I’ve been trying to get a part of OpB out a month, but this month I got swamped and just didn’t have time. I’m hoping I get it finished by this weekend, but it might not happen, so for the ones of you who follow me over here, I thought I’d post the first half (or quarter, really), for you to read over. This part involves a lot coming together all at once, so it’s just been a bit of a hassle to piece together.
I don’t usually post OpB shit over here and I’m not going to start, but if you see this and wanna follow the rest of it, it’s over on Fanfic and Archive. You don’t have to be all caught up or even read any of the rest of the Remember Me shit to understand it. It stands on it’s own, loosely in the Fairy Tail realm, focusing on the slave trade in Bosco. Nearly full OC, and kinda just me indulging my own shit a bit. It’s not for everyone, but I rather like it.
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Operation Bosco: A Call to Arms, IV
it was always strange.
The feeling of it.
Waking up.
Since Haven had been revived following the mishap on the gauntlet, it was always a bit of a jolt, first thing, as her eyes peeked open and she was greeted to a new day. There were some difficulties in adjusting, right at the start, to the feeling. Her chest would get heavy and the breaths she drew in always seemed to burn, just a bit, as the scarring over her stomach itched.
For as bad as the nights were though, the mornings made it worth it.
She’d never really taken a break. Before. Had always been on, constantly. From the day her parents let her start snagging the fliers off the job board, she’d either spent her days completing them or training to be able to do so. Days were meant for toiling and nights were meant for getting fucked up in her father’s guildhall. Her mind was focused on very few things and everything felt simple. Easy. Broken down.
Get stronger and reward yourself along the way.
But when she was revived, things were different. She couldn’t take jobs right off the bat, she was too weak to train in the first few weeks, and her father no longer held a guildhall for her to act out in, with not too veiled hopes of gathering his attention.
Everything was different.
Locke had to go back out, on jobs, and even once she was up to training, she had no one but her boyfriend’s father or Ajax to do it with. Navi was gone, Locke now had friends, real friends that he wanted to spend time with, if he wasn’t out, and it was jarring.
All of it.
Her family was there, but she was trying to ease back into those relationships and they were dealing with their own trauma, what with her coming back to life and her father disappearing in the middle of the night.
She’d spend days, both with or without Locke, at a bit of a loss as to how to get back to where she was. Or, honestly, how to be sure she’d never return to it. There was a call for the long stretches of solitude and peaceful atmosphere she was rewarded with, but at the same time, it felt far more like a punishment.
She was a woman of action. Strong action. Constantly falling in and out of dangerous scenarios in order to prove her worth. Those few months of either taking no jobs or taking one and needing a be recovery period was hard on her.
Very hard.
“I never want to be like this again,” she told Locke, more than once, and he only snickered, smiling even, in the beginning when he was still just amazed to see her alive and breathing, with him once more. “Don’t nothing. Sitting around. Waiting.”
“It’ll be different in Bosco,” he assured her and it was still a dream to them then, not fully realized or understood, what it would mean.
What any of it would mean.
She spent months getting stronger and him proving himself to the guild master, just to find their power and prowess useless. He’d spent the majority of their time away on guard duty, back on base or across the border, while her true powers had been suppressed and her new, fancy one she was so pleased to wield had only come into play once.
And for what?
So she could find herself folding clothes in a sweatshop, hoping to win the approval of women that saw her as little more than a kid. A fucking, stupid kid whose current placement in life did more to depress them than, perhaps, their current surroundings. Reminded them of their first time. Times. In new places, adjusting to the new regulation and lack of freedom they were presented.
There was a resignation, back in Ewings, but it wasn’t buried nearly as deeply as it was the majority of the women she was currently housed with. The majority of them were too old, had been under too long, and she was made known of this the second she tried to broach the topic with any of them.
It was a headbanging kind of realization, the ones she had every single day and night, as she tried to assimilate herself with these women. She lacked the nerves or fears she had, on Ewing’s manor, but they were instead replaced with frustrating jitters of wanting to do something, to start something, but not quite being able.
She didn’t connect well with other people. She never had. But it was now a major part of the job and, though she wished that both Locke and Shae were able to carry the heavy load in this, she knew that her position in the hoped revolution was very important.
One of the things that she’d learned recently from the short months she’d spent back home actually came during that down time she hated. And from Marin, her lame younger sister, of all fucking people. Marin possessed the potential for all the power in the world, but balked in her formative years, and instead had to build other skills.
