“What is a Mazikeen?” I asked Lacie as she fluttered around me, her face grew contemplative and she looked up then closed her eyes before she answered.

“They are more of a who than a what.” I have to admit I was confused by the answer but I waited for a better explanation. “So it’s biblical. The Mazikeen are the descendants of Adam and Lilith or well some of the descendants.”

“Adam was married to Eve.” I replied, I remembered by bible studies pretty well at least I thought I did.

“He was, but they were separated and exiled from the garden of Eden. Both Adam and Eve lay with, well creatures. So anyway. The Mazikeen is one result.” I shuddered at the thought. What this creature was telling em was that the bible was real or at least some version of it was. “They are very powerful but they are mortal; live, breath eat and have children.”

“And can be killed.” I said. Nervously, I brushed my dark hair back, I tried to frame a question. “Why has she been torturing me?”

“For fun. She is probably someone you knew and goes to school by taking a different form when she leaves.” The little pixie smiled. “There's a spell for that.”

“Detect monster” I whispered. Then I had a smile as I cast the spell. “How long will it last?” I asked.

“Just a few minu…” Before Lacie could finish the bell rang releasing the students to our first-period class. We both rushed out of the room.

“What do I do if I find it?” I asked excitedly.

“You kill it.” The Pixie replied matter of factly.

“I’ve never killed any thing before.” I said then I thought for a moment. “What do I do with the body?”

“Usually the bodies of monsters deliquesce.” She said with a smile at me.

“Usually?” I asked for confirmation.

“Well…” The Blond Pixie temporized. “ Sometimes they are more a part of this realm than they should be. I don’t know about the body of a Mazikeen, they are mortal so I don’t know.” The Fairly shrugged unhelpfully.

“So if I killed it I might be having to explain away a dead body.”I said with exasperation in my voice.

“Yes, like the Coco yesterday.”

“Wait? That was a rat.”

“No. It was a Coco, or Cuco also Cucuy. Have you ever had a rat talk to you before? That one was a baby they feed on people's fears.” She said happily. I was finding Lacie to be quite exasperating.

“So it was feeding on my dad's fear? And I killed it?” Lacie shook her head in confirmation. In frustration I stepped to the side of the hall out of the rush of students then stepped to a locker where I dial my combination and began shoving things in it and taking some out to prepare for class. “I’m not prepared for this. There should be a monster hunter class.” I muttered.

I heard a snort from two lockers down. Looking she saw one of the boys from the club that I hadn’t met the day before. He had curly dark hair, broad-rimmed bifocals, coffee-colored skin and about twenty pounds more than he should. “Heh, not in the first edition maybe in Monster Hunters international or something.” His smile showing off teeth encased in braces.

“I’m sorry I didn’t catch the name.” I said giving him a smile but wondering if going to the club had been a wise idea after all.

He stuck out his hand. “Hadrian Touphalhunden.”

“I am so sorry.” I felt eyes go a little wide.

“Call me Touph.” He chuckled as I shrugged. I noticed the number of students were dwindling so I made a break for my next class. The door was about fifty feet away.

“I have to go I’m late.” I said in apology as I ran. I passed through the door just as the second bell rang.

X X X

The first class of the day went as usual. I managed to stay awake even if only just barely. Why the AP teachers had to be even more boring than the usual teachers I didn’t know.

I attempted to use my new understanding of social cues to analyze the class and students. I don’t know what I was hoping for maybe to understand the class better. I didn’t know what exactly was going on, I had never noticed before but there were three groups of students in the class that seemed to group together. Four if I included myself. Then was asking myself if just one person could constitute a gang. Periodically though I cast detect monster to both practice the spell and see what I might be able to learn.

The first two casts of the spell I didn’t detect anything. On the last three tries however I detected something moving below me and to the west-northwest. Thinking about the location I was pretty sure it must be located in or near the gym. Fortunately, that was my next period class, one I hated with a passion.

I thought about my overall scores. I wasn’t completely out of shape. But I really needed to get into much better shape. I checked my mana levels and found that the last stretch of class I had replaced all the mana I had previously used.

I hurried through the double doors into the old building and found the couch had the ball carts out. That meant either basketball or dodge ball. I hatted dodge ball, it was a game thought of by a sadist I swear. Me and the other semi and uncoordinated kids became the victims of the more athletic players. I gave it some thought, if I wanted to level my dexterity wouldn’t this be a good way to do it? Maybe it really did come down to my attitude.

