Chapter 4: A Pearl

Kaitlyn's POV

After my strange and very much unexpected heart-to-heart with Warren, the normality of a PE class starting is disorientating. I have to bring myself back from the suddenly and weirdly optimistic place I was before, back to the reality of heroes and villains and bullies and bruises and dangerous situations. The same dread fills me once again as I take a second glance at the pit of spikes and sealed-off arena.

"Listen up!" Boomer calls for silence in his normal voice, and is granted it quickly. "For all you freshmen in here, welcome to PE. There are no introductory sessions for my classes, got it? You learn fast and keep up or get crushed. Principal Powers says that I should give you a chance to see what this is about, though, so just for today you're not going to be picked for this class. Count yourself lucky and enjoy your laziness while you can; after today, everyone is all in. Don't just slack off today though; study everyone else's fighting, see what techniques they're using, what works, what doesn't, what you can use from the arena. This is a fight,guys, remember that. Right, let's get Save the Citizen started! Speed, Lash, get down here!"

As Stretch and Fatboy – thank you, Warren – make their arrogant way into the arena, I avert my eyes and duck my head slightly, hoping they won't look for and/or notice me; I know they can't pick on freshmen today, but it may not stop them from doing something stupid. I think Warren's gaze flicks over to me briefly, but it's gone by the time I look his way again.

Once both on the arena floor have suited up in this weird white padded gear – either for protection, or hit-monitoring and scoring, or both – Boomer speak to them again.

"Let me guess: you want to be the villains."

Both nod excitedly, exchanging high-fives.

"Alright, who are your first victims today?"

I shrink a little further into myself and try not to wince. The word "victim" rang a few too many bells for my comfort. Call it my spidey-sense or proprioception or whatever, but somehow I know it doesn't go unnoticed by Warren, though there's no other reaction from him.

Though not directed at me, the evil grins on Speed and Lash's faces send a shiver up my spine as they select their targets from the crowd. The terrified expressions of their now-opponents say it all about their skill and the usual outcome of these fights. But I guess I should have expected that; I've felt their power more times than I can count, so I know what it's like.

"The idiots are undefeated," Warren confirms my suspicions quietly, begrudging respect in his voice.

I nod absently in response to this information, now staring down at the "villains". It'd criticised the system earlier, saying that letting those guys play villain all the time was just setting them up for the wrong path, but now that I consider them in all their entirety – all the encounters I've had with them – I don't think that would actually do much. Their personalities already set them up for the wrong path.

"Hmm," I muse, and explain for Warren when he looks over questioningly. "Forcing Stretch and Fatboy to play hero sometimes wouldn't make any difference to them, if you think about it. They would decimate their opponents either way. That's what they enjoy doing; preying on other people and using any excuse to beat them up. Whether they were the "heroes" or the "villains", they would beat the others to a pulp anyway."

"So those two idiots are doomed to and irretrievable from their idiocy?" Warren glances back at the two in question, deadpan. "Makes sense to me."

I bark out a quiet laugh, but the movement jostles my stomach bruise, and pain mutates the rest into those awful strangled coughs where you try to not move your diaphragm. One hand is over my mouth and the other over my stomach, as if each could hold in the urge to cough against the pain – which would only cause more – or the actual pain itself respectively. After a few moments of furtive gasping in restraint, I lower my hands again, trying to act normal. Casting a glance across at Warren, my hope of normality disappears; his calculating gaze is locked on my stomach before it flicks up to my eyes and then away quickly.

Furious at myself for getting caught yet again by Warren Peace, I grumble at him to save his thoughts. "It's just these two bruises for now."

"For now?" he echoes, not looking at me. "You plan on getting more?"

"Not plan," I murmur wearily. "Expect."

"If you expect it, you'll get it," he warns dully.

I snort, frowning. "I thought if you don't expect pain then you've already lost the fight."

"True enough," he accepts. "But if you expect the fight then it'll come to you."

"In my experience, if you don't expect the fight then you're an idiot."

