Percy and Elliot bump gloves and it brings everyone screaming about who they wanted to win. The pair began to circle each other, eyes locked, practically glowing. I took a deep breath and could smell the anger coming off them.
Elliot threw his first jab to which Percy swiftly moved away. Elliot throws another jab and clips Percy on the nose; his eyes begin to water but he throws his body on to Elliot causing them both to fall. Elliot covers his face with his arms and immediately Percy begins to punch wherever he could.
The crowd goes wild, screams, and people shove each other to get a better look. Elliot lifts his hips throwing Percy's balance off long enough to flip them over doing the same thing Percy did to him.
"Beat the twinks ass!" I can hear people shout all kinds of things. "Get the fuck up Percy!" "Kill 'em Elliot!"
It was hard to block them out and focus on the fight. Percy throws his fist ups and uppercuts Elliot in the jaw. Elliot fails to stand and instead crawls away holding his jaw. Percy sits up and looks up at me.
"Don't stop! Keep going!" I shout at him and he quickly mounts his back and Punches Elliot as hard as he can wherever he can. Elliot's claws begin to grow and I admittedly know what's going to happen.
"Percy get off of him!" Wayne beat me to it but it was too late. Elliot reached behind himself to dig his claws into Percy's upper thigh, his scream of pain didn't stop him from decking Elliot in the back of his head.
"Son of a bitch! You asshole! Using your claws hand to hand. You fuckin' coward!" Percy is practically beating this man. The thuds of his gloves hitting Elliot are louder than the people's cries.
"Someone get him off him! Now!" I shout and Morty, Tony, And Wayne spring into action.
Wayne and Morty break the crowd and Tony tries to pull Percy off of Elliot. Percy continues to yank himself out of his grip. His eyes were beginning to turn and I knew I had to help.
"How does it feel! How does it make you feel worthless asshole!" Percy shouts thrashing in his brother's grip kicking Elliot who lays still. I walk up to Percy and cradle his face.
"That's enough, you won. You're not alone anymore. Your family is here." Tony and I both hold him as he begins to cry in our arms holding us in a grip.
"Stupid…. I hate him...I fuckin' hate him" Percy manages to speak between sobs and screams. Everyone began to either clean or leave, paying no mind to us. Fighting like this happens sometimes, things get emotional but it's natural. Once you win a fight it isn't just your rank that changes, it changes you emotionally and physically."
"Hey buddy, let's take you to the nurse. Does that sound good?" Wayne slips his arms around Percy and lifts him, and Percy wraps himself around Wayne and looks up.
"W-where's Elliot?" Percy looks around. Someone must've moved him when we weren't looking.
"He's already at the nurses, buddy. Come on, we'll get you fixed up." Wayne walks away and Tony follows, not letting go of Percy's hands.
I stay there sitting on the ground watching them Leave, my mind is dazed. I didn't notice feminine footsteps Walking my way.
"Wow…. that was almost painful to watch." I look up to see Marylin standing in front of me, Morgan standing not far.
"You saw that?" I stood keeping my eyes on Morgan.
" I saw what I had to see." Marylin holds her hand out. "I have a friend I want you to meet. Come with me?"
I took her hand and she locked our arms together. As we walk, I can hear Morgan behind us.
"My king….and lady priestess!" Morty rushes to me.
"Hello, Morty." Marylin didn't make eye contact with Morty. Her grip on my arm became tighter. "It's been a while.".
"No kidding! It's so nice to see you. We haven't spent time together since before Arthur's party!" Morty moved to hug Marilyn. "Have you seen him? I'm starting to get worried"
"No, I haven't, I'm sure whatever happened he'll be back soon." Marylin shifted closer to me. I stood not really knowing what to do with my body.
"My priestess, I would like to spend the rest of the hour in the library." Morgan leaned in to whisper in Marylin's ear.
"Yes, go on, I suppose my visit with Jessica would be boring for you." Marylin nods to her pushing past Morty. She begins to relax the farther away we get.
Once we get to the building of witches I'm greeted with a different world. The witch hall was colorful and full of fantastic scents. As I walk past the ladies begin to stare at me and whisper.
" Don't worry about them, witches are gossips" Marylin giggles and opened the wooden double door to what looks to be a giant greenhouse. "Ladies, do you know where Jessica is?" Marylin greets the witches who were planting.
"At the tree by her bench I believe, my lady" one of the girls replied.