She wasn’t great at it either, after all. Connecting to other people. And maybe that was Haven’s fault, at least somewhat, but whatever it was, Marin found ways to overcome it. Where Haven thought to prove herself physically and violently, Marin managed her natural awkward disposition in another way.
With her natural abilities repressed, she found herself accessing social skills in other ways. She learned things about people, rather easily. She served them beers and fed them filling food until they felt comfortable enough to express things to her. Whether this was intentional or not, it allowed her to easily transverse any other personal relationships she was forced to have with others. They felt naturally inclined to consider her something. Not exactly a friend and maybe not a confidant, but at least someone that, even when sober and starving, they could count on to be there for them.
The best part of this arrangement was that Marin hardly had to offer anything difficult up to others; she merely had to provide the expected level of care. This wasn’t exactly an imparted benefit on Haven through word of mouth, but rather observation. She watched her mostly quiet and reserved sister in the guildhall many times following her resurrection, and it was a very alternate experience from how Marin was once treated around the place.
By doing her work, she found an avenue that otherwise wouldn’t be easily presented to her.
Haven wanted to be like that. With her job. To do her job and make friends along the way. It used to be that way, anyways, when she was just a regular mage, running around helping others. She fell in and out of relationships in her time away from Fairy Tail, nothing serious, but her prowess had always spoken when she was unable. Helped her fall in with the people she needed in the moment who required her powers just as heavily.
But now she didn’t need them. Didn’t have them. Couldn’t use them. It felt better, honestly, than it had back at Ewings place, now able to at least use her transformation magic, but it still ached a bit, as it always would, whenever she couldn’t draw electricity through her veins at will.
It was depressing.
Just how things had felt, when last year’s long, hot summer had faded into the darkness of a new season. But now she was trapped in the dull shadows of a hotbox sweatshop, equally as shut-in and alone, but just for different reasons.
Sulking wasn’t productive though. Nor was her natural inclinations towards anger and brash attitudes. Shae and Locke were both out of their element and struggling to find ground, but she was given the easiest job of all; she couldn’t fuck it up.
She just had to gain the trust of a bunch of old women.
Marin did it with the older men in the bar, plying them full of beer and liquor and listening to their problems. Finally, for once drawing true inspiration from her sister, Haven found that getting frustrated with her position wasn’t going to get her anyways; she just had to do her job and keep her head down.
So she tried it.
Haven had always been kind of afraid of it. Silence. Left to her own devices. To think. After her ventures into the afterlife’s eternity, she found mostly that she’d never not be afraid of the concept. Silence was just too much for her to handle.
But without even Shae now, it was what her days were mostly filled with. And as she focused, tried hard to get the folding and sorting all down, box breaking and box opening, but fuck.
Fuck.
It was just hard.
But she seemed to be endearing herself more, this way. Or at least she thought. There was a woman, anyways, of the few that were on folding and packing duty, that seemed to not look on her as harshly as she once had.
She was a...hearty woman, Haven thought. Homely, maybe, was the word. She kept her messy brown hair clipped back and out of her face for the most part, but sometimes a strand would fall from its containment and she was mutter curses just loud enough for the typical blonde to catch. A dark, rough patch laid over the older woman’s eye and she cursed about it at times too, wiggling a finger beneath the fabric to deal with an itch.
She went by Bea, the woman did, and she was a glimpse into the world Haven was merely visiting.
It started just like that. Not so harsh looks and, eventually, her grumbling at Haven to take a seat, beside her and two of the other women, during lunch break, down in the grass.
There wasn’t much to talk about. They probably didn’t really have much in common, removed from their current position, but they were trapped, all of them, with the magical marker denoting them as less than, and if they only had one thing to speak on, then it made sense that they eventually would.
“You wanna ask about it,” Bea remarked one day in that gruff she had. They’d had a few conversations by this point, short and to the point. Grumbles over the food, the work, maybe on a too cool summer evening, about the pond water. But this time, as they sat together in the warm grass, sun bearing down on them as they scarfed down their lunch, it seemed different. The tone. The intention. “All the new people do.”
Haven knew what she was talking about, of course, but even for as socially inept as she typically was, even she knew that she was heading down the entirely wrong path. Quickly shaking her head, she had to swallowed the hardened sliver of bread and warm meat of some sort that they’d been served before saying, “N-No, I haven’t. I-”
“Things were different,” Bea told her simply and this, at least, hadn’t been the first time she’d heard such at hing. “Around here. Before.”
