I'm back, with the newest chapter to this story. Hope you like it.

Thanks for all the wonderful reviews.

If this is not your thing, you can go check out my other HoA stories. And if my writing is not your thing, you can just tell me.

Check out my new story, titled "Space Revelations." Love y'all…

Mara

I'm flying! I'm really flying! I can't believe it. This was what England looked like from above? It's so beautiful. The clouds, the landmarks, it was an indescribable feeling of happiness. It was perfection. I just wished that someone was here with me, enjoying the sights I was seeing. Then I hear a faint voice that sounded like Amber. Amber was here too? But where? I look around, but see no one near me. The voice became louder, "Mara, Mara! Wake up, Mara!", and I realize that I was just dreaming. And now, my dream was over. I guess it's time to get back to real life, where I'm just a nice girl who spends her time reading and topping classes. It gets old sometimes, you know. I sometimes wish that I was someone else. Someone different, and likable, not just someone who gets taken advantage of for her smarts…

"Huh? What's up so early in the morning, Ambs?", I ask her, still feeling a little sleepy. Besides, it was still 5 in the morning. On a Sunday. I look at her, and she looked excited. But excited for what?

"Mara, I booked all of us into a paintball game! Aren't you excited?", Amber exclaims with glee. I think to myself, 'Amber? Excited for a paintball game? That's unexpected. I never knew Amber liked paintball, nor did I ever expect it to. I mean, paintball is messy, and Amber and messy don't mix, just like oil and water.' I'm not really a fan of paintball, but it seemed like Amber took care of everything, so I just can't say no.

"Sure, Amber. I didn't know you liked paintball." "Well, can you keep a secret, Mara. I would not want the others to know I liked paintball?" "Okay, Amber, but how would you tell the others about joining in the paintball game?" "That's why I woke you up… Can you ask the others, for me? Please?", Amber pleaded.

We did not notice that while we were talking, Nina stirred up from her bed and was listening to our conversation. We only realized she was awake when she asked, "Ask us what?". Nina walks to where we were seated, as Amber asks her, "How long were you awake?" Her reply, "Um, I was awake long enough to know that you liked paintball. Why?" Amber thought for a second, and told Nina, "You have to keep it a secret Nina. Now that you know about the secret, can you help Mara tell the others to join in the paintball game?" "Sure, Amber. Paintball sounds exciting. But who is going to join us?" "Oh, just the other students and Trudy. We all know that Victor would not let us out without any supervision.", Amber reasoned. I had to agree. We needed Trudy to come with us, or Victor would never let us go.

We decide to wait for the others in the living room, so we go down and sit on the sofa. Trudy was already awake, cooking breakfast, so we decide to go help her.

"Oh, you're awake, lovelies. Why are you up so early?", Trudy asks when she sees us. Nina responds, with a gentle nudge from Amber, "We wanted to tell the others about the paintball game we're going to later." "Oh, but Victor will never agree to let you out?", Trudy remarked, at which Amber replied, "That's why we wanted to ask you if you wanted to accompany us to the paintball game. Please?" Trudy thought about it for a second, and decided, "Sure, dearies. But I'm too old to play paintball." "It'll be fun, Trudes. I promise. And you're not too old to play paintball. That's nonsense", Amber added.

Once Amber got Trudy to agree to join the paintball game and telling her not to say that it was her idea, we help her cook breakfast, and prepare the dishes once we were done. We go sit around the dining table, on our places, while Trudy calls out for breakfast. A couple of footsteps later and everyone was here on the table, ready to eat breakfast.

Once we were all settled in on the table, Trudy speaks up. "So, my lovelies, Mara and Nina wants all of us to go play paintball later today. I'll have to ask Victor permission, but what do you say?" Jerome and Alfie look at each other, clearly excited, and say at the same time, "Cool idea… We would be unbeatable in paintball!" Patricia rolls her eyes, but responds, "That's cool, I guess. It can be fun." Mick answers, "Sounds fun!" Eddie says, "Sure. I would love to go play paintball." We all look to Joy, who was still thinking about whether she would go or not, when she breaks the silence and says, "Everyone's going, so I guess I'll go too." I look to Amber, and she seemed overjoyed that everyone was going. I also see something else. If I'm not mistaken, she had that mischievous gleam in her eyes that screamed, "I will win this one. And everone will be shell-shocked"

At that we start eating, while Trudy walks up to Victor's office to ask permission to go play paintball.

