The Armor (Prince Harry fanfic #1)

Chapter Thirty-One

The ball was kicked to Lucy again and again, and she proved time after time was that she was trained. This was a side Harry hadn't seen of her, and he would say it was almost magical. The ball passed easily from student to student, back to Lucy, which she didn't even look down, knowing it was right there.

He ran up to her, huffing beside of her. "Where did you learn to play?" Harry asked.

"I went to school," she reminded him, winking. The ball was passed to her, and she didn't glanced away as she kicked it away. Harry tried to go for the ball, but she was quick. "Try harder." She walked away.

They continued to play in the heat, which beat against them from all sides. The unrelenting sun was a heater just upon to moving players, which Harry didn't even notice. Lucy wasn't as lucky. The heat started to creep into Lucy's body and she had to stop. It almost got hard to breathe under the deep sun. Her eyes focused on the horizon. Her heart hammered. Sweat trickled down her skin. The fear was within her again. In the pit of her stomach, she found it hard to move. She swallowed.

"Everything okay?" Harry asked, not out of breath.

She nodded. "I don't run often. I need to catch my breath."

Harry met his eyes, and he nodded. He didn't believe her fully and he wanted to push. Looking up to the sun, he put his hands on his hips, kicking dust around them. "Are you sure that's everything?"

"I have a bad feeling," she reminded him, "but heat isn't my favorite thing. It'll go away in a moment."

He nodded.

Eventually, the game stopped, replaced by the students and the teachers returning to the schoolhouse. Lucy laid her head against some of the concrete, still somehow cold in the heat. With summer in the northern hemisphere, winter here hit, still hot in the desert. Tonight was going to be the longest night, undoubtedly slow. No one really left their slums once the night hit, where the predators thrived.

Teaching, his eyes wandered over to Lucy, who positioned herself at the back of the schoolhouse. He slipped up, which Lucy caught, teaching for him. He mostly kept himself on track. Though, even with her mind elsewhere, Lucy still kept everything in check. Her lying skills took a hold, and painfully he thought.

The two teachers walked around the room together as the students started to work together in groups. Lucy managed to pass him three times. If Harry didn't know any better, he would've said today was normal. But, now he knew Lucy well, whatever set her off. There was an itch she needed to scratch, somewhere and somehow.

"Ma'am," a student called to Lucy, which she responded with a nod, "tell us about humanity again, please."

Lucy hesitated and then moved forward, pushing off the wall. "What do you want me to tell you?"

"Why do people do bad things?"

Harry's blue eyes raked over to Lucy, seeing if she needed help, but she didn't need it, of course. Maybe Lucy didn't have the true meaning, because who could really know? Perhaps it was genetics and science, or perhaps you were raised and how you grew up. Perhaps it was your geography. There were many things that made a person do "bad things."

"Well, it isn't simply, but let's be honest: you have a choice. You can do bad things or you can do things. We all have choices." She walked around the class. "We are faced with hardships, moments that define us, and those moments are good and bad."

"Like November eleventh?"

"Yes." She shrugged, thinking of November twelfth. "What we do after these defining moments is what makes us human. We can be good or bad, and we can be both. One moment doesn't define you, but it is a part of you. After a bad moment, you could choose to stay on the bad side, whether it is with your choices or how you act...."

"Ma'am, but what if you don't want to be bad? What if someone forces you to be bad?"

Lucy stopped in front of the student. "You have your choice to make, and if they're physically threatening you, your choices are limited. But you must always try to make the best choice. Think about your future. Remember the good things. There are injustices around the world, and you don't want to be apart of one."

Her gaze was strict in the focus and soft on the edges. She could've taken down armies with that look. Her ability to change quickly almost scared Harry, like he didn't know her at all. She was meant to be something powerful, he knew, since the shooting, where she was built like a pyramid. Her name was meant to be known.

"Do you understand?" she asked. Her voice was meant for everyone, but really for that one child.

"Yes, ma'am."

Lucy continued walking, and Harry went back to teaching.

When class was dismissed, Lucy watched out the window and Harry stood behind her. Their eyes focused forward, upon the students. In the crowd, he couldn't find the one student that spoke about humanity. Lucy did find the student, and she was a hawk.

"You found your bad feeling," Harry said.

"Wait for it," she murmured.

Neither of them had to wait long. One student went down, followed by two more, until there were at least six on the ground. Two of the students were the ones who fought really; the rest were accidentals. The students to throw lousy punches without much aim or strength. Their hands weren't closed fully into fists. They only fought with their bodies, no heart behind the fight or technique. It was like they were told to do this, and reluctance appeared on their faces. In and out, they fought, each trying to get the upper-hand.

This was a fight that Lucy and Harry could break up.

Marching outside, Harry was the first stand between the two male students. The female students moved to the edges while other male students had no problem being up and personal with the situation. The male students cheered on the fighters, whom dared to fight against their teachers. The students growled at each other, and both of them felt as if they were back in elementary school: Harry who was the fighter and Lucy who was the watcher.

Harry yanked a boy back, and Lucy stood in between them, calculating the crowd's reaction. When the students tried to go for one another again, Harry went in between them too. He had two feet on both and more weight. While Lucy found it easy to see what wasn't met with the crowd. The children no longer cheered on the situation but they weren't disappointed to see the fight ended. There had been fights here before, and she expected them to end like that. The boys stopped trying to fight each other, but Harry and Lucy stayed put. Their eyes were locked in different places. The boys got out of the grips' of the teachers and went opposite directions.

The crowd of students quickly disappeared, going to their respected slums.

Walking over, Harry rubbed his arm where a student landed a punch upon him. "Is that bad feeling gone?"

"Yeah," Lucy whispered, scared if it was replaced by adrenaline.