An Unexpected Visitor

At 3:16 am, a young man walks into a rundown apartment building that surprisingly still has people living in it despite it looking like something out of Resident Evil with unidentified stains on the wall, the occasional plant growing from the cracks in the tiles, and every metal surface was at the minimum slightly rusted. Sometimes if you looked in the corners, you could see the moss and mold have their war for that corner. The moss was still holding strong from the looks of it. He mindlessly walks to the elevator while listening to some random podcast which serves as background noise. He was still wearing his uniform from his shitty gas station job - a simple black t-shirt with the gas station's logo on it, a simple green truck, and black pants. After a few moments of standing in front of the elevator, his tired brain realizes that he hadn't clicked the button to call the elevator in the first place. So he does just that and only a few moments later, he hears the familiar creaking and screeching as the elevator descends to the ground floor. The elevator lands with a small thump and then the doors slowly slide open. He walks into the elevator. The inside of the elevator was just as rundown as usual, at least there wasn't a bat in there this time. He then clicks the busted button for floor 13, at first nothing happens but then he clicks it with a little more force. The elevator shudders as it closes its doors as if it was chilly outside, which it was considering it was the peak of winter and -20°C outside. It then begins its slow and noisy climb up to the 13th floor. After a few minutes of standing under the elevator's flickering lights and staring at its damp yellow wallpaper, the elevator shudders to a stop and its doors creak open. He walks out onto the 13th floor, he is the only person who lives on this floor since people swear on their grandmothers rotting corpse that this floor was haunted. He really didn't give a shit since because of said rumors, rent was the cheapest in the whole city. He then begins his walk down to room 66 or room 666 since some jackass had carved in an extra 6 into the door. While he walks he suddenly hears some footsteps and . . . 90s pop? to be specific it was smooth criminal by the king of pop himself. He turns around thinking some guy was trying to mess with him, he sees nothing. Just as he turns around he swear he saw something completely black dart out from a shadow on the floor but he chalks it up to him seeing things. "I'm seeing shit and I still gotta go to school tomorrow," He grumbles to himself, rubbing his eyes as he increases his pace back to his room. The music only gets louder but the man quickly realizes that it wasn't getting louder but closer. He quickly whips around only to come to face to face with what he could only describe as a demon. It wasn't very tall, maybe 2 or 3 inches shorter than him, but it's proportions were just slightly off. It's arms were a bit too long, its legs a bit too long, just everything about it was just a bit too long or a bit too short, like a stretched out PNG. It wore surprisingly normal clothes, A pink hoodie, a crop top and jeans. Another thing that stood out was it's lack of a face, with where it's face should be just being an empty void beside its giant toothy grin. He also found the source of the music which was an old school cassette player. "Hello Human," It rasps in a distorted and glitchy voice. The young man turns around and not a second later, without saying a word, he bolts off towards his room. The creature tilts it's head in confusion as the man flings open his apartment door and slams it behind him. After he gets into the safety of his apartment, he breathes a sigh of relief. "God I must be hallucinating, I need to sleep," He groans, rubbing his temples. Just as he's about to kick off his shoes and go to his bed, the music, which had now changed to Judas by lady gaga, was now coming from right behind him instead of from behind the door. "Hey-" The distorted voice begins but before it could finish, the young man had already bolted out of his window and to the fire escape. "Oh, so he can see me," It thinks aloud before deciding to follow him. Meanwhile, the young man had already parkoured down the fire escape and bolted down the empty streets of the rundown part of the city he lives in. After a few minutes of running, he stops for a few seconds. He doesn't hear any 90s pop for a solid few seconds and breathes a sigh of relief. Not wanting to risk it, he decides to take refuge within a late night 24/7 café. He goes in and orders a small black coffee, thinking it would be awkward to sit down with ordering anything. After a few minutes of sitting down and reading a manga he had borrowed from the library, he noticed his coffee missing only to look in front of him and seeing the entity from earlier taking a sip. "I am not sure how humans like this, it is incredibly bitter," the entity says in its same distorted and glitchy tone. The man doesn't say anything and simple focuses on his manga, hoping the entity would leave him alone. "I know you can see and hear me. I won't be leaving anytime soon and I'm sure that you're incredibly tired, so how about we head to your place since talking here would make everyone else think you're crazy," the entity elaborates. The man sighs and nods before walking out of the café, the entity right behind him. "Well at least it doesn't seem hostile," he thinks to himself as he begins to walk back to the apartment. He arrives at the fire escape and climbs up via that, not wanting to waste anymore time by taking the elevator. After a couple of minutes, he climbs into his apartment via the window. His room was small, being roughly 400 square feet but that was more than enough for him. His entire home was bare, with nothing but the essentials for life in the 21st century such as a laptop and an air fryer. Despite it's bare and colorless appearance, unlike the rest of the apartment building it was incredibly neat and tidy with not a stain in sight, like an oasis of cleanliness in a desert of filth. "Huh, you're not much into decoration are you?" The entity questions, looking around the room for the first time. "Well decorations are expensive," the man replies. "So what are you and why are you following me," the man asks, turning to look at the entity. "Well to put it simply, I'm a creature from a dimension outside of yours. Before you ask, the reason I'm here in your dimension instead of my own is because I was banished. As to why I follow you, it is due to you being able to see me," The entity explains to him. "Ok . . . why were you kicked out? and how do you get kicked out of a dimension? How the hell do you know about human fashion?" he asks, motioning to her clothing. "I was aware that you humans are curious beings but it is intriguing to see it outside of historic records," The entity says, taking a moment to think before continuing. "As to why I was banished, that is a personal matter. For the how, it is due to my kind's abilities, I cannot explain how it operates as it would be similar to explaining quantum physics to a rat. My clothing is simply a result of studying your kind through our records but by looking around, it seems human clothing behaviors have changed since 1995," It says, it's body seemingly glitching in and out of existence as it talks. The man blinks for a few seconds before sitting down and putting his head in his hands. "So am I seriously the only one who can see you?" He asks. "Yes," The entity replies promptly. "So is that why you won't leave me alone?" He grumbles tiredly. "You say that as if it is an entirely negative thing, I'm sure you're curious about my society just as I am curious about you humans. After all, quite a lot has changed since 1995 in your world," It replies, curiosity creeping into its distorted voice. "Well, It sounds like something that would stress me out more. I have enough to worry about as is. So no, I'm not overly curious about your society" He says, keeping his head in his hands. "How interesting," The entity thinks aloud. "Well it is ok human but simple words like that will not deter me. I would rather not spend my banishment on my own, so it seems you will be stuck with me," It says, its voice surprisingly sing-song for how distorted and glitchy. The man sighs tiredly once again. "I just have 2 more questions," he states, pausing for a moment before continuing. "What should I call you and uh are you a guy or girl?" He asks it. "I left my real name behind when I was banished but you may call me 'Ciaran'. As for my gender, I do not have one but I do relate to the female gender more as you could tell," Ciaran answers, motioning to her clothing. "Well uh nice to meet you Ciaran, I'm Noah," He says, cautiously holding his hand out. Ciaran shakes his hand. "Nice to meet you Noah," she says, a wide uncanny smile appearing on the void where her face should be. "How old are you Noah? You must be an adult considering you own a home and have a job but I am not entirely sure," she inquires, hundreds of eyes popping out from the void that makes up her body to observe Noah. Noah thinks for a moment before cautiously answering. "I'm 16 years old," He says before looking to see Ciaran's reaction. "Wow, you're much younger than I assumed. It will be interesting to observe how human adolescents interact with one another at school," Ciaran says. Noah nods. "Well uh it was nice to meet you Ciaran but I am exhausted so I think I'll just go to sleep," Noah says before heading to his washroom to freshen up and locking the door. Inside, he brushes his teeth and washes his face, just as he usually would. Noah was never really religious but he wasn't sure if Ciaran was telling the truth or not and with no other possible explanations for what she could be, he uses some q tips and dental floss to create a small cross which he shoves in his pocket. He then exits the washroom, flops down on his bed, and under his covers. He closes his eyes and tries to sleep but as he does he cannot shake the feeling that something is watching him as he does so, It's probably Ciaran but she seems friendly enough for now. After 30 minutes of this feeling and no sleep being achieved, he finally opens his eyes to see what the hell Ciaran is doing. At first Noah doesn't see anything, straining his eyes to look in the dark but after a couple of seconds, he sees the blurry outline of Ciaran's silhouette. At first it seemed that all she was doing was standing at the doorway and looking away from him and at the kitchen. As Noah begins to close his eyes once more, he catches a quick glimpse of hundreds of little glitchy eyes appearing on her hair. He immediately sits up in his bed. "Why the hell are you watching me!" Noah exclaims, clutching the makeshift cross in his pocket. "I am simply observing you Noah, I find it odd how your kind needs to rest," Ciaran says in her usual horrible distorted voice. "Well can you cut that shit out? its creepy," Noah grumbles, his heart practically beating out of his chest as he lays back down. "I am sorry to have distressed you, I shall leave for now," Ciaran says, floating off to the living room. Noah breathes a huge sigh of relief, his heartbeat slowly slowing and shortly falling asleep. 3 hours he's woken up by his alarm blaring into his ear. He sits up groggily and rubs his eyes before stumbling over to the washroom to freshen up real quick. After washing his face, brushing his teeth, and changing out of his pjs, he heads to the kitchen to make himself breakfast. He grabs some eggs and bread. "Hey-" Ciaran whispers to Noah, putting his hand on his soldier before being cut off by Noah jumping a bit. "HOLY SHIT CAN YOU NOT DO THAT?" Noah says, turning to look at Ciaran. "Not do what?" Ciaran asks him, tilting her head. "Don't sneak up on me like that, its creepy as hell," Noah says with an annoyed sigh before going back to stove and cracking some eggs into the pan. "I see, I apologize for scaring you," Ciaran says, moving backwards and giving Noah some space. "So what is your plan for today?" She asks, watching him make sunny side up eggs. "Well I'm just gonna go to school as I would any other day, " Noah replies with a shrug. "I see, so I assume after school you'll be heading on some adventure through the forest with a group of friends to ward of evil?" Ciaran asks. Noah blinks and lets what she said sit in his mind for a second. "What are you talking about? Of course not," Noah says, furrowing his eyebrows and turning off the stove to face Ciaran. "Ah I see so you must be one of those teenagers who hangs out with a quirky group of friends and has some love interest, correct?" Ciaran asks, her eyes unblinking as always. Noah is silent for a moment before finally connecting the dots. "Is all your knowledge about teenagers from Y/A books and movies from the 90s?" Noah says, putting his eggs and toast on a paper plate. "Is that not how you humans spend your teenage years?" Ciaran asks, floating behind Noah as he heads to the dining table. Though the table was so small and rugged that it resembled a night stand more than a dining table. "Ya of course not, its fiction obviously," Noah says, sitting down by the table. "Oh but why would your kind make such works if they were entirely lies?" Ciaran inquires, once again being far too close for Noah's liking. "Well its for entertainment," Noah says moving his chair away from Ciaran. "Huh I see, well I am intrigued to see how your day goes then," she says before floating off to the kitchen. "What do you mean by that?" Noah asks , taking a bite of his now cold eggs. "I will be accompanying you to observe how your day goes," She says as she looks through the cabinets. "Wow, your food reserves are quite barren," she comments, closing the cabinets. Noah exhales deeply. "You are not coming to school with me, I have like 3 tests today," He says sternly. "You are aware that you cannot stop me from doing so, right?" Ciaran says as she continues to investigate his kitchen. "Yes but can't you just stay away from my school? I already got a lot of shit to deal with and I'd rather not have you there," Noah says, finishing his breakfast and putting in the sink. "I won't be bothersome and either way my mind has been made up, I shall be joining you for your school day," Ciaran says, staring right at Noah. Noah groans. "It's like talking to a brick wall," He grumbles under his breath before sighing. "Fine just don't talk to me, I don't want to look like the crazy kid with an imaginary friend," Noah says, quickly washing and drying his hands and heading over to his room to grab his bag. "Thank you, I promise to keep my side of our deal," Ciaran says, floating behind Noah as he exits his room with his bag and takes the elevator down to the ground floor. Noah goes over to the huge growth of vines on the side of the building, which worked great as a natural bike parking area since all the other areas to lock your bike by had been ripped out of the ground. Noah unlocks his bike, puts in his headphones and begins to bike to school. As Noah biked, the dirty slums he called home faded away and was replaced by the clean streets of downtown, where his school was located. After a couple of moments, he had arrived at the front of the school. He locks his bike against a tree and heads straight up to his first period class, physics. "Man I fucking hate physics, My bum ass teacher is giving us a test today too," Noah thinks to himself, heading up the stairs and sitting down at his desk. Noah sits on his own and studies by himself as his classmates walk around and talk about what could be on the test. Class had begun roughly 5 minutes ago but his physics teacher was still not here, as usual, since he was constantly 15 minutes late. Even when they had a test. Ciaran looks around, watching all the other students frantically study and talk about the upcoming test. "It seems tests are a large source of stress for adolescents," She comments before adding on. "Though you seem surprisingly calm," She says, looking at Noah's paper. Noah writes a response on his paper. "Well I know I'm gonna fail but it shouldn't drop my average too much. I've come to terms with it at this point," He writes, giving her a moment to read before erasing it. "Oh I see but still wouldn't you want to pass? Why would you come to terms with failing?" She asks, tilting her head in confusion. "Because I'm way too tired for this shit," He writes before quickly erasing it as Noah's physics teacher enters the room and scolds the class for walking about. After 5 minutes of this lecturing, he takes 10 minutes to lumber around the room and hand out the tests. Noah looks at the test before flipping through trying to find an easy question to start with and after 2 minutes, he had reached the end, not a single easy question on the test. Ciaran looks at the first question. "Oh this is pretty simple," Ciaran comments before going on to explain how she would solve the question. Surprisingly, the equations she used were just like the one Noah had to use in physics class. His eyes widen in understanding as he quickly begins writing the answer Ciaran gave him. This continues, with Ciaran even using her hair to write out the solution in air in front of him. After 30 minutes, Noah finished the test early, waiting another 10 minutes before handing it in. "Why'd you wait so long to hand it in?" Ciaran asked him. "My teacher probably would think I was cheating or something," Noah writes once he gets back on his desk. "Huh, So he must be one of those incredibly strict teachers right?" She says, looking over Noah's shoulder to read his response. "That's an understatement," He writes before flipping through his binder to today's homework. Ciaran nods in understanding before beginning to help Noah finish his homework. What would've taken 1 hour to 2 hours of his time, only took 20 minutes, allowing him to finish his physics homework just as first period ended. As Noah packs his bag and stands up to leave for his next class, one of his classmates, a guy he recognized as Ibrahim. Noah didn't know much about Ibrahim other than that he was kind of popular and that he didn't get the best grades. "Yo! I saw that you finished the homework quickly, so can you send me your homework over insta bro?" Ibrahim asks. "sure, what's your insta?" Noah replies, taking out his phone. Ibrahim tells him his username and Noah sends him a follow request. "Thanks bro," Ibrahim, dapping up Noah before leaving for his next class. Noah heads to his next class as well. Ciaran smiles widely. "Did you just make a new friend?" She asks excitedly. Noah takes out his phone, a cheap android, going to the notes app and typing out a response. "What? No of course not," Ciaran's smile fades. "Wait, why not? You talked to him in a friendly matter, Is that not how a friendship begins?" She asks in a confused tone. "Just because you talk to someone nicely, doesn't mean you're now friends. All I'm gonna do is send pictures of the homework to him," Noah types in response. "Oh so its like an one-sided transaction?" Ciaran asks, tilting her head in confusion. "I mean ya I guess but it's not like I'm doing much. It's gonna take maybe 5 minutes to send pictures of the homework," He types in response before putting his phone back into his pocket as he sits down at his desk. For the rest of the day, all of Noah's classes were going by with a breeze. Ciaran helped him out with the classwork and by the time school was over, he had no work to do after school. The only thing he had to do on his own that day was programming for his Java program, surprisingly Ciaran had no clue on how coding and computers worked. Luckily for Noah, Computer Science was a pretty light course for him. As Noah biked back to home, Noah had a huge grin on his face. Once he gets back to his room, he finally speaks to Ciaran since he was now in the security of his own home. "DUDE, YOU'RE AMAZING!" Noah exclaims happily before continuing. "I'll never have to homework again!" He says excitedly. Ciaran smiles too. "You are welcome Noah," She replies. "We seriously need to teach you how to smile," Noah says, looking at the wide, uncanny smile painted on her face. "Why? Am I doing it wrong?" Ciaran asks in concerned tone. "Uh don't worry about it right now, I'm just so happy right now," Noah says smiling again, causing Ciaran to smile again too. A few hours later, Noah had freshened up, sent Ibrahim his homework answers, and even got to spend sometime playing video games since he didn't have any homework to complete, and now, it was time for Noah to go to work. He put on his work uniform and took the elevator down to the first floor. While the elevator inched downwards, Noah checked his phone and noticed an email from his boss. He opened it and read what it said, his eyes quickly widening in horror. "Hey what is wrong Noah?" Ciaran asks, floating in the air next to him. Noah's gas stations, like many others had a fast food chain connected to it. Even though it never had happened to him, It wasn't uncommon at gas stations in his area to have people fill in at the restaurant if an employee was missing and vice versa. This would've been fine, except for one thing. Noah's gas station was connected to a waffle house. "I'm working a night shift at fucking waffle house," Noah says to himself as the elevator lands on the first floor.

