Thunder crashed harshly outside, making the windows shake just slightly. As Nya stared out the window at the pouring rain and the occasional flashes of lightning, her mind began to wander away from the breakfast she was supposed to be eating. She was glad that she didn't end up having any classes with her brother. As sweet and caring as he was, once he was obsessed with something he would never give up on it, and it was driving her crazy. And after school yesterday he wouldn't shut up about how he was already friends with someone on the football team.

Just please don't bug me during school, she thought, taking a glance at him as he ate his cereal. Leave me out of your plan.

"You should really come find me during lunch tomorrow, Nya," Kai was saying. "You could meet Cole. He's pretty cool."

Nya rolled her eyes silently, having given up on trying to talk to him about anything else.

"You're not listening, are you?"

"What?" Nya looked up with a little smile.

Kai glared at her. "Ha, ha," he said unenthusiastically. "You really haven't been listening at all, and I know you haven't."

"Don't blame me. You won't stop going on about it all. It's starting to get annoying."

He opened his mouth to respond, but Nya ignored him and stood to finish getting ready. When she was done, she turned on her music and put her headphones on so she wouldn't have to listen to Kai as she waited for the bus.

As the day slowly passed by, the thunder outside never ceased, and more than once a flash of lightning burst so brightly that the entire class was distracted for a whole ten minutes. Nya wasn't so easily entertained, and stayed at her desk every time. It was in the class just before lunch that she realized that she wasn't the only one to rush to the window with every strike of lightning. She had been doodling something on her paper absentmindedly, when she saw out of the corner of her eye, a boy in a blue hoodie just a few desks away. When she looked up at him, she saw him quickly turn the other direction. She smiled a little and returned to her drawing.

When Jay hesitantly turned back to look at the girl, he was glad to see that she was staring at her paper and working furiously again. She must have been new, he hadn't seen her before and she was definitely not someone he would forget in his life. He'd been working up his courage all class period just to move closer to her. In his mind he could plan out their whole conversation.

Hi, I'm Jay. What's your name?

Well, okay maybe he hadn't really gotten past that part. But that was only because he didn't know her name.

I really like the color of your pencil. You must like blue, right? Blue's my favorite color.

Wow really? That was the best he could come up with? Favorite colors were definitely not something they could bond over.

That pendant looks like a phoenix. Is that what it is? Where did you get it? Is there a backstory?

No, too many questions at once. That was a bad habit of his, talking too much. Zane never seemed to mind, but everyone else in the world did. And everyone else in the world probably included this girl. But maybe it didn't. Maybe she wouldn't mind either. But the only way to find out was to get over there and just say something, anything. His mind was made up. But just as he started to get up, of course it would just be within his luck for the bell to ring, which was exactly what happened. Jay sighed as the people in the classroom were suddenly uninterested in the storm outside and more interested in making their way into the hall. It was pointless anyway. She was way out of his league.

The halls were a nightmare, as usual. Jay did his best to keep out of the way and unnoticed against the wall. If he could go a day without drawing attention that would make his life so much better. He was decided that even if he saw someone under cruel and unusual punishment on his way to lunch, he would just ignore them and keep going no matter what. No matter what. No matter what. No matter…no…matter… Crap. It was that girl again, and that same guy again. No, Jay. Just ignore them. No matter what, remember? He groaned, unable to convince himself, and threw his backpack off his shoulders.

"Again?" he shouted, pushing himself between the bully and the girl.

"And what do you think you're going this time?" the older and taller and much stronger boy asked.

Jay took one step back. "The same thing I did yesterday. You can't keep hurting the same people!"

"Watch me."

Cole stood back. It was a complete rerun of what had happened yesterday, and it didn't pain him any less to just hear the fight happening. Though, when he thought about it, this wasn't really a fight. It was more like…one kid getting beat up by another kid. He winced every time he heard another hit and another muffled noise of pain, like the lightning and thunder still going on outside. He moved farther away and tried to ignore it, but by this point it was impossible.

"Will you stop already? He's had enough!" he said suddenly, doing what the other boy had done earlier. Maybe someone of the bully's own level would make him listen.

