing any fighting. You’ll see whe there.” Stel said.

  I had to power walk to keep up with Stel as she marched for a few blocks. I had never been in this district before. It seemed to have a lot more ads pstered everywhere than most other p LE, which was saying something.

  “Hey, look! It’s Tower of Hate and Love!” I poi giant video ads that covered the tallest building in the neighborhood. The cast group picture from the show formed an incredibly long ad that stretched around a whole block, slowly spinning to show off all the characters’ poses.

  Lil’ Haven wasn’t far from the parking garage and was easy to tell whe there because of the immediate increase of muscle mass in the people walking around. The ads also ged from normal promotions of television and movies to Haven fights. The over the top battles looked crazy and painful, and reminded me why I didn’t like gym css, or watg Haven stuff. There was a short lio get in, and it really freaked me out to hand my ticket to the bodyguard guy. I didn't know what he'd do to me if the ticket was fake or something. But the ticket reader binged and the light went green, so I darted through the gate when rompted to with a nod and a grunt from the bodyguard.

  "Stel, are you sure we're not gonna have to fight anyone?" I asked.

  Most of the ss in Lil’ Haven weren’t focused as mu the fights as they were on Haven President/Champion Ashli “Kitty” Kihe ss showed videos of Kitty’s aplishments, her interviews, her humanitarian endeavors, tours of her house, people who dressed like her, how weak her oppos were pared to her, and just about anything else that showed how great she was. Even the vide about the dangers of Haven for non-fighters ended in a video of Kitty posing. I literally couldn’t take a step on the sidewalk without seeing her face or hear her talk. I hoped Oka didn't have to spend much time with this Kinder if she was this obnoxious outside of the ring.

  Sidewalk workers wahe streets wearing Kitty merdise. They kept ing up to us trying to sell their gear to us while prog the glory of Ashli.

  “Did you know that Kitty has won more championships than anyone ever?”

  “Did you know that Kitty was voted fu fighter in all of Haven?”

  “Did you know that Kitty is prettier than both of you bined?”

  “Ugh, I really hope Oka doesn't have to deal with her.” I said, throwing out a pamphlet I got handed called Kitty and You: Why Kitty Kinder is the Best Kinder.

  “I'm impressed Berin has kept Oka so far out of the spotlight so far.” Stel said. “That Kinder name bras a lot of attention. Oh, this is it!”

  Stel pushed us ahead, pointing out the store she had brought me out here for, called “Elep-trid More”.

  “Get ready. Anything you o buy for Safe Silver we take care of in a siore.” Stel said.

  “This still doesn’t make any sense.” I said. I had a few ideas for stuff I wao get, but I still thought there was no way a siore in Lil’ Haven had what I needed.

  A robotic human mascot with bulging everythiedly threw a much smaller robotic human on the roof of the store. I spotted an ad on the window that said the store actually had a sele of phohe text literally read, “We actually have a sele of phones”.

  "Oh, do you think I could get Oka a phone?" I asked. Oka didn't have a cell pho, but I could tell by the way she looked at mine and our friends' phohat she did want one.

  “If the tales I heard about this sale are true, you could get all your friends phones."

  "Stel, this isn't like a scam or anything is it?" I asked. "You remember that quadrangle scheme or whatever I almost got hired for."

  "Pyramid scheme." Stel said. "No, that was something else. Normally I'd say obviously don't trust something that sounds this good on paper, but.." She trailed off.

  "But?"

  "I don't know, whatever, just go shopping!" Stel said.

  Whe into the store, Stel grabbed a cart and immediately zipped over to the movie and televisioion. She started filling the cart pretty much immediately. The store was filled with obvious Haven fighters, all of them in their gear. Everyone in the room had more muscles than I’d ever seen before. Even the salesman was a bit muscur, but also somehow kind of pathetic about it, like he gave up trying to maintain his form a few years ago. I started looking through the phones, and he came over to me.

  “Ha hey haha hey uhh hhahhaha…” He said, making an excellent and fident first impression on his potential t. “So you got a ticket to the sale, huh? I haven’t gotten many phone sales from out of area tely. I’m desperate…”

  “I’m looking to get a phone for my friend.” I said. I already had the model in mind, a newer version of mih a blue case and a sparkly pattern, and had found it while the salesman stammered through a response.

