Death Screams (8 page)

"
I left my backpack in Miss Tulle's room," Jade said with a contrite voice. If that enticing female tone didn't get him to soften, nothing would.

It did. He said, "Okay, run in there and get it, but the rest of ya, stay put."

We waited at the bottom of the stairs. When Jade was about at the top, I saw her hand come out to grip the smooth, tube like handrail and she flinched, gripping it harder. Her face paled and her body shook.

I had never moved so fast in my life. I think I cleared four steps at a time on my way to her. The janitor backed up, not sure what to do. I sorta shoved him out of the way and Jade fell backward into my arms. She was clammy, a light sheen of sweat on her forehead.

"
What? Jade... what's wrong?" I asked.

The group were all around me and she whispered, "Boys' bathroom..."

I looked at the guys. What was going on?

"
They're hurting him... need to help..." she said.

Hurting who?

"
I'm spoiling for something!" Jonesy yelled like a native before war.

The janitor hollered something about getting out of the school and we ignored him.

I scooped Jade up and hauled her underneath my arm, half jogging with her, football hold-style as I watched the guys sprint for the boys' bathroom as the girls jogged after, keeping pace with Jade and I.

I heard the shouting before I got to the door and knew who we were dealing with before I arrived.

Carson and Crew.

Marvelous.

Carson and Brett had some poor kid pinned to the cinder block wall, his nose crooked and bloody, one shoe off, his pants down to his ankles.

WTF? what was this happy horse shit?

Bry and Jonesy had burst through the door, the thing banging against the wall, Alex bringing up the rear.

I was almost stunned to silence that Christi was there, torturing the poor kid along with the sickness that was her brother, Brody.

"
What the blue hell are you doin' to him, ya clowns?" Tiff roared at the group of guys as her gum plopped to the floor in a disgusting wad.

Diego nodded, grinning like a loon and I put Jade into Sophie's capable embrace as John flanked my side. I slid my eyes to Tiff, who I knew first hand to be an underdog lover. This was so up her alley.

If she survived it.

Buddy was there too, just for shits and giggles. This was becoming a colossal cluster and I wasn't sure how to fix it but first things first.

"
What's going on?" I asked levelly, hoping to keep the tension down.

Diego straightened, giving his full attention to Tiff. "You're an abrasive little bitch, ya know that?"

"
Yeah," she bellowed back at him and he flinched, unprepared for Tiff.

Join the crowd.

His fists clenched and he looked at Bry.

Bry looked back at him, eyes steady. "Don't even try it. You touch my sister and I'll break your hand off and wipe my ass with it."

Diego smiled. "What do you care? This faggot was asking for it. Checkin' our junk out during suit up?" He turned on the kid. "Weren't ya?" he screamed in the kid's beaten face.

I knew that kid, Lewis Archer. He was in my... damn, couldn't think of it now.

He clenched his eyes closed and waited for more blows. I was figuring he was about done suffering through it all.

"
Alex?" I said, real calm.

"
Yeah, Hart?"

"
Go get... Lewis from these gang-beaters and we'll let them get back to what they were doing."

Jonesy added, "Looks like a circle jerk to me. Manned by Christi."

Oh. God.

All hell broke loose. Brody came at Jonesy to defend Barbie's dubious honor while Carson punched Bry in the face as he was advancing and Diego ignored the guys and went straight for Tiff.

"
John!" I screamed.

"
I'm on it!" Terran yelled, racing in a clumsy waltz over to where Diego was trying to grab Tiff, all six-four of him.

I glanced back at a pale and trembling Jade and had just enough time to prepare for the punch to my bread basket when I did a retaliatory strike to Brett's throat. He choked, a surprised, gagging sound that was partway between a gurgle and a strangle and fell on his ass. Not to be outdone, and you gotta admire his tenacity, he swept his foot up and glanced my nut sack. I fell, the urge to throw up a burning need in the back of my throat.

This was so outta hand I didn't know where to begin. I watched Alex, struggling to overcome the throbbing thing that were my balls, to see him take a hold of Diego as he threw him through one of the bathroom stalls and the door broke off its hinges, crumbling under the six-foot, two hundred pound Diego. Alex turned, obviously in a rage and set his sights on Buddy.

I held up my hand and choked out, "Leave him!"

Alex straightened just as Buddy turned on him and Carson leaped on his back.

That solidified my opinion of their utter brainlessness. Wow.

With a roar, Alex literally shrugged the pair off of him and they flew into the opposing walls. Sliding down until their butts hit the floor. I looked around at the fallen bodies and my eyes fell on Christi.

She looked even better than I remember. I didn't let that bother me. "What were you doin' to him Christi?"

Lewis is the one that answered, and even on the floor, holding my throbbing balls, with my enemies piled around me, I could see the kid's beauty. He had one of those faces, like an angel. "That sadistic bitch was hurting me," he said, the words totally not in sync with his looks.

"
Where?" John asked, giving her the look she deserved.

"
They didn't want to touch it!" she wailed.

Of course, Christi was willing, I thought uncharitably.

Bry looked at her like she was a pariah.

I looked at Lewis, his light gray eyes flinching, the lashes like black lace. "You know where," he said in a low voice filled with shame.

I hated these guys.

Jonesy trained his eyes on Christi, giving a good kick to Buddy as he strolled past, who groaned as his sneaker made square contact with a rib.

"
Let me sum this up then. You," he pointed a finger at Christi, "did a pecker-pull on Archer here while the losers with you beat him up?"

She just stared at him. He strode over to where she was and screamed in her face, "Is it true you stupid slut?!"

She yelped and I said in a low voice, "Cool it , Jonesy. We all know what a scumbag she is."

