A/N: in THIS chapter: Maggie meets Ronnie and Filkins, saves Emmit, gets stuck with a mysterious book bag, and issues a challenge.

Disclaimer: do not own Drillbit Taylor.

Chapter 2: Meeting~

When Maggie finally got her bearings, she turned around, ready to deck whoever shoved her. Her intentions were halted, however, when she took in the scene before her.

Two men...well, guys- students -promptly shoved a small...child(?) into a locker. Was he a student? He seemed too young to be here.

'Maybe he has a medical condition or something' she thought to herself.

The two 'students' continued pushing and shoving the young boy until he was completely inside of the locker, laughing and smiling all the while. Delinquents.

"Come on, guys, this isn't funny! Books go in here! I am NOT a book!" Their unfortunate victim yelled.

Sadly, the boy's cries for help went unheard by everyone save herself. Well, okay, they could hear. They stood in a small crowd observing the spectacle so she was sure they weren't deaf. They just didn't do anything about it.

And that was so not cool.

Bullying had always been a sensitive topic for Maggie. She hated it, and she simply couldn't stand by and let some punk with daddy-problems rough up some innocent bystander. At her old school, she would become friends with the victims and (when possible) deck the tormentors. Simple as that.

This, however, was a special case, of which there had only been two in Maggie's life of 17 years. Once in the 9th grade and once on a playground at a park she couldn't remember the name to. This happened to be a special case because the situation almost surely ruled out her usual two options for things like this: friendship for the victims, and hurt for the tormentors.

Friendship was most likely not an option because...well, just look at him! Maggie took one good look at the boy, who couldn't have been more than 12, and took in his appearance as best she could without the bullies getting in the way.

He had on baggy blue jeans (faded, of course), a light blue button-up shirt (a bit too dressy), wore braces (yikes), and he had a shaggy bowl-cut hairdo (…). Oh, and a somewhat crooked nose.

Not that appearances mattered to Maggie. Because they didn't. They really didn't. Not too much, anyway.

It was his age, or lack of age, really, that made her realize that she (most likely) wouldn't be making friends with him.

He was much too young. He didn't belong here. Heck, he probably got on the wrong bus or something.

This was a High school, and from the looks of it, he hadn't even gone through puberty yet.

And then, of course, there was option 2: going all-out on the bullies and beating them to a pulp.

It wasn't that she was incapable, of course, because she totally was. She'd done it before. The one that appeared to be the leader of the two was fairly skinny, and although she could tell he had some definition in those spindly arms of his, she could easily knock him out with a good uppercut...or something.

It was the other one, the minion, so to speak, that made Maggie keep her distance.

He was, in a word, big. He wasn't fat or anything, he was just...big. He was at least 6'2", and he had a beard coming in, making him look automatically older than any other kid in the entire school.

Maybe even some of the teachers, who knows.

But despite all these perfectly logical reasons not to engage in open combat on the first day of school, Maggie suddenly became aware of four very important facts:

1. This was going to be the craziest school year of her life.

2. The leader (let's call him Dave for now, she didn't like that name) was the one who pushed her.

3. Napoleon Dynamite was an awesome movie.

And 4. She needed to help that kid.

Just as she had made her decision, 'Dave' and (...Bob. He looks like a Bob) 'Bob' slammed the locker shut, locked it, and walked away laughing, leaving their victim crying - no, yelling. Crying was less dignified - behind them.

The second they left, Maggie sprang into action. She sauntered over to his locker and stared up at him through the metal slits.

"Are you okay?" She asked, brow furrowed in anger and worry.

"Oh, yeah. I'm fine. I just got stuffed into a locker on the first day of school, haha. No big deal." He laughed out nervously.

She couldn't tell if he was joking or being sarcastic.

"Well, do you want help?" She asked, trying to get across the point that she wasn't there to mock him.

He stared at her for a couple of seconds before replying in a somewhat relieved tone, "Oh, it'd be great if you could get me out of here!"

"Okay," Maggie breathed, looking down at the lock.

"What's the combination?" She asked, looking back up at him.

"It's 12-21-15! Hurry, just...get me out of here!" He shrieked out frantically.

Maggie put the numbers in and opened the door for him to get out. When he hopped down and dusted himself off, he only came up to her chest. And she was short. Standing at 5'4", she was probably the shortest girl in the whole school.

'Well not anymore,' she thought happily.

...

Oh, wait.

He's not a girl.

Never mind.

"I'm Emmit, by the way." He said nervously as he picked up his books. Emmit swallowed hard and his eyes darted in every possible direction, probably scanning for an oncoming attack. Jumpy kid.

"I'm Maggie," She replied with a small smile, though she didn't bother to hold out a hand for him to shake.

"Oh, I like your name!" He smiled dorkishly, showing off his braces.

"Yours, too." She lied.

...Bully victims need support.

A few seconds of awkward silence passed between them. Maggie thought about walking off to find her first class, but her curiosity got the better of her and she asked,

"How old are you?"