The Most Dangerous Fast Food Restaurant

"What's wrong with this "Waffle House"? Is it not just a restaurant?" Ciaran asks as Noah bikes to work. "Well, yeah, it is a restaurant, but the main problem is the people who come to Waffle House," Noah elaborates, gripping his bike handles so hard that his knuckles turn white. "What kind of people come to the Waffle House? Are there bullies that come there? If so I'm sure we can beat them up!" Ciaran says with her usual and far too wide grin along with throwing a thumbs up. Noah looks at her deadpan and sighs. "Man, we need to teach you human life outside of young adult movies," He says. "As for your question, it's drunk assholes who tend to pick fights," Noah says, finally arriving at the gas station. The gas station was right by the only major road on this side of the city, route 39. Much like the rest of the city, the gas station was pretty shitty looking. Vines and moss grew on the outside of the store and the inside, mold had conquered the corners. Mysterious stains were on the wall and Noah would rather not learn what the stains were. Multiple gnomes could be found in the gas station, Noah could swear he would find more every day. Other than the various homeless people outside, the only other thing of interest would be the fucking oak tree growing through the middle of the store and bursting through the roof. Noah then walks into the gas station and is then ushered into the back of the Waffle House via a door that connects the two stores. Inside, the only way you could describe it was that it was nothing less than a warzone. Drunk laughter, shouting and the sound of the occasional salt shaker being flung across the restaurant filled the air. "OK YOU MUST BE THE REPLACEMENT RIGHT?!" One worker, an older 30-year-old-looking man yells at him. Noah nods in response. "WELL GOOD! NOW GET OUT THERE, JACKSON IS ALREADY OUT OF COMMISSION!" The man yells again as Noah's eyes drift to the unconscious body of a teen sprawled out on the kitchen floor. Noah gulps, throwing on a uniform before heading out into the fray. He takes an order of 32 waffles from some fat dude and quickly retreats to the back, Ciaran catching salt shakers before they could hit him and hurling them back. "I can see why you were scared to come here, It seems like a warzone!" Ciaran says with surprise as she begins helping Noah cook up the 32 Waffles since the chefs were busy with other gluttonous meals. He balances the gigantic stack of Waffles, which even with help from Ciaran, felt like an impossible task. Eventually, he reaches the table when he sees something that makes his blood run cold. It was another teen, dressed like your typical hoodlum throwing some terrible amalgamation of waffle and technology. It looked like the unholy lovechild of food and an iPhone pro max and it was heading right at his head. Ciaran was already occupied with trying to catch the salt shakers, so Noah had one option left. He winded back an uppercut before punching the creation, causing it to explode on impact. Luckily, the shrapnel from the abomination did not hit any customers. Noah then retreats back to the back and is immediately enslaved and put to work on making food since another person, this time some girl named Isabella, had quit on the spot and jumped out the window. Noah did hear the screech of a car after that happened but he chalked it up to nothing. "This is madness, how is a restaurant like this still allowed to operate?" Ciaran asks, her voice bubbling with disgust. "No clue Ciaran, Lets just focus on surviving the nightshift," Noah says with a sigh as he rushes in and out of the kitchen, serving food to the endless hoard of drunkards. The hours flew past as nothing of note happened, other than the occasional fights between two drunk assholes breaking out, which ended in seconds since 9/10 times, since both combatants ended up passing out due to the amount of alcohol in their system. Noah was now on sweeping duty when the door flung open and a foul order flooded the restaurant, immediately silencing everyone in the Waffle House. Noah finally looks at who's at the door and sees 7 foot tall man who was built like a super marine from War Hammer 40K, wearing a ripped and torn suit, and a dirty WWII gas mask. "Where is my tithe, House of Waffle," The giant says, his voice rough like sandpaper. "We're not gonna bend over like those bitches at Hooter's, Bartholomew," said the older woman who managed the counter. "Its Bartholomew Maligdin the 3rd, Margret," Bartholomew Maligdin the 3rd says before thundercunting a chair at Margret. Margret's hands glow a slight green(due to LEDs taped on her palms) as she deflects the chair, redirecting it completely. "Hm impressive," Bartholomew says before rushing towards Margret. Margret jumps over the counter, ducking under Bartholomew's punch before hitting him with a palm strike to the stomach, followed up with a kick to the nuts. Bartholomew Maligdin the 3rd roars in pain before slamming his fist down at Margret's skull. However, the attack is blocked by a . . . broomstick? "Long time no see, brother," The Waffle House owner, Bernard, says with a smirk. He had swooped in last second, blocking the attack with a broomstick. "It seems my books really are underselling the life of a human teen," Ciaran says, looking between the two brothers, who were locked in a face off. Bartholomew smiles. "I thought you already crumbled into dust," Bartholomew says with a dry chuckle before trying to sweep Bernard off his feet. Bernard jumps over the sweep before hitting Bartholomew's knee cap, causing him to falter, giving Bernard a chance to strike at Bartholomew's head. Bartholomew grabs the broomstick, reducing it to splinters before countering with a jab. Bernard blocks Bartholomew quickly rushes in at Bernard, who counters with a liver punch and uppercut. Bartholomew tanks this before grabbing Bernard by the arm and tossing him across the Waffle House. The Waffle House drunkards roared with cheers as they placed bets on who would win. Bernard stands back up and grins before getting back into a fighting stance. Bartholomew roars with rage before blindly rushing at Bernard. Bernard sidesteps before punching him in the liver again, following up with a uppercut to the sternum. "Not done yet!" Bernard yells with a grin, grabbing Bartholomew by the hair, pulling his face down before slamming him in the face with a chair. Bartholomew stumbles backward holding his face before taking something out of his pocket. "What kind of whistle is that?" Ciaran asks, tilting her head, now fully invested in the battle. Bartholomew lifts his gas mask slightly and plays a tune on the whistle before putting it away and pulling his gas mask down. Two giant 3ft long, New York street rats burst out of the ground and Bartholomew laughs loudly. "It's three against one," He says before rushing in once more. The two rats flank Bernard while Bartholomew charges straight ahead. Bernard decides to deal with the rat flanking his right first, throwing a punch against it. As Bernard punched the rat away, Bartholomew punches him square in the jaw, sending him flying to a random table. The other rat rushes in and Bernard grabs a knife from the table, swiftly gutting it. Bartholomew had already reached him at this point, grabbing him by the head before tossing him across the Waffle House once more. The remaining rat lunges at Bernard. Bernard grabs the rat before tossing it at a charging Bartholomew, the rat jumps off his face before lunging at Bernard again. Bernard now equipped with a Smith & Wesson model 29 .44 magnum revolver, shoots the rat. Bernard quickly turns the gun onto Bartholomew who stopped in his tracks. "Now get out of here, Bartholomew. I don't want to kill my last brother," Bernard says in a dead serious voice. Bartholomew chuckles. "And that's why you lost, big brother," Bartholomew says before injecting himself with some kind of syringe. Before Bernard could react Bartholomew rushed forward and punched him sending him flying out of the Waffle House, ending the fight. "SHIT HE'S ACTIVATED HIS FENT REACTORS!" Margret says before pointing at Noah. "YOU! YOU MUST FIGHT HIM!" Margret says, her voice filled with urgency. "HUH?! WHAT THE FUCK! NO IM NOT FIGHTING THIS GUY!" Noah quickly yells back. "IF YOU DON'T, I'LL GET YOU FIRED!" Margret yells back. "fuck, I can't get fired . . ." Noah mutters with a sigh. "Fine, ill fight you Bartholomew," Noah says, his voice filled with determination. Bartholomew exhales aggressively, his gas mask scrunching up as he inhaled. "ITS . . . BARTHOLOMEW MALIGDAN THE 3RD!" Bartholomew roars with rage, rushing far too fast than a thing of that size should be able to be. Ciaran quickly blocks the charge with a broom, giving Noah a opening, who strikes him straight in the nuts. Bartholomew continues to throw punches and Ciaran continues to block the attacks as Noah continues to attempt to hit his nuts. Bartholomew finally changes his tactic, thundercunting a chair at Noah, which Ciaran blocks only for Noah to get hit on the side by Bartholomew's fist. Noah goes flying for a split second, only for Ciaran to use her hair to tie up Bartholomew and pull Noah to him. Noah kicks him in the nuts again and Bartholomew roars, biting Noah's shirt and tossing him again. Ciaran uses her hair to land them both safely. Bartholomew injects himself with more fent before rushing at Noah. Ciaran pulls Noah out of the way before wrapping her hair around his fist as Noah winds up a punch. Noah unleashes a devastating punch to Bartholomew's side, sending him across the Waffle House. As the dust clears, Bartholomew stays standing, breathing heavily. Noah is on his knees, tired from the fight. Bartholomew chuckles darkly. "It seems I will receive-" Bartholomew begins before the doors swing open and Fetty Wap is heard blasting from some shitty JBL speaker. "What the hell happened here? . . ." Ibrahim says, looking around as his JBL speaker continued to blast Fetty Wap. As he looked around, Bartholomew roared with anger and lunged at him. "Ay what's yo problem bro?" Ibrahim says, sidestepping Bartholomew's lunge. Bartholomew roars again before bringing his fist down at Ibrahim who blocks using a broken table leg before Ibrahim could counter attack, he's launched away by a backhand. When Ibrahim lands, he sees Noah. "Oh yo Noah! Wassup bro?!" Ibrahim says looking him up and down. "Just working night shift," Noah says in a tired and defeated tone. "Were you fighting this guy?" Ibrahim asks, pointing at Bartholomew. Noah nods. "Well the fuck does he even want?!" Ibrahim says. "It is simple, I want my tithe from the House of Waffle," Bartholomew says in calm voice. "What the fuck is a tithe?" Ibrahim says in a confused tone. "He wants money, basically he's robbing us," Noah says. Ibrahim was now livid. "NAH WE CAN'T LET HIM DO THAT, C'MON NOAH! WE GOT THIS!" Ibrahim yells. Both Noah and Ciaran were oddly moved by proclamation. "Ya you're right, we got this," Noah says, standing back up. Bartholomew's mask scrunches up and he lets out a deep sigh before rushing at them. Ibrahim blocked the initial charge as Noah flanked Bartholomew kicking the back of his knee. Ciaran than used her hair to pull Bartholomew down. Bartholomew fell but quickly jumped back up before trying to punch Ibrahim. Ibrahim dodged before punching Bartholomew in the jaw. Noah kicked Bartholomew in the balls from behind and Ciaran had joined Ibrahim, punching along with him. Bartholomew then pulls a water bottle that had a mixture of god knows what in it before chugging it. Bartholomew suddenly went into a rage, moving faster than he was earlier and jumped around, throwing Ibrahim and Noah away. Bartholomew than ran at Noah who dived out of the way, with Bartholomew's back turned, Ibrahim smashed a chair into his back. Bartholomew turned to Ibrahim before he could hit him, Ciaran pulled his arm down. Ibrahim quickly jumped up from his arm before putting Bartholomew into a chokehold. "time to finish this," Noah muttered to himself as Ciaran wrapped her hair around his fist, pulling it back and unleashing a devastating punch on Bartholomew's balls. Ibrahim jumps down as Bartholomew falls face first on the floor the Waffle House. Cheers erupt from the Waffle House but some drunkards grumbled, having lost the money they bet on Bartholomew. "I better get a fucking raise," Noah says, breathing heavily. "HA! don't worry, I'll put in good word for ya kiddo," Margret says with a wide grin. Noah nods as Ibrahim checks his phone. "I guess he ran when this guy showed up," Ibrahim says, checking a message on Instagram. "Anyways, WE FUCKING DID IT NOAH!" Ibrahim says with a huge grin, slinging his arm over Noah's shoulders. "Yup, we did," Noah says with a chuckle. Ibrahim quickly takes some pictures and videos for his Instagram story before they both leave. "Hey see ya around," Noah says, dapping up Ibrahim. "Ya cya," Ibrahim responds. Right after saying their goodbyes, they both begin walking in the same direction. "You're going this way too bro?" Ibrahim asks. "Yup . . ." Noah says, walking his bike. An awkward silence falls over the both of them. This silence is soon broken by Noah. "So why did you come to the Waffle House?" Noah asks. "Well basically, one of my homies, Aaron, knocked himself out after making one of his fucking contraptions. It was some syrup bomb or some shit," Ibrahim says chuckling. Noah's eyes widen in surprise. "Oh ok," He says, shrugging it off. "Anyways, dude you were going fucking nuts in there!" Ibrahim says with a grin. "Like I've never seen nobody punch that hard, bet you made Mike Tyson jealous with that!" Ibrahim says laughing. Noah couldn't help but laugh too. "Thanks but I wouldn't have won without your help. Thanks for helping me out man," Noah says with a chuckle. "Ah no problem dude plus I can't have my answer sheet dying on me!" Ibrahim says breaking into laughter again and so did Noah As the two walked back, they continued to talk about the fight, laughing all the way. Soon enough, Noah reached his apartment building. Noah and Ibrahim dap each other up before he heads inside and enters the elevator. "Seems I was right after all huh?" Ciaran says with a smug grin. Noah sighs. "Ok ok, maybe Ibrahim isn't that bad," Noah grumbles. Ciaran chuckles. "Well you can believe whatever you want, I believe you just made a new friend," Ciaran says, poking Noah's side causing him to smile softly. At the Waffle House, a teen girl stood at the counter, stunned into shock by the events that took place. It wasn't the 7 foot tall raging homeless man that shocked him either, it was her co-worker, Noah. As she took off her name tag which read "Valerie", her mind constantly replayed the events in her mind. Somehow the entire time, it was as if Noah could move things with his mind. Stopping salt shakers while facing the other way, pulling Bartholomew's arm down, and the list went on. Valerie had to figure out what the hell was going on, luckily for her, she recognizes him as a guy in her period 3 accounting class. Tomorrow, she would get her answers.