Haven paused, not wishing to ward off the potential for further conversations, but also being reverent of letting this once slip through her grasps.
“Before?” she asked softly.
“Before,” the older woman went on, “the current master. The young one. The son.” She almost sneered, maybe, shaking her head as she insisted, “He’s not nearly the...man his father was.”
“Did he...did he take your-”
“Plucked it right out.” She made a popping noise with her mouth that made a woman sitting nearby visibly appear revolted. Bea only reached up, almost absently, to sneak a finger beneath the flap, scratching with a sigh. “Punishments were stiffer. The work harder. What we were dealin’… But I was so young then. Your age, maybe younger. Things were just...different.”
“That’s fucked,” Haven remarked, but Bea only shrugged.
“I’ve seen yours.” Then she made that face again, that sneer, the finger slipping back out from beneath the patch so that she could gently tap the pad against the course fabric. “Well, as well as I can see somethin’-”
“What do you mean?”
“Your scars. On your stomach.” Bea raised an eyebrow. “Told ya mine.”
Which meant she wanted Haven to tell hers. It was probably the entire reason she’d brought up the conversation in the first place.
It was with a bit of a sigh that Haven thought about it. All of it. She had a lot of scars, of course, and wore them well, but the most important…
The fact it was even visible was her own fault, honestly. Her transformation wasn’t that draining, but she needed it to be perfectly even, refilled and never taking away too much. Leaving her scars where they were, hidden beneath her clothing, was an easy concession. And the visible ones only added to her credibility. But they all stripped together, each night, and even though the moonlight didn’t illuminate much, all light only revealed the most inconvenient. Or at least it always had for Haven.
“I got cut open,” she admitted, softly, and though it wasn’t the full truth, as she looked away and reflected, she told just enough of it that her pain was not only convincing, but real. “Died. A-Almost, I mean. I almost died. Someone was able to use magic to save me.”
“All that miracle,” Bea sighed with a click of her tongue and a shake of her head, “only to land you here.”
“Only,” Haven agreed, “to land me here.”
Things only seemed to look up from there. It was difficult, of course, to be too optimistic for the future when you were dealing in such a dank reality, but Haven did feel good about herself. Bea seemed to like her well enough, maybe, and though the other women all seemed to be distant, it was nice to have something of an in.
She felt comfortable in it, at least somewhat, and was very ready to shove it in the often doubting Locke’s face one day when she disappeared off into the shed, equally anticipating her boyfriend as she was the soda pop he’d bring.
Which was why, as he slipped in empty handed, she had a bit of a glare.
“Nothing?” she questioned. “I literally have nothing to look forward to and you still manage to disappoint-”
“Haven.” He rushed the short distance to stand before her, his goofy gaze rather harsh that day. Clouded. Concerned. Reaching out, he grasped her cheeks in his hands, forcing her to stare up at him, linking their gaze. “Something’s happened. Or is happening. I don’t-”
“Is it Shae?” She shoved him off, tossing up an arm and, originally intending it to crackle with the heat of electricity, she instead found herself merely flexing. “We’ll fuck ‘em up, Locke. We’ll-”
“No, Have, it’s…” He only frowned at her. “It’s you.”
Deflating some, Haven returned the gaze though hers was accompanied by a raised brow as she questioned, “What do you mean?”
He wasn’t quite sure, honestly.
The concern came from Shae herself.
Locke had the benefit (misfortune?) of being one of the guards sent up to the penthouse, not for their irregular defiling of select hostages, but rather to rouse Monty from where he was shirking on his duties. It had been with a bit of a huff that Wick chose him, finding the young man eating with some of the other guards in the dining room, and as he and Locke bounded up the stairs, his only offered explanation was, “You talk sense to him, Hux. He likes you.”
But he didn’t like Wick.
No one liked Wick.
He was a cold man, older than the other guards and from the old breed, Anderson had sneered to Locke once behind the man’s back. He kept to himself and mostly seemed to find his time spent trying to get Monty to do anything other than drink and hide in his arcade or penthouse.
It was a difficult task.
But recently, the Master had taken quite the liking to Hux and, while that was annoying to some of the other guards, Wick saw this as a new, unexplored advantage. Guys listened to their friends, after all, and if the new guard could, at the very least, supply an easy way to control the Master, then, well, his presence was worth it.
