CW: Extreme violence, death, blood, language

Emma left the bathroom without me, leaving me to get dressed in my school uniform again. When I left and walked into the hallway Miss Garcia was waiting for me.

“Are you alright?” She asked the moment she saw me.

“Yeah, I think I ate something that disagreed with me. But I feel a lot better now.”

“You ate at the school restaurants?”

“Uh... yeah…”

“Which one?”

“The English one…”

Miss Garcia crossed her arms and shook her head. “You should eat Spanish food, it’s way healthier.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you for the tip, Miss.”

“No problem.” She patted my shoulder. “It looked like you were in good shape before you had to tap out, next time I definitely want to see what you can do on full power. Alright, I need to check on the students who stayed behind to clean up the equipment. See you tomorrow.”

I said nothing and just nodded while she walked away. -Shit, that’s right, we have P.E. tomorrow as well.- A sigh escaped my lips and I leant back against the wall, waiting for the others to get dressed.

“Rora!” Ria jumped around my waist. “Is everything ok?”

“Yeah… yeah… I’m fine.” I smiled until I saw Emma’s face when she walked past, her solemn look grounded me instantly. Karin must’ve noticed because she quitely ran towards her sister and grabbed her hand. “I-is everyone ready to go?”

“Pres said we could go without her since she needs to help her club anyway.” Claire replied.

“Alright, let’s go then.”

Our walk towards the school gate was definitely a lot quieter than usual. Emma wasn’t saying a word and was still walking hand in hand with her sister who was just as quiet. Only Claire was trying to strike up a conversation but apart from Ria no one really was in the mood for a lot of talking right now. It didn’t help that my confession to Ria was getting closer by the second and the weather was clearly taking a turn for the worse with dark clouds gathering above.

“Well, see you all tomorrow.” Claire waved us goodbye as she started walking towards one of the parked cars.

“See ya.” I waved back together with the rest of our group.

“We are going to go too, our driver is waiting.” Emma quietly said as she gently pulled her sister along.

“Ok… I won’t forget my promise.”

Emma didn’t reply but smiled sadly at me before finally turning around

“What promise?” Ria pulled the sleeve of my uniform.

“Uhm… just to repay her for everything she’s done for me…” Which was technically the truth.

“I see…”

“Anyway, let’s get you home before it starts pouring.” Because yesterday’s weather forecast had predicted it to be clear all day long, I hadn’t bothered to bring my umbrella with me, and neither had Ria.

We started walking along another random route I had plotted using my phone’s GPS when at one point, when we were nearing a medium sized park, Ria suddenly halted.

“Ria?”

She had a questioning look on her face. “Can’t you just tell me now?”

I was a bit perplexed by her sudden question so I didn’t manage to say anything.

“Oh, sorry, that sounded a bit too pushy…, didn’t it?”

“Maybe a little, Miss Ojou-sama.”

“Buuu.” She pouted.

“We are almost at my house though. Do you think you can hold on a little while longer? We just need to go through that park and then only a couple of streets further to arrive at my place.”

“Hmm, maybe…”

“You can have some ice cream when we get there.”

“Sold!” She started laughing which immediately calmed me down as well. At least, I was calm until we arrived at the park's gate.

“What do they mean, it’s closed?” I looked at the sign saying that they’d closed the park temporarily while they renovated the playground equipment. Apparently some kid had hurt themselves playing on one of the old equipment and the neighbourhood had closed it down in the meantime to prevent further accidents

“Can we go around?” Ria asked.

“Hmm.” I checked my phone’s gps. “If we go around it will take 20 more minutes. We’ll get completely drenched by then, judging by these clouds.”

“I see.” Ria looked at the iron fence. “Can’t we just hop over then?”

“Ohoh, Ria wants to do something naughty…” The moment I said that I started blushing. -That is not what I meant!- Luckily Ria was too oblivious to notice.

“I don’t think anyone will mind, it’s not like we are doing something illegal in it.” Ria replied before facing the fence again. “Can you help me first?”