Who you gonna call? Demon busters!

The next morning, Valerie woke up sharp at 5:30 am to start her morning routine. She goes to the washroom to shower, brush her hair and teeth, and do her makeup routine. She put some primer on her face before adding a light layer of concealer under her eyes and then putting on some lipstick. Then she changes out of her pink Hello Kitty pajamas into a black above-knee length skirt, white t-shirt, and a black denim jacket. Next, she had to gather her weapons. If she was right, Noah was a demon or at least made a deal with a devil. To her, it made perfect sense because how else could he have those powers of moving and stopping things along with the incredible speed and strength that he showed? On top of the fact that the second he started working at the Waffle House, some super powerful homeless man(who was also clearly a demon) also shows up, and she's heard supernatural rumors about the gas station next door where Noah usually works. So, she grabs a bottle of holy water, a cross, a bible, and of course some rope, just in case she has to do an exorcism. She takes a deep sigh and heads downstairs. She sees her mom, who is drinking coffee while typing away at her laptop. She looks at her bag, concealed within the weapons for her crusade. She decides to tell her mom, after all, she works at the church so she must know better than her on this matter. Valerie approaches her mom. "Hey Mom, I need your help with something," She says, sitting down next to her mom, and setting her bag on the ground. "What is it?" Her mom replies, continuing to type away. Valerie's voice was caught in her throat but finds her voice quickly. "So uh Mom, let's say you uhm think that one of your classmates is a demon-" She says, being cut off by her Mom. "What are you on about Valerie?! Just because your classmate may be rude, it doesn't mean they are a demon!" Valerie's mom yells. "Mom wait, just let me-" Valerie starts, only to be interrupted once again. "NO! I'm not going to listen to any more of this. I am tired and we both have church service tonight, so no I'm not going to listen to your fucking fairy tails," She says with a heavy sigh, rubbing her temples. "Wait what?! I thought we didn't have church service this weekend!" Valerie exclaims. "Yes, we do. Don't worry, we'll be back by tomorrow morning," Her mom says, taking her glasses off and setting them down on the table with a soft thud. "But I have a test tomorrow! I can't do church service, I need to study-" Valerie starts, only to be interrupted by her mom again. "Don't argue with me right now Valerie, you will be going regardless," Her mother says in a strict tone. Valerie doesn't respond and her mom sighs. "Now go, I'll drop you off at school soon," She says, going back to her work on her laptop. Valerie clenched her fist and headed upstairs, slowly, making sure she didn't slam her feet too hard. She held her breath, knowing if she exhaled too harshly in front of her mom, it would start a whole other argument. When she got to her room she sat down and exhaled heavily, she wasn't sad. She should've known that her mom would respond like that. This only made her more determined to exorcise the demon that was Noah. She wrote down her plan, going through a stack of paper complete with writing, doodles, and diagrams to make sure that she accounted for every single thing. Here's her plan: 1. Get her friends on board 2. Make a fake love letter to lure him out 3. Splash him with holy water 4. tie him up and begin the exorcism To Valerie, there was no possible universe where this could go wrong. Just as she reread the plan, her mom yelled at her to come downstairs. She rushes downstairs and throws on her winter jacket and boots before sitting in the back of her mom's 2017 Honda Civic. She listened to some music while looking out the window. It was snowing lightly outside and as the sun rose over the city, the light from it silhouetted the high-rise buildings and made the ice-covered trees sparkle like they were encrusted in gems. Eventually, the car ride comes to a stop in front of their school, unlike the other buildings it seemed especially grey. She says goodbye to her mom and exits the car. When she enters the school, she searches the sea of people for her friends. Which only takes seconds, as she spots a short girl with golden brown hair who is wearing a short skirt, baggy sweater with a white undershirt, a big red bowtie, slouch socks, and of course brilliantly done but toned down make-up. It was her best friend, Naho, or Nacchan as she called her. She heads over to talk to Nacchan, who as usual surrounded by at least 5 other girls, probably all gossiping as usual. "So, like I literately told her to dump him but like she just doesn't listen," Naho says, leaning on the other girls who giggled and dogpiled onto the gossip. The second Naho notices Valerie approaching her, she turns around. "Oh my god! Hey, bestie!" She says, wrapping Valerie into a brief hug. "Hey Nacchan!" Valerie responds returning the hug. The two as usual begin their morning gossip session, walking through the halls of the school with their other friends. "Like it's crazzy how this girl is literally copying my style," Naho says, rolling her eyes. "Ya like she is so jealous," One of the girls replies. "Ya, what a bitch," another girl pitches in. Valerie giggles at this and the gossip continues until the bell rings. "Oh shit I gotta go, my English teacher is gonna gut me if I'm late," Valerie groans, before waving bye to Naho. "Byyee girl!" Naho exclaims back at her, waving wildly before going back to her gossip. Valerie got to her English class just in time, sitting down at her seat. She takes out her notebook to take notes but doesn't take notes on the actual lesson, not really giving a shit about the lesson. Instead, she thought heavily about who out of her friends would be willing to help with her plan. After a couple of minutes, she realizes that all of her friends, except for Nacchan, would just make up some excuse to leave. After a bit of thinking, she decides that she'll just skip her second-period Hospitality class and meet up with Nacchan, then together they'll find some people to help them. Soon enough the bell rings and she leaves class, texting Nacchan to tell her to meet up at the atrium. Valerie weaved through the crowds of kids who, just like her were skipping class. She quickly spots her best friend and heads over. "Hey Nacchan," Valerie says with a sudden nervous smile. For some reason, she was nervous to tell Nacchan about her plan. Naho looks up from her phone. "Heeyy girl! Didn't think I would ever see you skipping class," She says teasingly. "I uh ya but I got something really important to tell you so it can't wait," Valerie says with an awkward chuckle. Naho raises her eyebrow. "wweell what is it?" she asks, crossing her arms. Valerie quickly explains everything from what happened at the Waffle House with Noah to her plan. "So uhm can you help me find some people to help out?" Valerie says, fidgeting with her fingers. "Ya of course I'll help!" Naho says with a cheerful smile. Valerie's face immediately lights up. "Thanks so much, Nacchan!" She says, giving her a quick hug "No problem girl," Naho says hugging her back. "Soo likee what kinda people do we need for the plan?" Naho asks, breaking the hug. "Uhh well we need someone smart and someone strong," Valerie responds. "Hmm," Naho mutters to herself before she perks up. "I totally know some people that can help us!" Naho exclaims with a grin before grabbing Valerie by the wrist and dragging her along. "She totes likes this Noah dude," Naho thinks to herself with a smirk as they head to the library. They both go to the back of the library where they see a skinny boy wearing black pants, a black button-up shirt, big square glasses, and incredibly messy hair. Sprawled over the table he was at were magazines, news clippings, and various devices with online articles. His eyes dart across all the forms of media as he vigorously takes notes and draws diagrams. "Are you sure this is our guy? . . ." Valerie whispers to Nacchan. "Yuh huh, this guy literally aces like all of his classes," Naho responds. "Uhh, I don't know . . . I mean he seems kinda . . ." Valerie trails off before making circles around the side of her head with her finger. "Well ya but if you need a smart guy to help you out, he's your guy," Naho says. Valerie sighs. "I'd rather not, lets just go find the strong person. I already made a love letter to lure the demon. We just need someone to help us overpower the demon," Valerie declares Naho shrugs. "Alright, if you say so," Naho says before leading Valerie out of the library. After a few minutes the arrive to some random corner in the atrium. Valerie sees a girl sitting on a bench there, the girl was wearing a loose grey hoodie, black sweat pants, black fingerless gloves, and weirdly bandages wrapped around her wrists like how martial artists would. Her face also had lots of scars, some of which were covered by bandages. "That's Emma, I've heard that she does underground fighting after school," Naho whispers to Valerie. Valerie eyes widen. "So she's a criminal?! no way in hell I'm working with her, maybe we can just catch Noah off guard and whack him," Valerie whispers back, pulling Naho away, who rolled her eyes and sighed. "Or you could just go up to him and tell him how you feel to lure him out," Naho says teasingly. "No, that would be to obvious," Valerie states. Naho sighs before following closely behind Valerie. The two go up to the second floor and to Noah's locker. Valerie takes out the love letter and slips it into his locker. The two of them then wait by the nearby stairwell, gossiping and talking about random stuff. Soon the bell rings and Noah walks out of his accounting class and to his locker. He opens the locker and grabs his lunch bag when notices the letter. "Oooh, you got a love letter!" Ciaran says excitedly. Noah rolls his eyes and opens the letter before giving it a read. "Hey Noah, I've been thinking about you a lot lately, and I just can't get you out of my head. I don't want to say too much, but I need to see you. Meet me at the back of the school tonight after the bell rings. I've got something I want to tell you... and I promise, it's worth it.Can't wait to see you.Yours, anonymous" Noah sighs and takes out his phone. "This shit's clearly AI generated, probably some asshole trying to prank me," He types out before crumpling up the letter and throwing it in the trash. "Aw man, I thought I would get to witness a human courting ritual," Ciaran says with a disappointed pout as Noah leaves for lunch. Valerie, who was watching Noah the entire time sighs. "Fuck! why'd he throw it out!" Valerie exclaims. "Well it seems that didn't work, who could've thought-" Naho says with a teasing smile. Valerie glares at her but sighs. "Ya, I guess that was pretty dumb . . ." Valerie says, looking down at her feet. "Ah, don't get all sad! We can still do this buuttt, we'll need someone like super smart," Naho says with a slight smirk, glancing over to Valerie. Valerie groans. "But he's a complete schizo!" She exclaims. Naho doesn't respond and just continues to look at Valerie who after a couple of seconds sighs. "Fine fine, we'll go talk to the schizo" She grumbles. "That's the spirit, now c'mon!" Naho says, taking them both to the library once more. The boy was still there, doing the exact same thing as he was before. Valerie sighs and goes up to him. "Hey-" She says being cut off as the guy jolts up, sitting straight before he quickly hides all of his papers and devices. He looks around rapidly in all directions, spotting Naho and Valerie. "Are you two trying to steal my work!" He exclaims, his words all jumbled up. "Wait what no-" Valerie starts only to be interrupted again. "No, no, no. You both must be spying on me, trying to tell the government about my work! I'm not stupid-" He says before being cut off by Naho. "Listen, I literally don't give a fuck about your stupid little papers. We're just here because we like need your help," Naho says, crossing her arms and leaning against a book shelf. Valerie nods. "Ya, uh basically, This guy named Noah is a demon so I need your help to exorcise him," She adds. The guy immediately perks up. "So you believe him to be a demon? Why would that be the case?" He says, his voice filled with curiosity. "Well he basically brings bad luck with him and uh like he has some weird magic or telekinetic powers," Valerie says. "Hm . . . Well take me to this Noah guy, I want to see something," He says, standing up. Naho looks at Valerie, who shrugs and then they both leave the library. "So like what's your name," Naho asks, the guy as they all walk around the school, looking for Noah. The guy looked left, right and left again before finally responding. "It's Alex," He says, his voice just above a whisper. "Uh nice to meet you Alex," Naho says, forcing a smile. Valerie suddenly stops them and points across the hall where Noah was walking, while typing away at his phone. Alex looks over and his eyes widen before stumbles backward. "are you ok?" Valerie whispers to him. Alex nods. "Ya but I see something behind him, its like a black mist almost," Alex whispers, stumbling over his words while staring directly behind Noah. Suddenly Noah stops walking. Seeing this, Naho pulls them into the crowd just as Noah looks right at where they used to be. After looking around for a bit, he shrugs, types something into his phone before walking away. ''Holy shit, he like totally sensed us or something," Naho says. "Believe me now?" Valerie asks Naho with a smug grin. "Whhaaatt, I believed you from the start girl," She says jokingly. Valerie rolls her eyes and chuckles. Alex was muttering to himself as he wrote down ideas on a notepad. "Uh you good there dude?" Valerie asks him. Alex nods. "I uh ya but I'm not sure if it is a demon, I've never heard of any reports of people describing demons as a black smoke like I saw or any reports of demons emitting a black smoke," Alex says glancing back and forth between his notes and Valerie. "Well if it isn't a demon then like what else could it be?" Naho asks, raising an eyebrow. "I think it could possibly be some type of eldritch entity latching onto Noah," He says. "What the hell is that? And why would it attach itself to a random high schooler?" Valerie asks, tilting her head in confusion. Alex sighs. "Basically an eldritch entity is a super natural creature, usually its used to refer to creatures from other dimensions. As for why, my current theory is that it could be here to cause chaos which it can exchange as currency. Which it could easily cause by attaching itself to a high schooler," Alex explains, waving his hands about as he does. Valerie and Naho look at each other before Naho speaks up. "Literally I lost you like 3 whole sentences ago," She says in a confused tone. Noah sighs. "Basically, a creature from another dimension that wants to cause chaos by attaching itself to Noah," He says. Naho lets out a soft "oooh" as Valerie thinks. "Isn't that just a demon? An entity that wants to cause chaos?" Valerie questions. Alex thinks for a minute. "Well when you put it like that, ya pretty much," He replies. "Anyways how are we gonna even exorcise this demon? My plan already failed pretty much," Valerie says. "Plus I got church service after school so I'm running out of time." Valerie says with a groan. "ya and like Noah works at the gas station after school so its like now or never," Naho adds. "Not necessarily," Alex says, both girls look at him and he continues. "Well basically, we could lure him to the church by doing two things: 1. remove the snacks, 2. Erase all the numbers for snack companies in their phone book and putting in the gas station's. This will force them to call the gas station owner to get snacks which would then force him to come to the church to deliver them," Alex explains. Before Naho could call his plan stupid, Valerie speaks. "That's brilliant! With the amount of young kids at the church, they'll need snacks for the 11 hours everyone will be there for!" Valerie exclaims. "But, we do need someone to actually help us physically because I doubt us 3 could do it," She adds, glancing at Naho who gives her a smug grin. Naho then leads them to the corner where Emma was still at. They all walk up to the girl and she clears her throat. Emma looks up at the three of them. "The fuck do y'all want," She says, eying them suspiciously. "Uh well I was wondering if you could help us-" Valerie starts, only for Emma to cut her off. "Who do you want me to beat up then eh?" She says, now paying attention to what they were saying. "We don't want you to beat up anyone," Naho says, rolling her eyes. Emma raises an eyebrow. "Then what is it," She says in a slightly annoyed tone. "Well uh we need your help to uh," She says, forgetting her train of thought. "We need your help to exorcise a demon," Naho says bluntly. "Wait what?" Emma says. Valerie nods in confirmation and Emma shrugs. "As long as I'm getting paid I don't mind," She says. Naho and Valerie both freeze up this. Their asses were BROKE, especially after their shopping spree at the mall 2 weeks ago. Alex then takes out $250 in cash and hands it to Emma. "Is this enough?" He asks. Emma's eyes widen. "What the fuck?! HELL YA IT IS!" She says with a grin. "Where the fuck did you get all that from??" Naho asks in a surprised tone. "I just have a small YouTube channel," He says with a shrug before showing his channel called "Third Eye Opened" which has . . . "3 MILLION SUBS?!" Naho exclaims, her eyes practically bulging at the amount. "Well I ain't complaining, no way I wont help y'all after getting paid $250," Emma says, counting her money. Valerie smiles and sighs in relief and they all explain the plan before she get's Emma's and Alex's Instagram. She then adds them all to a group. "Well cya tonight!" Valerie says, waving good bye as they all went their separate ways. Valerie was extremely giddy as she waited outside for her mom to pick her up, after all tonight she would exorcise a demon.