Up in the penthouse though, as Wick moved through the living area, unconcerned mostly with the women that hung around, and instead headed to bang on Monty’s bedroom door, Locke uneasily glanced around at the women seemed equally as uneasy to see him. He almost raised his hand to wave at their very pointed avoided glanced, but he didn’t have a chance as someone came rushing over to him.
Shae had spent the past few days sitting by the door, mostly. She avoided Monty when she could, but felt it very important that she get to Locke, as soon as possible. Being locked away in the penthouse, this felt completely impossible as the man, she knew, would avoid the place like a plague. Still, there really wasn’t anything to do, at all, other than slowly go insane in the place and though she knew she was meant to be gaining trusts of the women around her, she found herself far more worried over something else.
She’d gotten up. Right before he came in. To find what had been left for them to eat in the kitchen. There was more, here, than down in the sweatshop, but most of the women, especially those who’d been there long, seemed to survive mostly on their pills and alcohol.
But Locke came in, while she was doing that, and at first, the sight of Wick stalking through the apartment wasn’t a welcome one to the woman and she hung back. But as he was barking for Monty, Shae saw the man she was actually looking for and, not knowing exactly when she’d be given another opportunity, she ran right for him.
It was awkward, the next few motions, as she hesitated and Locke tensed, at the feeling of someone approaching him in such a manner, but then there was the awkwardness of all the women staring and one of them had to say something, but it had to be here, because she was the one who had something to say, and while he was too shocked for much more than his silence, Shae knew she need to get the information to him as subtly as possible and, well, given their implied relations by that point, she figured it wasn’t too out of the realms what she did next.
Somehow, it was even more awkward.
Locke pulled back, when he realized what he was doing and it was like pressing her lips against nothing, mostly his chin, honestly, as she leaned up, but not enough to account for how hard he was trying to evade.
Pulling away herself, just slightly, she whispered, “Haven’s in trouble.”
Locke blinked with a questioning, “What?”
“Take this.” And her hands had been wrapped around his neck, but one of her balled up fists opened then and a folded slip of paper tickled the back of his neck as it tumbled down beneath the collar of his tucked in shirt and came to rest around his hip line, right where his too tight cut off passage. Shae’s eyes were wild as she insisted to the man, “You have to do something.”
It was on instinct, almost, the way he nodded at her solemn tone, but again, the seconds in this encounter were stifled by another immediately following it.
Wick had been coming out of the bedroom then, chewing out an inebriated Monty while he was at it, but this stopped suddenly when he saw what was taking place. Shae still had an arm wrapped around Locke’s neck and he was still too dazed to do much about it. The sight, for some reason, caused Wick to shout at them, but his gaze was quickly somewhere else.
“Enough,” he’d growled, the older man had, and all the women, who hadn’t really relaxed the entire time, seemed even more uneased by the action. With a deep growl, he was stalking right back across the room then to grab Shae roughly by the arm and toss her to the side. “You will not-”
“Hey!” Locke bucked right up as Shae, fighting against all instinct she knew, forced herself to only fall away and not bite back at the man.
“Shut your fucking mouth.” And Wick turned to Locke once more, raising his hand and striking him, sharply right above his left ear. Having been raised on such things, if anything the feeling made the hardy mage almost nostalgic. If only the hit wasn’t so weak with no true iron behind it. As Locke blinked away the feeling, his direct superior only glared darkly into his red eyes. With a shake of his head, Wick insisted, “You will never do that again. Do you understand? You are on duty. And in front of her?”
“In front of who?” Locke griped as he resisted the urge to rub at his ear. “What are you talking about?”
But Wick just huffed then, turning on his heel and walking over to where some of the women were coward, wincing as he came close, but there was only one that he seemed interested in. Locke had seen her before and, though she hadn’t stood out to him before, he recognized her as one of the women that worked in the kitchen. Not marked. Hired help. She was the youngest one of them, a teenager, and Locke had mostly steered clear of the kitchen help, not quite sure how they fit into liberation.
He grabbed her though, Wick did, hissing something about how she shouldn’t be up here, right now, and she was wide eyed, the teenager was, nodding her head and being drug from the penthouse while everyone else stood stock still and eerily silent.
As the teen and Wick disappeared out the door, a beat would come to pass before Monty, the only one capable of breaking the tension laughed, drunkenly, shaking his head as he continued on then.
