Interplanetary Interschool

Telekinetic boys were the worst. The umpires were psychic too, and supposedly able to detect a contestant illegally using his powers, but low-level stuff slipped by them. That was why my shoelace coming untied mid-game always made me fume with suspiciousness, and doubly so when my underwear happened to need an urgent untuck just when I was about to shoot the ball.

This adjustment made, I glared accusation at my opponent. He, knowing what I was about to say, rolled his large blue eyes.

"Like I'd want to!" he exclaimed. "Even telekinetically!"

"All I'm saying is, he oughtn't to be allowed to get away with it," I later railed at my friend Four-Eyes. "If I were telekinetic and did that to a girl, I'd be penalized."

"If you were telekinetic and did that to me, there wouldn't be enough left of you to penalize," Four-Eyes said.

"And another thing, are we even going to talk about what happened with the ball-machine the other day?" I flung out.

"Will you give it a rest?" cried Four-Eyes. "Our favourite exchange-student's the one who needs moral support right now."

We were headed for the cloakroom by the big gymnastics hall. Four-Eyes, despite her nickname, was as much an Earthling as me and only had the two, but she wore twin lenses on top of them in an archaic arrangement our people had for some reason practised centuries ago. The classmate of whom she spoke, however, had six eyes, being a native of Planet Lepidoptera. As she drew into sight, I saw why mine and Four-Eyes's cheerleader skills were going to be required.

Our friend was standing at the full-length mirror, her back bare and her wings unfurled because she was wearing her leotard, together with the most determined expression I'd ever beheld on her. The problem however was that no matter how hard she tried to spread those colourful butterfly appendages, they were just really little, totally out of proportion to her rather broad body. She could only really twinkle about on them or flutter lightly to the ground. Meanwhile Four-Eyes and I had seen the girl she was up against for this competitive gymnastics bout, who came from Seraphic, one of the inhabited moons and planetoids dotted about in Lepidoptera's huge shadow. Her wings were proper feathery white ones, such as would have been considered imposing even if she'd been full-grown. On a Seraph so small it was amazing to see pinions that reached all the way down to her heels. I had a feeling our exchange-student was thinking much the same as she tried to stretch her own tiny wings to their utmost.

"We're all different, Nectar," I told her, trying to be encouraging.

"Yeah, some of us don't even have extra-sensory perception yet," Four-Eyes added smugly.

Nectar, hearing us, turned around. "Fear not, my hormonal homeroom-fellows," said she. "I have a device to make all well."

Conspiratorially she batted her eyes at me - all of them - and twirled around, switching the molecules of her gym clothes to those of full uniform. This included a fetching little miniskirt, just like Four Eyes's and mine. Nectar proceeded to explain:

"Through remaining thusly attired until the very commencement of my routine, I may conceal within my underbelongings several handfuls of finest Lepidopteran sneeze-pollen. This I'll throw at that other girl when nobody is looking!"

Four-Eyes and I looked at each other dubiously. There was something about a butterfly going on the offensive that didn't sit right with humans.

As it turned out, we were too far off in the stands to see how it went. The hall was a gigantic empty cube, upholstered in bright blue cushioned mats - on every plane, including the walls and ceiling. Floorwork took on a new meaning when the gymnasts could fly. As for what transpired at the border of this expanse, Nectar had to tell me and Four-Eyes about it, which she did when it was over.

Through her tears.

And quite a lot of sneezing.

The large but little-winged Lepidopteran had crept into position, one hand behind her and fumbling with the elastic of these strange but occasionally useful Terran garments. Sidling by her adversary's awesome folded plumage she had halted, all innocence, beside the slender humanoid component of that other girl.

Time to strike.

Then all at once the Seraph had whipped her head around and was staring at Nectar, even raising her fist!

"Try some of your scabby planet's home-grown produce, you sack of smell!"

The fist opened, and the girl from Seraphic blew on her palm.

Sneeze-pollen!

"Atchoo, atchoo, atchoo!" poor Nectar erupted.

On hearing her story, Four-Eyes and I comforted our classmate as best we could. It was however out of respect to Nectar that we both avoided one particular subject, that of why a girl who'd already had the contest in the bag should have wanted to hurt her opponent all the same, as if out of pure spite. Sadly, the reason for this was all too plain to see.

For the Lepidopterans were colonizers. It was innate to their very nature - just think for a moment how Earth-butterflies work. This however meant the Seraphs and all their near-neighbours had been Lepidoptera's subjects for generations, and both Four-Eyes and I secretly felt that if we'd been Seraphs too, we wouldn't have felt like being good sports about it.

"This sort of thing is exactly why politics and gymnastics don't mix," Four-Eyes said gravely afterwards.