(This chapter is mostly setting the scene for the next chapter, but still kind of important…feel free to put criticism in your reviews, or death threats telling me to update faster .all comments are appreciated)

Chapter 3: Vendetta

Two days later, I spoke to Gunn again, this time in Citizen Support class, which was something to do with dealing with citizens when you're a hero, etc etc. Not that I was paying attention… except when the teacher called the register, I noticed that he called Warren's name, which surprised me because I'd never seen Warren in CS… he probably skipped it.

"The Grudge was better," Gunn was saying as my mind returned to the conversation; we were discussing films.

"No way," I said. "The Ring totally beats the Grudge!"

"Come on, if you were stuck in a room with two doors, behind one was Samara, the Grudge behind the other one, where would you run to?" he asked.

"Samara…"

"Exactly."

Just then, the bell sounded, so I grabbed my bag and shoved my pencil case into it, then headed out the door to my next lesson, saying bye to Gunn as I did.

Next I had mad sciences - biology, with Layla, and after lesson we walked toward the cafeteria together. As we drew closer to it, I spotted Will and Warren a little way ahead. Pulling Layla through the crowd, I tried to catch up with them. They were going through the double doors when Warren paused. I craned my neck to see why, and noticed that the students around us had gone considerably quiet. Leaving the cafeteria was a small group of girls, the tallest of which, a pretty girl with pale blond hair, was also standing in the doorway, glaring at Warren, who glared back. Unable to hold his gaze for long, she looked away, and Will grabbed Warrens arm.

"Come on," he said quietly, and Warren allowed Will to lead him away from the door into the cafeteria.

"Whoa, what was that about?" I asked Layla as we approached the doors.

"That was Brittany Frieze," Layla said. "Warrens ex."

"What happened with them?" I asked as we sat down at the table.

"Well, Brittany cheated on Warren. She hooked up with some guy at a party, and they were kissing and groping and stuff, and Warren saw."

"Ouch."

"I know. But Warren pretended he didn't know, and just when she was starting to really fall for him, he dumped her."

"Harsh."

"Do you blame him though?" Layla asked me. I shook my head, glancing at Warren. He was acting completely normal, but there was a certain forcedness to his actions, which told me that underneath his unaffected exterior, he was very pissed off.

"So, are you going to tell us about your evil great grandma or whatever?" Magenta asked as she sat down.

"Magenta!" Layla sent her a warning look.

"What? It's not like she's the only one, I mean look at Warren,"

"Warren?" I glanced towards him. Hi slowly raised his head and looked at me.

"Yeah. My dad is baron Battle."

"Oh, I'm…sorry," I didn't know what to say.

"Don't be," he told me, then turned to glare at Magenta, who recoiled slightly.

"Well… my great great grandma was Reign of Mayhem," I said.

"Whoa, no way," Zach had an almost disbelieving expression on his face.

"The original super villainess?" Ethan asked, and I nodded.

"Way cool," Zach said, leaning back in his seat.

Once again I was surprised with the readiness that my new friends accepted this piece of information. No weird looks what so ever.

Warren had gone back to concentrating on his food, his fork stabbing at it with a little more force than necessary.

I felt bad for him, so at the end of lunch, when we stood to go to lesson, I put my hand on his arm. "are you ok?" I asked, but he shrugged me off. I was really hurt, more so than I should have been. I mean yeah, I should have felt kind of hurt because I was trying to be nice, but this was… I don't know. It was like I really couldn't stand the thought of Warren being angry at me…

It only hit me a few hours later, when I was home alone. Oh my god, I have a crush on Warren Peace! But wait; didn't I have a crush on Gunn? Isn't that where the weird butterflies feeling came from when he smiled at me? Ok, I was confused now. I decided to go for a walk as I sorted my thoughts out; I was starting to feel a little claustrophobic at home.

My parents and my brother weren't going to be home until around 9pm and had left me a note telling me to make my own dinner, so I decided I would eat out. It was around 6pm when I left the house, just starting to get dark.

Wondering around town, I considered calling Layla and Magenta to see if they wanted to meet up, but I decided against it; I wasn't sure if we were at the stage of randomly calling each other when we were bored… I had their numbers - Layla had given me hers on my first day at sky high, telling me if I ever needed help or anything, to feel free to call her, which I thought was a really sweet gesture – but I'd only ever used it to text them a few times, mainly over the weekend. I hadn't met them outside of school yet.

Instead, I decided to get something to eat because I was starting to get hungry. There was a Chinese restaurant a little further down the street, called 'The Paper Lantern', so I decided to go there.

An hour later, I was finishing off my food at the restaurant, while reading a random book I had bought over the weekend, but not had a chance to read. When the waiter came over to take my plate, I almost choked on the water I was sipping when I saw it was Warren.

"Hi," he said once I had gotten over my coughing fit, leaving me incredibly embarrassed.

"Err, hi, I didn't know you worked here," I said to him, wondering if he was still angry at me.

"Yeah…" he was silent for a second and stood as if he was deciding whether or not to say something… "I'm... sorry about earlier," he said finally. "I was just…"

"What was it about? The thing between you and Br… that blond girl." I said, stopping myself from saying the name. I didn't want Warren to know what Layla had told me.

"What, you mean Brittany?" he said, raising his eyebrow "like you don't know."

For a second I thought maybe he was a mind reader, before he said "I heard Layla telling you."

"How she broke your heart, so you broke hers…"

I stood up and followed him to the counter to pay for my meal.

"Broke my heart?" Warren asked. "Please, don't make this into some soppy love story rain,"

"You didn't love her?"

"No."

"But she loved you,"

"No… If she loved me, she wouldn't have done that." He said flatly, handing me my change. "Do you need a ride home? My shift finishes now, so I could take you…"

"It's ok, you don't have to…"

"Seriously, its fine," he insisted, so I shrugged and agreed, getting those same butterflies in my stomach I had when Gunn smiled at me.

A few minutes later, he held the door open for me as we stepped out into the cold night air.