“C’mon, Hux,” he slurred as he came to weakly slug the man in the shoulder. Grinning, his glassy eyes found Locke’s as he remarked, “Gotta finish work, huh?”
“Yeah,” Locke agreed with a nod and, though he did glance at Shae, he turned to follow after the Master.
Monty stumbled down the stairs with Locke’s help and, with some more assistance, the mage managed to shove the guy into his office where, following, he was certain to close the door behind them.
“Wick’s just freaked,” Monty explained, going to fall into his chair. “That I don’t, uh, seem presentable to my uncle.”
“Your uncle?”
“Alwood.” He sniffled though, at the man’s name, Monty did. Raking a hand across his face, he groaned some as he said, “Man look’s out for me.”
But he couldn’t even think about that sort of thing, in that moment, Locke couldn’t. Instead, he only paced a bit, around the small office, while Monty continued to rub at his face trying to wake himself up.
“Can I ask you something?” Locke finally asked and Monty waved his hand a bit.
“Sit down and do it,” he grumbled a bit. “Giving me a headache.”
Hesitating, Locke glanced at the door before going to sink into one of the plush chairs that set before the desk. Softly, he asked, “Who was that? That girl?”
“I dunno,” Monty replied as he rubbed a palm roughly into one eye, the stinking eventually causing him to gasp and drop his hand. Then, dryly, he replied, “You’re the one fuckin’ her.”
“What? No, I meant… The one that Wick drug out of there,” he explained. “The young one. Who-”
“That’s Wick’s fuckin’ daughter.”
“He’s what?”
Monty snorted then, sneering some as he sat back in his chair and focused on the ceiling for a moment. “I’s a kid when it all happened. It was under my dad that it all happened. That fucker. Left me all this shit to deal with. And fuck Wick too. Asshole. Thinks he so good. So great. Knocked the woman up. Down in The Factory. Judges me. He does the same fucking thing. Did. Whatever.”
Locke shifted, a question on his tongue, but doing so caused the slip of paper down the back of his shirt to scratch against his back and, suddenly, he couldn't give a shit about Wick.
“Hey, man, are you going to be alright?” Jumping up, Locke forgot for a moment that he actually, sort of, had a job to do and straightened at the remembrance. As he looked over Monty, he added, “If I take off?”
Monty ran a hand for once through his hair, causing it to become even more disheveled. Shaking his head, he said, “Gotta, uh, sober up. Before Alwood comes around.”
Locke found it unlikely that this would be accomplished, but he had his own problems to worry about. Not only did he imagine Wick would be on his ass, should he run into the man again, but he needed to get that slip of paper and read it over as soon as possible.
His room was empty, thankfully, when he arrived at it. On occasion, the other guys would be lingering around to talk or try and goad him into going into town with him. They all got their checks every two weeks and, now with a sizable accumulation of cicles, the offer seemed like it should have been more enticing to him than he was displaying to the others.
But he didn’t want to leave the property. Not with Haven around. If he told her about it, she’d goad him into going out with the other guards, get to know them better, study them, learn something useful to the cause, but fuck that. He wasn’t leaving her alone on the property.
It was hard enough knowing she was so close and yet barred off from him the majority of the time.
His chest was pounding, as it had since what had popped off upstairs, but alone now, closed off in his tiny bedroom, his heart felt like it was trying to rip from his chest. Ripping off his shirt, he probably looked a foo as he spun around in a tight circle, trying to find where the slip of paper had fluttered off to, freed now.
It wasn’t much. As he found the white slip sticking out against his dark hardwood floor, his fingers trembled some and he was both disappointed and terrified by just how short in length Shae’s note was.
She had to be straight to the point, of course, and there wasn’t much there for him to glance over, but still, he found himself collapsing onto the edge of his bed as his eyes traced over the short writing.
Alwood’s taking Haven back with him.
Stop her from going.
I’ve heard bad things about him.
She’s not safe.
The note didn’t tell him much. And though he tried to get what he could out of the guys he had patrol with the next morning, because of the former, he didn’t have much to offer Haven that day, as he stared with heavy concern at what, truly, was a strange woman, but exuded all the warmth (or lack there of) that his girlfriend did.
He’d spent the majority of his life trying to protect her. And others. It was in his nature, since he was a boy. He liked for all the people he cared about to be as safe as possible. This was a difficult task, growing up as a mage, but he always saw after his friends. Haven especially.