Emmit stared at her for a moment before answering in that skittish voice of his, "Oh, I'm 14."

What?14?! No way. He didn't look more than 12.

At Maggie's failure to hide her dumbfounded expression he quickly added, "I skipped a grade." Oh. That made sense.

Another awkward silence.

Emmit was the one to break it. "Um, hey. Do you, maybe, wanna-"

"Hey!"

Emmit looked past her, his face paling considerably. It didn't take a genius to figure out who he was looking at. Maggie sagged her shoulders and threw her head back, aggravated, and turned around.

There they were, the two jerk-offs from not 5 minutes ago.

And they were stalking towards her.

Great.

'Dave' barged his way through the crowd, 'Bob' following close behind. He didn't have to do much pushing; most of the students moved out of the way as soon as they saw him coming. Apparently they were used to these two.

Dave, shoving a random student to the side, paused for a moment to look at Maggie. Once he took in her defiant expression, his face almost immediately turned from irritated to angry. His brow furrowed, his lips pursed, and his eyes widened.

It was almost comical, if not for the fact that he was totally fuming.

Of course, personal space meant nothing to bullies. He was in her face in a second.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Dave demanded, his face hovering angrily above hers.

Maggie didn't miss a beat. "Helping a fellow student."

Maybe it was the way she said the sentence with such obvious simplicity, as if talking to a child, or maybe the way she coated her words with a bit too much fake sweetness, or maybe it was just her face, but Dave became even angrier.

"Well stop helping," He said curtly. Dave then glanced above her head, finding Emmit. He pointed a finger past Maggie at him.

"You," He said menacingly. Emmit jerked in response.

Dave pointed at the locker. "You get back in there." He ordered.

Emmit didn't have to be told twice. He immediately clambered back inside his locker, fitting into it as best he could, and slammed the door.

Dave turned his attention back to Maggie. "And you," He said, now pointing at her.

"You," He began, poking her in the collarbone, "can go back," - poke - "to whatever hole you crawled out of," - poke - "and just," - poke - "STAY there."

This time he shoved her. Into the lockers. Into Emmit's locker. By the time Maggie recovered and she opened her eyes, Dave was in her face again.

He had lowered himself to eye level with her, and had also been kind to rest his arm on the locker to her right, blocking her escape route.

How lovely.

She started to turn her face away in defiance, but stopped when her face nearly collided with Bob's. Apparently he was denied attention as a child, because he was so close his whole face took up her vision. She couldn't even focus her eyes on him, he was so close.

But two things were obvious: He enjoyed irritating people. And his breath was awful.

It smelled like he had eaten tomato soup with onions, then decided on decaying teeth for dessert afterward. Needless to say, Maggie turned her head back to Dave.

"And the next time you decide to," Dave held up his hand and air-quoted, "'help'," he feigned a concerned expression, "just remember: I'm in charge here. And what I want," he paused for effect, "I get. And if I wanna shove the World's Smartest Midget into a locker," he leaned closer, his face getting blurrier and blurrier, "I will."

He breathed out the last word, fanning peppermint all over her face.

A welcome change, compared to Bob.

Apparently satisfied with their 'reasoning', Dave pushed off the locker, lightly hitting Bob's arm with the back of his wrist.

"C'mon, Ronnie, let's go." And with that, they were gone. It was then that she noticed how much attention they had attracted. The students, now bored with the lack of action, gradually resumed their previous tasks.

"Well that was scary," said Emmit, who had been watching the entire time through the slits in the locker. Maggie, ignoring the fact that she had just made a spectacle of herself on the first day of school, rolled her eyes, pushed off his locker, and opened it up. Emmit hopped out and dusted himself off.

Again.

Maggie picked up his books – at least she assumed they were his books – and handed them to him.

"Are you gonna be okay?" She asked.

He looked up. "Oh, yeah. I'll be fine." He replied, already cheerful now that Bob and Dave were gone.

Well, Ronnie and Dave.

"I would've hit him for you, but, that'll have to wait another day." She said it jokingly, but Emmit could tell by the dim fire in her eyes that she was completely serious.

He laughed anyway, though, catching on to the fact that she was obviously trying to lighten the mood.

"Thanks, let me know when you do."

"Alright." She agreed.

Maggie began walking away, but turned around to ask: "Are you sure you're gonna be okay?"

Emmit smiled. "Yeah!" He shrieked out. Clearly embarrassed, he tugged at his collar, clearing his throat. "I mean, um...yeah."

Sated but not satisfied, Maggie simply answered with a disbelieving "Okay."

And with that, she turned around and resumed walking to her first class.

When she was a little more than halfway down the hall, she looked back once more. Emmit was still standing there, but he was talking to someone. Two someones. A skinny kid with glasses and curly hair, and a – erm – 'chubby' short kid with a bit of an afro, though you could tell it was just really curly.

'They're both wearing the same shirt,' She thought absent mindedly.

She could only imagine how humiliated they were, especially with it being the first day of school and all. Emmit was sure to be mocked if he started hanging out with those two.