The Exorcism of Noah Herst

"Ciaran, I'm telling you it was probably nothing. I didn't see anybody when I looked there." Noah says as he bikes home from school. "Noah, my senses are 10 billion times more fine-tuned than your human senses. I assure you that somebody else can see or at least sense the presence of my being." Ciaran replies matter-of-factly, putting her hands on her hips. Noah rolls his eyes. "Not like we can do anything about it now anyways." Noah says, sighing. "Well tomorrow, our top priority will be to investigate this!" She proclaims, pointing up to the sky. "I got nothing better to do tomorrow, so ya, we'll just do that." Noah says as he arrives at his apartment building, locking his bike on the vines as usual. After a couple of grueling minutes in the elevator, they finally arrive at Noah's room. Noah quickly freshens up and checks his phone. It is Ibrahim, asking for homework as usual. Noah sends him pictures of his homework answers. An hour and a half later, Ibrahim messages again. "Thanks for the answers bro" Noah likes the message but the second he puts his phone down, he gets another ping. "Yo, do you play Marvel Rivals" Ibrahim messages. Ciaran, who was not so subtly observing Noah's conversation, immediately beams. "That's the game you always play right?!" She says in an excited tone. "Well ya." Noah says with a shrug as he types out a text to tell Ibrahim that he's busy. "Then why are you telling him that you're busy? He's asking you to play with him clearly." Ciaran says, raising an eyebrow. "Cause I don't feel like playing right now-" Noah says before being cut off by Ciaran. "You say that as you load up Marvel Rivals on your personal computer." Ciaran states motioning to the computer. "Well what I was going to say, is that I don't feel like playing with Ibrahim." Noah says but before he could send his message Ciaran snatched his phone. "You constantly complain about the random players that instalock dps and I'm sure playing with Ibrahim will save me from your rage after losing 14 matches in a row." Ciaran says, typing out a message to Ibrahim until Noah snatches the phone from her. "I just don't feel like it, I won't rage this time." Noah says as he types out a message to Ibrahim. Ciaran crosses her arms and rolls her eyes. "Ya sure, just give it a try! You'll have fun, trust me." Ciaran says, leaning over Noah's shoulder. "Will you stop bothering me if I do?" Noah says, with a sigh. "Yup! I shall examine the literature that you have brought from the city library and leave you to play." Ciaran states confidently with a nod of her head. "Alright, I'll play with Ibrahim." Noah says typing out a message telling Ibrahim that he's down to play. He then heads to his pc and boots up his pc as Ibrahim sends him a friend request. Ciaran smiles, pumping her fist and saying a soft but still audible "yes" before heading to read the books that Noah got from the library. 3 hours go by and Noah and Ibrahim are absolutely tearing up all the enemy teams they were going up against, with the MVP title switching between the two game after game. Ibrahim was using Venom while Noah used Spiderman. Their strategy was having Ibrahim go in with a dive to disperse the enemy team while Noah swung around back and pulled a player away from the group to kill them. It didn't matter at all what their teammates were doing since they were practically wiping teams on their own. Sadly for Noah though, he had to go to work soon. "Yo, I have to hop off now, I got work." Noah messages to Ibrahim. "Oh damn" Ibrahim messages, the three dots reappearing as he types his second message. "alr cya later bro" Ibrahim types after a second. "Bye" Noah messages before closing his pc and going to his wardrobe to get ready for work. A couple miles away, off in the calm suburbs of the inner city. White picket fences, perfectly mowed lawns, and a gate to keep out the poors- or that's what I assume the gate is for at least. Upstairs of one of the biggest houses in this community was a bedroom, the right-side wall was covered by a giant bulletin board with various pictures of things like aliens, cryptids, and of a certain three letter organization. All of which were connected with red threads. The backwall was where his twin size bed resided, above of which had another bulletin board with various old news paper clippings pinned to it. The left wall was his desk which was covered in papers and his desktop opened with hundreds of tabs on it. Above his desk were two shelves which were lined with various anime, cryptid, and D&D figurines. Beside the desk was a shelf stuffed full with books like 1984, animal farm, blood meridian, and some manga. And on the floor was an exhausted Alex, covered in crumpled up papers. Suddenly, he sat up straight adjusting his glasses and checking his watch. "I'm late!" Alex yelled, which was heard throughout the house and followed up by crashing noises. His parents, who were downstairs and watching tv together, looked at each other before heading the stairs. "Alex honey! Are you ok up there?" Alex's mother calls up. "I'm ok mom!" Alex yells back before shambling out of his room and rushing down the stairs. Surprisingly, Alex for once was wearing something that wasn't his school uniform from his last high school. Instead, he was wearing a pair of jeans that was a size too big, a messy turtle neck, and some creased dress shoes. Alex's father raises an eyebrow. "And what has you all dressed up today?" He asks an amused smile on his face. "I uh I'm going to hang out with a friend" Alex forces out. "You made a friend?!" His parents say simultaneously, their voices filled with surprise and shock but most of all, happiness. "Ya-" Alex responds before being cut off by his parents waves of questions: "Who are they?", "What's their name?", "Are they a boy or girl?", and so on so forth. Alex is unable to answer their questions but he also realizes something - he never got the names of the people he agreed to hunt an eldritch entity with. As he continues to think over this fact, he feels his palms get sweaty and his head start to hum with the familiar feeling of a headache. His parents, noticing this, calm down. "Oh We're so sorry honey, it's just that we're so happy for you!" His mom says, fidgeting with her hands. "Ya just what your mother said son, now c'mon get out there! Have a good time" His dad says with a chuckle and a wide smile. "Uhm ya, I will." Alex says, forcing an awkward smile as grabs a jacket. "Just remember to not be home too late ok?" His mom says. Alex nods. "I won't, bye!" Alex says, rushing out the door. As the door shuts, his parents let out a deep sigh before embracing each other tightly. Alex's mom pulls back, looking up at her husband. "He did it honey, he really made a friend!" she says with a soft smile. Meanwhile, Noah had already begun his work inside the gas station. The store as usual was basically empty except for the occasional trucker coming in to buy gas and a six pack of beer or their driving juice as they call it. Noah sat behind the counter scrolling on his phone while he listened to a podcast, he had already finished all his other duties like sweeping the floors and stocking the shelves, mostly due to Ciaran helping him to multitask. As he scrolls through his phone, he hears the ever so familiar clunking as something crawled through the vents. "The gnomes are back" Noah grumbles under his breath as he stands up. "Gnomes? There are small porcelain men in the vents?" Ciaran asks, looking up from the book she was reading. "Ya, I have no clue who puts them in there" Noah says, climbing up the oak tree and sitting on one of its lower branches to get to the vents. He then pries the vent open with a screwdriver causing 3 gnomes to fall out of the vent and into Noah's arms. Just as Noah finishes reaching the ground, another loud thump is heard from the vents. Noah groans, putting the gnomes down before climbing back up. "Seems it'll be a long night for you." Ciaran comments, looking up at Noah who precariously hangs from a tree branch to get to the vent. "Instead of pitying me, can ya help me out??" Noah huffs as he opens the vent and a torrent of gnomes spill out, causing him to slip, fall and be buried in the small pile of gnomes. He pops out of the pile and sighs while Ciaran laughs her ass off. Meanwhile, Valerie was stuck within her mom's car as they drove towards the church. She stares out the window, watching as the clean and tall buildings of downtown shift into old and decrypted buildings. After a few grueling minutes of seeing the same gross streets, they finally arrive at the church. The church, unlike it's surroundings was incredibly clean. They both enter the church and their both quickly approached by the other church moms. "Hey Samantha!" One middle aged woman with short blonde hair says as she gives her mom a hug. The two quickly begin their small talk, flexing their children's achievements like how Valerie would flex the shiny Pikachu she caught on her game boy. Just as Valerie was about to sneak away to find Naho, the auntie immediately turned to look at her. "Valerie! Oh how are you doing honey!" She says with a wide smile. "I'm good, what about you?" Valerie says with a tight lipped smile. "Oh I'm having a wonderful day, thanks for asking hun." She says in a cheery tone as her eyes scan over Valerie. "My my, I swear it feels just like yesterday when you were so little." She says pinching Valerie's cheek. Valerie just gives a slight nod. "So when are you getting married? You're so big now, I'm sure you at least got a boyfriend!" The auntie says teasingly causing Valerie to freeze up slightly. "What? No! Of course not." Valerie says, pulling away "Well if you're interested, I could set you up with Margret's son-" She says before being cut off by Valerie. "I uh I gotta go help with the church service. Bye." Valerie says before quickly leaving, letting out a deep sigh once she's out of the auntie's range. She scans the crowd of people who were loitering around as they waited for the service to start, she couldn't spot Nacchan but she did spot the familiar and disheveled form of Alex in a wrinkly and un ironed polo. "Hey Alex, have you seen Naho or Emma?" She says, walking up to him. Alex jumps a little and he whips around to face her. "Oh uhm hey, I haven't. I was just looking for you all." "Oh ok, well c'mon lets check the basement. I bet they'll be there." Valerie says as she stares out at the area, calculating the best route to take to avoid any more aunties from prodding into her love life. She then begins to sneak to the back of the church where the stairs were, Alex follows behind, his eyes constantly darting about. They arrive at a faded and scratched up oak door, Valerie gives it a soft push causing it to slowly creak open, revealing the rickety wooden stairs that descends into the darkness. They two walk down the stairs, the stairs creaking, taunting them with the threat of collapse. After the stress inducing climb down the stairs, they reach the basement, which unlike the stairs was well lit. The basement was dominated by children and bored teenagers, various children's books(Mainly bible storybooks) in the bookshelves and brightly colored carpets. Valerie's eyes dart about, her eyes quickly land on Nacchan, who was chatting up a grumpy looking girl in a grey hoodie. Valerie walks over, Alex right behind her. "Hey Nacchan-" Valerie starts before her brain fully processes what Naho was wearing. "What the fuck are you wearing??" Naho, who was wearing a full nun outfit and a cross necklace smiles brightly."Heeyy girl! I thought I'd dress for the occasion, I mean we are exorcising a demon right?" She says, wrapping Valerie in a quick hug. Valerie rolls her eyes and chuckles. "Fair enough I guess." After a moment, the two pull away from the hug. "Alright so what's the plan?" Valerie asks, looking at everyone. "Well I took sometime to make a map of the church." Alex says, glancing side to side before pulling out a full in detail map of the church's both floors from his back pocket. Everyone's eyes widen in surprise. "So we need to get rid of all the snacks from here." He says pointing at a cupboard on the map. "Luckily for us there isn't too many snack to get rid of but unluckily for us, there are a few adults stationed there to guard the snacks." "I can just knock them out." Emma says with a shrug. "Probably not the best idea, we'll get caught for sure if there's any sort of struggle. The walls here are paper thin." Valerie says. "I can cause a distraction and then Emma can sneak in and get rid of all the snacks." Naho says. "Sure, then me and Valerie can write down the name of the gas station in the phone book along with this fake ad I made." Alex says, holding a poster for "Stop&Go Convenience". Everyone nods. "Alright lets do this then!" Naho exclaims putting her hand in the middle of the group. Everyone stares blankly at the hand for a second. "So no 3 2 1 team? Man you guys are no fun." Naho says with a slight pout. Valerie chuckles and Emma rolls her eyes. "Let's just get this going gringos, I wanna box a demon." Emma says impatiently. Then just like that, everyone disperses. Naho goes to the children. "Hey there kiddos!" She says cheerfully. The kids ignore her, busy acting out some storyline involving Godzilla, Superman, and Spiderman. Naho's eye twitches as she tries again, this time clapping her hands. Once again, she's promptly ignored. Meanwhile Valerie led Alex to the phone room, which was upstairs. As the two walked to the back of church, they bumped into the pastor. "Oh hey there Valerie, how're you doing this fine evening." The pastor asks with a wide smile, his cheerful voice loud and booming. "Oh uh I'm doing good Pastor Samuel." Valerie says. "That's great!" Samuel says with a chuckle before his eyes drift to Alex. "And who is your friend over here? I don't think I've ever seen him here at the church before." Valerie freezes up slightly but Alex quickly juts in. "I uh I'm planning on converting so I came to check out the church, Valerie is just showing me around!" Alex says, the words shooting out of his mouth like a rapid fire machine gun. Pastor Samuel raises a slight eyebrow before his face contorts back into his usual bright smile. "Haha! Well that's great son! I do hope that you're able to find your way here at the Church." He says, patting Alex's shoulder with a surprising gentleness for a man of his stature. "And good on you Valerie for showing this young man around, your mother would be proud." He says, his voice softening. "Thanks Pastor Samuel" Valerie responds with a small smile. Samuel chuckles. "Well, you two have fun exploring now. Just make sure to make it in time for the sermon." He says before walking away. The two then sneak into the phone book room, luckily for them, all the other adults were busy socializing. Even though it wasn't a Sunday, there was still a huge turn up which wasn't super unexpected. So, they quickly wrote down the number for the convenience store and slipped the poster into the book before heading downstairs to see how Naho and Emma were doing. "What the fuck-" Valerie says, her eyes widening. The basement was in complete chaos, all the small children were running around playing tag while the adults struggled trying to calm them down. Through the sea of toddlers, they spot Naho and Emma standing near the back. They run over, dodging the occasional stray toddler running through. "What the fuck did you do Nacchan!?