His whole point in coming to this place was for that exact reason. He dreamed of more, he wanted more, but deep down, it was the only thing that really mattered.
“Alwood is going to try and take you,” he told her simply. “But I’m not going to let him.”
Haven stood there for a moment, after his words, losing her tension and fear for Shae and, at least somewhat, gaining some for herself.
“Alwood,” she repeated his name softly then, frowning, “knows Ewing.”
“What?”
“I told you. That’s where I know him from.” Turning from the man, she could only blink in the darkness, her desire for static, not to draw, but to expel, pooling in the pit of her stomach. “What if Ewing told him about me? And he came here to get me?”
“Haven, I don’t think-”
“He knew me, Locke.” She shook her head some. “From the last time. When I was there. The first time. He knew exactly who I was. He’s connected and shit and is after me now, I bet, and-”
“If you need me to get you out of here-”
“What?”
Locke looked quite serious when she glanced over her shoulder at him. Softly, he said, “I’ll sneak you out. Whatever. That’s why I came. If you or Shae run into trouble-”
“I’m not in trouble.”
“What do you mean? You think some rich fucking sicko is out to get you.”
“Are you kidding? Fuck him. He’s after me? Ewing’s after me?” She turned quickly then, bouncing on her feet, seemingly amped. “Fuck him. He doesn’t know what he’s messing with.”
“Haven-”
“I’ll kill him. I’ll kill them all.”
“You’re not-”
“I’ll fucking kill them, Locke.” She threw up a fist again, still with no electricity behind him, but as the blow connected to Locke’s chest, he had to suck in a breath. Twisting her fist, she pressed harder into him, but didn’t stumble forwards, instead only hanging her head, arm taut and rigid as she breathed heavily down at their feet. Bravado deflated, she only whispered, “I’ll fucking kill him, Locke.”
“You won’t have to.” He balled his own fist, but it was only to crash it down on the top of her head, sighing some as he took in her new look. When she raised her eyes, they were dark and not her own, but the heaving of her chest alternated perfectly with his own as he tugged her to him. “I fucking will.”
Haven rested there for a moment, indulging maybe, if just for a moment. Shoving him off after a beat, she only whispered, “You can’t kill shit. Fucking worthless.”
“If you had killed Ewing back at his place,” Locke retorted with a frown, “then we wouldn’t even be having to deal with this shit.”
“You’re an asshole.”
“You’re,” he replied, “in trouble. You get that, right? This isn’t a joke. You can’t go back with Alwood. And if he’s intent on taking you, then it’s probably best if we start figuring a way to get you out-”
“No way.”
“Haven-”
“Give me time,” she insisted. “We can’t fuck this up. Shae upstairs, I’m down here, you’re a guard… This is too perfect to not be the plan. How it’s meant to be.”
“I’m not going to let you-”
“I’m not going with him. I won’t.”
“Then-”
“I don’t fucking know, okay?” Shaking her head, she asked instead, “How do you even know they’re taking me? Have you spoken to him? Alwood? Or did your little friend the master-”
“Shae told me.” He rubbed at the back of his neck. “She, uh, passed me a note.”
“How does she know?”
“Haven, I don’t fucking know.” It was his turn to be annoyed. “How do you not know? If she does? I thought you told me you were making friends.”
“Friend. I’m making a friend.”
“Haven-”
“I’ll ask her about it.” Haven seemed to snap out of her funk, if only for a moment, as she snapped her fingers together. “I’ll ask her to tell me everything she can about Alwood and if she knows why he’d even want me, what for and all that, right? She’ll tell me. We talked, you know? Seriously talked. About-”
“You’re not going,” Locke told her simply. “With Alwood. If I have to drag you out of here kicking and screaming-”
“Calm down. Idiot.” Haven held her head higher. “I didn’t want to go with him either. I’m not going to. Especially not if he’s tangled with Ewing. That’s not why we came. We came to get access to tunnels or some shit, right? So I’m going to fucking get us that.” Then she conceded a bit, “We’re going to fucking get those. I’m going to talk to Bea and you’re going to actually be fucking useful and we’ll figure out how to avoid Alwood all together. When does he leave?”
“I don’t know. I-”
“Useless.” She shoved him this time, but it was playfully, maybe, and Locke pushed her back, maybe too hard, but he was kind of tired of being smacked that day. Still, when she sighed, he gave one back, only nodding his head when she ordered, “Find out. Okay?”
