Scenario 5- ''Joren Tried To...''

Kel knew his behavior was suspicious. Finding no proof of anything bad, she couldn't do anything about it. While part of her mind was thinking, ''maybe he's changed'', the deeper, inner part just knew this wasn't so.

It was just a normal day, like any other. Joren was talking to Kel, and wanted to take her back to her rooms but Kel refused.

''I can walk to my rooms,'' Kel said, ''I'm not incapable.''

Joren argued this point with various ridiculous things.

''I'm fine, Joren,'' Kel said, feeling suspicion stir up inside of her. Neal's warning flared into her head, screaming.

As Kel walked back to her room, she felt a strange feeling. Something was watching her. She took a look around and seeing nothing, she unlocked the door to her room.

Just as she was about to enter, she felt something-a hand- pull her down.

The hand went to the laces in the back of her dress and began forcefully unlacing.

Kel knew with a sudden pang in her stomach her attacker's intentions, and knew that he couldn't act them out.

Kel pushed him off of her, and kicked him as he came toward her. He came near her again, and pulled at her dress sleeve, leaving a bare shoulder.

She shoved him off of her again, clawing him, and kicked him twice in what she could feel were his ribs.

He tried pressing her down again, his grip steel.

Unable to move her arms, Kel kicked him again, as hard as she could.

''It's time for you to be put in your place, bitch,'' a voice, tinged with exertion, said in the darkness.

She knew that voice. It was Joren, Joren who had been strangely and suspiciously nice of the late. Now she knew why. He wanted to rape her.

''No,'' she said, ''I don't want to do it. I'm not doing it.''

''You'll do what I tell you to do.''

Then he threw her against the wall, and pushed her there. She heard something rip- that left dress sleeve she knew- and her skirt being pushed up. She writhed and squirmed, making the grip harder. ''No, no, no,'' she kept saying, chant-like, but he wasn't listening.

She kicked him. Kicked him, again and again and again, in his face, in his stomach, in his groin. She could feel him being torn off of her, as he went flying into the hallway, and heard the loud crack of him hitting the wall.

''I said no!'' She shouted this to him at first, and then repeated it in a whisper: ''I said no.''

''What's going on, Kel?'' she heard someone asked.

Lantern light illuminated the dark hallway, and she saw the curious and concerned eyes of her friends on her, Neal's green eyes shining above them all.

It was Neal who asked the question, she realized, after a few moments. She steadied her breath, and after a few more moments she answered him. ''Joren tried to...'' she began, panting, ''tried to... force me.''

Neal's face slowly illuminated in shock. He shone his lantern on Joren, who was half-naked, his breeches right next to him. Then he shone it on Kel, examining her state by sliding the view from her head to her feet.

He, with fury, noticed multiple rips and tears in her dress, especially a big one that exposed her left shoulder and went down dangerously close to her breast.

He also noticed the fear in her eyes, before she put up her Yamani mask, and was reminded of the time when she saved them all from bandits three years before. She was just as afraid as the others, but despite that she fought the bandits and lead them with a clear thing. She must have done the same thing this time, and that was the thing that saved her from...

Seeing Joren attempt to get up, he ran over to him and kicked him as hard as he could. ''She's just a kid, you pervert!'' he exclaimed.

Wyldon suddenly approached, making his way through the crowd. ''What's going on?'' he asked, though he already knew the answer.

''Joren tried to force me, sir,'' Kel said, working harder than usual to keep on her Yamani mask.

''Force you to do what?'' Wyldon asked. Though he knew what she meant, his job forced him to ask.

''He tried to rape me, sir,'' Kel said, the effort to keep up the mask up increasing. As she said this, she could see the rage, hatred and disgust on her friends' faces and even on those she barely knew.

Wyldon tried to hide the disgust on his face, as he told Joren to put on his pants and report to his office.

Neal knocked on Kel's door, feeling rage at Joren and concern for Kel mix together in a sickening combination in his chest.

She didn't answer so he did it again, feeling the rage and concern boil in his chest to an even higher level.

She still didn't answer, so he knocked three more times.

''Kel, please answer,'' he begged after he knocked for what he felt was the millionth time, ''please. I want- I need- to talk to you.''

Nothing.

''Please...''

To his surprise, the door opened and showed Kel.

''Come in,'' she said.

The first thing Neal noticed about Kel was that she was wearing her Yamani mask. This could only mean she was trying to hide her feelings, and the thought hurt him in various ways.

''Kel...'' he began, ''how are you?''

''I don't know,'' she said, ''I... nothing happened but it almost did. I came so close to having my virginity stripped away from me, and it scares me so much.''

Neal was knocked speechless. What could say? That it didn't happen, that it was okay now, that her virginity wasn't stripped away from her at least. What good would those things do?

''I'm angry at him, and I'm angry at myself. I knew that something was up, that he was being too friendly for him....''

''Are you trying to say that you think this is your fault?''

''Part of it is. I should have been...''

''Kel, listen to me,'' Neal said, ''none of this is your fault. It's all him. All him. He's a sick bastard, a man whore and you just...''

The expression on her face stopped him cold. A single tear fell down her cheek then, a show of how shaken she really was.

''Oh Kel...''

It took 3 more months for the case to be tried at court. It then took a month for the case to be heard and tried.

It was a month of gritty details, and repressed feelings, nightmares and a paralyzing combination of anger and fear.

It was a month of pity-filled support from everyone, which Kel couldn't stand.

''Guilty,'' she heard the judge say. She would always remember that voice. The judge's face she soon forgot but she remembered that voice because of all it triggered. Joren's face, the faces of those watching the trial, how briefly her mask slipped.

''Do you still want to be a knight now?'' Wyldon asked.

Kel knew that once more he was trying to convince her out of being a lady knight, as he had done before in her early page years. He had asked this question to her when he told her she could stay, and after the situation with Joren. Her parents, and some of her friends, had asked her that question, too.

And she knew the answer.

''Yes, sir,'' she answered, ''I do.''

''You know that the chances of something like this isn't unlikely,'' Wyldon said.

Kel nodded.

Wyldon nodded hesitantly. ''Alright, then,'' he said.

Some nights were harder than others. Some nights she woke up, sweating and cold with fear, from a nightmare about what had happened. She healed though, and moved on, but she never forgot.

I know this isn't like the other scenarios but it popped into my head. I heard a statistic that disturbed me and gave me the idea for this. It's that a woman in the US military is more likely to be raped than killed at battle. So the chances of this happening on Kel, a lone woman out of… It's…. Plus, you figure this isn't entirely out of character for him. Well this gave me chills writing it, so if this was too much for you… The next chapter will be back to romance again so don't worry. Please keep reading and reviewing, even if this chapter was hard on you.