“I’ll look at this as an opportunity.” I said. I stood up to my gym locker and started to take my gym clothes out and get dressed. I heard banging and giggling coming from down the row looking I saw it was Karen Polanski. Karen was the queen bee cheerleader that everyone loved to hate. More importantly, Karen seemed to love to torture me in her own right. “I wonder.” I said aloud.

I waited until Karen was busy getting dressed before I loosed my spell. I surreptitiously cast it while Karen had her gym shirt covering her head. With an indrawn, hiss of breath I saw small purple glows spring from the necks of the five cheerleaders that always seemed to accompany Karen. They were surrounding her getting dressed.

I killed the spell quickly when I saw the glow envelope the head cheerleader. “Hey, want to sit and talk during class?” I heard Caroline say as she slipped in next to me as she got ready to get dressed for class. Wide Eyed I turned to my friend and nodded, I had just seen my first monster that I knew was monster, and I didn’t know what to do.

“Yeah, we definitely need to talk.” I said in a muffled tone as I pulled my own top over my head.

“Hey look they’re looking our way.” Looking over I saw all six of the girls I had just spotted as monsters looking over at us. “They never look over here.” Caroline continued. “I wonder what's up.” I had a sinking feeling that they knew. I shrugged and looked worriedly at the queen bee and her minions.

I wanted to ask the fairy a few questions but apparently AP us history was not a subejct Lacie was interested in. She had left the room within the first ten minutes and had yet to return.

I bumped my friend. “Whatever it is we’ll find out all to soon. Let's find a seat and talk.” The blond girl nodded and followed.

The class was seated on the bleachers as per usual. Looking around the hall I saw five red rubber balls spaced on the centerline, which could only mean one thing. Their teacher stood up to her full height of five feet six inches and bellowed at them, It was always a shock such a large voice coming from such a small woman. “Alright, ladies today is Dodge Ball. A through K on this side the rest of youns on the otha. “ The class make-up was twenty-five girls between the age of sixteen and seventeen. Mrs. Smiths informal breakdown of students meant that approximately half were on each team. But numbers didn’t mean much when there was a clear disparity in ability.

The students wandered into their positions, some with more alacrity than others. The basic rules to dodge ball were easy. If you got hit by the ball you were out. If you caught the ball the person who threw it was out. If it touched the floor before it hit someone the ball was dead. Sometimes the teachers wanted the game to last longer so if you caught it a player that was out could come back in the game. The unwritten rule, however, was to hammer the weakest player first. With the trill of the coaches whistle the melee began.

Karen and her squad were on the opposite team they grabbed four of the five balls and then threw in a coordinated effort, I now thought I knew why the mean girl's clique acted in concert on most things.

“I’ve got this!” I said as the first ball streaked toward my group. With an effort, I got to it in mid-flight and caught the ball.

I smiled in glee as I then aimed, reared back and threw the ball I had just caught as an asian girl stomped off the court. Even as I threw at a player, another ball came streaking in toward me. I dropped to the ground and the ball sailed past me. Then I popped up to grab at a second ball that seemed to have been aimed at me. I bobbled the ball a little but then got it in control and grabbed it before it could touch the ground. From the other team there came a grown of displeasure.

I noted though that my own team had lost four players to their two despite my own spirited defense.

I watched as Caroline threw her ball and the aim was good but it struck a red-headed cheerleader on her upper back as she tried to dodge. She had a stunned look on her face and I remembered that was the general area that the monsters aura had come from. She risked a quick spell then took aim at another cheerleader that had her attention on the stunned girl. Then I released my ball. Surprisingly my aim was good and it struck her on the back in an area that was glowing. She stumbled then went down stunned. I only had eyes for a small glowing creature that was knocked loose and scuttled across the gym floor.

The other girls were cheering me and Caroline on as we did battle against the cheer squad.

“We can do this!” I yelled to Caroline as she dodged a ball that struck the floor. I recovered it and used it to block two of the other team's balls that had been thrown at me. The first bounced back toward a blond cheerleader whose name I didn’t recall. The second popped up into the air and was caught by Caroline who threw it at a distracted and anxious Karen. The ball was thrown quite well but seemed to just miss the girl. But as she dodged Caroline’s throw my own missile struck her on the thigh. With a cry of rage, she glared at Caroline and me. “You’ll regret that.” She said.

“Wow, soar loser much.” Caroline quipped quietly to me.

Looking thoughtful I nodded. “Yeah, if we are only that lucky.”