It felt weird, when she turned her head up to press her lips to his, and Locke laughed some into the kiss, which got him shoved again, but he only shook his head.
“Doesn’t feel right,” he told her. “Here. With...this you.”
She snorted, shoving passed him then, “if you could make yourself taller-”
“I’m going to find out when he’s leaving,” he insisted. “And if we haven’t figured a way to make sure he’s not taking you with him-”
“You worry too much, Locke.” And she clipped his name the way that he liked. Poised to head right out of the shed, she only reminded, “Do what I told you and everything will be alright.”
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This is a quickie. Partially inspired by my childhood and teen years.
Both Elementary and Middle school had hammered home the idea that people are shitty and that they will fuck you up at any given chance in any way they think of. I started spending more time by myself and away from people. The only time I ever left was to hang out with friends and even that seemed to be falling apart for me. It was rough, really. Ive known my friends were shitty for a while, but its what i got. Everybody else is either too stupid or weird for me to fit into. Not to mention the assholes.
Everyone in my class was a fucking asshole and they could suck a fucking dick if they thought i was about to drop years of resentment and turn the other cheek.
Fuck that.
Ill stick with the criminals. At least they can be fun.
After my first day of 7th grade, I felt about 3 feet tall and twice as exhausted. I had an inkling that it was depression. I did some looking online and thats what matched how i feel. Tired, lack of motivation, easilly upset by everything. It felt like i was loosing my edge and i cant say im too happy about that.
At the same time, it seemed that as one fire was being put out, another was being discovered. Something felt wrong. I was still angry as ever but it was different. I was more angry at the world than i was angry at a particular thing.
I was slowly realizing that things just arent gonna get better and if they do, it wont be for a long, long time. I was pretty much destined to do nothing with my life considering i wasnt smart enough to carry myself education wise. Ive needed help with a lot of things for as long as I remember.
It felt unfair. I was supposed to be such a smart person, right? Yeah what a crock of shit. It seems that adults have been lying to me about far more than just santa claus and the tooth fairy.
And right now I really felt like knocking someones teeth out of their head.
Like the universe had read my fucking mind, I heard a few pebbles get tossed at my window.
I got out of my chair and peered behind me. Out the window stood Dylan. He cupped his hands and shouted.
“Lets fucking go!”
I nodded and slid the bandana up my face. I grabbed my leather vest and walked out of my room, making sure to close the door behind me as quietly as possible. My mom was passed out on the couch again with the dogs laying beside her. I stared for a moment, watching her breathe heavilly in her unconscious state before i decided it was safe to sneak away. I practically slithered to the door before taking one more look back.
Mom layed facing the tv and away from me. I knew the dogs were gonna go apeshit as soon as the door opened and so i prepared myself.
Then like ripping off a band aid, I swung the front door open and hopped outside, swinging it shut behind me. They started barking like crazy as I thought they would and so I stepped down the stairs on my porch real fast and ran around to my backyard where Dylan was waiting.
“What took you so long?” he said to me as I caught up with him.
I didnt answer, deciding that answering him was just a waste of time.
We walked through our backyard and through the tall grass of the house that lived behind us. It happened to be on the market for years now and didnt seem to be selling anytime soon. That made it a great place to break into and hang out. It was a regular thing at this point. Although since the yard was so open and surrounded by other houses, we kept the hanging in there to a minimum.
“Dude, this fucking kid has been talking some mad shit about me recently.” Dylan started in, “Hes been talking to my girlfriend and saying some really fucked up shit to her. Saying what he wants to do to her and all this shit and I swear if I get my fucking hands on him…”
He spoke with gnashed teeth and a vein fit to burst from his neck. He said all this while looking at his phone screen. I could only assume he was looking at this guys facebook profile.
All at once Dylan turned back to me and showed me the phone screen.
“This fucking faggot. Im gonna fucking kill him!”
I looked at the photo and quickly recognized his name. That was the guy my girlfriend cheated on me with. I could feel my blood draw to a boil as i stared at him. I balled my fists at my side white knuckle tight. Each digit made an audible popping sound as they rolled up.
“You know this kid?” Dylan asked me.
I looked away from the phone and to dylan and nodded my head.
He nodded back at me in understanding and we both had the same idea in mind.
