Defenders

Defenders (15)

Sitting in the passenger's seat of Lena's car was very awkward. The music was on full blast, and neither of us said anything to each other. I would have really liked to be back at the DAU. But now I was stuck with her.

I really wasn't sure how I felt about the fact that I was going to have to spend the day with Lena, especially after everything that had just happened back at the DAU. Why was my ankle healed after only a day? It didn't make any sense!

"I'm normally not the kind of girl that would go to the mall," Lena explained to me as we entered, and I didn't say anything, but it was the same for me. "The clothes are all expensive and tacky, and then everything else is just way too expensive."

The last time I had gone to the mall, I had flipped someone over because I thought that they were trying to trick me like Randall had at the beach. So this place didn't exactly have the best memories for me.

"Are you sure we should be here?" I asked her now, and she wouldn't let go of my wrist as she continued to drag me around. "I mean, Aiden's completely unconscious back at the DAU..."

"You're actually worried about that guy?" She rolled her eyes at me. "Why? He's obviously a total jerk."

I wasn't going to deny it or anything. Honestly, I didn't even know how Aiden really was. All I was able to really see was how much he cared about Kristie and pretty much nothing else.

"Just because he might be a jerk doesn't mean he deserves to be hurt," was all I whispered now, but I didn't think she heard me.

"So, I've got to talk to you about something," Lena declared simply as we continued around the mall.

I blinked at her. "Okay."

"How much do you like Dex?"

My eyes went wide. "I... I don't like him at all."

Lena didn't look like she believed me. "Really?" she asked, one eyebrow rising. "You don't like him at all? Not even a little bit?"

I shook my head. "No."

"You've got to be kidding me," she laughed now, and I didn't get what was so funny. "You have to be lying to me! Come on, you can tell me the truth. We're friends, aren't we?"

This made me stop dead in my tracks, my breath catching in my throat. Lena had just called me her friend. Lena thought we were friends. Lena thought she was my friend.

I swallowed. "We're... we're friends?"

She rolled her eyes at me. "Well, duh," she drawled. "Why else would I want to go to the mall with you?"

"I thought I was just your last resort," I responded honestly.

She shrugged. "Well, yeah," she nodded. "But just because you were my last resort doesn't mean I didn't want to go with you."

My mouth went dry. Lena was my friend. I had a friend. My first friend in... years.

"Why do you look so surprised?" she asked me now, her arms crossed over her chest. "It's not like you don't have any friends or anything."

If only she knew...

When she saw the look on my face, she seemed to understand. "You don't have any friends?"

I meekly shook my head. "No, I don't."

She looked at me as if I was insane, and I kind of felt like I was. Was it really that weird to not have any friends? Was it weirder to not want any?

"What about your teammates?" she asked me, her hands now moving to her hips. "Aren't they your friends? I thought that was kind of required."

"No, it's not," I answered honestly, thinking about my four teammates I was forced to spend time with. "Honestly, I never wanted friends. And the five of us barely ever get along, so we're not exactly friends. We just kind of... have to deal with each other."

"Well, I know how you feel," she shrugged, still acting like she didn't care about anything at all. But I could tell that she did. "I don't have any friends either. Not because I don't want any, but because people don't really like me very much."

Lena didn't look particularly sad about this, but then she didn't look happy either. I could tell that she knew it was her attitude that drove people away. She was so beautiful that her looks definitely couldn't have been it.

"You figured out why, huh?" she asked, letting out a little chuckle before shoving her hands into the pockets of her jeans. "You know I'm not exactly the nicest person around. It's hard to get along with me, so most of the kids at my school don't even acknowledge me because they know I'll just be a bitch to them. Also, it's not so much fun being around humans. Except when you get to freak them out with your powers."

I didn't know what it was really like, to be surrounded by humans. I hadn't left my room in my old foster home for years, so I didn't have to deal with any other humans besides my foster parents. I didn't really know how human teenagers acted. Actually, I didn't really know how any teenager acted.