I finish my self-sullen and depressing sentence with matching face, body and mood. Those first few years of always hoping for better returning unbidden into my mind, the stupid aspirations of when first my birth parents coming to collect me to live happily ever after, then that the infestation at Daisy Bank would come to accept and appreciate me, then of when I'd escape that place somehow. All dashed because I didn't expect the fight that I wasn't strong enough to win. Even yesterday, when I hoped things would be better in all my life just because I was suddenly attending Sky High, where I could be myself and where I have new friends; I'm in this messed up situation now because I hoped stupidly, because I was dumb enough expect better.

"You heard the coach."

Warren's voice breaks me out of my spiral of depression and self-deprecation. He's still facing the front instead of looking at me.

"No slacking off; watch the fight and talk me through what's good and bad."

Excuse me? I think disbelievingly, anger rising within me again. 'No slacking off'? He knows nothing of my life, nothing of what I go through every minute of every day, and he's still telling me not to slack off? I don't care if he's the son of Baron Battle, I will not let him get away with that.

But something makes me pause halfway to a fiery rebuke. I can't tell you what it is. It's something about him though; his expression is the same, from what I can see from his profile, his body language hasn't changed…. So what is it?

Giving up trying to decipher exactly what it was that made me pause, I search for the reason rather than the source. As I said before, nothing has changed, so it must have been his words. His bossy and insulting instruction was what needled me in the first place, but is there something about it that I missed in my anger? The timing of it seems too perfect.

Yeah, I was 'slacking off' in my memories, and he saw and decided to wake me up, a snarky and still angry-side of me remarks.

No, it was more than that; I'd basically just admitted that getting beaten up wasn't a rare occurrence for me before being dragged into memories of such events in his presence. The reason for his interruption creeps reluctantly – it's so unexpected – but with certainty into my consciousness; he wanted to distract me from my memories and self-berating.

So astonishing are his motives that I can't actually follow his instructions, but simply stare at his profile in amazement instead. After a few moments of silence, Warren turns his head towards me and meets my gaze. Though his handsome, unblemished, tanned face remains stoic, his dark, dark eyes – a soft dark chocolate, I see now – sparkle with pride and almost mischief, probably due to the ingenuity of his plan and its execution and how its real purpose eluded me initially. The spreading smile in my eyes joins the one on my face as an answer to his, and this wonderful connection, this exchange of emotions that surprise both of us continues for another few moments before the sudden cheering around the bleachers announces the beginning of the battle.

Hesitantly breaking the connection with Warren, I glance at the battle arena, in particular the positioning of the two teams. Even from this distance you can see the difference in the way each side holds themselves; the 'heroes' are both tense and nervous and severely lack confidence, whereas Speed and Lash look like they're just hanging out on a street corner, and ooze sickening arrogance. As the whistle blows, Lash immediately stretches over to Speed, who catches him and starts running. With Speed's power, Lash is suddenly next to one of the 'heroes', wrapping around him to spin away, making the guy twirl uncontrollably into the wall of the arena. At closer inspection after this act, I identify another difference between the two pairs that I had not expected to find.

"Teamwork," I voice my thoughts, amazed.

Warren glances over, his indifferent mask finally broken as his face morphs into confusion. "What?"

My amazement translates into enthusiasm, and I point animatedly towards the make-shift battlefield. "Watch the way the two teams fight; the first thing that Speed and Lash did was enhance each other's power. Speed used his power to get Lash beside that other guy quickly, which was really effective. But, look at the two 'heroes'; they even started facing away from each other relative to Speed and Lash, and the girl didn't help the guy when Lash appeared beside him. They're fighting individual battles, so it's basically two lots of two-against-one. If they combined their powers, worked together, they might actually stand a chance. The male 'hero' has just shot lasers out of his eyes, so I'm guessing that's his power, but there's been nothing from the girl. What's her power?"

Warren had been regarding me intently throughout my explanation, and hesitates a few seconds before responding. "Telepath, I think. But she's no slouch at physical combat."

