Authors Note: Sorry it's been like a week since the last update, but here we are. Also, I learned how to do the separating lines, so I consider that an accomplishment.
Chapter 11: You Distract, I Stab
The girls stood in the middle of the locker room, the smell of sweat and mud still clinging to the air. Tamsin played with the frayed edge of her shorts as Bo pulled the lock off of the small metal locker. The Succubus pulled Tamsin's boots out first, knowing her bare feet wouldn't enjoy burning on the asphalt of the parking lot. Tamsin grabbed the boots and slid them onto her feet.
"So," Bo broke the silence. "Are you excited about your first high school party?"
The blonde smirked, "Oh so it's been upgraded to a party?" She tapped the heel of her boot against the metal wall of lockers.
Bo pulled the rest of the clothes out of the locker, separating her jacket and pants from Tamsin's, well, whole outfit. The blonde pulled her bag off so she could slide her arms into the surprisingly warm fabric of her jacket, mud stains still clinging to the edges of the softer lining on the inside of it. She grabbed the remaining clothes from Bo and shoved them into her bag before throwing it back over her shoulder.
"Frankie, the guy from lunch," Bo began.
"The Vampire," Tamsin spoke.
Bo smirked, grabbing her own jacket and throwing it over her shoulders, throwing her pants over her arm. "Yeah, that guy," she continued, "If he knows about it then so does the rest of the school."
"So, it's a big party? I thought this was just your group thing."
Bo closed her locker, waiting for the click of the lock before dropping it. She turned back to Tamsin, "Yeah, so did we. I don't even know how Frankie found out."
Tamsin and Bo began walking toward the door of the locker room. They tried to hop around the clothes scattered around the floor from the days classes. "Then why don't you guys just move the 'party'?" Tamsin suggested.
Bo eventually got tired of trying to avoid stepping on all of the black fabric, finally pushing the clothes into a pile with her foot. "That's not a bad idea Tamsin, I'll ask Kenzi if we can have it at her place."
"Kenzi has her own place?" Tamsin opened the locker room door, holding it open for Bo.
"Yep, she lives there since some stuff with her mom happened. It's big enough for us to hang out, and with everything happening around town it might be safer than the woods." The Succubus paused for a second, dropping her bag in the middle of the hallway.
"Um, what are you doing?" Tamsin looked at Bo, confused about what was going on. Then she heard it, a loud, ear piercing scream that came from down the hallway adjacent to the one they stood in.
Tamsin pulled her phone out of her bag, calling Acacia. She shouldn't be far, considering she left them maybe five minutes ago.
"Go for Acacia," the voice on the other end spoke.
Bo pressed her body against the wall nearest Tamsin and began walking toward the noise.
"Acacia," she whispered. "Come back to the school, something's going on."
"Turning around now," she spoke. The call ended with a beep.
Tamsin pushed the phone into her jacket pocket and followed Bo. "Are you insane? You know normal people run away from possible danger," Tamsin whispered as she neared Bo.
Bo came close to the corner, peeking around to see if the screamer had made it anywhere near them. She didn't see anything. "You're a freaking Valkyrie and I'm a Succubus, that doesn't exactly scream normal," she turned back toward Tamsin.
Tamsin smirked at Bo, she lifted her eyebrow, "Really? You had to say scream?"
"Good point," Bo turned back to the hall. The white brick walls looked just like they had when they had come this way earlier. There were no signs of disruption in the hall.
Another cry came from down the hall.
Bo stepped into the middle of the hall, keeping her eyes focused on the direction the screams came from. "What do we do?" she looked over at the Valkyrie.
"Come on," Tamsin grabbed Bo by the wrist and began pulling her down the hallway toward the noise.
The screaming persisted and seemed to be growing louder and louder as they ran through the hall. Then something else made noise, a loud, guttural roar.
"Do you have like a weapon or something?" Bo huffed as they ran.
Tamsin laughed, gesturing at the shorts she still wore, "You think I could conceal a weapon in these shorts?"