“S-sure thing.” I gave her a little push so she could get over the top of the fence after which she easily managed to stand safely on the other side. Climbing over it wasn’t an issue at all for me, as long as I took care to ensure my skirt didn’t snag on it. I gallantly landed on my feet to the cute applause of Ria-chan.

“This is quite a lovely park.” Ria was looking around while we made our way to the other side.

“It is, isn’t it?” Even though in many ways it was a lot less fancy than what we were used to at school, the person who had designed it definitely knew what they were doing.

“Oh! They have a ducky pond too!” Ria excitedly ran over to the pond. “We should take this route again Rora!” She called out to me with the biggest smile ever while I was walking over.

“Alright.” I smiled. “Want to co….” the sound of clanging metal and the noise of engines interrupted my sentence.

“What was that?” Ria had heard it too and quickly walked over to stand beside me.

“I’m not sure…” I closed my eyes for a second and concentrated on the direction of the sound. What I could hear, muffled and under the other noise disturbed me greatly and made my heart start racing. ‘They went further into the park’.

“Shit.” I quickly looked around but couldn’t see any good hiding spots in the vicinity.

“What is it, Rora?”

“Ria, we have to go, now.” I took her by her hand and started running towards the exit of the park. However, just as we reached the final open field before the exit, three cars burst through the bushes behind us. It was the black sedan and van I’d seen a couple of days ago and they were accompanied by a black SUV too. The SUV circled around us, so we had no place to run.

“Rora, I’m scared.” Ria grabbed my arm.

“Get behind me, Ria.”

As if perfectly orchestrated, a dozen or so, men stepped out of the cars in lockstep. Their bodies, completely clad in black, are protected with layers of military grade body armour. The pistols, assault rifles and submachine guns they carried sent a chill through my spine. This was the most amount of weapons I’d seen outside of a museum, and these were state of the art firearms, not your standard issue world war 1 rifles. It was clear that these men were not your run of the mill criminals. However, the one person who caught my eye the most was the man with the eye-patch. The same man who I’d seen looking at me that evening.

“Get the girl.” He commanded his men.

“What about the other one?” The man on his right asked.

“She’s just some worthless rat, kill her, but do it quietly.”

He nodded as he and a couple of others drew their knives but before they advanced mister eyepatch said one more thing. “Make sure to not hurt the blondie at all, otherwise I’ll kill you myself.” He tapped his Arctic Eagle pistol against the shoulder of his henchman.

“Yes sir!”

That’s when

I looked at Ria, my number one priority was to keep her safe, no matter what cost. “On my sign, run between the SUV and the sedan, ok?” I nodded towards the gap, the drivers had stopped a little too far away from each other to close the escape route perfectly.

“B-but what about you? Didn’t you hear what they said?”

“I did. But don’t worry about me.” I smiled and patted her head. This made a couple of the men who were approaching look a bit weirdly at us.

“Sorry to disturb you but fun time is over!” One of them reached out for Ria but I easily grabbed his arm midarm, holding him in place.

“Ria, now!” Ria started running as I squeezed my hand tight, feeling the bones in the bandit’s arm crumble under my fingers like chalk. He let out the most inhumane screech I’d heard I’d ever heard outside of movies.

“The bitch broke my… a-arm!?” He fell down on his knees and almost instantly shut up once he saw my murderous glare. I could only imagine how bright red my eyes were shining.

“No one puts their filthy hands on the people I love…” despite the situation, what I just said did make me blush a bit.

“M-monster!” I released the man’s arm as he ran away in terror until a shot rang out through the park, the man dropping dead in an instant.

“Anyone else who wants to run? It’s a fucking school girl. Kill her already. And get the bloody Blondie!” Eyepatch commanded.

A couple of goons ran after Ria while the others who had their knives drawn ran towards me, but their swings came so slow that dodging them felt more like yoga than anything hurried. I quickly disarmed two of them, by simply snatching the knives out of their hands and throwing them at Ria’s pursuers’ legs. The sheer momentum of the knives simply sliced right through partially amputating them.