"Thank you, Tiffany." We walked at a peaceful pace. A very different place from where I was five minutes ago. As we approach the giant tree in the middle of the greenhouse a girl. Marylin stops walking.
"This is Jessica the Oracle" She whispers, and continues to walk. I'm a normal tone of voice Marylin begins to speak once she was close enough to Jessica.
"Hello Jessica, how are you?" Marylin sits next to Jessica.
Jessica was dark-skinned and fair. Not a single blemish in sight. Her nose was wide but soft and her ears were fairly small. Her hair was boy-like short, and her nose had a septum piercing. She wore a white sunhat and black overalls with leather high-tops. She was pretty to look at and once she began to speak it was like honey, but what freaked me out was that she had no iris, they were pure white.
"Who's the wolf?" Jessica tilts her head too, what I think is to "look" past Marylin to me. "Hello." She smiled bright and innocent like...she reminded me of a child that had the potential to hex me whenever she wanted.
"Oh! I'm...I'm Lance." I step forward reaching my hand out, then slowly pulling it back to my side.
"Hello Lancelot, I've heard plenty about you.". Jessica stands to almost curtsy her invisible skirt. "I was wondering when you both would come to me. It's always exciting to watch pieces click into place." She sits back down and, I guess you can say "looks" up at us. Marylin sits next to her on the bench and I find my place on the concerted path in front of Jessica.
"You were expecting us?" I had never met an oracle Before Jessica. I was beginning to come up with random questions to ask her.
"I wouldn't say that, sounds like a cliche movie." She giggled and held Marylin's hand. "You want to know where Pendragon is. Future-telling isn't as simple as most people think. The future is like water, it changes direction based on the choices people make. Your story was told before but a drastic change has happened. You both have strayed far beyond what was written for you. Good news is now your life and the others around you are in your own hands.".
Jessica had closed her eyes and rested her palms face up.
"I see death, distraction, love, and pain... usually not a good sign, but if you changed your story before I'm sure you can do it again." She opens her eyes and blinks.
"You've thrown yourself to the wolves, Lance, I saw a throne with a beast for a king, Foe with the face of a friend, the fire will consume you, blood will be spilled if you don't change your direction." She slowly reached behind her to pull a sketchbook out of a bag and flipped through the pages.
"This isn't the first time I have looked; this vision came two days before the promotions." She handed her book to me.
It wasn't a sloppy drawing. The details were far more advanced than I thought. I saw the throne covered in blood and the bodies of my friends, fire in the background. It made my heart sink in my stomach and quickly shoved the book to Marylin.
"Marylin. Your face today is of a man... strange. Well to you it is anyway" she giggled and stared at me. "I'd put that thing on a leash Lancelot."
"Excuse me?" I look around myself trying to understand what the fuck she was talking about.
"Him!" She stood and pointed to the spot next to me. "It's one thing being a wolf but that thing is a weapon."
"She sees our true forms and uses nature to help with that. Though she can't see what we really look like, she sees you as a wolf and… I don't really understand what she sees when it comes to me. I "change faces"?" Marylin uses air quotes and makes a weird face.
"You really don't know, it's honestly kinda funny watching you struggle with that" Jessica giggles
"Teasing isn't nice Jess." Marylin shifted in her seat.
"There's an old Japanese story saying that you wear the face of the one you loved most in your past life. Isn't that strange!" Jessica begins to pull at Marylin's face.
"Yea I suppose so" I said
"My king, there is something that I see. There is a growing darkness inside you and I'm positive that you feel it as well and you need to overcome this darkness or it will consume you and everything in its path will burn" Jessica looked up almost as if she was staring into my soul
"I understand, thank you this means a lot to me" I said grateful for her counsel
"My pleasure Lancelot" she said with a voice like silk giving a half bow with fear she might keel over
I heard familiar footsteps coming towards the three of us.
"My king, Percy is done healing in the nurses and would like to see you" Morty said from behind us
"I'll be right with you." I turned to Morty then back to Jessica "Thank you again Madam Jessica and please, call me Lance" I said as I stepped forward to bow and kiss her hand.
"Never be ashamed of who and what you are, my king you'll see why soon, I love Lancelot much better. See I'd wink but I have no idea what that looks like. But until next time Lancelot and remember...I'm watching you." She chuckling after every pun
"Hehe blind jokes" Marilyn laughs
-
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Minutes later Morty and I made our way over to the nurse at the front desk.
