Disclaimer: All recognizable characters and settings are property of their lawful owners. This story is written for entertainment purposes only and no profit is made. No copyright infringement intended.

A/N: Thank you for the reviews!

Originally I wasn't planning to do anything more about the comment mentioned in the New Year's Eve chapter. But then one review made me think maybe I should write something so once again I dove into the deep. Somehow I always end up writing about big and sensitive subjects.

There is violence (or more like the aftermath of violence) and some nasty words ahead.


CHAPTER 11

Things have been going great for the last few weeks. We've been busy with school projects and exams but despite that, things have been going well. Today was our last exam for a while and we scheduled a date in the cafe after school and promised to have a calm evening at home after that. I'm looking forward to that. And the whole weekend, to be honest.

We always meet in the corner of the parking lot because it's easier than trying to remember in which class rooms each one of us has our last class of the day.

"Liz?" I call out when I reach our meeting point. I'm two minutes late but Liz is usually a lot more patient than that.

"Liz?" I call a little louder and look around me. Something's off, I just know it.

"In here!" she calls back from somewhere behind the trees but I can't see her.

I walk further into the woods, surprised to find Liz holding down one of the football players. He's lying on his stomach, Liz sitting on the small of his back, his arm bent behind his back in a painful position.

"Liz?" I ask softly. Her back is towards me so I'm not quite sure what's going on. "What happened?"

"She's a crazy bitch, that's what happened!" the boy screams but Liz shuts him up by pushing his face further into the snow before she turns to look at me with raised eyebrows. Her nose is bleeding and it has stained the lower half of her face and even some of her neck. There are also scrapes, or more like gashes, on her left cheek.

"Christ," I sigh and the anger flares inside me. I take a step forward but Liz stops me with a glare. Alright, she's got it under control, I know that. But the son of a bitch hurt her.

"I believe he was trying to test a theory," Liz says calmly and spits away some blood that has found its way to her mouth. "For the record, I didn't scream. He, however..." Liz bends the guy's arm a little higher until he lets out a strangled scream. "See?" she asks me and I'm a little concerned about the calmness in her. She looks like she could chop the guy in two inch slices with an axe and not blink an eye.

"You want me to call the police?" I ask and for the first time the tough guy's shell cracks a little and he seems genuinely scared.

"Let's start with the principal. If that doesn't work out the way I think it will, then we'll get the cops. Give me a hand here."

I hold the guy down while Liz gets up, then pull him up and start towards the school but Liz stops me and takes the lead again.

We walk into the principal's office and explain what happened. I don't really have a lot to say so I find myself in the waiting room soon while the three of them continue talking. The school nurse goes in a few minutes later and comes out less than a minute after that. She looks worried and angry and I have a guess Liz refused to be cleaned up. It confuses me until the boy's parents come fifteen minutes later and I realize she wanted them to see the full extent of her injuries.

It's another half an hour before the boy leaves with his parents and the nurse is invited back in. A few minutes after that Liz walks out of the office, still looking bruised up but at least now she's not covered in blood anymore. I get up right away and my first thought is to hug her but I'm not sure how she feels about physical contact right now.

"You OK?" I automatically ask even though it's a stupid question.

"Let's go home," she says and takes my hand. We don't usually walk around hand in hand so I guess she really needs some reassurance.

"No cops?"

"No," she shakes her head.

We walk home in silence, the cafe forgotten. Liz is shivering every now and then and by the time we reach home she's shaking. I wrap her in three blankets before we sit down on the couch. I'm pretty sure she's not shaking because of the temperature, though.

"Tell me," I whisper softly. I don't care where she starts, I just need to know what happened and what's going to happen now.

"He kept saying he was just kidding but his parents were pissed," Liz starts, her voice is weak and far away. "They'll sell his car and ground him until college. Not that he's going to college because he got kicked out of the football team and that was his only hope. I think his life from now on is thoroughly ruined. His parents wanted me to press charges but I said no."

I'm not going to ask for her reason right now, she'll tell me later. There are more important questions in my head right now. "What did he do?"

"Grabbed me, told me what exactly he would like to do to me, pushed me against the tree and groped. That's it. I elbowed him in the stomach, kicked in the groin, restrained when he was on the ground. Didn't even need any special combat skills."

She's shaking worse now and I wrap my arm around her. There's something more but I can't figure out what it might be.

"I let him do that," she whispers.

"No, you didn't. It's not your fault."

