Klic the Trickster
Klic was twelve years old when he became a certified legend at Millfield Middle School—or, at least, that’s how he saw it.
It all started with glitter. Not just any glitter. We’re talking ultra-fine, rainbow-reflecting micro-shards of chaos, the kind that once unleashed, could never truly be cleaned up. Klic had spent two weeks planning this one, hiding the materials behind loose bricks, in ceiling tiles, and, once, inside a janitor’s abandoned mop bucket. This wasn’t his first prank, but it was his most ambitious.
The plan was simple: synchronize a fleet of toy drones to release glitter over the faculty parking lot precisely when Principal Durney was showing the superintendent around the campus. Not enough to injure anyone. Just enough to coat Durney’s new toupee in shimmering shame. He had calculated the wind speeds, drone speed, battery life, and glitter dispersion rates. Most twelve-year-olds were playing tag—Klic was doing glitter-based aeronautical calculus.
And it worked. Too well.
The drones zipped into action like synchronized bees. Glitter exploded in midair, showering the staff lot in iridescent fire. Teachers screamed. Kids laughed. Principal Durney froze, mid-handshake, as his scalp caught the brunt of the storm. By the time he turned around to locate the source, the drones had already auto-piloted back into Klic’s custom-made camouflage kennel (the school had a community pet rabbit—don’t ask).
Dan, Klic’s best friend, stood nearby with his mouth wide open. “Bro,” he whispered, “that was the greatest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Jennifer, always a step away from trouble, but never above smiling at it, giggled behind her book. “You’re insane, Klic.”
But Klic wasn’t listening. He was watching. Watching Principal Durney’s hands, his pace, his blink rate. Anticipating it. Not just guessing, but feeling it, knowing it.
The chaos lasted minutes. The investigation? Hours. But Klic knew how it would go down. He sat calmly in the principal’s office, legs swinging off the too-high chair, while the adults tried to unravel what had happened.
“So, Mr. Simpson,” Durney began, glitter still embedded in his eyebrows, “You wouldn’t know anything about the drones?”
Klic tilted his head. “Drones? You mean those loud flying things? I’m terrified of heights.”
“I see. Then perhaps you can explain the blueprint found in your locker?”
He blinked. “Art project. It’s called ‘Revenge of the Sparkle Demons.’ Avant-garde.”
“And the tablet linked to the drone signals?”
“Purchased it at a garage sale. Probably cursed.”
Even the school counselor struggled not to snort.
The thing was, Klic wasn’t just a good liar. He wasn’t lying. Not really. He was… maneuvering. Sliding through possibilities like a dancer on marbles. He could feel Durney’s next move before it happened, predict pauses, redirect with a joke just before a question would have pinned him down.
He was playing chess. They were playing Uno.
Eventually, Durney sighed and rubbed his temple. “Your mother’s on her way.”
And that’s when Klic knew the game was over. Or… maybe just changing levels.
—
She arrived ten minutes later. A quiet woman with deep eyes and sleeves always pushed up like she was ready to fix something. There was always something electric about her—like if she clapped too hard, the lights might flicker.
“Thank you for joining us mam,” Durney began, gesturing toward her son. “Your child orchestrated a precision attack of glitter-based vandalism with illegal drone use and digital sabotage.”
She turned to Klic slowly. “Did you?”
Klic nodded. “Allegedly.”
She raised one eyebrow. Then turned to Durney and smiled politely. “We’ll discuss this at home.”
No yelling. No grounding. Just that.
But when they got home and the door shut behind them, something happened. She looked at him—not with frustration or exhaustion—but with curiosity. Like he was a jigsaw puzzle and she had just found a corner piece.
“You predicted what he was going to say, didn’t you?” she asked, not accusing, just… knowing.
Klic shuffled. “I just… saw it.”
She nodded, slowly, then walked past him. Down into the basement. He followed on instinct, feet quiet.
She opened an old cedar chest he’d never noticed before. Inside, nestled under cloth, was a sleek, dormant device. Matte black, with a faint blue pulse at its core. She touched it, once. Then, gently, she locked it with a fingerprint scanner and slid the chest shut again.
“Not yet,” she whispered to herself. “He’s not ready.”
—
Klic didn’t see the chest again. But that night, he couldn’t sleep. His brain spun like a pinball machine on overdrive.
Was that… tech from the Infiniverse? He’d only heard whispers. Old message boards. That one podcast he wasn’t supposed to listen to. The real, high-tech, extra-dimensional secondary reality. But that was adult stuff. Restricted stuff. Forbidden.
He lay awake, staring at the ceiling, reimagining the prank ten different ways. Rewriting the outcome. Wondering why his brain felt like it had already lived that moment.
Was it just a prank? Or something more?
—
The next morning, Dan met him at the bus stop. “Dude, are you famous yet? I think Mrs. Klob watched the video six times.”
“I got glitter in her coffee,” Klic said proudly.
Jennifer appeared with a smirk. “You’re going to get banned from recess.”
Klic shrugged. “Worth it.”
As the bus pulled up, Klic stared into the middle distance, mind still buzzing.
There was something inside him. He didn’t know what. But it was big. And weird. And possibly illegal.
But it made him feel… like more than just the weird kid with too much energy and not enough impulse control. It made him feel like maybe, just maybe, he belonged somewhere.
Not here. Not yet. But one day.
He just had to figure out where.
—
Later that week, while sitting in the counselor’s office—again—Klic stared at a fish tank bubbling quietly behind the desk.
“Do you ever feel like you know what’s going to happen before it does?” the counselor asked, pen tapping.
Klic shrugged. “Only when it’s important. Or funny.”
He didn’t know how to explain it, really. His brain wasn’t linear. It leapt. It sprinted. It cross-stitched events from future and past and possible.
The counselor smiled kindly. “You might be gifted. Or at least very, very creative.”
Klic smiled back. “Or cursed by a glitter demon.”
She wrote something on her notepad.
—
That night, as Klic drifted off, he had a dream.
In it, the school was floating in a sky made of binary stars. Drones buzzed with consciousness. Glitter rained like stardust. His mother stood at the center, watching.
She turned to him. “Not yet,” she said again. “But soon.”
—
In the coming weeks, Klic toned down the pranks. Slightly. Mostly. He still couldn’t help noticing things no one else saw—like how Mrs. Fenley always tapped her foot before calling on someone, or how the fire alarm test was always scheduled two days after the nurse got a delivery of frozen ice packs.
Dan started calling him “The Predictor.” Jennifer called him “That Maniac I Like for Some Reason.”
But his mom? She started watching him differently.
Not nervously.
Hopefully.
—
What Klic didn’t know—what he couldn’t know—was that his mother had once been like him. Wild thoughts. Chaotic energy. Patterns no one else could follow.
Until she’d entered the Infiniverse and discovered what her brain was truly built for.
Now, she waited. Watching. Knowing that one day Klic would eventually enter the Infiniverse for the first time. That one day, he’d see the full shape of his mind’s design.
But for now?
He was just a boy.
A trickster.
A glitter-wielding agent of chaos with a brain built for worlds yet to come.
And somewhere in the Infiniverse, that future waited.
Quietly.
Patiently.
Shining just beneath the surface, like glitter in the sun.