"
Yes, we do," John agreed and Alex nodded, his glasses hanging off one ear. As I watched, he adjusted them and they slid down his nose.

Bry said, "Don't hurt her Jones. She's horrible but she's a chick."

"
She isn't a chick," Jones said with real feeling. "She's female." He walked over to Tiff and dragged her over to Christi. "This is a chick. You're nothing..."

He began to turn away, Tiff looking at him in stunned adoration that he had finally tipped his hat to her when Christi chilled us to the bone with, "You're just a fag-lover, Jonesy. Deep down, that's why you go out with girl after girl. It's a put-on. You actually want to travel the Hershey highway." She smiled at her little pun.

Jonesy whipped back around and I knew he was going for it when Bry launched at him, Jonesy fighting him like a barracuda. "Not. Worth. It. Jones!"

Christi pushed herself away from the wall and strolled around a foaming-at-the-mouth-Jonesy. "Yeah, my brother's told me about you guys. Your little hideaway. Where you all meet. The AFTD and all you other weirdos. It's all a front. You came here to save your little
friend.
" She reached out a hand to touch Lewis, who was looking at her with horror and he shrank away from her touch.

Not to worry, Tiff balled up her fist and hit Christie square in the nose. Her hands went to her face but not before a jet of blood like lava shot out of her nostrils in a literal stream. Tiff wasn't done by a long shot and grabbed her shoulders and slammed her knee into Christi's fashionably flat abs. She made an
oof!
sound and keeled over in a bleeding heap on the boys bathroom floor.

Lewis looked up at Tiff, her hands on her hips, blood all over her hoodie and said in a whisper, "Thank you."

"
Welcome," Tiff said, jabbing a new stick of gum in her mouth.

Cripes-on-a-crutch.

I scrambled to my feet and went to Jade. It was at that point that I heard an ominous clicking in the hall, approaching on a stiletto rhythm, I'd know it anywhere.

Chen.

A boiling wall of heat began to engulf me, causing my hair to rise as if static electricity charged the air. I swung my face away from Jade's and looked at Brody and Carson.

The Incineration Pair.

Great, I thought, my hair starting to cook where I stood.

Chen flung the door open, all blackness and ninja. She swung her arm out and the wall of heat suddenly dissipated. Brody's fists clenched and Carson scowled. Poor saps, foiled in their heat wave by the principal.

"
Can anyone tell me why there was a preemptive pyro event happening here?" Chen asked. Jensen the Janitor was peeking around her shoulder, topping her by ten inches. It was funny really. I got the crooked mouth again.

Jade walked over to me and I slid my arm around her waist, my balls a low drone of pain. It'd be a night and half the next day before they felt okay.

Carson, Buddy, Brody, Brett and Diego straggled over to the far side of the room and Chen's eyes narrowed on them momentarily then shifted to me. "How is it that you're involved here?"

I could tell that I was gonna have to think fast. I had just been in her office this week. Let me think. No fighting or making out. Well, I blew that all to hell.

I opened my mouth to answer when Lewis said, "They ganged up on me and somehow..." he gave a quizzical look at us then turned his attention back to Chen, "they came and stopped it."

Chen looked at Lewis, taking in his beaten face, the large gray eyes, steady and haunting. Her eyes shifted to the losers. "There is a zero tolerance at KPH for abusing other students. Zero," Chen repeated in a tone.

They remained sullen and quiet. And it was at that point that Chen noticed Christi looking pathetic and weak on the floor.

"
Oh my! Who hurt a girl?" Her gaze fell on my group and I just shook my head. I wasn't going to rat Tiff out but none of us guys would touch a girl. I couldn't say the same for Carson and now, Diego.

Christi scented the possibility of sympathy and maneuvered her position until she could look up at Chen with those luminous whiskey eyes of hers, her nose bashed up. A small face with eyes that took up half of it. Even I had to admit, had I not known Christi, I would have wanted to hammer a guy that did that to her. She sat there looking fragile and beaten and it wasn't a guy. It'd been Tiff. She'd deserved it. Still, I kinda felt bad about it. Must be in my DNA I thought with dismay, the desire to protect a female. Even one as horrible as Christi.

Tiff didn't have that biological directive.

"
I did it," Tiff volunteered. Bry put his face in his hands.

"
Thank you for your honesty, Miss Weller. You will receive a less severe suspension than your peers."

John groaned, thinking of the crucifixion he would receive at home. Mrs. Terran would have him encasing the basement furniture in plastic.

For a couple of days. While cleaning the microwave hinges with a toothbrush. Pink apron strapped on for added torture.

Her attention swiveled back to Carson's group and she asked, "Why were you abusing your classmate?"

Nobody said anything. Finally, after watching the boys shift around nervously, Lewis said, "I'm gay, Miss Chen."

Chen looked at him. Then she said, "What does that have to do with anything?"

He spread his hands out and laughed, dried blood edging his nostrils. "You wouldn't ask that if you were gay."

"
I am not trying to be condescending on purpose, Mr. Archer. I truly don't know why... were you being targeted because of your sexual orientation?"

God, catch a clue, Chen. Duh. With that group? I think so.

She scowled. "Are you certain, because that flirts with a hate crime."

He nodded. "They'll tell you that I was provoking them. But I wasn't. It was them. They knew. Every day, day in and day out, it was, 'how's it hangin' pretty boy?' Or, 'packed any fudge lately?' I'd say that qualifies as hate to me."

I thought so too.

She folded her arms across her chest and looked at Carson. "You admit to this? Is his retelling accurate? You know that fighting, using your ability against others, and this issue you allegedly have with sexual orientation go directly against what you pulsed your consent for. That your parents pulse-consented at the start of school?"