-" Valerie asks. "Don't worry about it girl, we got rid of all the snacks." Naho says with smile. Valerie just sighs in response. "Well whatever you did worked at least. Now we just have to wait for them to place the order from the convenience store." Alex says with a exhausted sigh before putting in some wired headphones and sitting down in the corner. Noah and Ciaran had just finishing dealing with some naked drunk dude in a Venus flytrap costume, painted completely green and was scooting around in a plant pot. The guy had been insisting to Noah to "Eat him like a bug" luckily, they were able to kick him out of the store. Noah was now laying his head facedown on the service counter. "I fucking hate this job." He mutters before the he hears the ring of the bell as the door opens. He looks up to see his boss so he immediately sits up straighter. "Oh uh hey boss, what's up?" He asks nonchalantly. "I need ya to run over to the church out on Wainscott to make a snack delivery, I already got the stuff ya need to deliver outside so just take your bike and go." His boss says with a sigh as he smoked a cigarette. Noah nods before heading out to do just that. Ciaran grabs the box of snacks, floating beside Noah as he begins the bike ride to the church. The occasional person they pass stares wide-eyed at the box of snacks floating in the air beside Noah. After roughly half an hour of biking, he arrived at the church. He used to go here with his mom and dad so he was anxious to get the fuck out of here as quickly as possible. Ciaran hands him the box so the church wouldn't burn him at the stake for witchcraft or some shit. As if reading his thoughts, Ciaran speaks. "That's a big assumption." Ciaran says laying down in the air, her limbs sprawled out as if she was floating in a swimming pool. Noah rolls his eyes as he heads to the back of the church to drop it off, since he didn't want to disturb the sermon going on. As he rounded the corner, he was immediately punched in the gut, causing him to drop the box. Noah doubles over but before the assailant could strike again, Ciaran goes to attack them. "EMMA, MOVE TO THE RIGHT!" A shrill voice yells from further away. The attacker, who Ciaran could now see was a girl with a baggy grey hoodie with the hood pulled over her head, weaves to the right, causing Ciaran to miss. The girl goes for an uppercut, which misses as Ciaran pulls Noah back. "WOAH! WHAT THE FUCK?!" Noah yells as the girl rushes at him again. Ciaran, puppeting Noah's body helps him to expertly weave all of the jabs. Noah continued to yell, trying to tell her to stop but the girl ignored him completely. Noah throws a jab back, the girl quickly weaves before going for a left hook, which Ciaran pulls him out of the way of. Ciaran tries to counter attack but the same voice from earlier calls out. "DUCK!" The voice yells. The girl listens, dodging Ciaran's counter. Noah looks up to see a kid wearing a messy ass polo and big ass glasses. Ciaran follows his gaze and her face lights up in recognition. "HA! That's the kid who can see me! I freaking told you!" Ciaran exclaims smugly. "Can you just get him to stop seeing you??" Noah hisses through gritted teeth. Ciaran nods, as she shoots towards the nerd. The second she does so, Noah gets hit with a left hook and a jab. Then two more girls come from the side, tying him up with a rope while the other takes out a cross and pocket bible.t The girl with the bible began chanting when suddenly, the scream of the boy is heard. "AAH! I CAN'T SEE IT!" He exclaims looking around left to right. The girl began to say the prayers faster. Ciaran shows up, quickly freeing Noah before slapping the two girls away. The boxer girl comes back but without her lookout, Ciaran is able to get some hits. As Ciaran and Noah continued to fight the girl, a giant cross slammed into the ground between them separating them. "Now I was wondering why you weren't at the sermon Valerie but this is just disappointing." Pastor Samuel says shaking his head. "Wait you don't understand! He's like possessed by a demon!" Valerie exclaims. Emma now fully convinced nods rapidly in agreement but Samuel just exhales deeply, his entire mountain of a body heaving with it. "HOLY SHIT! THANK YOU FOR GETTING OUT HERE! THESE GIRLS JUST JUMPED ME OUTTA NOWHERE!" Noah yells. "Well you used some like magic or something so we're not wrong." Naho says, crossing her arms. "Well, I am not sure what would compel you to attack this young man here and frankly, I do not care. I want you to apologize immediately." Samuel says sternly, crossing his arms. "But-" Valerie tries to argue. "No buts or I'll tell your mother. Now all of you come apologize including you back there." He says glancing over at Alex. The 4 of them gather and mumble out apologizes. Samuel sighs and shakes his head. "I am so sorry about this son but I do hope you can find the strength within you to forgive them." He says, putting a hand on Noah's shoulders. "What!- They beat me up and tried to exorcise me!" Noah exclaims. "I know, I know and I apologize for this deeply but their intentions at heart were not malicious." He says softly. "Ya but they still beat me up." Noah says stubbornly. Pastor Samuel's shoulders heave softly with a sigh. "Well I cannot argue against that. Well, at least let me try to make it up to you." He says before beginning to head into the church, motioning everyone to follow them. "Come, join us for dinner." "Uh I think I'm good, I gotta head back to work-" Noah says. Pastor Samuel chuckles. "Don't worry, I'll tell the old man to give ya a break. Now come on in plus, some free food never hurt nobody now did it?" He says raising an eyebrow. "Fine, I guess I'll come." Noah says reluctantly. Noah begins to slowly follow Pastor Samuel and the other kids back inside. "So how'd you make the kid stop seeing you?" Noah whispers to Ciaran. "Oh, I just put a mini version of myself in his head." Ciaran says with a chuckle. Noah glanced at Alex who was rubbing his head and looked around rapidly. Noah could swear he faintly heard the voice of Ciaran blabbing on about some random 2000s children's book coming from him. "Holy shit you're evil." Noah whispers with a soft chuckle. "It's not that bad plus his brain was already pretty fucked up." Ciaran says with laugh as the two enter the church.

Some Dumbass Set the School on Fire

Noah sat, head on his desk, as he listened to the early morning blabbering of his physics teacher, who was going over the video lesson they had to watch for homework, with the occasional comment about his wife or daughter. Noah, of course, hadn't watched the video. I mean, when you have an eldritch thing that thinks your physics is basic kindergarten science, why would you? Disregarding the slight existential crisis that came with that information, all Noah could think about was how tired and sore he was. This week was absurd in the weirdest way possible. Tuesday night, he met Ciaran, whom he has come to see as a blessing. Wednesday night, he fought a 7-foot-tall, raging homeless man named "Bartholomew". He wonders what happened to the guy, you'd think something like that would be on the front of the local news. Then yesterday, he got jumped at a church. At least the weekend was basically here, he just had to get through the day. Eventually, his physics teacher finished the lesson and told everyone what questions we had to do from the homework packet. Noah flipped to the said questions and Ciaran, as usual, began helping him out. Within 15 minutes, he had finished up, so he went back to lying his head down on his desk. His thoughts resume, specifically about what took place yesterday. He was still pissed at the goon squad that jumped him, thinking he was some kind of demon. It wasn't all bad, though. After the jumping, he was invited to join the church dinner. Which was amazing, he was expecting it to be some terrible chicken casserole or something, but instead he had the best mac and cheese he's ever had, along with fried chicken, Cajun catfish, and a bunch of other dishes. The cherry on top was the sweet old black lady who called him "sweetheart" after putting the food on his plate. The other cherry on top was the priest letting him take 5 boxes of leftovers back with him. With that said, the dinner itself was pretty awkward. He had to sit next to the people who jumped him, which led to a very quiet and very tense dinner. These thoughts were then cut off when he heard the soft scraping of the cheap school chair at the desk next to him before the audible creak of someone sitting down. "Yo, wassup bro?" Noah looks up and sees none other than Ibrahim. "Sup." He responds, sitting up straighter. "Nothing much," Ibrahim says, his eyes drifting to Noah's paper. "Holy shit, you're already done???" He exclaims. "Yup, need help?" Noah asks, rubbing his eyes so that they don't shut close. "Yes, I'm so lost right now." Ibrahim says, taking out his notebook. Noah nods before he begins to explain how he solved the questions, It takes Ibrahim a good bit but he finally understands how to do it. "Thanks dude." He says with a small smile before turning his attention to his paper. After 30 excruciating minutes of trying not to fall asleep, the bell finally rings and Noah is freed from his torture and gets up, grabbing his bag and jacket. He begins to speed walk out of the classroom, as he does, he feels some grab his shoulder. He turns his head to the right and sees Ibrahim. "Wanna go grab drinks during lunch?" Ibrahim asks him nonchalantly. Noah's eyes practically bulge out of their sockets. "What?? No of course not, we're underage!" Noah says, a dumbfounded expression on his face. Ibrahim looks at him blankly as he forms a thought before a look of realization flooding his face. "I meant grabbing some Arizona tea or something! I can't even drink alcohol, its completely haram for me dude." Ibrahim says with an embarrassed chuckle, his hand rubbing the back of his neck. Noah lets out an "ooh" in understanding. "Uh I don't really have any money on me today." Noah responds. "It's all good, I can pay for you." Ibrahim responds with a slight shrug. "Nah seriously, you don't have to-" Noah says, shoving his hands in his pockets. "C'mon bro, you've helped me out with a bunch of homework, its the least I can do. Plus you look like you could use a monster or something." Ibrahim says with a chuckle. Ciaran, observing the entire situation grins. "Noah, go for it!" She says in her usually glitchy voice. Noah, without any reason to refuse and with Ciaran's constant nagging, nods his head. "ya sure, I'll see ya at lunch." Noah says giving a wave before heading to history class. Ibrahim waves back. "See ya later bro!" Ibrahim says before heading to his next class. "He wants to hang out with you, hate to say I told you so buuttt I knew you both would become friends." Ciaran teases while floating through the halls next to Noah. "Asking someone to get iced tea with you isn't that big of a deal." Noah grumbles with a sigh, to which Ciaran only responds to with a teasing smile. As Noah walked down the hall, he mentally braced himself. You see, his physics class is filled with your average, completely normal students but his second period history class is filled with, to say the least, mentally challenged people. Not mentally challenged as in they have any mental illnesses or disabilities but more so the type of mentally challenged that made one think putting lead into a Chromebook to make it start smoking an ingenious idea. He walks in and immediately saw the chaos taking place in the classroom. A group of kids at the back were circled around 2 other guys who were wrestling. In the middle of the class, some kids were fucking around with the Chromebooks, one of whom he recognized. It was the hoodlum who threw that waffle thing at him on Wednesday night, who apparently was Ibrahim's friend Aaron. He sighs heavily before sitting down in the front right corner, making sure to stay as far away as possible from the 0.5 GPA bandits. His History teacher, an older, balding man, stares off into space and he can't help but feel bad for the old man. "It's even more rowdy than yesterday." Ciaran comments, looking around. "It's Friday, they're celebrating." Noah says with a sigh, taking out his history binder. "And why would they be celebrating? It is not that big of a deal is it?" Ciaran asks, tilting her head. "Oh ya, I've never told you how the week works. Basically, its now the end of the week so we get two days of no school." Noah explains. "Interesting, well in that case, I can sympathize with their cause of celebration." Ciaran says with a nod. "But it does make them look . . . unevolved." She adds, various eyes appearing at the ends of her hair which flows around to observe the chaos surrounding them. Noah stifles a laugh. "Ya that's for sure." He says, a small smile appearing on his face. The teacher gets up to begin teaching so Noah stops talking to Ciaran, wanting those extra marks from the teacher by pretending to pay attention. Even pretending to focus was a difficult task with the hooligans do dumb shit in the background. Any kind of whimsy was quickly wiped off his face, replaced with a blank stare and a headache. It was gonna be a long period. Valerie sat in her seat, typing away at her Chromebook with an earbud in one ear. She was listening to a 10 hour video about every single cryptid in every single continent. The video was from Alex's channel, Third Eye Opened. She decided to watch the video last night while she was at the church out of curiosity since she was incredibly bored. So, while she helped around at the church and supervised the hell spawn that were the little kids, she began chewing through the 10 hour video. What surprised her wasn't how detailed the video was but more so how not annoying his voice was, she expected his voice to how it was in person but nope, it was surprisingly smooth and put together. That along with how he broke down the full history of each cryptid really caught her interest. She was never into anything like cryptids and conspiracy but after getting through 6 hours of this video, she had a bunch of questions which brought her to her current dilemma: Should she skip accounting to talk to him? She