Everyone was still buzzing about what they will do once they get to play paintball, even after we finish breakfast, as Trudy gives us the good news that she had managed to make Victor agree to let us out, so we decide right then to form the 2 teams, with 5 players each. We decide that it is best to let Nina and Eddie choose who their teammates will be. Jerome tosses a coin to see who will choose first. Nina.

Nina chooses Alfie first. Eddie picks Amber.

Nina chooses Jerome next, as Eddie picks Mick.

Nina chooses me, after which Eddie picks Joy.

Nina chooses Trudy last, which leaves Eddie with Patricia.

We go back to our room to get ready to play paintball, and once we got ready, we went to Trudy's van, which I did not know existed before today. I thought about getting a book to read on the way, but I decided against it, telling myself that I wanted to have fun today. We pack our spare clothes in the van, and we were off.

I observe the others while we were in the van. Amber was not wearing makeup, which was very surprising, considering that we were going out today. I'll have to ask her about that later. Jerome and Alfie were discussing about a gameplan on paintball, and I think they were holding their walkie-talkies. What were they going to do with those, I wonder? Eddie and Mick were talking about sports to pass the time, while Patricia and Joy were talking about something I can't hear. Trudy was driving the van we were in, heading towards the location Amber booked us in.

We reach our destination in an hour, in which we unload from the car and get inside the building. The caretaker, a guy named Steve, hands us the keys as he says, "Have fun today kids. You are booked for the entire day, which gives me an opportunity to take a break." He points towards a large box on the side of the room we are in, mentioning. "All the weapons and paint balls are there." He points to a smaller box, "There are a set of costumes there for you to use. Can be cleaned easily by wiping, so that you won't worry about your clothes, and when you're ready, get through that door, and start shooting. Well, I think that's it. I'll be back at 5 pm. And yeah, don't destroy the place, okay?. Bye." Steve leaves and we are left to ourselves.

Patricia narrows her eyes. She can't believe that we were booked here for the whole day. "W-wait a sec!", she gets out attention as she speaks up, "It costs a lot to book paintball for a whole day, especially for a building like this." "How would you know that?", I inquired, and she answers, "I know a friend… Anyway, back to what I was saying, I doubt that you two can afford booking this place for a day." She looks to Nina, then I. She adds, "The only person I know with enough allowance to afford this is…" She looks at Amber, in that she admits, "Fine, Trish. I was the one who booked us to this place. Satisfied?" "Yep… I just knew it."

"Let's just play, shall we?", Amber tells us, and we all agree. That was what we came here for, anyway. Amber sighs in relief, knowing that she had just avoided the barrage of questions that was coming for her once everyone knew she was the one who planned this all along.

We all walk towards the large box, where all the weapons lay There were all types of paintball weapons in there, including what seemed to be a freaking paintball machine gun, a few shotguns, a sniper rifle and of course, the regular paintball pistols. Some semiautomatics (rifle and submachinegun) have been tossed in there too, for good measure.

I knew a lot about weaponry, and you may be wondering why. Nobody may know about this yet, but my real passion was studying weapons. And I'm not letting anyone know anytime soon.

We let Amber choose first. After all, she was the one who paid for all this. She grabs two pistols and holds it up in a V, action-hero style. Then we all grab our choice of weapons.

This is the list of the weapons they picked up. (and their actions)

Nina: The machine gun (seriously? She picked up the machine gun? I did not expect that, looking at her)

Alfie: one semiautomatic rifle and a pistol (he tried to do his best impression of what may be parkour. I wasn't sure, it was that bad)

Eddie: two semiautomatic submachineguns (with a scream of "Yeah, baby!")

Amber: the two pistols

Jerome: a shotgun and a pistol (he brushes the dirt off his shoulders)

Mick: the sniper rifle (he checks his scope, like a real sniper)

Me (Mara): a pistol, a semiautomatic submachinegun and some paintball grenades I discovered (I just walk away. Hey, that's not cheating)

Joy: a semiautomatic submachinegun (she looks at the gun, not sure what to do with it)

Patricia: two shotguns (she had a smirk on her face)

Trudy: a shotgun and a semiautomatic rifle (she holds both of the guns, one hand each)

We then grab our costumes from the other box, after which we go through the door Steve mentioned to us a while back.

The building was 4 floors high, and so we decide to start playing paintball. We made a bet, that the losing team would buy lunch for all of us. Our team (blue team) decides to start from the fourth floor of the building, while their team (red team) will start at the first floor.

When we reach the fourth floor, Jerome, who assumes the role of leader, tells us all about his gameplan, which was very detailed. I had to say, he was a very good tactician, even though there was no need to be this detailed about a game. A fun game, at that.