"Excuse me, ma'am, we're here to see Percival Bravo of the Werewolf Faction." I said to the woman at the front desk who was surprisingly human which was extremely rare at the school but slightly common for the staff
"Yes sir, He is in room 12A, just knock and step right in honey he'd be more than happy to see you. But first I'm gonna need y'all to write down your names and Rank."
"Yes ma'am". We all both in unison
"Just be careful now, my baby's been crying for a good while now and I s'pose he's still getting over the emotional aspect of his match. Poor boy so sweet like himself shouldn't feel this much frustration".
Mrs. Smith was the head nurse at the academy and knew just about everyone in the school but somehow had an emotional connection with anything with a smile. She was a reasonably tall rounded African American woman that wore glasses and braids long enough to touch her behind.
We made our way down the hall and opened the room door to see Percy curled up in a ball with Tony sitting on a bench next to him
"Come va" I said after opening the door, greeting them in Italian.
"Come va" Tony replied back.
When we entered, I could see that the moment Percy saw us he stopped talking altogether and curled into a ball trying to cover something. Tony gave me a signal with his head that he wanted to talk to me outside.
"Hey buddy, I'm gonna go just outside the door here, alright. Do you need anything?"
Tony said to Percy as he was standing up with the rest of us to follow as he put on his leather jacket over his undershirt that was clearly a size too small for him but he wore it anyway because he knew it made his biceps look bigger and outlined his figure.
"Hugs please?" Percy said in a near childlike innocent tone
"Of course, bud" Tony replied giving a warm very close brotherly hug where I could literally smell the love and bromance in the air if I tried.
"You too moron" Percy said to me slightly cracking a smile
"Yea whatever you please, your highness, I said smiling to give the same type of hug but I noticed out of everyone in the tribe or family, Percy always pulled me tighter and closer like he never wanted to let go almost as if he only felt truly safe in my arms.
We stepped out into the hallway getting a bit of a distance from the Med room.
"He's not healing" Tony said as his light smile turned dead into a cold straight face
"What do you mean?" I spoke
"Did the power he won over from Elliot transfer?" Morty asked
"It did I can feel it but defeating Elliot brought up all his past trauma with him and it's hitting him like a sledgehammer" Tony said with near parental concern and worry.
"What trauma, may I ask?" Morty asked in genuine curiosity
Tony looked at me then back at Morty and said in a stern voice
"Alright, this doesn't leave the three of us, understand me?" Tony said, pointing his finger at me and Morty. We nodded and he proceeded to break the news.
"Lance you already know half the story and none of you feel any type of way for him not telling you this himself. When Percy and Elliot were together Elliot got a little too aggressive when they tried to get intimate." Tony paused and started to grip his rosary while his voice started to get noticeably shaky.
"I let them go on a date to a drive-in movie or at least that's what they told me and everything was fine like I saw him light up for the first time but... when he came home running but he wasn't wearing clothes. His eyes were glowing yellow for the first time, meaning he had shifted out of strife, not by the power of the moon, and I could see the pain in his eyes. That bastard...he. That son of a bitch raped him. There were marks of bruises that looked like they were slowly healing but they burned every time I touched him and later on, I found him in his room with tears slowly streaming down his eyes repeating words to himself with a smile on his face that was riddled with hurt saying...'It's okay, it's okay, I asked for it. It's my fault' I couldn't eat or sleep after seeing that and Lance you out of town at your uncle's rehab. I can still hear it and I made myself a promise that I'd never let that kid cry again.".
At the end of this revelation Tony had stabbed his fingertips and palm on the edges of his rosary leaving the both of us speechless
I was trying to take it all in slowly but I sensed an extreme amount of pain next to me. I turned to my left and for the first time in my years I saw Morty crying with tears of remorse and empathetic guilt almost.
"I could have...I could have stopped it or at least done something, like what the fuck" His face began to become red and his shattered heart sounded like it could be heard throughout the building.
"He should have told me Tony… I could have done something. How was I supposed to be a King or even my position now if I couldn't even help a friend...much less a brother?"
Morty said solemnly as his hands started to shake more intensely and faster than before. His breathing started to pick up immensely to the point where I don't think there was much breath in him.
I couldn't believe my eyes...he was having a panic attack.
"It's going to be ok...I got you" I said as I leaped to him pulling him to me for a hug holding him but for whatever reason, he squeezed me gripping the back of my jacket as he cried slowly but calming down with his heartbroken heartbeat dancing at its usual pace.