Ignoring the fabulous potential for a pun, I continue. "Well, that just makes it even worse; she knew Lash was going to appear there, but did nothing to prevent her teammate from getting hit. If she'd punched Lash – and his ability wasn't activated to make him a little more durable to getting hit in the face – she could have dazed him enough, or even just distracted or surprised him enough, for the other guy to zap him. They could actually make a really good team, their powers are actually pretty compatible, and they're just wasting it because they think these guys are too good to even try properly. Or they just never considered working together, which is just as stupid."

Rant over, I glare mildly in the direction of the scattered 'heroes' for their wasted ability to defeat the idiots. The continued silence alerts me to the fact that Warren still hasn't responded yet, and I glance at him to check his reaction. And blink when I see it, expecting it to fade. But it doesn't; the small smile is still spreading his lips and his eyes are still slightly wider than they were before, and still sparkling with wonder and amusement.

Still too shocked for my usual level of modesty, I smile at my obviously-appreciated skill, somewhat awe-struck. "Here endeth the lesson."

Amazingly, his smile widens, and his teeth glisten, perfectly straight and white. "Holy shit," he says, his voice trembling minutely with contained laughter. "How did you see all that?"

Elated by how impressed he is – not going to lie, so am I – I gaze back down at the arena, searching for some indication that my observations were obvious. Apparently not; Warren, a sophomore at least, didn't see it, and the unchanged play-style of the 'heroes' means they haven't seen it either.

"I don't know," I admit. Then it hits me. "I guess I'm just used to seeing fights."

I feel the mood about to lower in our vicinity again, but I don't let it. Yes, I've been through many, many fights in my life. Yes, I've mainly been the victim, and in those circumstances I'm not sure I can call them 'fights' as I rarely fought back. Yes, I've seen a lot of violence in my life. But I'm now using that to my advantage, to go further, to go above and beyond what is expected of me. After being told that I am considerably below average in all things for all of my life, this is so heartening to discover.

Returning my gaze to Warren, I'm disappointed but unsurprised to see his smile gone, and his eyes no longer sparkle, they just stare at me, the sympathy in them almost – almost – undetectable. But I grin at him, still high on my achievement and recognition for it. He blinks in surprise and continues studying me, curiosity now the theme. I match his gaze equally, letting him gain whatever answers – or questions – he wishes.

A countdown begins around us, which we ignore, and the same with the cheering and the sound of things breaking, most likely as the poor makeshift citizen meets its fate. The whistle blows to signal the end, and we spend the rest of the lesson – two more matches – discussing battle strategies and lamenting about our classmates' lack of drive.

I think I just unknowingly proved myself to Warren Peace. Is it a good or bad thing that everything about our interactions seems automatic and unconscious?

On my part at least; I sometimes feel like I'm prising open a particularly stubborn oyster when talking to Warren, or more precisely getting him to talk. But I'm only persisting because I know there's a pearl inside. Somewhere, deep down, hidden behind layers of barnacle-covered shells. And I know that because I just glimpsed it.

ЖЖЖ

Warren and I part ways with a "See ya" from me and a non-committal acknowledgement from him. I meet up with Layla and Magenta – who are apparently oblivious to where I have just been, or who I have been talking to – a few moments later, and we walk into the changing rooms together, commenting about the fights we saw.

Remembering Warren's advice about how to cover the bruises, I tell the girls that there's something I have to do before leaving, and that I'd see them on the bus. I quickly change in the cubicle again before hurrying out towards the nurse's office.

The door is closed when I get there. Knocking on the door, I enter after a friendly "Yes?" sounds from inside. An old but approachable-looking lady in a nurse's jacket smiles brightly at me from behind her desk. Her eyes glitter from behind large circular glasses.

"How can I help you, dear?" she asks in a very grand-motherly way.

I smile sheepishly. "I'm really sorry to bother you after the bell, but I was told you can help with healing bruises?" I phrase the sentence as a question.

"Of course," she assures me, rising from her chair. "I have a cream that can accelerate healing for bruises, though not for anything else; there are separate products that do that." She opens up a cabinet and collects a tub. "Where are the bruises, then?"

Here comes the hard part. "Uh, here," I present my wrist, then steel myself before pulling my top up quickly. "And here."

The nurse freezes momentarily before her stature seems to sag. "I see," she says quietly, soberly. "Miss Rivers?"

