Lucky Rabbit {Twisted Wonderland} [Various X OC]

A Heart Faced Jerk

(Tw: anxiety attack, implied dissociation)

The two human thirds of the cleaning squad ran after Grim, unsurprisingly finding him in the middle of a battle with Ace. A crowd of students had already formed around them.

Elle sighed as her building stress was suddenly washed away by a wave of apathy. She didn't want to deal with this. Fine. Let the cat learn consequences the hard way. She has washed her hands of the matter. She turned on her heel, picking up a broom and beginning to sweep.

"E-Elle?!"

"Hm?"

"You're just going to...let this happen then?"

"I'm not good with people, and I don't have the magical ability to interfere with those two. All I could really do would be blindly throw myself between them, and I like living, thank you very much."

"A-Ah..."

Yu nodded. Her reasoning was...sound, but as someone who was unceremoniously handed responsibility for the weasel, he didn't have the same luxury as her. Guess he had to handle it himself, then. He made his way through the crowd to try and mediate.

"Hey, now! Let's all take this down a notch!"

Despite his protests, the fight continued. With Ace taunting Grim, and the fire weasel only getting angrier, things were getting out of hand, fast.

"Awww... can't hit me with your little fireballs?"

"Grrr... You better believe I'm about to! Take that!"

While Yu desperately attempted to stop whatever horrible catastrophe was about to occur, Elle quickly finished her apple, throwing the core into her trash bag. She tuned out the sounds of fighting, almost on autopilot, as she swept any leaves that had fallen onto the path into a neat pile next to one of the statues. She had started sweeping them into a bag when she heard Yu shout.

"Elle! Look out!"

The world suddenly sharpened back into focus as she saw a blue fireball careening directly towards her. She ducked down, immediately throwing her arms over her head, and felt the heat of the flames against the back of her hands as the ball whizzed by, barely missing her. Immediately after, she heard multiple footsteps headed closer to her. She glanced up and saw Yu, along with a few other students with animal ears who she didn't recognize.

"Holy crap! Are you okay, miss?"

"That fireball nearly crashed right into you! You didn't get scorched or anything, did ya?"

"Man, what were those guys thinking?"

"Elle! You're okay, right? I'm sorry, I should have stopped them sooner..."

The girl waved her hands in front of her, unused to all of the attention.

"I-I'm perfectly fine, if not a little shocked. It was surprising, to be sure, but I survived and that's what matters. Um, Thank you very much for your concern. Yu, don't you dare blame yourself. You could not have done anything to change that outcome. You blame yourself for this and I will blame myself for the mattress."

The animal-eared students seemed satisfied with her response, and soon wandered off after confirming she was okay. That was nice of them, she thought. Also, animal people existed. That...certainly was a thing.

Yu puffed up his cheeks, but relented. This actually was all Ace and Grim's fault, now that he thought about it. Speaking of the two troublemakers, they were currently frozen in place, staring in horror at the now burnt statue of the Queen of Hearts. Of course they felt bad for nearly torching the girl, but frankly, hitting the statue wasn't much better than landing someone in the infirmary.