Casey's POV
As the final bell of the day rang, all I wanted to do was go home and sleep until my alarm went off at six tomorrow. I was completely exhausted. I had found out that I couldn't skip school when my mom came into my room to wake me up, citing a soccer game. Therefore, instead of running to my sweet bed, I had to board a large yellow school bus and ride with my teammates to Frederick Douglas High School, in hopes of kicking the Buffalo's butts back to next week.
My first issue with this arrangement was, obviously, the lack of rest that I was going to have to suffer, but the second source of my irritation came from the fact that my mother didn't believe that my team could beat the Buffalo's without me. One, this was wishful thinking, I contributed nothing to the team, and participated mainly because I had hopes of a secondary education. Secondly, it's the Buffalos. Who the heck thought up that mascot? We were the Tigers. Last time I checked, tigers, in their natural habitats, were predators, and buffalos were larger, furrier versions of cows. Therefore, I wholeheartedly believed that I had no business being on this bus, especially in light of the sleep I could be catching up on. Despite this, I was still seated on cracked leather older than me as the bus lumbered down the interstate at exactly 55 mph, and not an iota faster.
Staring out the window as all of the other vehicles on the highway passed us, my thoughts turned again to Lombardi's words. They had haunted me all day, popping up in my mind at the moments I least expected them to. The rational side of my mind told me to forget them, but it was impossible. Even though I was still tired, I knew that I probably wouldn't be getting much sleep with his voice in my head.
Yawning, I reached for my bag and selected my math homework from the clutter of papers inside. Then I started the epic search for a pencil, opening all the pockets of my backpack and sliding my hand into the nooks and crannies of the larger pockets. It took me while, but I finally found a blue papermate pen. Although my toothmarks were evident on the end, it was usable and much better than the alternative, a fluorescent yellow highlighter I had located under my chemistry binder.
I remained in the consuming, if boring world of quadratics until the bus finally reached it's destination. Tossing the pen and paper into my backpack, I grabbed my gym bag and phone and filed off the bus with the rest of my teammates.
Fredrick Douglas High School was a private school, so it was no surprise that they had nice facilities. But these weren't just nice, they were pristine, state-of-the-art. Walking through the large school to the locker rooms, I tried not to gape, but it was hard. The blue lockers were much cleaner than ours, and the hallways were larger, with higher ceilings. Nice little blue signs told visitors where everything was, and the gym was at least twice the size of ours. But it was the bathrooms that most impressed me. They were relatively new, and they were absolutely free of graffiti. Absolutely. Free. I had always been a hardcore believer that one could always recognize a high school bathroom by the state of its walls and toilet paper dispensers, private school with new bathrooms or not. This contradiction to my lifelong faith left me dumbstruck and a little scared. I mean, what was the world coming to if the girls bathroom, the heart of the rumor mill, was completely blank? Then again, I figured Catholic girls weren't supposed to spread rumors, and since this was a Catholic high school, that might explain the blankness of the blue stalls. Either that, or they had enough money to change their bathroom stalls and fixtures fairly often.
I stepped out of the bathrooms and started my warm up stretches. Across the field from me, the opposing team was beginning to do the same. But out of the team, only two girls stood out to me. They seemed to move more fluidly than the rest of the team, and I could make out a golden halo surrounding them. They were definitely supernatural, the question was, what were they. Obviously they weren't ghosts, but they could be almost anything else. I wasn't close enough to tell, although I highly doubted they were vampires. They clearly went to school, and most vampires weren't capable of being around humans for more than a few hours, much less for an entire day.
If I had to take a guess, I'd say they were werewolves, but they could also be another type of shifter. Unfortunately, werewolves aren't the only type of supernatural animal/human combination out there, although they were by far the most common. Shifters was general term used to describe both werewolves and others who could shift into different animals. Some could shift into bears, others into cheetahs. It made my job harder. If a shifter wasn't a werewolf, I then had to guess at what they were so I knew what I was up against.
As the opposing team came out onto the field in front of us, I realized my guess was right. These girls were both werewolves, young, unmated ones. Since they had most likely never encountered a paranormal, and since I was really only here to play soccer, I relaxed. They were no threat to me, just competition.
Still, I remind myself to try and avoid them on the field, just in case. Even if they didn't know what I was, they had probably been taught what a paranormal was. Most supernaturals educate their children about us, specifically, about me and my family, and I didn't want to take the risk that they were going to call in their pack. It would suck to have to fight, especially since I was only awake due to caffeine.
I follow my team out onto the field and took my position. I'm on defense. That's probably for the better, given my current exhausted state. Usually, I would have begged Coach Lewis to put me on offense, but for today, I'm content with not getting as much action on the field. Of course, sometimes the defense works harder than the offense, but today's not one of those days. We aren't scoring anything, thanks to the supernatural girls being on defense, but the other team's offense isn't even getting halfway close to our side of the field, giving me an easy first half.