Sighing at how even the school nurse has been 'warned' of me and the problems I might cause, I nod. She smiles sadly and gestures for me to sit on the bed she has in her office. Once I've done so wordlessly, she begins to rub my stomach gently with the cream. It hurts like anything, and man, it's cold, but I just breathe deeply to stop myself from crying out.

When she's finally finished with my stomach, she looks up and smiles at me. "You're a very brave and strong girl, you know?"

I frown at her in bemusement. "What?" I have only ever been called the exact opposite of those adjectives in my life, so for a moment I'm pretty sure she must be talking about someone else.

That smile again. This time formed in sympathy and understanding. She explains what she meant as she caresses my wrist gently, rubbing the cream into it. "Everything that you've lived through, you've done so perfectly, like you're doing now. You're in pain, but you're not letting it show, and even making the most of it sometimes. You may have been through a lot, but you're not letting it run your life. I saw your face just then, when I identified you; you were annoyed that I knew you because that meant that I knew what you'd been through, and you didn't want that. You didn't want to be judged because of your home life, which means you want to forget about it and deal with it yourself. It takes great strength to be able to do that. It's not the wisest idea, in case you can't actually manage it yourself – which is often the case with many, many people – but the fact that you've made it through this far in such brilliant condition is truly astounding."

From the very start of her speech, I'm staring at her in wonder. At Power Placement yesterday, I lamented the fact that the teachers had apparently been told about me, my upbringing and the sympathy that the poor little problem child, the special case, deserves. But here is a woman…admiring me, admiring things I have done, even linking them to internal, immoveable traits of mine, things which can only be mine. Any achievements aided by them can only be attributed to me. Rather than what I was afraid of – that the teachers would brush off my failures and blame my upbringing – this woman is doing the exact opposite, by attributing my successes to my disposition. With regular input from the likes of Miller, Hayley and the rest of the infestation at Daisy Bank, I had thought my character couldn't be any more flawed, and this woman – who knows a part of me that they will never see – has contradicted them.

With the words 'strong' and 'brave' still echoing in my head, my eyes suddenly fill with tears which spill immediately over my cheeks, even as I smile wider than I have all day.

When the nurse looks up from her task, she starts as she sees my tears, obviously worried that she might have upset me. But as she catches my hard-to-miss smile, beaming about my wonderful state, a pleased smile graces her own face.

"Thank you, ma'am," I gasp out a laugh, sniffing.

Her smile widens. "Julie, dear. Call me Julie."

I laugh again. "Julie."

After a few seconds of very content silence, Julie continues. "That's it for today. Come back and see me tomorrow, and I'll most likely put on another coat, but you should start feeling a difference in a few hours' time." She beams at me again. "And you can come and see me about anything at any time."

My grateful smile still in place, I hop down off the bed and thank her again before collecting my rucksack, throwing it over one shoulder and walking out into the corridor…

…Straight into a wall of black and red.

My automatic apology gets stuck in my throat. Warren Peace mutters a soft "Sorry" before doing a double-take as he realises the identity of the obstacle. His eyes betray his surprise, and they flick over to the door of the nurse's office. He obviously knows where I've just been.

"You went to the nurse," he states, his surprise leaking into his voice.

Still elated, I laugh. "Well, yes. That's what you suggested, wasn't it?"

"Y…yeah. It was."

His bewilderment confuses me, and I simply stare patiently but curiously at him, waiting for him to explain himself should he wish to. But he merely shakes his head, even as his eyes retain their amazement.

"Forget it."

I shrug good-naturedly, unconcerned in my euphoria.

"Did she help?" he asks suddenly.

My smile returns as I think of the miracle on the other side of the door. "Yeah. Yeah, she really did."

Warren nods again, seeming to want to say the word "good" but unable to force himself to sound so caring. Once again, I'm not bothered; I'll let him break out of his shell in his own time. I'll certainly be breaking out of mine, definitely at school, possibly even at Daisy Bank. Well, we'll see where that gets me anyway.

Wait. Daisy Bank….

