The Hero & the Broken

CHAPTER 1

Suffering. That's how she always felt. Getting text messages threatening to hurt her, her friends, her family, anyone close to her. She just wanted it to end. And one night, she got an opportunity to make the texts end.

Let's finish this game once and for all tonight. Bring Maya's bag. Tell no one, bring no one. Meet me at Alison's grave. 10 PM. Don't be late. Kisses, -A

It seemed risky, but she was going to end the game. She wanted to tell her friends so they could back her up that night, but she knew what A's conditions were. Tell no one, bring no one. As the clock struck 9:45 PM, she grabbed Maya's bag from her room, and got into her car. She started driving towards the cemetery. She memorized where Alison's grave was, since she had been there so many times.

She got out of the car, and found the gravestone. She looked down, her heart sinking when she saw the name written on the gravestone. It hurt her. She manned up, though. She knew she would have to be bold to take down A. Hopefully, A would just want to make the exchange: Maya's bag for no more A games. But, when it came to A, she knew it was never that simple, so she was prepared to fight back. She had brought a kitchen knife and stored it underneath her shirt, tucked into her jeans.

She watched her phone's clock carefully. Five minutes until A was supposed to arrive. She knew that A wasn't planning on being early. He or she would sneak in and probably be there for only a millisecond. They would exchange it—Maya's bag, for no more threatening texts. Well, that's what the deal was thought to be. But, Spencer wasn't that stupid. She knew that making deals with the devil wouldn't help her at all. So, she had it planned. She would rip A's mask off. She knew that they would probably have a weapon with them, so that was the scary part of the plan. She was willing to risk it, though. The A game had gone too far.

Hearing a noise from the bush, Spencer knew it was time. She glanced down at her phone. 9:59. There was one minute until their meeting time, meaning that A had probably already arrived. Looking up, she saw it. The hood.

The infamous black hoodie.

X

Pulling his truck up outside of the cemetery, he took his phone out. He looked at the photos that he had uploaded to his phone a while back. He kept the pictures on his phone, just to remind himself of the woman he loved so much, and would always love. It was Marion Cavanaugh—his biological mother.

It's not that he didn't like his new step mom—she was great, actually—however, the step sister that came with a new mom wasn't pleasing at all. Besides, no new woman could replace the one that gave birth to him. No new woman could replace the years of memories he had with his biological mother!

After his step sister Jenna had upset him by making sexual jokes, he fled the house. He needed to get away. He just wanted his mother back. If she was back, maybe she could save him from that devil sister of his. He knew his mother would always protect him if she came back. She was such a loving, kind, amazing woman. He missed her so much. There was nobody who cared for him as much as she did.

So, whenever life got tough, he desired to go to her gravestone. It felt right to be near her, dead or alive. One of those times that life was hard was that night. Jenna always made it easy for his life to get tough, so he found himself visiting her grave a lot when she was around him.

Flowers in hand, he got out of the truck and walked towards his mother's gravestone. Since he had visited her stone so many times, he had practically memorized the directions to get to that spot. He knew it too well. He felt like he was the only one who visited her, though. His dad was always too busy with his new wife, so he never really wanted to visit Marion's grave. Jenna and her mother weren't too keen on showing respect to Mr. Cavanaugh's dead ex-wife, either.

Even if he was the only one going, he would. It didn't matter if the rest of them wanted to. He always knew he had a closer bond with his mother than anybody. All of the best memories from his life that he could recall were with his mother. Whether it was when she held him close and read books to him, or when she played him a song on the piano about how much she loved him... No one made him feel more at home than she did.

"I love you, Mom," he mumbled quietly, setting the flowers down.

She was his mother. He would call his dad's new wife his mom, but she would never truly be the one he called mother in his heart. He only called her that out of respect. His real mother was in that gravestone, but it didn't matter, she was still his true mother. Jenna's mom was not his real mom, no matter how close they got. And they weren't even that close at that point, and probably never would be.

"Stop! Please, we had a deal!"

Where the hell was that coming from? He knew that voice all too well. It was a sort-of friend of his. Fully letting go of the flowers, he got up. Something felt odd to him, as if he could sense danger. Or maybe it was because he heard someone he knew screaming...

The girl kept screaming, getting as loud as she could. He tried to follow the sound of the screams, but it seemed someone else was trying to make her shut up by covering her mouth, because sometimes her screams got muffled and muted. He still did his best to look for where the person was. And then he saw it. Of course, the person whose gravestone was there... it was that girl that always brought trouble with her.

Alison DiLaurentis.

But, the more shocking sight was Spencer Hastings in an epic battle with a hooded figure. The figure was dressed in all black, fighting back roughly. The figure stopped pushing her around when he noticed that Toby Cavanaugh stood there, looking tall and bold. He could tell that the person got worried that somebody else had witnessed the fight.

They didn't seem to have any remorse for their actions, though... And that's because the figure pulled out a gun from his or her pants, aiming it at Spencer's head. Toby's eyes went wide. He came to the cemetery to pay respect to his beloved mother, not to get into a gun fight! It was a life or death situation, and he knew he wasn't going to leave Spencer Hastings behind and run away. It wouldn't be right. Plus, he would be lying if he said he didn't have a teeny tiny crush on her. (Okay, maybe it was a big crush). And it being a big crush, it was his chance to play hero for her.

"Help!" Spencer tried to scream, until the hooded figure shoved his or her hand on her mouth, silencing her at once.

Without another moment of hesitation, Toby sprinted across the grassy cemetery. He leaped forward and tackled the hooded figure. At that moment, Spencer knew that Toby Cavanaugh was a hero.

A/N: I wanted to write a short, A-centric, AU story (about Spoby), so here it is! I plan on making it a very short fiction. Not a one shot, but kind of a short story, if you will. I'm estimating about three to four chapters, but I'm not really sure yet. Expect three, because that's what my heart is currently set on! Anyways, hopefully you picked up on the AU-ness of it. It's not really that different. The only thing is that Spencer and Toby never became a couple, so they're just friends at this point. And that means he doesn't know about A...

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