"Okay, I'll admit they're a little short. But come on, you're a Valkyrie, aren't you supposed to have something?" The Succubus jabbed at the blonde with her elbow.
"No, we don't just carry weapons unless we have to. Why, got a plan?" Tamsin began slowing down. She pulled Bo to a stop.
Bo stepped past the Valkyrie, going for the wall. She pulled down the lever of the small red box sitting in the middle of the pale white, painted cinder block. An alarm started blaring from the overhead speakers.
"There, now we have a distraction. Come on," this time Bo grabbed Tamsin's wrist and began pulling her down another hall.
"Where are we going," Tamsin asked. The Valkyrie reclaimed her wrist and began rubbing it.
Bo lead her back down the athletic hall. When she finally stopped walking through the main hall she turned and smirked at a large glass case set up at the end of the hall. Large yellow lights illuminated the trophies sitting just within the glass.
Tamsin understood the plan now. Inside the glass, at the top of the display were two crossed swords, probably an award for fencing.
Bo pulled open the sliding door of the case, grabbing at the swords. She handed the first one to Tamsin. "There," she laughed, closing the case, "now we have weapons."
The Valkyrie smirked at her before taking off down the hall when they heard another scream. She pushed her legs to go harder, run faster. Eventually the pair made it to the end of the hall. They pushed the doors open, leading outside.
Tamsin spotted it first, a large, bloodied creature running on two feet toward the parking lot, dragging tattered clothes with him.
"What the hell is that?" Bo slid behind Tamsin for protection.
Tamsin dropped her bag off of her shoulder and took off after the thing.
The Succubus sighed dramatically, "What is with today?" She began running after the blonde.
Tamsin cornered the beast between two of the school buildings that connected later on, creating a dead end.
Bo breathed deeply behind Tamsin, far enough away from the beast that they could stop. "So, what the plan?"
"You distract, I stab."
"Sounds good to me," Bo slid past the Valkyrie, her coat brushing against the red brick of the outer wall.
Bo got close enough to the beast that it would see her but not close enough to let it stab her with its extremely long claws.
"Hey buddy," she bounced back and forth on her toes. "How's your day? Because mine's kinda sucky right about now, so if you could just drop dead, that would be great."
Tamsin smirked behind Bo, making an audible laugh sound from her throat.
Bo scoffed, glancing over her shoulder at the blonde, "Are you laughing at me?"
The Valkyrie silenced, "Nope, I'm just gonna go around to one of the classrooms and come out a window, be right back."
Bo backed away from the beast that had began beating his bloodied and bruised fists against the brick walls that seemed to be closing around him. He released a loud cry, much like the one Tamsin and Bo had heard from the hall.
"Seriously? You had to leave before he got angry? Wow Tamsin, good plan," Bo cursed her once she was gone.
She swung the flimsy sword at the monster, trying to make contact with his furred abdomen, or what she could only assume was his abdomen.
The thing jumped back against the wall that created the dead end. It cried again, almost shrieking like the mortal screams that echoed from the corridor.
"It was you," realization flushing across her face. "Holy crap! Tamsin! Tamsin!" she began screaming.
Tamsin slid one of the classroom windows that faced into the small alley like area open. She stuck her head through the small glass opening. "This is hardly the time to scream. What? Are you not familiar with the 'distraction and stab' plan?"
The beast still cowered against the final brick wall. Tamsin turned to face it as it let out another scream.
Bo pointed at it with her fencing sword, "I think it's scared."
Tamsin hopped out of the classroom through the window, sliding to a halt in the alley. She began walking toward it, poking it with the tip of the sword.
The beast cried out, swatting at the metal.
"Holy shit," Tamsin poked it again, receiving the same reaction. "Do you have your phone?" She looked over at Bo.
Bo reached into the pocket of her basketball shorts, pulling her phone out and handing it to Tamsin. The Valkyrie stepped behind Bo, dialing a number.