The referee calls break, and I jog over to the sidelines. "Casey!"
Coach Lewis is stalking the sidelines of the game, as always, and I fell into step with his pacing.
"What's up, Coach?"
"You're on offense till the end of the game. Go out and don't go easy on them," he says.
"Got it," I reply, sighing. This is going to suck. I think I may just go home and sleep a million years.
I jog back over to the rest of my teammates and gulp down the rest of my can of Red Bull. Finishing it off, I see the two werewolf girls yelling at a teammate. She looks petrified. I set my jaw and tell myself that I can't get involved, no matter how bitchy the wolves are.
Some members of my team start to return to the field, an indicator that break is over. I walk out to the field, and I get some "Good luck!"s shouted at my back. I wedge myself into the offense huddle between Hanna and Lara, just as Kayla, our captain, is talking.
"So, try to pass quickly, otherwise they have a habit of ganging up on us. And watch numbers 11 and 14. They're quick."
I glance up at the opposing team, and sure enough, numbers 11 and 14 are the werewolf girls. I grin evilly to myself. As much as I know I should stay away from them, I might just have to give them a challenge. They radiate power, and during the break, I could see how they used it. They need a lesson.
"Everybody ready?" asks Kayla.
We all nod and spread out, ready to play. As soon as the referee blows his whistle, I'm off and running for the ball. Currently, my team has it, but I have to get into a position where Kayla can pass it. She sees me and passes it off. I take off down the field, and prepare to pass to Lara on my left. A girl on the other team almost intercepts it, but Hanna gets in her way before she can kick the ball off course.
Lara is good at scoring, but werewolf girl is in the goal, and I know there's no way Lara can score when she's up against a goalie with reflexes at least ten times faster than her own. Moving quickly, I catch up with her and signal her to pass. Confused, she gives up the ball, and I aim.
The werewolf girl looks like she can hardly believe it when she hears the shouts from our side of the field. I give her a smile. That's how it's done.
That's also how the rest of the game goes. The team's offense sucks, so they score nothing, and I score two more goals, infuriating the werewolf girl each time. I can see how perplexed she is, and I almost pity her. Or I would, if I knew that she wasn't a high ranking person in her pack, using that power for her own amusement. Even humans are effected by the power that alphas and betas wield, which is probably how she got away with yelling at that girl earlier. I leave to change, smug that I managed to deflate her ego a little bit.
Of course, the supernatural never like their ego deflated. I only make it halfway to the locker room before they pounce. One moment, I'm walking down the hall, the next, I'm being slammed against the lockers.
Adrenaline flooded my body. If they wanted a fight, they would get one. I kneed the one holding me against the locker in the stomach, and pushed the other away from me, spinning to face them.
"What the hell do you two want?" I snapped.
The one I'd kneed got up slowly. "What are you?" she gasped.
"Um...what do you mean?" Shit. Hopefully if I played dumb they'd give up.
Her companion sighed. "She's just a girl Tracy, let's go-"
"No she's not. I'm not stupid. She's something, I just don't know what."
"What are you guys talking about?" Please please please let this work.
"See? She's not-"
"You know exactly what I'm talking about. What are you?" Tracy punctuates each word.
"I'm something you don't want to mess with," I reply.
Tracy leaps for me, and I move out of her way at supernatural speed. If she didn't think I was normal before, she definitely won't now, but my cover was blown already. Now I just have to kick her ass and keep her from asking anymore questions.
That proves to be slightly harder than I anticipate when her friend joins in the mix. Werewolves are known for being amazingly strong, and even though I'm tougher and stronger than your average human, I really have nothing on them. It would also be easier if I could link, but I can't, since I'm still weak from lack of sleep. My other worry is that one of them or both of them will shift. If that happens, I'm dead. One werewolf at a time is an accomplishment, two, without the power to link, is near impossible. Thankfully, neither of them do, probably from fear that a person will come out and see them. Three girls fighting will get us in trouble, a girl and two huge wolves...that will get us in over our heads.
Even though the fight feels like it lasts hours, I know that the entire thing probably doesn't take more than ten minutes for me to finish. I know that it's over when the panting, bruised werewolves back off, glaring warily at me.
"Listen. I will be off your land as soon as my bus leaves. What I am is not important. I am leaving and not coming back."
They hesitate, but nod in unison. I turn my back on them and stalk back to the changing room, only relaxing once I'm changed and safely on the bus. As we pull away from the curb, I look back at the school, hoping the girls like the letters I left in their duffel bags, signed Casey Aguire.
Casey is so much fun to write! But next chapter stuff will really start to heat up. Unfortunately, due to stupid APs, this will probably be the last chapter I upload for a while. Thankfully, after that, school gets progressively easier till the end, so I should be able to write lots. If you haven't already, please go check out my new book Run. The description and first chapter are up. It is a teen fiction/action.
Vote, Comment, and thanks for reading!
- t_pearson