…
My name is Nunya Business and I am dead.
What's that you ask, how can I be talking to you when I'm dead? Well, I'm not dead dead. Not completely anyway. Okay, I see I am not making much sense. Let me rephrase.
My name is none of your business, and I might as well be dead.
Better? Oh… no, I'm not being melodramatic. Kudos on knowing that word, by the way, I wasn't expecting it from someone like—
Hey now! I'm trying to give you a compliment! Oh, okay, back to the dead thing. Here, let me clarify. See this needle? Feel this? Woah! No need to hit me, I was just illustrating my point! It's just a little prick.
Really? 'That's what she said?' That was bad and you should feel bad. I pricked you—
Okay, get the juvenile humour over with. Are you done? Good. I pierced—
Teenagers… As I said, I pricked you to prove a point. Do it to me. No, you saw correctly, I didn't flinch. Fine, do it again if you must. It doesn't hurt, I literally can't feel it. Yeah, now you get it. I might as well be dead, I can't feel a thing. How did it happen, you ask? Well, for that we need to go back to a particular Friday…
x-x-x-x-x
"Is she coming?" Emma asked.
"Julie saw her headed this way, she should be passing the corner right about—"
"Hush, she's here," Sophia interrupted Madison. The trio waited for Taylor to pass the door to the classroom they were waiting in, then stepped out as one.
"Hi there, Taylor," Emma said in a sickly sweet tone. "Looking for another place to hide?"
"Emma, I... what do you want?" the timid girl asked.
"What I want is for you to be gone, weakling, but I'll settle for you being put in your place."
"I... I... gotta go," Taylor stammered, grabbing her backpack closer to her and scanning the corridor for an exit. Unfortunately for her, she was near a dead end, with only the roof access door offering a way out. Seeing Sophia take a step towards her, she took it.
"You messed u-up," Madison said in a sing-song voice as Taylor passed through the door. Sophia smirked as she took a wooden wedge that the trio had prepared beforehand and blocked the door with it.
"That'll do it," Sophia said. "No way the four-eyed ho is getting out of there before anyone removes this."
"How long are we keeping her up there?" Emma asked.
"Who cares? The break is almost over girls, let's get back to class. Let the ho have fun up there."
"Hope she dressed warm, I heard it may snow later," Madison said. "Not that I'm worried for her," she quickly added.
x-x-x-x-x
How long was I stuck up there, you ask? Well, long enough. Long enough for it to happen. Oh, don't give me that. What 'it'? Don't you have eyes? Yeah... I thought so. Anyway, I'm not exactly sure when they found me but it was long enough for a missing person to have been filed by my father. I'm still surprised he even noticed I was gone, probably only because I usually do the cooking for him and he got hungry. Oh, you think I'm being harsh? Well, you try living with a man who has emotionally shut down and whose evenings usually come down to crashing in front of the TV with a beer or ten. Yeah, enough about that indeed. Anyway, the next thing I knew I was waking up in a hospital bed with an IV stuck in my arm and one of those annoying heart monitors beeping next to my head. Turned out I was in a coma for a few days and they weren't sure if I'd ever wake up again. Well, I did, obviously.
'Did they catch them?' Heh. Of course not. Who would ever act for little Taylor Hebert against the perfect little girls Emma Barnes, Madison Clements, and Sophia Hess? Oh, didn't you catch them the first time? Emma 'traitor' Barnes, Madison 'slut' Clements, and Sophia 'psychopath' Hess. That helpful? Yeah, yeah, I heard it before. Useless dad rolled over and signed the papers the school lawyer handed him to not sue in exchange for hospital bills paid, and the cops didn't pursue the matter as it was 'just a prank, bro!'. Fuck them all. What? Okay, okay, I'll get to the point...
x-x-x-x-x
The big guy was snarling, "... the children, just shoot. Doesn't matter your aim, just shoot. You see one lying on the ground? Shoot the little bitch twice more to be sure. We give them no chances to be clever or lucky, understand?"
The rest of the ABB gangsters agreed with the big guy, so I had a bit of a problem. I had been planning to just run away when I first saw Lung and his gang, but if he was planning to murder kids?
Not gonna happen.
I left the cover of the dumpster that I had been using for cover and stepped towards the gang.
"What the hell?" one of the gangsters said as he saw me, which was all I was willing to let them say. I raised my arms and let go.
Blueish white energy left my palms and quickly impacted the would-be child killers, turning into snow, ice, sludge, and more winter fun. Before Lung had even turned to face me his entire gang as well as he were covered with snow and ice.
I actually laughed, wondering if that was all he could do. Of course, that's when things went a little bad. The ice started to melt as the air around Lung started to heat up, and the big guy quickly began to get bigger.
I took a deep breath and let loose more of my cold, but it wasn't stopping him. He was already at least twice as large as he had been when I started, and a good part of his body was beginning to be covered by his armour. Worse, he was looking straight at me. One of his eyes was just a glowing line behind his dragon mask, but the other was like an orb of molten metal.
"Kill oooo," he said, his transformation already impacting his capability to speak.
Of course, I wasn't going to let that happen, so I drew on more of my power. A veritable glacier's worth of ice formed around his body before he could take a swipe towards me, or even worse, breathe fire on me. There was so much ice and snow flowing from me to the giant-sized gang leader that it blinded me, but finally I had to let my arms drop again. I stumbled forward, catching myself with my tired arms and then, finally, looked up.
Lung was completely engulfed by blue ice, hatred barely visible on his face as he literally stood frozen in front of me.
x-x-x-x-x
What? No, I didn't see anyone else. Just those ABB bastards and then, later, Assault and Battery. Undersiders? Never heard of them. Bullshit, I'm not lying. Well, your software is wrong. Fuck you, Halbeard. Can I talk to Assault again, instead? At least he doesn't have a fucking halberd stuck up his arse so far it's—
Thank you. So, that was the fabled Containment Foam? Not a pleasant situation to be stuck in. Pun intended indeed. Where's the big armoured jerk? Snrrt. Serves him right.
Oh, thank you for the tea. No, it's fine... the cold doesn't bother me anyway.