"Shit, the bus!" I gasp, dashing away from Warren and the startled look I manage to catch on his before turning. "Sorry, see you tomorrow!"

Luckily the bus hasn't left yet, and I leap onto the steps before pausing to catch my breath. I smile at Ron as he raises his eyebrows.

"Sorry, Ron; I was with the nurse," I decide to leave out the part with Warren Peace. I bet even the bus drivers have heard of him.

"Fair enough," he grins. "You were pretty lucky this time, but try not to do it again."

I nod enthusiastically. "Sure thing."

Making my way towards the back where my friends are, I call out to them. "Hey, guys!" Sitting down next to Layla, I grin at them all. "So what did you guys think of Save the Citizen?"

ЖЖЖ

We discuss Save the Citizen and our hopes and fears for the rest of the bus trip, but we eventually have to say goodbye. I hop off at my stop, promising to see Ron tomorrow, and begin my solitary journey to Daisy Bank. I'm not exactly happy about going back, but I somehow feel more prepared, less utterly despairing.

I'm not that far from the bus-stop that I hear two voices that I'm surprised I hadn't heard earlier than this.

"You got lucky today, Rivers."

"We would've picked you for Save the Citizen if Boomer hadn't given that stupid rule; we still need to pay you back for that stunt with the milkshake."

A shiver runs down my spine, but not quite like it has done for all the other times these two have terrorised me over the past six years. There's still some of the usual fear there, sure, but the majority of it is a thrill. The thrill of doing something dangerous and exciting, and I'm suddenly speaking words I didn't plan as I turn to face the pair.

"Oh, I thought I could smell chocolate around here."

Speed and Lash blink in shock – yeah, where did that come from? – before their already-nasty faces become even angrier.

"You think you're funny?" Speed demands.

I shrug, still bizarrely callous. "Well, people do seem to laugh a lot when I'm around them."

They each step closer, fists clenching. "You won't be laughing for much longer."

Frowning, I correct them. "I hate to disappoint you, but I'm not actually laughing now." Seeing their growing anger, I grin and push recklessly forward. "I've taken all your shit year after year after year because I've never had the freedom to do what I want, for many different reasons, the most obvious being the lack of super people at Daisy Bank. They don't know who I am. You do. And now that I'm at Sky High, where I can use my powers openly, you two are going to know me a whole lot better. And I suggest you watch out."

Before I can react, Lash stretches out to wrap around me. His extended arm coils around my stomach and my mouth before tightening.

"Oops," he sniggers. "Don't you have a bruise there?"

I have just enough brain capacity to wonder how he knew; did he see me doubling over in the bleachers? But the rest is just pain. All I can do is wait until he gets bored of me or my writhing will free my mouth so my scream of pain will be heard by someone who will come and investigate.

"Ooh," I hear Lash giggle sadistically. "Dude, I can feel her throat vibrating against my arm."

I have no idea how long it goes on. But eventually I stop writing as I realise that's making it worse, so Speed and Lash dismiss me by tossing me into the wall with one last stab of "'Watch out', huh? Pathetic" over their shoulders.

So I'm there, alone on the side of a deserted road, on my hands and knees and gasping for breath, one of my arms against my stomach. Time passes indifferently, and eventually I manage to haul myself up, grimacing at the fresh agony in my mid-section. But as I wipe my mouth with my sleeve, the thrill appears again, and a dangerous smile, a smile I have never had before, forms on my face, and I fire it in the vague direction of Speed and Lash.

Challenge accepted.

Wow, that was a fun chapter. So I hope you all enjoyed that as much as I did. Warren Peace smiles! And laughs! Who knew? ;) Anyway, I hope you can all see a depth of Kait that you didn't see in previous chapters. It's rather exciting to write about someone who is actually rather kick-ass coming out of their shell. There will be more kick-ass-ness to come in later chapters, and I apologise for all of you who wanted to see the Save the Citizen fight scene; I didn't write about it in here because Kait was more interested in Warren. But when there are more important fight scenes, I will definitely include them, both the originals and my own versions.

Thanks for reading, and please leave a review if you want to read more.

Fly on,

NitnatRide