Dogs of War - Pardon me, thou bleeding piece of earth

[x-pressive.livejournal.com]

Once again in high school, Mark approaches a young woman named Eddie to learn more about the missing kids, specifically Josh Chambers. The news is not good.


The sound of the bell that dismissed classes had become a sweet sweet sound over the past two days. Mark waved at Holly as she left the room to go to her next class, but instead of following her, he took his time to pack. He did still have a job to do, after all, and despite the possibility of getting some from a hot cheerleader, he couldn't afford to take that detour. His actual target was always one of the last to leave, he'd noticed, so he planned his own departure carefully.

He felt bad about purposefully bumping into her and making her drop her books, though. "I'm sorry," he said, bending down to pick them up for her. "Didn't see where I was going."

"Too busy admiring yourself in your reflection off the window, I suppose?" the girl replied sarcastically. She was tall and sort of wiry, all elbows and knees and gangly limbs. True to Holly's description, she was wearing a pair of baggy jeans that should have belonged to her brother, a worn leather belt holding them up. Combat boots, a t-shirt with "Life's a bitch and so am I" on it and a worn denim jacket completed the look. Her black hair was roughly cut short in the back and long in the front, the bangs doing much to hide her face. Crouching down beside Mark, she roughly pulled her books out of his hands. "Go on and play with the pretty people. I'm fine here."

"I would think that someone who's on the periphery of high school society would avoid making judgments like that," Mark replied calmly. The comment irritated him, though, because he used to be closer to her than the popular clique, and being involved in it all over again was distressing.

Eddie rolled her eyes. Oh, a smart ass, like Marcus and his crew. "In case I lose my chance at making friends? Too late, boy wonder - that happened the minute I set foot in high school." Books collected, she straightened. "Go on, before someone sees you talking to me and decides to start shoving you into lockers."

"No one's gonna shove me into a locker. I'm not Buffy, you're not Willow, and Holly isn't Cordelia." Maybe a geeky reference like that would help his case. "I'm not talking to you to make your life more difficult, y'know. I wanted to say hi and decide for myself who's cool and who's not."

She looked him up and down. "You sure aren't Buffy. Don't have the tits, for a start." It was something of a joke, and her suspicious tone eased a little. "You know, Holly's going to insist you be fumigated if she sees you talking to me. One half of the Freak Twins, that's me. You might catch Weird or something."

"Don't tell her, but I already have," he whispered conspiratorially. "One of the good things about transferring high school halfway through? I get to personally reassign my clique." Mark smiled goofily and held the door open for her. "Where's your other half, then?"

She gave him an odd look at the door holding, but continued on, maintaining a careful distance from him in case this was a trick of some sort. Like that "Carrie" movie - telekinetic she wasn't. "Josh... had to take off for a bit," she replied, evasively. "He'll be back in a while, once things are a bit less crazy around here."

"People talk about him like he plays 'Doom' in a trenchcoat," Mark said sadly. "My old school had metal detectors and cops everywhere and all that shit to prevent that. And they're always wrong about who the real nuts are, y'know?"

"Josh wouldn't hurt anyone," Eddie declared, although there was a hint of doubt in her voice. "And it wouldn't be so bad if they just left us alone, but they have to keep pushing until..." She stopped herself, and hoisted her book bag more firmly up on her shoulder. "Any way, doesn't matter now. The worst of them are gone."

"So the fellas who left were the biggest bullies in the playground?" asked Mark. Just what Holly had told him. He wondered if it really was just a matter of 'making trouble with the principal.' "Looks like I got here at the right time, then, huh? Probably couldn't've fooled them. Holly was easy, at least."

Eddie snorted. "'Easy' is one way of putting it. 'Completely brainless' is probably closer - Holly does what she's told to do. Since Troy and the others van-- left, she's been scrambling to find a new sponsor and you'd be just the thing she'd go for. Bet you she gave you the whole sob story about how awful she felt about Josh getting locked up in the trash can, too." Eddie's tone grew more intense. "What she didn't tell you is they left him there almost the whole night. Any one of them could have come back, let him out on the sly. Including Holly. Fuck, they could have told me and I wouldn't have said a thing, just gone and got him. You should have seen him..." For a moment it seemed like the hard-bitten Eddie had tears in her eyes, but they vanished as soon as they'd appeared. "Of course, no-one believed him, except me. You can't say a word against any of them - or at least, you couldn't. It's different now, of course. Rumors are like that."

"So did they really leave because Josh finally complained hard enough?" Or is that just a rumor, too, Mark wondered. "You know, my mom, she's a counselor. Deals with bullies and victims all the time. Maybe I could give Josh her number?"

"Is that what they're saying?" Eddie's contempt was clear. "No fucking way. They didn't leave, Josh..." She halted herself, biting her lip and looking around. It was obvious something was eating her up inside, worry and guilt suddenly clear on her face.

"Josh what?" he asked curiously, but in a tone that said 'I won't push it . . . much.' "Did he, like, pull a David Copperfield and make them disappear?" Oh God, say they were wrong on that score.

"I don't know!" Eddie burst out, sounding upset. "He had this book, he said it was a spell book and that he could do something about it. I just thought he was joking, but then they disappeared, and the next time I saw Josh... He was scared. Real scared." She wasn't sure why she was spilling her guts to the new kid, but she had to tell someone. "I never thought he could actually do magic. I mean, it's all garbage. Harry Potter isn't real!"

It was only through very VERY careful control that Mark didn't flip out and run for the hills. "Magic?" he asked, his tone slightly incredulous. "Is he, like, a mutant or something? Because it's dangerous for mutants down here, I'd imagine." His hand was itching to reach for his phone to call Amanda.

"A mutant? No!" Eddie's response was a vehement whisper, and she looked around to make sure no-one had heard. "He's never done anything like this before, even though he's been trying for years. He said the book would change a whole lot of things." She gave Mark a pleading look. "You don't think I'm crazy, do you? I know it sounds insane, but they disappeared and Josh said we wouldn't have to worry about them any more. I didn't want to believe he'd do anything to hurt anyone, but then this weird shit started happening, with the werewolf sightings."

Great, they had an Amy wannabe on their hands. "Goddess Hekate, work thy will and stop being a bitch," Mark muttered. "Have you told anyone about this?"

Eddie's look was answer enough to that. "And say what? I think my friend did some magic and a silver werewolf ate the school bullies? Yeah, right." She shook her head. "I shouldn't have said anything. Josh'll be pissed."

"I'm not going to blab about this," Mark assured her. "Not like anyone would believe me, anyway. But, like, I had a bunch of mutant friends in NYC, so I'm not totally in the dark about this kind of weirdness. I dunno. Maybe I could help. Where is he?"

"Help?" Eddie looked doubtful, but she was desperately worried enough grasp at any straw. Even one held out by a pretty boy New Yorker. "I'm not sure..." she began, trying to make up her mind. Josh would see this as a betrayal, but he was in big trouble this time, of that she was sure. "There's an old cabin, up in the woods. We use it as a hideout, you know? Meet me after school, I'll tell you how to get there."

The next bell rang signaling that the next period was about to begin and that they were late. "Ick, history. OK, I'll see you after school." He waved at her as he retreated down the hall, reaching into his bag for his phone while glaring down everyone who was looking at him like he'd grown another head by talking (in a friendly manner, even) to this girl.

"Hey, Amanda? It's Mark. Yeah, we're in deep shit here."

Comments

[x-rahne.livejournal.com]

Goddess Hekate, work thy will and stop being a bitch

Aren't those kind of incompatible requests? :P