"Stay in front and keep the sword pointed," she whispered as she passed with the phone pressed against her ear.
"Yeah, Acacia? No I know you're coming back but have you ever heard of a scared monster?... No, no it's legitimately scared... Yes I know what that means... No, I'm not killing it if it doesn't have to be killed..." Tamsin talked to the voice on the other end.
Bo kept her sword pointed at the beast. It had pulled it legs up against its chest and cried out again.
"No, that was it... I know, we heard it in the hall... Bo and me... Okay Acacia can we please talk about the thing that we are yards away from?.. I think that might be a little excessive... Hell no, we reserve that for forest nymphs... Yeah, sure.. Okay," Bo listened to the conversation Tamsin was having, zeroing in on what she had said after she mentioned her name.
"So what's the plan?" Bo asked. Tamsin slid the phone back into the brunettes pocket.
"Say, do you happen to have some rope?" Tamsin leaned against Bo, her elbow resting on the shorter girls shoulder.
Bo looked at her, slightly confused, "You're serious? Why would I have rope?"
"I honestly don't know, but Acacia thought you might, species and all."
"Ah," she laughed, still pointer her sword at the cowering monster. "I have duct tape, does that help?"
"Is it in your car?" Tamsin pulled her elbow off of Bo.
Bo pulled her phone out of her pocket with her free hand, "Call Kenzi."
"I don't know what you and Bobo are doing and I don't want to know, but here's the duct tape," Kenzi handed the roll of gray tape to Tamsin.
"Nothing you need to worry about." She threw her hand into her pocket, fishing out a pair of keys to the Camaro Kenzi and Dyson had been sitting in for the last twenty minutes. "Bo says to go home and she'll see you later."
"What are you doing? Is this some twisted Valkyrie and Succubus thing? Scratch that, i don't want to know," Kenzi rubbed away the image that had formed away. "Tell Bo I'll see her once you two are done with whatever and that if she's not home by ten then I'm locking up."
"I'll tell her, you and Dyson have fun," Tamsin laughed as the human walked away.
The small girl looked up at the ceiling, the loud ringing of the alarms continued to sound. Kenzi turned back before Tamsin began walking back to Bo and the monster. "Is that the fire alarm?"
Tamsin opened her mouth to speak.
"Nope, nope never mind. You two have fun, or don't. You know, not assuming anything over here," Kenzi walked away.
Tamsin set the swords on the lip created by the brick that protruded from under the window she had created, hiding them from the beast.
She neared it, leaving Bo next to the weapons in case this was all a ruse. "Hey big guy, I know this is super scary, sorry for almost trying to kill you," she held her hands up defensively as she neared it.
She grabbed a strip of the tape from the roll she had put around her wrist. "I'm gonna put this around your wrist so you don't get hurt, do you understand me?"
The beast nodded, surprisingly. It lifted its hands out so Tamsin could tape around the hairy and bloody wrists.
"This might hurt when we take it off but I promise it's gonna be okay, do you understand?" Tamsin soothed as she tied the hands together. She pulled at the beasts wrists, testing the tapes strengths.
"I'm Tamsin, this is Bo," she gestured toward the Succubus. "We're gonna find out what happened to you, why you're like this. We think you understand us, but can you speak?" She finished with the tape and slid it back over her knuckles.
The beast shrugged, shaking it's head back and forth. It opened its mouth and tried to make a noise that only came out as a groan.
"Okay then, now we know." Tamsin placed a hand over its wrists. She saw the sadness buried in its eyes, a sadness she was familiar with. She sympathized with this creature. "Can you stand? We want to take you somewhere where we can help you more."
The beast nodded once more, nudging Tamsin back so it could stand, it's height leaving Tamsin in the shadows.
Bo smirked, leading Tamsin and the thing toward the front of the school. "Who knew you were good with kids."
"It's not a child Bo," she turned to the creature. "Are you, a child?"
The beast shook its head.
"See, not a child."