"No. This isn't the regular victim's guilt. I let him. I could have stopped him when he started talking, told him to get lost and stay away. But it would have been my word against his and nothing would have changed. I... needed evidence. I knew I could take him so I just let him... smash my face to the tree. I let him do it. I didn't realize it would affect me like this."

"Oh..." That's pretty much the only thing I can come up with.

"It was the first time I had to defend myself in this body. I knew I could do it but..."

Yeah, I get it. The what-ifs. What if her head hit the tree a little harder and got too disoriented to fight back? What if she lost consciousness? How far would that asshole really have gone?

I want to kill him. Slowly, painfully. Suddenly the chopping in two inch slices -image is in my head again. If I start with the toes and work my way up really fast, he might still be alive when I reach his balls. Sadly enough, he probably wouldn't be conscious.

"I don't know what to say," I tell her honestly. Because I can't tell her the disgusting details that are rushing through my head right now.

"Don't kill him," Liz says, her voice serious, and for a second I'm worried that she actually reads my mind. "I'm not losing you because of that asshole."

"Is it enough if I promise not to get caught?" I ask, voice laced with humor but I'm actually very serious.

"No." She shakes her head. "You won't touch him. Understood? My fight, I handled it the way I thought fit, that's it."

"Alright, alright," I give in and we slip into silence. At least she's not shaking anymore. That's something.


"Good reflexes," I admit out loud when the guy jumps into a sitting position as soon as I click off the safety of my gun. "Of course if I was here just to kill you, you'd be dead already. Next time, try to wake up without the jumping part, huh? Sudden moves are not a good thing in situations like this." I chat like we were just casually waiting for a class to start, not like I'm hiding in the shadows of his bedroom in the middle of the night.

"What the hell are you doing here, O'Neill?" he growls but I can hear the fear underneath the threatening tone.

"Oh, just thought you'd need a little reminder. Would be better for everyone if you fixed that attitude of yours and kept your hands the hell away from girls who don't want your hands on them. That a deal?"

"I make no deals with you, punk! I'm gonna get you in jail for break and entering."

"I didn't break anything. Entered, yes, but you can't even prove that in a few minutes. I'm not stupid enough to leave evidence." A little arrogant, I admit, but I'm feeling pretty confident about this stunt. "Liz could have sued you for attempted rape. She didn't. Hell, she could have killed you with her bare hands but she chose not to do that. And she made me promise not to kill you, either."

"Damn, man," the guy chuckles. "You're whipped!"

I raise my eyebrows. Seriously? This guy is laughing at me while I sit in the corner with a gun? He really doesn't seem to have any sense of self preservation.

I point the gun at his head and the laughter stops quickly. The gun isn't even loaded, I wouldn't take the risk. I would never kill a kid, no matter what he had done. I just wanted to teach him a little lesson and since Liz told me not to touch him... Well, let's say my options were limited.

To be honest I was kinda hoping he would wet himself but it seems I'm not getting lucky with that wish. Oh, well. I'll take what I can.

"No," I say calmly, still pointing the weapon at his forehead. "It's called respecting other people's wishes. You should check it out from the dictionary, respect that is. It usually gets you a lot further in life than assaulting girls behind parking lots."

Oh, now he wets himself. Sweet! I lower the gun and stand up, deciding I got what I came here for.

"I think you got the point," I tell him and open the window. "Goodnight!" His room is in the second floor and I am a little anxious to get away so instead of climbing down the tree like I got in, I just drop myself to the ground, hide the gun under my jacket and walk away. The patio underneath the window is a little hard to land on but it's heated so at least I'm not leaving footprints in the snow.

The adrenaline in my blood scares me. I've missed it, more than I even realized. But I promise myself not to make a habit out of this.


"I told you not to touch him," Liz mumbles as soon as I sneak back under the covers. I had really hoped she wouldn't notice I'm gone. Mostly because I don't want her to get in trouble in case I get caught.

"I didn't. And I didn't kill him either. Those were the rules."

"What did you do?"

"We had a little chat. I hope he won't cause any troubles anymore." I want to tell about the wetting his bed part but that might be a little too cruel so I leave that information to myself.

"I'm still angry with you," Liz mumbles but turns around and snuggles against my shoulder.

"You're welcome," I reply softly and kiss the top of her head.


A/N: I wanted to bring a bit more of Jack to Jonathan's character. That's my excuse for that part.

To keep the balance, next chapter will be all pink and fluffy.

I'm going to London tomorrow (for AT6) so no promises about next update. I'm taking my texts with me and the next chapter is pretty much finished but I'm not sure how often I'll have internet access.

Thank you for reading!