was leaning toward the direction of wanting to, I mean its not like her mom would give a shit if she skipped accounting. That and she really wanted to talk to him, she had to ask him all about the video and about the cryptids. I mean who wouldn't want to learn more about some weird alligator looking thing with a propeller on its tail and a singular spike on its back called a "Snoligoster"? With little mental back and forth, Valerie decided that she was gonna skip to find Alex in his usual spot. After coming to this conclusion, she began paying attention to the video once again, which was now talking about a cryptid called the "Not Deer" but her listening was soon interrupted by the sound of the fire alarm. Noah stood outside in the -10 degrees Celsius weather, staring up at the window of his History classroom out which smoke bellowed out from. His history teacher took attendance, while his classmates were celebrating as if they were NASA scientists celebrating Neil Armstrong's moon landing. Noah and Ciaran stare deadpanned at the school. "How did you end up at this hell hole again?" Ciaran asks. "I have no fucking clue Ciaran." Noah responds with a heavy sigh. As Noah looks around he sees someone walking towards his class, the person being Ibrahim. He decides to go on his phone, assuming Ibrahim was just gonna walk past him to meet with Aaron. "Yo wassup Noah." Ibrahim says, his hand outstretched. Noah looks up from his phone. "Oh uh hey." Noah responds, dapping up Ibrahim. "So wanna go grab some drinks now?" Ibrahim asks. "We shouldn't go right now, I mean the school just got set on fire." Noah responds, putting his hands in his jacket pockets. "Eh its fine, I mean we're gonna get the day off while they investigate, nobody is really gonna give a shit." Ibrahim says with a shrug. "Seriously, we should go once everything is settled." Noah says, adverting his gaze from Ibrahim and back to the school. The fire had now spread with smoke now bellowing from multiple windows. Ciaran taps his shoulder. "Just go Noah, you're not gonna get another chance. Plus I am getting annoyed by the . . ." Ciaran trails off, turning to look at Noah's classmates as she searches for a word. "'hoodlums'" Ciaran says tentatively, testing the word on her tongue. Noah then looks over at Aaron and the others. "Why don't you just go with Aaron, he'll wanna go with you." Noah says, motioning to behind himself. Ibrahim sighs. "I don't want to go with him bro, why don't you want to hangout?" Ibrahim says in an irritated tone. "Noah, you did agree to hangout with him. Bailing on him would be quite rude in my opinion." Ciaran says, crossing her arms. Noah thinks it over. Ciaran wasn't entirely wrong but he didn't get why he had to hangout with Ibrahim. I mean circumstances changed and plus he's not even friends with Ibrahim. At the same time, he understood that Ciaran had a point and that he was making excuses on not to go. I mean, its not like the school could call his parents. Noah fidgets with his hands, an awkward silence falling as he thinks. Ibrahim looks at Noah, his face scrunched up with a frown but as the seconds tick by, his face softens. Ibrahim realized that he was pushing it, I mean Noah wasn't exactly the most social guy, even Ibrahim could see that. "Hey sorry man, uh you don't gotta go." Ibrahim says, putting his hand on the back of his neck. "Nah nah, its all good bro. Let's go, it's not like we're gonna get in trouble." Noah says. Ibrahim raises an eyebrow in surprise before shrugging it off. He then begins walking and Noah walks next to him. An awkward silence follows them like a rain cloud in a cartoon. "So did you see the new Marvel Rivals update?" Ibrahim asks after almost 5 minutes of walking silently. "Ya, Mr. Fantastic looks like a lot of fun to play." "Ya he's moving like fucking Luffy." Ibrahim says with a chuckle. "Ya, his ultimate is basically gear 4 bounceman." "Ya." Ibrahim says with a nod. The short small talk was like a dinky little umbrella trying to protect them against a typhoon of awkward silence. As the silence continues, Ciaran pokes Noah hard. Noah fidgets with his hands. "So do you watch one piece?" "Nah, I just know about it because my little brother is always watching it. The opening has practically become our houses theme song with how many times I've fucking heard it." Ibrahim responds with a chuckle. "If I had to hear the one piece opening for the 12th time after getting whooped on Marvel Rivals, I'd commit a felony." Ibrahim laughs. "Dude, every time I hear the one piece opening, I get PTSD like a veteran." "I could imagine, I would too honestly." Ibrahim nods. "So what have you been watching?" "I haven't really been watching much recently but I've been reading some manga." "Which ones are you reading? I've been reading a lot of Doomspire Crusaders recently" "Wait, really?! I've been reading that too, who's your favorite character?!" Noah exclaims, a small grin spreading across his face. "Jilian easily" Ibrahim says, a grin growing on his face as well. "So . . . " Noah says, pausing dramatically. "What woman is your type?" He says, trying not to laugh. "TALL WOMEN!" Ibrahim exclaims, dapping up Noah who was laughing hysterically. They had just arrived at the shop and some geezers who were buying way to many lottery tickets, turn their head to look at the two rowdy teens and Noah quickly quiets down but Ibrahim continues to chatter loudly about the manga. "Dude, I didn't think I'd find a fan of Doomspire Crusaders! It's hella underrated" Ibrahim says with a smile as he picks up some mango flavored iced tea. "Ya same here! Arc 5 was so good, Solaris went so hard as a villain" Noah says, picking up a can of ginseng iced tea. "Ya, easily the best villain so far" Before Ibrahim could go to the counter to pay, Noah puts his hand on his shoulder. "Yo, trust me. Get the ginseng" Ibrahim shrugs. "Sure why not" He says, replacing his mango flavored tea to the ginseng. Ibrahim pays for both of their drinks and then they leave the convenience store. Ibrahim takes a gulp of the tea while Noah just kept his in his bag, considering he didn't want a freezing cold drink when it was below freezing. "Ay man this is pretty good" Ibrahim says, exhaling after chugging a quarter of the can. "I told ya" Noah says putting his hand as he watches his breath crystalize in front of him. The two walk in silence once more but it was a new kind of silence, a comfortable silence that you'd expect between two bestfriends. Naho looks all around, it had been about 10 minutes since one of the guys set the school ablaze and she expect her girl, Valerie, to come meet her. Taking matters into her own hands, Naho weaves through people, strategically picking routes that avoid her gossip girlies so that she wouldn't get sucked into a 20 minute gossip side quest. "OH YA! WHAT MAKES YOU THINK IM MAKING IT UP!" A shrill voice yells. "WELL IT SEEMS LIKE BULLSHIT THAT APPARENTLY YOU DON'T KNOW IF THERE ARE CRYPTIDS HERE WHEN YOU MADE A 10 HOUR LONG VIDEO ABOUT CRYPTIDS!" Valerie's voice yells back. Naho quickly pushes through the crowd to see Valerie and Alex, face to face like two angry dogs. Naho stifles a laugh and quickly snaps a photo to blackmail Valerie with later. "WELL, SORRY THAT I DON'T KNOW IF SOME RANDOM TOWN IN NEW YORK HAS CRYPTIDS OR NOT!" "Well, if you can't take me on a cryptid hunt, I guess they aren't real" Valerie says, crossing her arms. Alex's eye twitches from under his thick glasses. "OH YA?! ILL SHOW YOU, THIS WEEKEND! I'LL FIND A CRYPTID!" Alex says, pointing his finger at her dramatically before leaving. Valerie smiles to herself before feeling a dark presence behind her. Before she could turn around, Naho slaps her ass hard. Valerie deadpanned and just stared at her as Naho laughed her ass off. Valerie stayed like this for a moment before becoming incredibly flustered on realizing that Naho might've saw her whole argument with Alex. "Annnywaayys, Valerie do you wanna like get outta here? It's like totally not a vibe." Naho says, motioning to the school which now had some fire fighters at it to fight the raging inferno. Valerie rapidly nods. "Ya, lets go get boba." She says before walking alongside Naho, who as usual was talking about drama and any other random topic that crossed her mind. Valerie nodded along and actively gave responses but really her mind was looking forward to tomorrow's hunt for cryptids.

Not-Deer Killed in Illegal Fighting Club

"Conspiracy log #23," Alex wrote in an old, beaten leather notebook. After underlining the heading, he continued to write. "It is currently 5:32 am, Saturday, November 20th. I am currently on the outskirts of the northeastern woods on the outskirts of the city." After writing this into the book, he closes it, putting it into an inner pocket of his coat. He rubs his hands together, blowing hot air into his numbed hands. "Where is she? She is incredibly late." He grumbles, looking at the dark, dead trees around him. Their branches outstretched like bony hands. It uneased him to say the least. "What a jerk, I should just go home. I guess she just wanted to prank me." He mutters under his breath, standing up from the log. As he walked away, keeping his eyes focused on his boots as they crunched through the light layer of snow. Suddenly, he bumped into someone causing him to fall flat on his ass. "Look where you're going dummy!" Alex yells out, scrambling back up to berate whoever had ran into him full force. "WELL I'M RUNNING LATE!" The other person yells, getting in Alex's face. Alex gets up in the person's face as well. "SO WHAT? MAYBE LOOK WHERE YOU'RE RUNNING!-" He yells back until cutting himself off. "VALERIE?!" "ALEX?!" "WHERE WERE YOU?! I WAS WAITING FOR HALF AN HOUR! ITS COLD OUT HERE YOU JERK!" "WELL WHO THE HELL HOLDS A CRYPTID HUNT AT 5AM ON A FUCKING SATURDAY?!" "DO YOU WANT TO FIND A CRYPTID OR NOT?!" "YA BUT WHAT KIND OF CRYPTID ARE WE EVEN LOOKING FOR" Alex takes a deep breath, holds it, and then exhales. His breath crystalizes in front of him and dissipates just as quickly. "Did you not read the document I forwarded you??" He says, rubbing his temples. "It was 40 pages, I got to page 3 before passing out" Valerie admits sheepishly. Alex sighs once more and adjusts his glasses. "The cryptid we are hunting is a prolific cryptid known as the 'Not-Deer'-" "Ooohh ya, I remember listening to your section about it in the video but aren't those guys supposed to be all the way in Appalachia? We're all the way in New York." Valerie asks, tilting her head. "If you read the doc, there were a bunch of sightings of white tailed deer with strange features. For example, one hunter said that a deer had far too many eyes and another one spotted one with hands at the end of its antlers." "Oh that's freaky" Valerie says, cringing slightly. "So do you have a gun or something? I mean your dad probably hunts-" "That's a pretty big assumption-" "Not like I'm wrong" "Fair enough but no I did not steal my dad's hunting rifle." "So . . . You're telling me, YOU DIDN'T BRING ANY WEAPONS FOR MURDEROUS DEER WITH HANDS FOR ANTLERS?!" Alex stayed silent. It was now Valerie's turn to sigh. "What's the game plan Alex?" "Sneak up on them, get a video, some photos, and hope that we don't get caught" Alex mutters, fidgeting with his fingers. "I thought you'd have a better plan considering how much you know about cryptids" "Well I didn't consider that we might get attacked by the Not-Deer" "Oh well! Too late now." Alex nods. "Yup, so lets get going." Emma slept peacefully in her small but personality filled room. In the corner was a punching bag, next to it a small desk with various open sketch books. Some dumbbells of varying weights lay under her bed. And at her door were two rascals, sneaking a glance at her before looking at each other and quietly giggling. The partners in crime sneak up to the bed before jumping up and onto Emma's back. "WAKE UP SLEEPY HEAD!" The young boy and girl yell, laughing loudly. Emma wakes up like an angry bull, sitting up straight and immediately swiping and trying to grab them. The children's laughs quickly converted into screams of sheer terror as they scrambled away and belted down the hardware floors with Emma right on their tails. They run straight into the kitchen and Emma sharply turns the corner into the kitchen. The rascals had hid behind her mom. "Emma! What are you doing not ready yet? Go, you have a fight today!" Her mom says with a tsk. "But mama-" Emma starts but her mom gives her a sympathetic look, so she heads up to get ready. As she did so, she heard the commotion of her little siblings being disciplined, which admittedly did make her smile. After quickly gathering her gym bag with all her gear and changing out of her pjs, she heads downstairs where she sees all of her family rushing. "JUAN, CAMILA! HELP ME FIND THE KEYS!" A deep voice that Emma recognized as her father yelled as he threw his jacket on. Her two younger siblings sprinted around the living room, looking for the car keys. "Morning papa!" Emma yells on her way to the table. Her dad nods and gives her a quick wave before getting back to flipping couch cushions. Her mom was cooking breakfast which consisted of rice, beans, scrambled eggs along with some guacamole. Emma heads into the cabinet and grabs the half empty box of 'Milo', she scoops some of it into a warm glass of milk before mixing it up to the best of her ability. "I found it papa!" Juan yells, emerging from under the couch. "Good job" Her father says, patting his head as they all go and sit at the breakfast table. They all eat quickly, with her dad constantly checking his watch. Emma finishes her portion of breakfast and chugs the rest of her cup of Milo. Soon after, they are all piled into their old car as her dad speeds off to the fighting ring. Once the car stops outside of the abandoned warehouse where the fight club is hosted, her, her mom, and her siblings pile out. "Send me the videos of the fight after! I wish you luck Mijo!" Her dad yells out before speeding off to work. "Come on, you're going to be late!" Her mom scolds as they rush inside. "UUGGH WE'VE BEEN WALKING FOR 3 HOURS STRAIGHT! AND WE HAVEN'T SEEN A SINGLE THING!" Valerie complains, lulling her head back as she stumbles along. "Nobody said a cryptid hunt would be an easy endeavor, that's why I recommended to bring a warm beverage and food." Alex says, continuing to march along as he takes a sip of coffee from his thermos. Valerie sighs. "Ya but still, this sucks-" Valerie says, being cut off by the noise of a woman screaming. Valerie stops cold in her tracks while Alex continues walking. "What are you doing dumbass!" Valerie hisses. "That sounds like a fucking Skin walker or something, we should get out of here-" "Don't worry, its just a bobcat, I've heard so many audio clips of mountain lions and bobcats screaming and its identical