"And sometimes, I remember how I didn't get picked for the DAU," Lena continued with a shake of her head. "And yes, I'm totally pissed about that. For many reasons. My aunt was recruited, and I look up to her more than anything. Even my mom was recruited. When I didn't get a letter, I didn't think anything of it. Because you don't get a letter unless you're the leader. Honestly, I didn't care about being the leader. I just wanted to be on a team. But then no one came to pick me up, and I knew... I knew I hadn't been recruited. It made me feel like I wasn't good enough. It made me feel like I was just a waste of space."

I couldn't believe that Lena was actually telling me all this. But who else could she talk to about this? I was supposedly her only friends. She obviously wasn't comfortable enough to talk about this with Nay or her mother, so I was the only one left.

"I understand," I nodded. It was the truth. I knew exactly what she was talking about. "I felt that way, too. But I felt that way before I even found out about the DAU. I felt that way during the five years I was locked away in my room at my last foster home. Honestly, I didn't want to stay in there. But they made me. When I was eleven, they would lock me in that room for days because they didn't want to deal with me. And after a while, I got used to it."

"The DAU was an outlet for you, huh?" Lena questioned me, a small smile making its way onto her face. "I get it. Maybe that was why you got recruited. That stupid Director knew that you needed a way out of that house. It was just a bonus that you have cool powers."

I shrugged. "You're probably right."

Lena nodded now. "You and I really get each other."

"Lena..." I didn't know what I was supposed to say. "I..."

But she cut me off before I could say anything else. "Okay, stop getting all sappy and answer my question."

And now Lena was back to her normal self. But I was fine with that.

"What question?" I asked, forgetting what she had originally asked me.

The blonde girl rolled her eyes at me. "About how much you like Dex."

Oh, yeah. She wanted to know if I liked Dex or not. I felt like even if I told her that I didn't like him at all, she wasn't going to believe me. So I didn't really know how I was supposed to respond to her.

"I don't like him," I informed her honestly, since there wasn't anything else I could say or do. "I really don't. We're not even friends. He's actually pretty mean to me."

At least, he was. He had been acting nicer toward me recently, which was good. But that didn't mean I liked him or anything. It just meant that we could possibly be friends, sometime in the future.

"Alright," Lena nodded. "So you wouldn't mind if I make a move on him?"

"Would I..." I stammered. "Would I... mind?"

For some reason, I wasn't able to answer her. I wanted to say that she could do whatever she wanted and I wouldn't mind, but my mouth just wouldn't let me say it. I just continued stammering like a complete idiot.

"Hey," a voice suddenly called out, stopping me from having to answer Lena's difficult question. We turned around to see three teenage boys grinning at us. They looked to be a little older than us, but I couldn't tell by how much.

"Hi," Lena greeted back, her tone hard. All I could do was give her a look. Should we really acknowledge these guys?

"You two are cute," one of the guys with blonde hair said to us now, and I found this very unappealing. Were all human boys like this? "You want to come hang out with us?"

Lena seemed to be used to boys like this, so she only rolled her eyes. I, however, had no idea how I was supposed to react to this. The first time I had gotten hit on, it was fake. The second time, I had attacked the boy. I did not want a repeat of either of those.

"No, thanks," I politely declined, knowing Lena would have been mean about it, so I couldn't let her talk to them. "We're kind of busy."

"Doing what?" another boy with red hair asked now.

Damn it. I wasn't good coming up with things on the spot. I just really hoped that Lena had a better excuse to give them than I did.

"We just don't want to hang out with you," she shrugged simply. That was definitely not better! Why did I ever let her open her mouth? She was going to get us into trouble! "Besides, we already have boyfriends."

The thought of me having a boyfriend almost made me laugh. It seemed impossible for me to get a boyfriend, but these boys didn't have to know that.

"Oh, really?" the boy that appeared to be the ringleader questioned. He had black hair. "What're their names?"

"Dex and Anthony," she informed them uncaringly, not missing a beat. "My boyfriend's Dex and her boyfriend's Anthony."