  “Miss, I will literally, seriously, and pletely give you a 200% dist. That’s how bad I his sale.”

  I ughed. And then realized he was serious. His sweat stains all over his shirt (which despite being more formal had its sleeves ripped off) gave away a high-strung lifestyle.

  “So you’ll…pay me for it? I have enough money.” I said.

  “No! I mean. Well, how much? I just need a few more…hundred…sales from outside the area types to meet the quota for the year. My fights haven’t been going so well, so I’ve been w this job too. The ute between here and Haven is damaging most of my retionships. So, I give you…two phones?”

  “This seems like you’re ing out of this worse.” I said. If tickets to this sale or whatever were so scarce it sounded like this guy was screwed already.

  I got a text from Stel tellio meet her in the movie se. I headed over. From there I could also see a sign for the clothiion, and the edge of the makeup se, which I gaped at for a minute marveling at the price tags. They couldn’t possibly be real.

  “Hey Zeta, e here,” Stel said, and suddenly pulled me aside leaned close. “You gotta jump on a deal like that, especially when the salesmen are desperate. Everybody here is from Haven, and Haven's ey is basically nonsensical. We have to take advantage of this because who knows if we'll ever get tickets for this again."

  “I mean, is this even a deal? I feel bad for this guy.” I said.

  “If he’s , you’re taking it.” Stel said. She pushed me back to the salesman. “She’ll take it!”

  “Do you need pants too? I got pants.” The salesman said as he started to unbuckle his belt.

  “No. Please let me just give you money for this phone. Do you take regur money?” I said.

  “We do, but of course it has to be verted into Sm Bucks.”

  “….’Sm Bucks’?”

  “Haven politis didn’t like having mohat didn’t match Haven’s ‘vibe’. It was decided in the great battle debate at Ultra Sm gress. Since Lil’ Haven is teically part of Haven, now we have Sm Bucks.”

  “…OK.” I said.

  The procedure for verting to Sm Bucks wasn’t that plicated, but it retty b. I felt a bit greedy and in need of a treat for myself and try to knoy list in one go like Stel was doing.

  Somehow though for the price of one phone I ended up with two, 2 free years of service for both of them, some video games for Kalei, a gem bracelet and some shirts, some movies, a somehow autographed copy of the first season of Renderfold’s Tryst (that one was for me), and a bunch of Haven branded merdise. He tried to pawn his pants off one more time, but I somehow mao stop him by immediately rushing to hide behind Stel as she tinued shopping.

  “Do other people know about these prices?” I asked her on the way out. We each had two giant bags full of stuff.

  “There’s a kind of weird culture in Lil' Haven,” Stel said. “The actual try of Haven is pretty much a mess too, but they get a lot of sponsorships and end up having to offload a ton of it here iowards the end of the year. But then because they're, literally disastrous with everything they do, they end up doing the sales as a sweepstakes thing. Our tickets are actually tickets for a Haven show...”

  Stel expined Haven stuff for a long while but none of it made seo me.

  “I don't get it, but I'm happy to be doh all this shopping already!" I said.

  We didn’t have time to check out any of the other sub districts before Stel had t me back, so we stopped at a (what else) fighting themed restaurant. After finishing my Kick Fried Underhook Back Suplex Burger, I felt pretty satisfied.

  "Sorry t you through all this on such short notice," Stel said.

  "Oh no, I'm happy to get all my shopping done for Safe Silver! I even got your present so don't look in my bags."

  "I won't," Stel said.

  "And I'm happy to visit you, too," I said.

  Stel looked a bit sad for a sed, or worn out. I followed her gaze to see her looking towards a table o us with a big family all eating together.

  "You alright?" I asked.

  “I know it’s not much,” Stel said.

  I knew what she was thinking. In addition to Stel's love of Safe Silver, she also got had moments around the season where she'd get really down, especially when fronted with thinking about how the size of our family. The underlying message of "I know it's not much," from her was “I know we’re not much.”

  “But we’re family.” I said.

  Stel blinked and looked back towards me.

  "And I'm perfectly happy with how things are." I said. "Thanks fih today."

  "Yeah," Stel smiled. "Yeah, you're wele Zeta."