to that. Now c'mon, lets continue, it's already 11am" Valerie deadpans at him before sighing and begins to follow him further into the winter woods. "Fine but if it's a Skin walker, I'm pushing you and then running" Noah rolls out of bed, awaken by the sound of Ciaran screaming and smoke. He yawns and stumbles into the kitchen. "NOAH HELP!" Ciaran says, as she floats in front of his stove, which was completely engulfed in flames. Noah grabs his fire extinguisher from the cabinet and puts out the fire. "Ciaran please don't tell me you tried making eggs" Noah says, his eyes half open. "I may have possibly used eggs" "for fucks sake, eggs are so expensive and I've lost who knows how many" "I apologize Noah, I wanted to attempt the cooking from a 'YouTube' video" Noah sighs. "It's ok I'm just tired." Noah says, rubbing his eyes. "But you are banned from the kitchen, indefinitely" Noah adds before opening the fridge. "Oh man" Ciaran says with a pout. "But I suppose that's fair" She says, looking at the ashen remains of the eggs she tried to make. Noah yawns as he slowly scans over his empty fridge, his brain struggled to process as he stood there. "Noah the fridge is empty." Ciaran says, giving him a light tap on his shoulder. Noah blinks. "Oh, shit. Man I don't wanna go shopping today" He groans, leaning against the fridge. "I shouldn't have stayed up on call with Ibrahim" He mutters with a sigh. "Well, I believe it was worth it. The conversation you both had about the manga leaks was comedic to witness" Ciaran comments matter of factly. "Ya, It was a pretty fun" Noah says with a yawn. "Well I guess today is an errand day" Noah says before heading into the washroom. A few minutes later, Noah emerges, now in his usual jeans and hoodie combination. He then flops onto his desk chair and goes onto his computer to open his bank account. "I should have my paycheck here by now" He mutters under his breath as he checks his transfers. "HOLY SHIT!" Noah suddenly yells. "Hm? What happened?" Ciaran asks, floating over. "HE TRANSFERED ME 600 BUCKS!" Noah yells, jumping out of his chair. "I GOT A RAISE! WHOOOO!" Noah says throwing his hands in the air. "YIPPEE! I'm so happy for you!" Ciaran says cheerfully, clapping her hands. Noah blinks. "I just realized that I've never heard anyone say yippee unironically until now" "Do humans not use yippee anymore? In the stories, they use it with relative frequency" "Ya, huh, that's pretty odd" "Ya, I guess" The two sit in silence for a second. "Anyways lets just get going, we have to go to . . . Walmart" Noah says with a shudder. "Is this 'Walmart' like the 'Waffle House'? If so, is it necessary that we have to go? I don't want to fight for the 3rd time this week, keeping you alive is stressful" "Well it's not exactly like Waffle House but ya we do have to go, it's the only grocery store in the area" Ciaran sighs. "Well I will trust your word but if I have to save you again, I get 3 books" "Ya, ya, now come on! We gotta get there quickly" Noah says, grabbing his wallet before rushing out of his apartment via the fire escape. "Alex, can I please have some food" Valerie says, pulling on his sleeve. "You should have brought your own food like I told you in the document" Alex adamantly states, crossing his arms. "Well you could've told me instead of putting it in a 40 page document you asshole" "Not my fault you can't read a little" "Who in their right mind would read a 40 page document the night before an early morning cryptid hunt" "If you were serious, you would've" "JUST GIMME A SNACK BAR YOU CONSPIRACY NUT" Valerie yells while trying to snatch Alex's bag. "No! You don't deserve it!" Alex says as he speed walks away. "You're not taking my snacks because you didn't pack your own you jerk!" Valerie doesn't respond but instead begins to run after Alex, inciting a shriek from him as he begins to run away from her. They hop over exposed roots, weave between trees, at one point, Alex hides behind a rock, only to be found and chased. After a few minutes of this, Alex comes to a halt and crouches down behind a bush. Valerie opens her mouth to yell at him more but Alex raises his hand and makes a soft but audible "Shhh". "What is it" Valerie hisses under her breath as she crouches down next to him. Alex doesn't respond but instead just points forwards. Valerie's eyes follows the direction he's pointing and her jaw hits the floor. In the clearing were deer, 5 of them. Now that wouldn't be abnormal, they had both seen at least 3 white tail deer during their time here. But these weren't white tail deer. They were tall, at least twice the height of a white tail deer, they dwarfed some of the small trees around them. They had a huge hump on their shoulder, similar to a bison. Their builds ranged from skinny, so skinny that you could see their ribs, to incredibly bulky and muscular. Tumors and welts dotted their skin and all of them had far too many eyes. Most of them had normal antlers but one, one had a tangled mess of human arms and hands in place of its antlers. In the trees around the Not-Deer were the mangled corpses of deer and foxes. The sound of hooves scrapping against the frost was the only thing heard as the deer continuously rammed into a large black mound of fur. "Is that a fucking black bear?" Valerie whispers under her breath. Alex nods, his hands shakily raising his camera. He took a deep breath and steeled his nerves. "This is it, a real cryptid, I can't mess this up" Alex mummers. A loud, audible click is heard as the camera takes the photo. The deer immediately look up from the corpse, their antlers completely covered in blood. Valerie freezes up. "Just stay still, deer got eyes on the side of their head so they can't see us" She whispers to Alex. Alex shakes his head. "Look" He whispers back, pointing to the Not-Deer, whose eyes are forward facing. "They see us" The color drains from Valerie's face. "Well then let's run!" She yells, grabbing Alex's arm and dragging him along as the Not-Deer begin to chase after them. The duo begins to weave and zig-zag in between the trees, the Not-Deer attempt to do the same but with their bulk and wide antlers, making it impossible for them to make the same sharp turns. The largest deer stops trying to make the sharp turns and instead charges forward with it's head lowered, causing small trees around it to fall and snap. The other deer follow in it's lead. "SHIT SHIT SHIT!" Valerie yells, her eyes darting about. "LOOK!" Alex yells, pointing to a bike tangled up in some branches. Valerie runs towards the bike and yanks it out before hopping onto it. Alex hops on behind her as Valerie peels off on the bike, thankfully it's tire wasn't flat. The bike shakes as it drives over different roots and logs. After a moment, they break out of the tree line and onto a trail. Moments later, the Not-Deer also tear out of the tree-line, hot on their trail. Alex's eyes dart about before they land on a cliff with a road below it. "Over there!" Alex yells, pointing at the cliff. Valerie nods and takes a sharp turn left. They ride off the cliff, soaring through the trees. Alex and Valerie scream before the bike hits the ground, falling apart into a bunch of different pieces. The Not-Deer stop at the cliff. Alex snaps another picture before Valerie grabs him, pulling him along as she begins to run away. The Not-Deer bellow, testing the ground before beginning to run down the cliff after the two. "WHAT DO WE DO?!" Valerie yells. Alex looks around before spotting a decrypted Walmart. "Over there! It looks abandoned plus there's probably some weapons in there!" "SOUNDS GOOD!" "Why does it say 'allmart'? Where's the W?" Ciaran asks, looking up at the grey building. "Some guys sold the W a couple years back" Noah responds as he locks up his bike in the bent up bike rack. "Why??" "No clue, people are weird" Noah responds with a shrug as he walks into the Walmart. Ciaran sighs. "Humans are a lot weirder than they are in books" "Ya" Ciaran's eyes scrunch up. "What is the smell?" "Probably the residue from the sewer meth lab that got raided last year" Noah says, putting a bag of apples into his cart. "I thought you said the Walmart is normal" "I said it's normal compared to Waffle House" Ciaran sighs once more. "That you did" As the two peruse through the aisles, Ciaran turns to look at every other customer like a child staring at a person with a disability. "Everybody here seems to be morbidly obese" Noah sputters. "Well its Walmart" Noah says, holding back a laugh. Ciaran smiles and the two go back to walking through the aisles once more. That is, until they hear a loud crash as the aisle two aisles to their right, topples over, causing a domino effect. Ciaran quickly pulls Noah out. "What the fuck-" Noah mutters before seeing to familiar faces. "I THOUGHT YOU SAID THIS PLACE WAS ABANDONED!" Valerie yells. "WELL IT LOOKED ABANDONED!" Alex yells back as the two run through the aisles. The Not-Deer are running around the store and slamming into the shelves and ripping into packages of steak and other meats. One chased a group of customers, who waddled away helplessly. "Lets get the fuck outta here!" Noah says as he makes a break for the exit. "RUUUUNNNN!" Alex shrieks as he and Valerie run towards the exit with 2 of the Not-Deer chasing them. "YOU DUMBASSES, DON'T COME TOWARDS ME" Noah yells back at them. "OH ITS NOAH!" Valerie yells. "HEEEELLPPP!" Alex yells. "IM NOT HELPING YOU, YOU GUYS JUMPED ME!" "PLEASE" They both yell back at him. "NO" Alex and Valerie take a sharp right, dodging a charge form a Not-Deer. Valerie grabs a metal baseball bat from the aisle next to them, slamming it into another Not-Deer before running again. "Noah, why don't you help them" Ciaran asks. "CAUSE THEY JUMPED MY ASS OBVIOUSLY" "You have to be the bigger person and forgive them Noah-" "THIS ISN'T A STORY BOOK, LETS JUST FOCUS ON GETTING THE FUCK OUTTA HERE" Ciaran sighs. "The message is in almost every junior fictional novel, there must be a reason as to why" Noah sighs and rolls his eyes. "I just wanna go home, I'm never shopping at Walmart ever again" Just as Noah is about to reach the exit, the bulkiest of the Not-Deer bursts out of the aisles and skids to a stop in front of him. Noah quickly does a 180 and runs in the opposite direction as the Not-Deer runs after him. He sees the emergency exit behind the Halloween section and makes a sharp turn towards it. Alex and Valerie finally lose the two Not-Deer chasing them after hiding in the vent. They bust out of vent. "LOOK OVER THERE!" Alex yells, pointing at the emergency exit. Valerie nods and they both begin running towards the the exit. "God damn satanic symbols" A senile old man mutters, walking around the Halloween section with a leaking canister of gasoline in his cart. As Alex and Valerie join Noah in running towards the exit, the two Not-Deer that they had lost before, now had noticed them again and were chasing them. Just as the three of them are about to enter the Halloween section, the senile old man, lit a match. "TO HELL WITH YOU DEVIL SPAWN" He wheezes out before throwing the match, setting the entire Halloween section ablaze. Noticing the fire, they all quickly turn, causing the bulkier Not-Deer, which was charging, to send itself straight into the fire. It screeches and bellows as it thrashes around in the flames. "What in tarnation!" The old man yells before hobbling away from the fire. The two Not-Deer try to help their companion, letting out screeches to call over the other Not-Deer. Noah meanwhile, rushes out towards the main exit, unlocking his bike. "YO WAIT!" Valerie yells. Noah is about to continue biking but Ciaran forcefully stops his bike. Noah opens his mouth to protest but Alex and Valerie run up to him. "Please, can you help us-" Valerie starts before Noah cuts her off. "You jumped me, why do I gotta help ya get out of your own problem?" Valerie opens her mouth to respond before being interrupted by Alex. "Ill give you 650 bucks" He says, taking it out of his wallet. Noah's eyes widen. "Fine, I'll help you but I can't carry you both on my bike" Alex takes out a pair of rollerblades. "Uh I can't rollerblade but-" "Just gimme that and hop on his bike" Valerie says, snatching the rollerblades and putting them on. Just as everybody is set up, the Not-Deer burst out of the Walmart, no longer completely silent and instead screeching, bleating, and bellowing in pure rage as the 4 remaining rush towards them. Noah peels it out of there with Alex on the back of his seat, Valerie follows behind with her rollerblades. Ciaran watches the three run for their lives, now eating some popcorn she took from the Walmart. Noah glares at Ciaran. "Can you do something other than being useless?" "I can't save you out of every situation Noah, the literature I have read taught me that sometimes you must leave the youth to their own devices" Noah sighs, turning away from Ciaran and focusing on the road. As they continue to escape, a stop sign whizzes by Noah's face. "ZIGZAG! ZIGZAG!" Alex screams, as a rock sails over Noah's head. Noah nods and begins doing just that, He glances back and sees the Not-Deer with human arms as antlers, using said arms to throw things at them, luckily for him it had shit accuracy. Slowly, they are able to start leaving the Not-Deer behind. "NOAH MOVE TO THE RIGHT!" Alex yells. Noah does so just in the nick of time as a Not-Deer is launched through the air, landing right next to them, biting and screeching. Alex smacks it with a fire extinguisher he stole from the Walmart, which then slips out of his hands. Valerie, who was lagging behind, scoops up the fire extinguisher, spraying it in the face of the Not-Deer right behind her. The Not-Deer flail, screeching violently as they try to get the expanding foam out of their eyes. One of them stumbles onto the road during this process, where a semi-truck slams into it, killing it causing it to disintegrate, only leaving its pelt behind. "Where do we go!" Valerie yells, as the three Not-Deer left, pick themselves up and begin chasing them, only further enraged by their second comrade's death. Valerie scans around, when she sees someone waving out to them on the side of the road. "VALERIE!" Naho yells, waving her arms. "GIRL, OVER THERE! YALL CAN LOCK THEM IN THERE!" She yells, pointing at an abandoned warehouse. Valerie nods. "Guys! Over there!" She says, pointing at the warehouse. Noah nods and turns towards the warehouse. "Thanks Nacchan!" Valerie yells as she whizzes past, the Not-Deer rushing past right after. They arrive at the warehouse and swing open the door, rushing in and locking it behind them. They collapse onto the ground, exhausted. Noah looks up from the floor and the color drains from his face. They were behind some bleachers, on which were hundreds of people, watching a boxing match. "Shit" Noah mutters. "Our luck with abandoned