I had nothing to say to this. Of course she would get Dex and I would get Anthony.

"Well, they don't have to know that you hung out with us," the redhead smirked, and it made chills shoot down my spine. All three of them were really creepy. "So, come on. Let's go somewhere."

"I don't think you want to mess with us," Lena smirked, her hands balling into fists at her side. "It'll be the worst idea you ever had."

"Lena," I whispered, grabbing onto her arm. "I don't think this is such a good idea."

"Come on, we have powers and these guys don't," she whispered right back with a roll of her eyes. "What could they possibly do to us that we can't stop?"

I didn't want to answer that question, especially since I didn't have great control over my powers. And Lena didn't know that about me.

Before I could tell her to just forget about this, she was suddenly shooting an icicle right at the redhead. It merely grazed him, ripping his shirt. I knew Lena had done this on purpose.

"What the hell?" the one Lena had grazed shouted. "Was that ice?"

Lena blew at her pointer finger like it was an imaginary gun. "Don't be so surprised."

This was a bad idea. Neither of us could erase memories! If these guys saw something they weren't supposed to, we would be screwed over for sure. And then we'd probably be killed by Nay.

"Lena," I snapped at her. "Don't!"

"Come on," the ringleader now snapped, taking a step toward me and reaching out for me. I took a step back, but he was still able to grab onto my wrist. "Let's go have some fun, baby. Just you and me. We don't need your friend."

Before I could take actions into my own hands, someone else was suddenly punching him right in the face, sending him flying away from me. After a few seconds of shock, he pushed himself up off the ground and he and his friends took off.

I turned toward my savior to thank them, expecting Lena. But my eyes went wide when I saw it was Dex.

"You can't just go out and have a fun time, can you?" he asked, and I bit down on the inside of my lip. "Do you have to get in a fight every time you leave the Defensive Affairs Unit?"

I glared at him. "It's not like I'm doing this on purpose!"

"Seems like you are!"

Before I could shout at him, Lena took a step in front of me and cut me off. "Were you following us?" she demanded.

Dex rolled his eyes at her. "So what if I was?"

Lena's eyes narrowed, and she took a step toward him. My stomach turned. I really was not in the mood to deal with their sexual tension for the thousandth time.

So I took a step back, and neither of them even noticed. I turned away and started off, not knowing where I was going to go. I just didn't want to be around either of them.

I was gone for a good three minutes before Dex finally stopped fighting with Lena and said, "Where's Violet?"

But I was long gone. I was still in the mall, but nowhere near them any longer. And I liked finally being alone for once.

I didn't know where I was supposed to go. I had no idea what was in the mall, or where any of it was. So all I could really do was just walk around. It wasn't like I had any money to spend anyway, but that didn't bother me. Nothing in the mall interested me.

When I was stopped dead in my tracks by the three boys that had just run away from Dex, I wasn't really surprised. And of course, this area of the mall was practically deserted. "Oh, come on," I groaned, running my hand over my eyes. "Of course this would happen. I can't catch a break."

"You might have had that guy to protect you before, but now you're all alone," one smirked, his hands balling into fists. "And now we're angry."

Honestly, I wasn't scared. Not in the slightest. All I could do was stare at them flatly, wanting to ask if this was all they were capable of, but chose not to. It probably wasn't the best idea to get them even angrier.

I didn't need Dex to protect me. I didn't need my powers. I was trained to fight, even without my powers. These guys weren't all that scary anyway. If they wanted to fight, then we could fight.

My first kick landed on the side of the blonde's head. He went down immediately, unconscious. It was actually pretty cool.

The other two took a step away from me, but they didn't back down. They hadn't expected for me to be this skilled, but I knew they weren't going to forfeit that easily, even if one of their buddies had already been knocked out.

The redhead ran at me, and I lifted my knee and rammed it right into his stomach. He let out a loud cough and fell to the floor. I then hit the back of his head and he slumped against his friend, unconscious as well.

This was really too easy. It was much easier fighting humans than it was fighting others from my own species.

