The rest of the class was less intent in filling in paperwork that the teacher had given them, things like their parent's address and phone number in case of an emergency, things that were normal under school circumstances.

There were no other incidents during the length of the class, even Thomas remained calm and concentrated on the task at hand, taking great pride in writing out every single detail of his family's notoriety, whilst Jonathan finished his paper in under five minutes. There honestly wasn't much to say that was all that interesting about him, of which Roman, his twin, was the most interesting, probably. He had noticed earlier on that he and his brother had not been placed in the same class or any of the same study groups. That would make it a pain to revise, as they both had different material, but there was, of course, a reason behind the teacher's decision. They probably thought that they would become a dynamic duo of troublemakers, and in that sense they were right: they may have been mature for their age, but at the end of the day, they were kids like any other.

Jonathan was left to his own thoughts and examined his surroundings while Thomas scribbled furiously at his paper. The walls were rather plain, no posters like there had been in elementary school, and the view onto the rec area outdoors wasn't the most exciting either. In the end, the brunet was more or less forced to look at the chalkboard once more, and the words, just below his own, that the teacher had not yet bothered to wipe out.

His handwriting contrasted quite sharply with the redhead's: although his own was flowier, the other boy's was more sharp, using separate lettering rather than cursive as Jonathan did. For some reason, his focus went to the words "past trauma". It was weird, like something that had difficulty rolling off one's tongue: past trauma, past trauma, past trauma…Not easy to say, even less easy to endure. But to the point of mutism? Jonathan had his reasons, and technically speaking he was not mute, he had just taken the decision not to speak anymore. Mutism through trauma… now that was something other.

He had researched it when he had taken his decision, something that seemed like years ago but was in fact perhaps only a few months back. This was definitely not the same thing that he had been through, far from it. His trauma had been… endurable, if that word could be applied under any condition.

To put it simply, he was curious. What could have pushed the redhead to this limit? Was it the reason why he was in foster care in the first place? Morbid curiosity surpassed his guilt, and he stared into the back of the pale boy's head as if that would reveal the secrets that remained enclosed in that brain of his.

"Class' up! Time for your first break, make good of it and start doing those reading assignments!" The teacher ordered over the mumble of students, the zip of pencil cases and the squeak of chairs. Thomas was up and waiting for Jonathan even before he had time to give in his paper, a thing that surprised him at first, because just moments ago he had been as concentrated in his task as can be, but of course the reason to his rapidity was quick to reveal itself. It was Sherwin, not that he hadn't doubted that beforehand, but there had been a part of him that had hoped that Thomas would let off for a while before fully attacking his prey.

As it seemed to be destined to, he joined Thomas outside the classroom.

"Hey, so we've got a new one to join the crew properly, I see."

Jonathan shouldn't have been surprised, really, that there was more than one person who "adhered" to Thomas' ideas, but it still took him a second of consternation to relax and take his place in the ranks of the small group. There were two other people: A tallish, rather quiet-looking boy from the year above, and a smaller girl with her hair held in a ponytail with a yellow flower hairband. She seemed talkative and all around a nice person, whilst the boy was as sullen as they come.

"Hey guys, so this is Buster. He's a newbie and he doesn't talk."

"Oh, just like our target then? That's odd, what's your excuse?"

There was a silence, in which Jonathan threw a pointed look at Thomas. The blond smirked, barely, but then he redirected his attention to the other two kids and waved his hand, dismissing the subject.

"Eh, vocal cord malformation. He isn't all like 'my daddy hurt me so now I'm a poor little traumatized orphan boy now uwu'."

The boy let out a brief bark of laughter, saying 'good one' before he settled back into his normal state. The girl sighed and rolled her eyes, flipping her ponytail.

"Guys, can't we just get on with it? Leona has been getting on my tits again, I need to punch something to calm my nerves."

"Good, because our little hero from les Mis is nice and fresh after a holiday healing and adding to his freckles. Oh, Buster boy did punch him this morning, in front of his carers too! My man," he added, patting Jonathan on the back and grinning from ear to ear.

"Did you now?" said the taller boy, who took a step forward and presented his hand. "I'm Brandon, and I guess you might be worth the enthusiasm Tom puts into you."

Reluctantly, Jonathan shook the sweaty hand. Brandon held it for too long, he thought, but that might have only been an impression, what with the unsettling way his brown eyes stared into his own blue ones.

"Come on! Break is nearly over, I wanna have a go on the punching bag," whined the girl, and with that, they were off.

"The bitch is Sunny," Brandon whispered into Jonathan's ear. As much as he knew that it was so that the girl wouldn't hear him, he still shuddered from the brown-eyed boy's breath on his ear. Why did he have to be so close?

"Hey, Donny man, target in sight," Thomas muttered, an evil smile flashing across his face as the blond's eyes locked on Sherwin. Jonathan felt a sinking feeling in his stomach when he realized that a person was talking to the small redhead, and that person, smiling and laughing along happily to his jokes, was Roman.

Sunny cracked her knuckles.

"Sweet! Two fags for the price of one, let's go groupies!"

Jonathan wanted to say something. Jonathan desperately wanted to cry out, to warn his brother about the imminent threat, the girl and boy he had just met wishing for his blood on their fisted hands, but he couldn't. He remained silent, just as easily as it had been to apologize to the janitor lady earlier on. In fact, she was there, witnessing the scene without budging an inch, waiting on a good fight.

Thomas wasn't doing anything to stop the two other kids either. The brunet threw him a desperate look, but the blond had the same expression on his face as the janitor. He simply wanted to see blood, and who it was from was entirely irrelevant.

Then, all the colour left his face. His expression turned from machiavelic to panicked, and in seconds he barked his orders to his two cronies.

"RETREAT! God damn it, retreat!"

Someone had rounded the corner. Someone huge. Someone muscular and with eyes that pierced through anything, not unlike lasers. Someone, inexplicably, who also wore a yellow tie.

Immediately, the attention of everyone in the hall was drawn to Thomas, but at least it was not in vain. Blanching as their boss did, both Sunny and Brandon screeched to a stop, turned tails and trotted back to the blond's heels like well-trained dogs.

The man, because this could only be a man, took no notice of this, and immediately slung an arm around the now beaming Roman. Jonathan's eyes were now darting between his brother and Thomas at lightning speed, hoping he wouldn't get the wrong idea, praying that he'd leave his brother alone-

Then, Roman and the giant kissed.