places is terrible" Alex mutters "This is all your fault nerd" Valerie hisses. Their bickering is interrupted as the crowd breaks into cheers. "ANNNNDDD THE WINNNER IS OUR RESIDENT LIONESS, EMMA LOBO!!" The announcer yells into his mic. "Lets get outta here guys-" Alex whispers, sneaking back to the door but before he could, the door is launched off it's hinges as the three Not-Deer pile into the room. The Not-Deer screech as they clamber into the ring, their eyes darting around, looking for our trio. The audience screams and begin to panic, clambering out of their seats. "shit shit shit, get them to stay!" A man in a suit whispers in the announcer's ear. The announcer nods, clearing his throat. "Calm down folks! This is a planned event, our next match is The Lioness versus . . . THE DEMON DEER!" He yells into the mic, the crowd look confused for a moment before sitting back into their seats. Emma's eyes widen. "Well shit" She mutters as she fixes her stance. The Not-Deer however, don't approach her, instead they continue to look around the warehouse. Finally one of them spots something under the bleachers, screeching to the others and causing them to go ballistic. They jump out of the ring and rush under the bleachers, causing the spectators to scream once more. The high pitched scream of Alex is heard as him, Noah and Valerie rush out of the bleachers and into the ring. "OH AND 3 MORE FIGHTERS JOIN OUR LIONESS IN THE HUNT OF THESE DEMONIC DEER!" The announcer screams into the mic. "STAY ON THE EDGE OF YOUR SEAT FOLKS, THIS IS A MATCH OF MAN VERSUS EVIL AND I KNOW YOU WON'T WANT TO MISS THIS!" As the crowd roars with cheers, Emma's mom has a concerned look on her face. "Mama, will sis be ok?" Juan asks nervously, looking down at the ring. "Those monsters look really scary, does sis have to fight them?" Camila adds on, fidgeting with her hands. Emma's mom sighs. "Don't worry your sister is very strong, I believe in her" She says squeezing Camila and Juan's hands reassuringly. "Ciaran, wanna help now?" Noah hisses under his breath. "I shall but now you have a debt of three books to me" Noah rolls his eyes and sighs. The two groups circled each other, until the Not-Deer, thirsty for vengeance, charge forward. "AND THE DEMON DEER MAKE THE FIRST MOVE! CHARGING FORWARD RECKLESSLY WITH A THIRST FOR BLOOD!" The announcer yells. One Not-Deer charges towards Alex, who screams and runs away, The Not-Deer chases after him before being whacked in the head by a fire extinguisher. The Not-Deer huffs, shaking its head before opening its mouth to bite Valerie, who had hit it with the fire extinguisher, only to get a mouth full of fire extinguisher foam. Its eyes widen, turning bloodshot as it gags, screeching loudly. "OH AND THE DEMONIC DEER GETS A WHOLE MOUTHFUL! OUR FIGHTERS ARE REALLY SHOWING WHY MAN WAS MADE IN THE IMAGE OF GOD!" The other two Not-Deer had charged at Noah and Emma. The one charging at Noah is stopped by Ciaran restraining it, allowing Noah to punch it square in the forehead, which does nothing to stagger it as the Not-Deer wriggles out of Ciaran's restraint and nearly gores Noah but Ciaran pulls him out of the way just in time. "A CLOSE CALL FOR ONE OF OUR FIGHTERS!" The Not-Deer that went for Emma was the one with human arms as antlers, so it had lowered it's head, throwing punches with its many arms. Emma weaves before backing up and trying to find an opening. The Not-Deer, seeing her back up, charges forward. She swiftly side steps before upper cutting it's throat. The Not-Deer responds by swinging its head, grabbing Emma's arm with one of its hands before tossing her across the arena. Ciaran sees this and slows her fall. "What the fuck" Emma mutters, looking around. The Not-Deer screeches again as it charges forwards at Emma. She weaves before jamming her thumb into one of the Not-Deer's eyes. The beast screeches, as it attempts to grab her again but Emma backs up and out of it's grasp. "OH AND AN ABOSULTLY BRRUUTTALLL MOVE FROM OUR RESIDENT LIONESS!!" Noah notices what Emma did and looks at Ciaran, who nods, getting the same idea. The Not-Deer charges only for Ciaran to intercept it once more, Noah with the provided opening then jabs his thumbs into the Not-Deer's eyes, leaving it with one less pair. "OH AND ANOTHER BRUTAL MOVE! IT SEEMS OUR FIGHTERS HAVE FOUND THE STRATEGY!" Noah pulls his thumbs out and goes to attack the Not-Deer again but it bucks, breaking free from Ciaran's grasp and slamming into Noah, knocking the air out of his lungs and sending him skidding across the ground. "THAT LOOKS LIKE IT HURT, OUCH!" Meanwhile on the other side of the ring, Valerie was trying to fight the Not-Deer with little success. She swung the fire extinguisher at it but it had learned its lesson, avoiding the fire extinguisher and then at the right moment, it speared the fire extinguisher, causing foam to gush out of it. Alex watches from the corner he had hid in as the Not-Deer prepares to charge at a now defenseless Valerie. He steels his nerves before running towards the deer. Valerie looks at the Not-Deer, frozen with fear and exhaustion but just before the Not-Deer charged, she sees Alex jump onto its back, causing the Not-Deer to buck and screech. "Valerie!" A voice calls to her. Valerie turns her head to see Naho outside of the ring. "Nacchan?!" "Here! Take this!" Naho says, tossing her a pink baseball bat. Without questioning where and why Naho had a metal baseball bat, she catches it and swings it at the bucking Not-Deer, the swing just barely misses it's head and instead breaks off one of its antlers. "WHAT A SHOW OF TEAMWORK AND FRIENDSHIP!" The Not-Deer bucks, finally shaking Alex off its back. As it orientates itself, Valerie slams the baseball bat into its face. It shrieks, quickly recovering before backing off and circling around Valerie and Alex. Emma had just barely avoided being trampled by the now enraged Not-Deer, which was haphazardly throwing punches with its various arms, forcing Emma to keep her distance. As she continues to back away, her back hits the ropes. "UH OH, OUR LIONESS IS CORNERED! HOW WILL SHE GET OUT OF THIS SITUATION?!" The Not-Deer charges in, throwing punches, Emma attempts to dodge but with the sheer amount of punches being thrown that's impossible. She gets hit a few times, leaving her body sore, those would most definitely bruise later. The Not-Deer opens it's mouth, filled with human teeth and two prominent fangs. The Not-Deer goes down to bite her and Emma quickly grabs hold of its tongue with both of her hands, which was rough like sandpaper. The Not-Deer's eyes widen as it tries to pull away but Emma had also begun to pull. The Not-Deer, realizing this, tries to bite down on her hands but before it could, Emma finally rips its tongue out. It lets out an enraged gurgle, blood pouring out of its mouth and tears pouring from its various pairs of eyes. "MY GOD! WHAT'S WRONG DEMON DEER? CAT GOT YOUR TONGUE?! ANOTHER BRUTAL DISPLAY FROM THE LIONESS!!" Noah breathes heavily. His hands are drenched in blood, the Not-Deer he was fighting was now almost completely blind but it was also even more pissed. He looks around, Valerie and Alex were tiring out now and Emma was bruised up and bleeding, her hands had scratches on them from the Not-Deer's nails and teeth and the skin on her palms had been scrapped off. "Ciaran, can you hold it off for a second" "Ya of course" As Ciaran holds off the raging and mostly blind Not-Deer, Noah shoots a quick text to Ibrahim. "Yo Ibrahim, I need your help, hurry!" he messages, sending his location as he waits for Ibrahim to respond. Soon enough the 3 dots appear and Ibrahim responds. "Playing cricket, I'll be there soon" Noah responds with a thumbs up emoji before shoving his phone in his pocket to continue fighting. The 4 of them continue to fight but it seems that the Not-Deer are nowhere near to tiring. Noah had completely blinded his deer now but that only made it more volatile as it blindly rampaged, trying to gore him. Valerie and Alex had hit their Not-Deer a couple of times but their Not-Deer was becoming more bold as well, realizing they are tiring. Emma's Not-Deer was the most pissed off as it tried to trample, bite, punch, really just harm her in any way it could. Emma continued to keep her distance, landing the occasional punch which only rattled its brain and pissed it off more. The 4 of them had their backs against one another now as the Not-Deer circled around them. "OUR HEROES HAVE THEIR BACKS AGAINST THE WALL! WHAT WILL THEY DO NOW!?" Emma's mom and siblings were now tearing up, with her mom trying to wade through the crowd to get to the owner of club to stop this. Suddenly, the door of the warehouse slammed open and Fetty Wap is heard blasting from a JBL speaker. The Not-Deer turn to look at the new noise, just as they do, a cricket ball slams into the face of one of the Not-Deer. "How the fuck did you manage to get into this mess" Ibrahim says, stepping into the ring. Noah just sighs. "AND WHAT A TURN OF EVENTS! WE HAVE A NEW COMBATANT IN THE RING!" The Not-Deer Ibrahim had hit with the cricket ball shrieks before charging at him. Ciaran restrains it, giving Ibrahim and Valerie an opening, Ibrahim slamming his cricket bat into its skull and Valerie slamming her metal bat into its skull. A loud crack echoes throughout the stadium as the Not-Deer crumples into a heap on the ground before disintegrating, leaving only the pelt behind. Valerie breathes heavily. The other Not-Deer, who stood still with shock, were now even more livid. They both stand on their hindlegs briefly, letting out a earsplitting shriek before going back to four legs and charging forward. Ibrahim snatches the bat from Valerie and tosses it Emma, who grabs it, slamming into the throat of the Not-Deer with arms for antlers. It's neck bends, looking like a boomerang now. The Not-Deer's eyes roll back into its head before disintegrating on the ground while standing, leaving its pelt and the skeletal remains of its antler arms behind. The blind Not-Deer charged wildly, looking for them. Noah whistles loudly, leading it to him. It perks up before it could get to charging at him, Ibrahim grabbed it and suplexed it causing its antlers to snap as it slams into the ground. It cries out before Emma finishes it off by slamming the bat into it's neck. All of them except for Emma sit down on the floor. The crowd is silent for a moment. "AND ITS OVER FOLKS! THE LIONESS COMES OUT ON TOP ONNNCEE MOOORREE!" The announcer screams into the mic causing the audience to cheer. The audience roars with cheers as they begin to throw down 1 dollar bills, which Emma collects. "Are you ok miss, do you need any treatment?" A medic asks, walking up to the ring. Emma shakes her head. "I'll be just fine" She says, grabbing a pelt off the floor and draping it over her shoulders. "Its just some bruises" She says, as she wraps her hands in fresh bandages. The crowd only goes even more nuts. Emma's mom watches, cheering just as loudly as the rest of the crowd. Juan and Camila try to rush down to Emma but are held back by their mom. "Let her have her moment" She says, a smile forcing its way onto her face. "Damn she's a professional aura farmer" Ibrahim whispers to Noah, who simply nods. The sound of the door being slammed open is heard as Emma's dad bursts through, a gun in his hands but when he sees his daughter in the Not-Deer cloak, he drops the gun before rushing onto stage and wrapping his daughter into a hug. "Papa!-" Emma protests but her dad laughs loudly as he picks her up and puts her on his shoulder. "That's my daughter!" He proclaims proudly, parading her around the ring. After bit, her dad sets her down as her mom and siblings rush down, wrapping her in a hug. After a moment they break away. "We'll let you talk to your friends now" Emma's dad says, as they get out of the ring. Emma smiles. The crowd had begun to filter out so she turns to Noah and the others. Alex braces himself, expecting to get yelled at but instead, Emma just sighs. "Man I'm hungry" She grumbles, sitting down. "Same" Valerie replies. Alex nods in agreement. "Ya I could go for something right now" Noah says. "Me too, shawarma anybody?" Ibrahim suggests. "Nah we should get sushi!" Naho exclaims, stepping into the ring. Everybody shoots her a glare. "What? Does it look like I can fight? I was cheering for you guys from the sidelines!" She says, leaning against the ropes of the ring. "There's a good burger spot nearby" Emma suggests. "Do they have halal options?" Ibrahim asks. Emma shrugs. "No clue, what makes something halal anyways?" "That's a little complicated but in a nutshell its how the animal is slaughtered and there's certain animals which aren't halal like pork" Ibrahim explains. Emma nods. "ah ok, well we can check once we get there" Everyone nods in agreement and walk over to the burger place, with Emma quickly getting permission from her parents before going. Luckily for Ibrahim, they had some halal options on the menu. Noah spends the next hour at said burger place. He was surprised that it wasn't awkward, jokes and stories were flying back and forth as they ate. Noah kept in the back of his mind that these were the same people who had just jumped him 2 days ago but I guess they were just being really, really dumb that day. Eventually, Valerie had to rush home before her mom came back home. After Valerie left, everybody was sore, aching, and probably pretty smelly so they split up to head back home. It was now dark out, even though it was only 5pm. The cold and crisp night air filled Noah's lungs and when he exhaled, his breath crystalized. "So seems you have made some possible friends?" Ciaran says floating next to him. For once, Noah doesn't try to even lie. "Ya, I guess they aren't that bad after all" He responds, a small smile showing on his face. Ciaran smiles. "Hehe and who is the reason you got those friends?" Ciaran says, crossing her arms and looking down at Noah all smug. Noah rolls his eyes. "Ya ya, I get it" Ciaran grins, floating next to him. Noah smiles as well as he begins to bike home. Usually the cold air would sting but it didn't feel that bad for once. 1100 kilometers away, in the pentagon, a balding man looks at a computer screen. "God damn it! How the fuck, did you loose 5 whole Not-Deer?!" He yells, slamming his hand on the desk. "I'm not sure sir!" A man dressed in a swat uniform stutters out. "Well find out! And find the Not-Deer" "About the Not-Deer . . . uh they're all dead" "HOW?!" "I'm not sure-" "Well find out for fucks sake, send out fucking Colonizer if you need to!" The other man nods, swiftly leaving the area. "What the fuck has been happening in New York recently. First that giant energy signal and now 5 dead Not-Deer." The man in the suit mutters, rubbing his temples before sighing once more. "I need a coffee" He mutters before also leaving the room.