His friend stopped with his fist in the air. "C-Cole?" He lowered his voice to a whisper. "What are you doing? Get out of the way. Can't you see I'm busy?"

"Not anymore. You need to stop this." Cole turned away from him, toward the guy who'd been beaten up. He reached a hand out to help him up, but the bully pushed him out of the way. "Get out of here, Cole."

"I hate to start fights, but I will if I have to."

The surrounding crowd let out a unanimous "Oooooooooooh."

The bully stopped at the sound and turned again to face Cole with a dark scowl. "Was that a challenge?"

"Nope. Just saying."

"Challenge accepted." He swung his already clenched fist, but Cole moved quickly and dodged. The pattern continued, until people began jeering at him saying he was a coward and telling him to be a man and finish the fight he started. He wasn't sure how much time had passed, but already his adversary was looking tired. Cole smiled. Now it was his turn. He stepped out of the way again, and in the same swift movement he swung around to hit the bully once in the jaw. He fell back against the wall and looked up a second later to look at Cole, who only stood there, hardly worn out at all. And the bell hadn't even rung yet.

The bully got up, but walked away with nothing more than a rough bump of the shoulder toward Cole. When he left, so did the rest of the team and the crowd, who had gathered for the fight. But Jay and the girl had stayed. They were both looking at him like he was an alien, but none of them said a word. Unable to think of anything else, Cole nodded to them and walked down the hall on his way to lunch.

"So if you were not hurt as badly as you were yesterday, why can you not speak?"

Jay rolled his eyes and scribbled on the piece of paper again, which was nearly full by now with his writing. Somebody tagged my throat. I think it was the guy who came in to defend me, but I'm not sure. I wasn't exactly out of the way until the fight was half over. I think I recognized him from somewhere. Not sure on that either.

Zane looked up when he finished reading. "You said he was on the football team?"

Jay nodded and motioned toward his shirt.

"He was wearing a jersey?"

He nodded again.

"Some of the team are in the classes we share."

Jay rolled his eyes and snatched the paper back. They're in practically every class. There's a bajillion of them.

"I suppose that is true," Zane said quietly. "Did you recognize the girl?"

Jay shook his head, but a moment later used the tiny open space on the paper to write, Fight yesterday.

"But you don't know her?"

He shook his head again and continued eating. It was strange to Zane for his friend to be this silent, but because it was nothing natural, neither one of them were sure when Jay would get his voice back. And until then, Zane would have to endure the silence. But even when they met again in Japanese the strangeness of it all nearly frightened him. After all, the reason why they had become such quick friends was because they were two pieces of a puzzle. Zane was the silent one who usually answered whatever questions his friend might have, and Jay would fill the conversation with whatever came into his mind to say, which always happened to be quite a lot.

Today instead, the silence was filled by the new boy who again sat on Zane's other side. Kai, he remembered from the boy's various attempts at conversation the previous day. It was just the same as before, except partway through the class one of the members of the football team came up to them and began to talk to Kai.

"I thought you were going to sit by me today," said the boy with the jersey.

Before Kai could respond, Jay made a sudden gasping noise and Zane turned to face him. Jay was pointing frantically at the black-haired football player. "The fight?" Zane whispered. Jay nodded, and looked at the jock and began waving silently to him. But the guy didn't notice.

Zane tapped him on the shoulder and he turned around right away. "What?"

"My friend apparently wants to talk to you," Zane said, motioning toward the silent Jay.

Cole raised an eyebrow, then apparently recognized him as well. "Hey, you're the guy in the fight today."

Jay nodded and began to say something before remembering that his voice was gone.

"Can't talk, huh? Yeah I think I might have hit you. Sorry about that."

Kai stood and looked past Cole at the boy in the blue hoodie. He was silent too, but not in the way the boy in the white was. Cole had told him their names yesterday, but he couldn't remember. "Who are these guys again?" he said, a bit louder than he'd meant to.

"Oh…um…"

The boy in blue moved his arms around, obviously trying to get something across, but Kai had no idea what he was trying to say. "He is Jay," the boy in white said. "I am Zane."

"Oh, right. You guys rhyme," Kai said with a smile.

"We…what?"