Jerome split us into three groups. First was the runner. Basically, he was the bait. He would run until he saw an opponent, then he would run back towards the fourth floor, shooting back whenever possible. There were two followers. They would follow the runner at a slower pace and a safe distance away, shooting at anyone foolish enough to follow him. The remaining two members, the guardians, would be left guarding the fourth floor, until signaled otherwise. This was when Jerome and Alfie's walkie-talkies came into handy. There were a lot of details about backup plans, that it took me some time to memorize it fully.

We signaled the other team that we were ready, and then we were underway.

At the first round, we executed the plan into perfection, as Alfie, the runner, managed to bait Eddie, Joy and Patricia, and they were shot down by Jerome and Nina, the followers. Alfie signals me with the walkie-talkie to accompany them downstairs, leaving Trudy to guard the fourth floor alone. Then came the next phase of our plan. Knowing that Mick was holding a sniper rifle, we distracted him with two targets, Jerome and Alfie, and when he came out of his hiding spot, I and Nina jump out of ours and shoot him down. Amber was nowhere to be found. We were looking for her in hiding spots on the first and second floor, but we did not need to look, as Trudy gave us news from the walkie-talkie. She shot Amber down. Imagine that.

The second round was much like the first round, except this time, Nina was the runner, and Jerome and Alfie were the followers. The result was even better this time, as they all decided to chase Nina and the three of them shot Amber's team down. We weren't even called down.

The third round, now that was different. Jerome decided to be the runner, and from the start the plan fell apart. They were ready for him. The moment Jerome ran to them, they shot him down. I and Nina got shot down too, thanks to some shooting skills I did not know Amber had. She managed to dodge Nina's machine gun and she gave us a mark in both of mine and Nina's foreheads. Alfie and Trudy did not stand a chance as Amber's team charged the fourth floor and hit them both with paint balls.

A dozen or so rounds later, it was almost time for lunch, and the game was tied. I decided to use the "pièce de résistance", the grenades I found a while back. When I showed them to my teammates, they were shocked.

"Mara, where did you find these?", Jerome asks me, smiling. We were so gonna win. "I found them on the weapons box. Do you want to use it?" Jerome and Alfie gasp. "Mara, that's cheating! Are YOU suggesting that we cheat to win?", Alfie asks. "The rules clearly tell us to use any weapon of choice to hit the enemy with paint, right? This is a weapon. I'm not cheating." I point towards the grenades. "B-but, that's unfair!", Jerome remarked. "You want to win, or not?" I say with steel in my voice. I wanted to win this. I'm not a big fan of losing at all, and I realize I was willing to do anything to win this paintball game.

Everyone on my team was shocked with my statement. "Mara, that's not nice.", Trudy commented, but I was determined, so they gave up arguing, and decided to let me use the paintball grenades.

We won, by the way. Jerome and Alfie were still shell-shocked at what I just did, not expecting me to do anything of that sort. When we all settled down on the room where we picked up our weapons, Patricia grumbled, "That's unfair, Mara. I can't believe you would do that! I thought you were nice". She was not happy. Amber's hair was a mess, as she glared at me and squealed, "Look what you've done to my hair! You've painted it all pink! You're so mean!" Joy stammers, "B-but, that was against the rules… And, it wasn't nice at all!". Mick and Eddie just stood there, silent, with paint splattered on their costumes. The three girls went to confront me with what I have done.

I realized I had made a mistake, and so I wanted to apologize, but something else overcame me. It was my alter-ego, Mary.

Oh no, not Mary. Anyone but Mary. She was terrifying, and so unlike myself. She was capable of hurting someone, which I would never do, even though her only intention was protecting me. I had thought that she had disappeared, because she hadn't shown up in years, but now she was back. The last time she appeared, she nearly killed my classmate, strangling him with an electric cord and beating him up with whatever she found. He was the school bully back then, but after that incident, he was terrified of me, and so were the other students. So I had to move to another school. The question was, what would she do now?

My memory was all a blur after Mary appeared, with only fragments of what happened that I remember. When she finally disappeared, back into my mind, Jerome and Mick were restraining me, with Alfie and Eddie ready to help just in case. I looked towards the girls, and that was when I saw Patricia with a bloody nose and a black eye, and Joy was knocked out. Amber was terrified, hiding out in the corner of the room, while Trudy was nursing Patricia, and Nina was trying to wake Joy up.

The paintball game was a disaster, thanks to Mara's 'outburst'. You did not see that coming, did you? I'm not really good describing things I've never experienced before, like paintball, so if it does not seem real, that's the reason why.

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