“What was that?!” Raziel asked, she was the first between herself and her sister to speak, but even at a glance she could see that Lialah was wondering the same thing. That Albaer should gain strength by the way they used his body when they took turns possessing him was expected. It was, after all, still his flesh.

  ‘But that was the First and Second Motion of the White Wing school of martial arts, Lialah’s heritage, while the eye gouge was the Fourth Motion of the Black Wing school… mine!’ Raziel couldn’t have failed to recognize either one in a thousand years. ‘Could there be some school of combat here that is just like some fusion of our home?’ She asked herself, but immediately dismissed it as absurd.

  ‘No… and that leaves me with questions…’ Raziel’s mind raced until Lialah snapped her out of it, going in front of Albaer the disguised angel put her hands on both his cheeks and tilted her head toward him.

  “Home… back to your home, now. Forget this, for now at least. No more of them… just go, just let’s go back to your home, okay?” Lialah urged, and Albaer nodded.

  The rush of a mere minute or three was gone, leaving his body shaking and unable to really even stand properly. Every scrap of skin over flesh was tingling like he was on a bed of pins and needles, the hairs on his body stood on end and his eyes were wide and wild, darting around until Lialah grabbed his face and made him focus.

  “Yeah… yeah, okay. L-Let’s go.” Albaer responded and let them walk him back to the table where Lisa stood, her own body shaking from the shock of what just happened. Albaer barely had a mark, but while he retreated, the cries and moans of Jason followed after him, and the fact that he did not look back, or show any regret or remorse shook her to the core.

  “Are you… are you alright?” Lisa asked while he snatched up his backpack in fumbling fingers and put it over his shoulders again. She went to touch him, and he stepped back, this stopped her in her tracks.

  “Y-Yeah I’m fine, better than he is.” Albaer responded, he still felt the mix of stares, and heard muffled mumbles like they were distant voices heard through another room rather than people standing near enough for a gently tossed ball to be caught.

  “You.” Raziel raised her arm and pointed to Lisa.

  The young woman froze, her eyes would have widened if they hadn’t already done so, and the icy voice of the disguised demoness lost none of its venom in that single word, Lisa’s brief courage threatened to wilt away, as a result, she said nothing.

  “Come by our home tonight. I suppose we have to talk again after all.” Raziel ordered and then mouthed silently, ‘Do not make me come get you.’

  Lisa didn’t answer, nor did Raziel or Lialah stay to hear one.

  There was no need.

  Her answer would be in Lisa’s arrival or absence.

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  But the young honey blonde girl lingered and watched as the trio walked off school grounds, leaving her standing in place, and Albaer’s target lying on the ground.

  Only when the trio were out of sight did she turn to look at what mayhem was left in what Lisa considered to be ‘their’ wake. The school nurse, clad in her white uniform with the little red plus sign over her heart, was crouching down over Jason. She was a younger woman in her twenties, with a fresh face and strawberry blonde hair tied up in a bun, wearing white flat shoes that matched her one piece button down nursing clothes.

  “What happened?!” She demanded, and people started mumbling, looking away rather than answering. The nurse’s voice and intense stare did nothing to inspire answers, her hands flew with the swiftness of bullets as popped open her first aid kit. “Someone, tell me now!” She commanded, and Lisa snapped out of her stupor.

  She approached the nurse and her injured patient and said, “It was Albaer.”

  “Albaer… Lamark? You can’t be serious?!” The nurse demanded, “He did… this?”

  She pulled the boy’s hands away from his eyes, they were bloody and cut and the area around them was already swelling up enough to blind Jason almost completely.

  “Yes, but… Jason attacked him.” Lisa said, “Jason threw a basketball and it hit Albaer in the back of the head.”

  “Accident… it was an accident…” Jason tried to protest through his moans. “I didn’t mean to…”

  “Liar!” Lisa spat back, “You’re a liar. I heard about how you said you wanted to hurt him, and the basketball court is on the other side of the school! You want us to believe you took one of those from there, brought it over here, and threw it into his head by accident?! Are you stupid?! Or do you just think we are?! Huh?!” She shouted down at him, “Now you get your ass kicked like the shit you are and you want to play like he’s the bad guy-?!”

  “Enough!” The nurse ordered, cutting off the rant, “What did he actually do!?” She was touching the ribs and checking for injuries, drawing winces of pain from the boy. “Does it hurt here…?”

  “Yes… he… hit all those… an’ face… nose…” Jason was trying to move his arms to point, and the nurse lifted up his shirt, she winced.

  ‘I’ve treated a lot of Albaer’s… accidents, over the last two years, but good god…’ She thought as she began to mentally tally off Jason’s injuries.

  While she didn’t begin being very sympathetic to the bad seed, having seen the ravages of cancer on people and knowing what she knew of Dr. Lamark’s willingness to fudge data for profit, she’d always treated Albaer’s injuries when she had to. And little by little her thoughts drifted closer and closer to, ‘That poor boy…’ After quiet bruise upon quiet bruise on a dejected face and a vacant, hollow look.

  “We’re going to have to get you to the hospital.” The nurse finally said with a sharp, decisive air about her. “You have a couple of ribs cracked and a broken nose, not to mention your eyes. You’ll live, but you won’t be too happy about it for a few days, maybe weeks.”

  She went toward his shoulder, scooped his arm under his back and looked down at the waifish English teacher. “You. Help me. Now. Get his other arm and help me walk him to my office while I arrange for him to go to the hospital.”

  “R-Right…” She said, blinking several times as she was so brusquely addressed, then the two got each arm under the young man’s broader shoulders and began to walk him inside the infirmary, the sea of students parted like the Red Sea for the trio that slowly, steadily, moved toward the entrance.

  Lisa watched them disappear, her small fingers formed a small fist, bile rose from her throat, the smell of blood and sweat was thick on the spot where she stood, and she bent over clutching her gut and vomited over the space, the sour taste of her own stomach acid lingering on her tongue well after the last drop of spittle fell into the now stained green grass.

  She shook while she brought herself upright again, went to the table, grabbed her discarded backpack, and made for the entrance, ‘At least nobody laughed at me when I threw up just then…’ She told herself, and left the area behind, along with all the gossip that had already begun.