"Sorry. Cole was telling me yesterday about you guys."

Zane looked up at Cole, as if he was confused.

"Wait. You don't actually know each other, do you?"

Zane shook his head.

Kai sat back down. "Oh."

But he looked back up when he heard an annoying tapping noise. Jay was shoving a piece of paper toward him. Just because we don't know you guys doesn't mean things have to stay that way. When Kai was done reading, he gave Jay a hesitant smile and let Cole read.

He smiled as well. "Okay then. Well, I'm Cole but obviously you guys know that. Football team but I've never played in a league game. I mean…not yet. I'll get back to you guys on that. Um…there's really not much else that interesting about me."

Jay motioned toward the paper and Cole returned it to him. You saved me out there.

"Well, yeah but. That's not interesting." But when Jay gave him a look, Cole said quickly, "Okay maybe it's interesting. A little bit. I just don't like the idea of beating other people up just because."

"I think that's interesting," Kai said.

"Hm," Cole said with a little glance at him. "You next."

"Name's Kai. I'm completely new here, along with my sister." Jay began writing on the paper hurriedly again, but Kai kept talking anyway. "Um…not really sure. I guess I'm just pretty excited about being in a totally new place."

Jay slid the paper toward him. You have a sister? Is she hot? Kai glared at him. And he thought Zane was weird. "Okay, I'm not answering that."

He grabbed the paper back. Does she like blue?

"Back off."

Jay hung his head and silently pointed to Zane, who only shrugged.

Cole looked at him. "Nothing to say."

Zane shook his head.

"You're acting like Jay," Kai said with a smile.

"He's not usually like this. Actually, there is hardly a moment when he is silent."

"But what about you?" Cole asked. "You're just quiet all the time."

Zane shrugged again. "I have nothing to talk about, so why would I speak?"

Out of the corner of his eye, Kai thought he saw Jay facepalm.

"Do you do anything other than…not talking?"

"My classwork."

"You're boring. How about you, Jay?" Cole said, taking the paper from Kai and giving it back to the silent one.

He was writing for a long time as Cole continued to try to get some answers out of Zane, to no avail. Kai watched him write erasing constantly, and eventually he flipped the paper over to start over again. Kai was glad Jay had lost his voice. When he was done, he shoved it toward Zane, who read it for the other two. "Normal life. Grew up with both parents, no siblings. He hates it when other people are getting bullied in school, which is why…" He paused, and didn't begin reading again until Jay gave him a nudge. "…why he puts himself in harm's way to protect others."

Cole sighed. "If I could, that's what I would be doing too. But I would be fighting back."

Jay moved his mouth, trying to speak, before grabbing the paper from Zane. You did today. Why not before?

"Because I can't. I could get in serious trouble."

Just then the intercom beeped and the class quieted down. "Would Cole Brookstone report to the office please?"

Cole sighed and got up. "Right on cue. See you guys tomorrow. Or not."

"Psst. Lloyd."

He looked around, hearing his name, but didn't see anyone around who would know him. The halls were full of strangers going to their lockers and hurrying out to the buses or to their cars to get home at the end of the day. Then he noticed a nearby dark classroom, with the door just open a crack, moving back and forth subtly. "Great. Just what I needed," he muttered, walking in that direction. "What do you guys want?" he said into the apparently empty classroom.

Gene and Brad came out from behind the door, both with their arms folded. "It happened again," Brad said quietly.

"What?"

"It happened again. You told us it wouldn't."

"You mean about the football guys?"

They glared at him, taking slow but menacing steps toward him. "Once is bad enough, twice is horrible. What do you think two days in a row does to us?" Gene asked.

"And what makes this inexcusable is that we saw you there."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"You were there. At the fight. And you just watched. Didn't even think about telling someone else, huh?"

"Hey that guy who stood up to them had it under control!" Lloyd said, taking a few steps back when they got close.

"Oh, there was a third?" Gene looked at Brad and they shared a smile that Lloyd didn't like the looks of at all. "And I thought this was inexcusable as it was."

"Guys, I'm your friend," Lloyd said quickly, still backing away until he nearly fell backward onto a desk.

"A friend who betrayed us. Now you'll pay the price."