The ringleader was the only one left now, and he looked scared. I had to fight the urge to laugh. Obviously, he never thought that he'd get beaten by a girl.

"Good night," I smiled, punching him on the side of his head.

They were all unconscious now. I just stood there, not knowing what I was supposed to do. I didn't know if I was the one that could erase memories or not, and if I tried to erase their memories and I was the one that could do it, I could completely wipe their minds. And I didn't want to do that, even to these jerks.

But there wasn't anything I could do. I had my cell phone, but the last thing I wanted was to call Hank and tell him I needed his help. And who knew what might have happened before he got there? They could have woken up and ran away.

I didn't know what I would do if I wasn't the one that could erase memories. Dex was around the mall somewhere, but I didn't know if he was the one with the power either. I knew Lena wasn't able to do it, because she would have been recruited to the DAU if she could. So I might have actually had to call Hank if I needed to.

I lifted my hand, placing it right in front of the face of one of the boys. I bit my lip, not knowing if this was the best idea.

"Violet," someone suddenly called out, stopping me from doing anything.

I spun around to see Hank. "What are you doing here?"

"Dex called and said you were missing," he informed me, his eyebrows furrowed. "I came to see what was going on."

"I wasn't missing," I snapped, though I didn't mean to. "I just wanted to be alone. I was tired of seeing Lena and Dex together."

Hank had a look on his face that I couldn't read. I didn't think I want to. "Well, I understand how you feel, Violet, but it's not the best idea for you to go off on your own. This just proved it."

I was tired of being treated like a child. So what if I always got in a fight whenever I was by myself? It wasn't like I was the one that initiated them. It was always the other person. It wasn't my fault.

"I won't go off on my own anymore," I grumbled, and I knew Hank could tell I wasn't happy about this. "Obviously, I'm not capable of taking care of myself."

Hank's eyes softened. "Violet," he sighed. "I know you can take care of yourself. But one day, you're going to have to deal with an enemy that's stronger than you. And enemy who isn't just a human."

"Like someone from Redrum?" I inquired, even though I already knew the answer. Hank nodded. "I know the members of Redrum are stronger than me. But it's not like I'm going out and purposely running into them! It's not like I'm looking for a fight. I just want to be alone sometimes. Is that too much to ask for?"

Hank nodded. "I understand, Violet. I understand."

I couldn't say anything else to him, because we were then cut off by two sets of footsteps. I spun around and wasn't surprised when I saw Dex and Lena making their way toward us. Dex looked extremely pissed.

"What the hell happened?" he demanded, looking at the three unconscious bodies on the ground around us. He then grabbed onto my arms. "Are you okay?"

Why was everyone assuming I was hurt? I had the one that had come out victorious in this fight! Was I the one unconscious on the ground? No!

"I'm fine," I snapped, unaware of the fact that he was actually worried about me. "I can take care of myself."

"Right now you can, sure." Dex frowned now, still not letting go of me. "What's going to happen when you can't take care of yourself and no one's around to protect you?"

I wasn't in the mood to have this argument again. "Then I'll go ahead and die."

His grip on my arms tightened. "Don't even joke about that."

I was tired of people thinking that I was weak. I had just taken down three guys that were bigger than me! Sure, they were humans, but didn't that count for anything? I knew they were going to be different from Redrum members, but that wasn't something I wanted to think about.

Lena was giving us a look I couldn't read, much like Hank had. I ignored it. It was best to not fuss over this type of thing.

"Whatever," I snapped, yanking myself out of his grasp. "Come on. Let's go."

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Yay, a new chapter! I really enjoy writing this story. :)

Favorite character? Favorite couple? Least favorite character? Least favorite couple?

(Here are the couple ship names... Vex, Vanthony, Lex, Kaiden, and then whoever else you want to be together!)

Sorry this chapter took so long! I've been completely swamped with school. But I'm going to try my hardest to keep updating regularly! :D

Please COMMENT, VOTE, and FAN! <3