The men who’d lost their knives pulled back a couple of meters and drew their submachine guns. “Fuck this shit.” One of them opened up with a short burst, I tried to duck out of the way but there just wasn’t enough time. The flurry of bullets hit me in the side, but to my surprise it just felt like the impact of a couple of weak BB guns, they did however shred my uniform.

“I-impossible…” They dropped their weapons and ran, only to also get shot by their increasingly annoyed boss. With Eyepatch included, there were only four of them left, or at least, that’s what I thought.

“Let’s see if you can survive this.” He grinned as a loud crack rang out from beneath one of the cars. The impact of the shot sent me flying into the SUV behind me. It stung like hell and knocked the breath out of me, but I was still alive.

I peered at what was left of the bullet on my stomach, and wiped of the pieces of metal which revealed a bright red spot. “Holy shit. Did I just get hit by an anti-material rifle?” I looked back over to where the shot came from, the shooter was hastily trying to reload another round but clearly hadn’t expected to actually need to shoot twice. “Oh no you don’t!” I stumbled upright, pried one of the bent doors off the SUV’s hinges and threw it at the car with all my might. The shooter and another bandit couldn’t get out of the way in time, the impact killing them both instantly.

The remaining three bandits looked at each other and then at their boss. “There’s three of us…”

“And only one of him…”

They pointed their weapons at him. “Sorry boss, we prefer to stay alive.”

“I know, that’s why I have insurance.” Eyepatch replied, as the van they were standing next to suddenly exploded. “Can’t get any decent employees these days.” He took a small depressed detonator out of his pocket and threw it away. “If you want something done right, you need to do it yourself.” Aiming his pistol at me, he immediately started firing.

Even though he was remarkably precise, just like the first time, the bullets felt like nothing more than a nuisance. -What does he think he is going to do to me, alone, even his strongest weapon didn’t work…- I shrugged and slowly walked towards him.

“C’mon just die already!” He kept firing and reloading, firing and reloading, firing and reloading until finally we were standing face to face. He froze and that’s when, for the first time since this started, he showed true fear. “W-what are you?”

“Someone you shouldn’t have messed with.” I took the hand his pistol was in and slowly crushed it before I launched him at the wreck of the sedan, impaling him on one of the pieces of metal. I sighed a breath of relief and looked at the destruction around me. -It’s over... Now, for what truly mattered.- “Ria!? Are you there!?”

I waited a minute but there was no reply. “She must have seen what I did and think I’m a monster…” I started slowly walking home, leaving the carnage behind me when I heard something from the bushes.

“R-rora?” Ria stepped out and ran across the battlefield to me. “I thought I heard your voice so I ran back… but how? And your clothes… and your eyes...” She looked in confusion over the shredded pieces of my uniform, and then back to my face, before hugging me in relief. There was no fear in her eyes, just worry and concern.

“You see, there’s quite a lot I need to tell you…”

Ria squeezed me affirmatively and nodded. “But… shouldn’t we call the police or something first?”

“I think it might be best if we leave as quickly as possible…”

“Ok…” She smiled weakly and hugged me one more time. Our small moment of peace was short lived as lightning struck in the distance and a clap of thunder soon followed, along with yet another bang.

Ria cried out in pain as I felt something hit my stomach, blood spattered on my shirt. It wasn’t my own. I looked around in panic before I heard a voice coming from the sedan’s wreck. Eyepatch’s voice.

“I… I always was a lousy shot with my left hand.” The last of his life force drained from him as his injuries caught up with him and he collapsed into a bloody pile.

“Rora… it hurts... so... much…” she moaned in pain as her legs buckled beneath her.

I caught her just in time. “No no no no no, Ria, no! Please, Goddess, no!”

The heavens opened and the deluge of rain began to fall, its sound completely blocking out my pleas. Blood and water mixed and ran away from us, the growing puddle slowly spreading out like a shattered mirror...