“Lets find this motherfucker”
…
After some talking and walking and all kinds of looking, we figured the easiest way to get this fucker out of his safe space was to have Dylans girlfriend bait him into coming to a secure location. We decided that under the bridge in town was a pretty good place considering that not many people know how to get to the path down under. We headed there and waited for the little bastard.
After a while of sitting around, it was about 9:00. The sun had gone completely down at this point and it was dark. There wasnt any foot traffic above for nearly an hour until we heard a bicycle rattle its way over the wooden slats. I nodded at Dylan and he ran over to the bushes to go hide while I stayed in the the open. I leaned on one of the concrete beams and crossed my arms.
This was going to be interesting.
“Bella! Psst, Bella!” I heard him whispering as he walked down the little hill. He waded past some real tall grass and walked out onto the smooth surface before he noticed me standing there.
“Uh...hi?” He asked, looking at me.
I stared at him and waited.
I watched as Dylan stood from the grass behind him and bolted in the guys direction. Dylan decked him from behind in the back of the head and he stumbled foreward, falling on his hands.
That was my cue.
I walked over and pulled him up to standing level. He had his eyes squinted shut and teeth together. That punch definatly hurt.
Not taking time to hesitate, I held him infront of me with my hand around his mouth and holding his right arm behind his back.
“So, you think youre hot shit, huh?” Dylan said standing over him.
He drove a fist into the guys gut and I struggled to hold him as he doubled over in pain. I snapped him back into place as dylan got into his fighting stance. He stepped over and punched him across the face hard. It was the kind of hit that would leave a bruise the size of an apple. I felt the guy breathe heavier, and tears hit my hand that was still clamped over his mouth.
Dylan reared back again and swung, hitting him right in the teeth. The guys head rolled back a bit at the force of the hit. Im suprised that didnt knock him out.
Than dylan got a start and drove his foot square into his gut. The guy moaned in pain under my hand.
Then the guy did something balsy. He bit right down into my hand, hard. My instant reaction was to let go of his mouth and suddenly he pulled his arm away too. He tried making a dash for it but my anger had flared at the pain. I grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and yanked him back hard into the rocks and gravel at my feet. He flew into the rocks face first and tried getting back up. I grabbed his belt and tossed him again, swinging his face into the rocks once more. At this, I didnt wait to see if he was gonna get up again. As soon as his head was raised, I crouched to his level and put my hand on the back of his head, slamming his face into the sharp rocks again. He yelped a bit in pain so I flipped him over and clamped my left hand around his throat. I squeezed like I meant it and closed off his wind pipe. He looked up at me in pity as he choked. I picked him up off the ground a bit and slammed him back down. I brought my right up like a big ass flesh hammer and brought down hard on his face. I raised it again and smashed him in the face again.
Once I saw the color start to drain from his face, I let go of his throat. He coughed and gasped for breath he desperately needed. I saw something move quickly out of the corner of my eye and brought my arm up to sheild my face. Dylan pelted a handful of sharp rocks at the guys face before following it up with another hard punch. Once I knew dylan had this, I stood up and brushed myself off.
Dylan crouched to his level and looked him in the eyes. Than he did something that actually shocked me. He produced a knife from his pocket and flipped it open real fast in front of the kids face.
Holy shit, was he actually going to kill him?
Dylan brought the knife up and dragged the dull side of the blade down the guys face, who now was so terrifyed that he had full on tears streaming down.
Right as I imagined dylan jabbing the knife through his eye, He stopped just short and whispered real low.
“You come near my girl again or If I hear you talking shit about me around down, Im gonna come to your house and kill you and your whole familly. Do you fucking understand?”
The guy just looked at him in fear.
“DO YOU FUCKING UNDERSTAND?!?!” He shouted in the guys face.
He quickly nodded out of fear.
Than Dylan clamped his hand on the guys face and shoved him back to the ground.
I got up as did dylan and we both started walking back to the top of the bridge. Once we got up there, we saw the guys bike parked next to the bench without a lock. So Dylan kicked the peg up and started walking it over the bridge.
At first I thought maybe Dylan was gonna steal this guys bike but that didnt seem like something he would do. Then we got to the mid point in the bridge and he stopped walking. I stopped too. He suddenly grabbed the bike by the middle and flung the whole damn thing over the edge like a big ass frisbee.
It dropped for a second before we heard it smash into the water below.
“That will teach that fucker…” Dylan said.
…
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