'Well at least he's making friends,' Her conscience countered.

As Maggie turned to leave, she bumped into a fellow student - a female student, to be exact - though at the time all she really saw was a mess of blonde and black.

As she picked up her books, Maggie couldn't help but notice this girl's appearance. She had straight blonde hair with the tips dyed black that came down far past her shoulders, and her left – well, her left, Maggie's right – eye was covered with black emo bangs. She had pale skin, an oval face and a long, thin nose.

Unlike Maggie, she wore makeup, but not obsessively so.

And her clothes.

They were so...odd.

She was wearing a loose oversized black t-shirt with wolf's eyes printed on the front, and a purple-and-black plaid pleated skirt with a chain hanging off it.

They weren't too odd, she supposed, but her tights were the real eye-stopper. They were...she didn't even know. They were just a mesh of bright neon yellows and reds and purples and blues and...were those bunnies? Anyway, the tights combined with the black combat boots she wore made her look quite odd.

But oh, well. Who was she to judge?

Noticing the girl's obvious self-consciousness, Maggie quickly averted her eyes, trying her hardest not to ogle and keep her attention on her books (which had fallen to the floor).

It was tough, but she was successful.

As they both finished picking up their things, the young girl abruptly walked off.

Weird.

Maggie noticed the girl's book bag on the floor. She must have forgotten it. Looking up to call for her, Maggie realized she was nowhere to be found. Sighing, she bent down and picked it up, searching for a name tag.

Alexandria. Hm.

Taking one last look around her and, finding no Alexandria, Maggie slung the bag around her shoulder, letting her own drag on the floor from her fingertips, and started towards class.

Maggie walked into History class feeling pretty confident. That is, until she saw the students. Two in particular.

Sitting four seats away from where she stood by the teacher's desk, behind the ONLY empty seat (apparently she was the last one to make it to class, how convenient) was Dave.

And next to him (of course) was Ronnie, but only Dave paid any attention to her. Mr. Dunbar asked her to introduce herself, and she did as she was told, though she was none too enthusiastic about sitting with her back turned to Dave for an hour-

"Mr. Filkins, would you please help Ms. Lovelace into her seat?" Mr. Dunbar asked.

-Sitting next to Filkins for an hour.

This was not happening. She could not let this go down.

Turning to Mr. Dunbar, she asked in a sweetly innocent voice, "Um, actually, I was wondering if I could sit next to," she briefly scanned the seats, finding her little friend from not 15 minutes ago.

"Emmit?" Mr. Dunbar glanced over at the boy in question, and Maggie waited with bated breath as he replied, "I'm terribly sorry, Ms. Lovelace, but the seats are assigned. Sorry, but you'll have to sit by Mr. Filkins." He gave her a sympathetic look, but that was about it.

Great. There was no getting around this.

Sighing silently in defeat, Maggie trudged down the first aisle of seats, stopping next to hers. It was the third from the back, and third from the front. In the middle. Yay.

Filkins had already gotten up and pulled out her chair for her, an innocent 'nice-guy' expression on his face, smile and all. A look which was obviously reserved for teachers and grown-ups. So he was one of those.

He gestured for her to sit down, and she was so irritated at this point that she didn't bother holding back the eye roll she felt coming on. She set down her bags (judging from all of the odd looks she received they probably thought she stole the extra one) and sat down. She spared herself no dignity as she twisted around in her seat to stare back at Filkins, who was smiling innocently at her.

Maggie's eyes narrowed to slits, sending him the clear message that she would be on her guard.

Filkins, however, squinted his eyes as well, changing his angelic smile to a devilish smirk. Maggie sent him one final death glare before turning back around in her seat. Mr. Dunbar had already started his lesson. Something about the Civil War.

While trying to focus on the teacher, Maggie thought about what had just occurred.

A challenge had been issued. Though no words had been spoken, it was a mutually silent agreement, she was sure. And she was so going to win -

Tug.

Maggie's head jerked back as she felt a firm tug on one of her long, brown, wavy strands of hair.

...Never mind.

A/N: Oh-KAY, SO! Not really much to say about this chapter, except that I feel like I use italics too much :/ I was gonna wait until tomorrow to update, but I was bored and couldn't wait :P

And yes, just to be clear, those two 'kids' that Emmit was talking to? Yeah, they were Ryan and Wade, from the movie. They'll make numerous cameos throughout the story, so keep an eye out.

...Or not. I don't care. Whichever you prefer.

Oh, and just in case there was any confusion (though I doubt it), 'Bob' was Maggie's temporary nickname for Ronnie and 'Dave' was for Filkins.

As I said before, I'm not the best writer, it's really just a hobby to pass the time. I'm good at spelling and grammar (I know the differences between there, their, and they're and all that jazz) and basic structure, but not much else.

SO, if you have any pointers for me, fire away.

Also, I've decided to update twice a week now, because I was looking back at all the chapters I wrote and it would be horrendously slow if I were only to update once every week :/

So yeah, I'm gonna update twice a week now.

'Till next time ;)