A/N: Okay guys, I know it’s been too long since I last updated, but seriously, Graphic Design isn’t as easy as you think!

Chapter 13: Outcome

“Whoever said that the pen is mightier than the sword

obviously never met automatic weapons before.”

-Leon Woon as he maintained his M4 assault rifle while talking to his friends-

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What was it like to be loved?

What was it like to have someone you cared about, really cared about, to love you back?

Peter Lee only plopped his head onto the desk as his mind started to wander off to other topics which could be considered irrelevant to Further Maths.

This was really saying something, as Peter was considered one of the most dedicated and focused students ever to grace the college halls.

But it was for good reason, really. It wasn’t often that Peter Lee thought about girls. Mostly because he never seemed to socialize much with any of them.

But he chuckled to himself when he realized his mistake. He wasn’t thinking about a girl.

No.

He was thinking about a woman.

Peter often cursed himself for always falling for a girl that was rather out of his reach (just like another certain someone…)

There was that girl in Form 6 when he was in Form 4…and that other girl who was 2 years older than him…but this crush really took the cake.

He fell in love with a teacher. And this has been his longest crush in like, ever.

Did he have some complex for older girls or something?

Things were complicated. That much was certain.

Peter dazed dreamily into the cream-colored walls of the lecture hall, thankful that Eng Hoe –who was sitting in front of him- could obscure the lecturer’s view of Peter.

“Hey, this so isn’t like you, dude,” Jason said, nudging Peter. “If we have to suffer through this crap, so do you.”

Peter blinked once before looking at Jason, who was scribbling some formulas on his workbook –of which none were useful for the question the lecturer just posted up.

Peter would have tried to calculate the answer, but he just couldn’t find the heart to. He was just too lazy to, for once in his life.

“Thinking of her again, then?” Jason asked, Peter not even responding. It was a rhetorical question, really. It didn’t need an answer.

“You’ll go nowhere with this, man. Just ‘fess up to her already,” Jason hissed, Peter shrugging as he continued to stare blankly at the wall.

He was always the cool and collected one, and emo never associated itself with him. But Peter’s Achilles’ heel is his total inexperience with girls. He isn’t the type to strike a conversation with one girl for no apparent reason, nor find the courage to talk to the girl (woman?) of his dreams.

He crinkled his nose in discontempt when he gathered that even Leon had more girl acquaintances than he did, which struck Peter like an ironic jab to the gut.

“Mr. Lee, do you have the answer to this equation?”

Peter almost cricked his neck as he turned to see his lecturer –and almost every student- looking at him, expecting him to answer the question of which he had not paid attention to.

Oh damn…

He appeared lost for a second until he spotted Benedict –who was next to him- discreetly sliding the answer towards him.

“Uh…” Peter feigned a thoughtful gaze, picking up the paper and passing it for his own, taking up another piece to stage a calculation.

“According to what I tried to calculate, the equation is 3.141529 to the power of 12,” Peter said in one go, trying to sound as legit as possible.

The lecturer gazed at Peter, his cold calculative stare seemingly piercing through Peter’s guise like a hot knife through thawed butter.

Peter wasn’t a very religious person, but right now he was praying that whoever was up there would save him from his predicament. He didn’t care how.

“I think you’re missing a decimal, Mr. Lee. Never mind, at least you got the equation in general,” the lecturer said before turning around, running a hand through his dark long hair.

Plopping down onto his seat, Peter heaved a sigh as he thanked Benedict, who was hiding his grin. “Just goes to show that even the mighty have fallen, eh?” Jason asked, Peter shrugging as he tried his best to pay attention.

He was getting himself into trouble by day-dreaming like this. He knew it. But if it was thoughts about her, he knew they just might be worth it.

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Even when travelling at sub-sonic speeds, a bullet can be affected by small matters such as the direction of the wind and its speed, the humidity, and the Coriolis Effect.

A sniper team consists of a sniper and a spotter. The two-man team offers many advantages over the deployment of a lone sniper in the field. The spotter carries his own special scope that is much more powerful than the scope on a sniper rifle.

The spotter uses his scope to help the sniper observe objectives and set up the shot. The two soldiers work together to get to the objective safely and discreetly and then set up a position.

What happens next need not be said…

“Hey, Chris, you done yet?”

The bespectacled teen looked up, Ken standing in front of him with his bag slung across his shoulders.

“Hmm?” was all he could say, his train of thoughts apparating away.

“Since Leon lent you that book, you’ve been obsessed with it, dude,” his older twin mused, gesturing Chris to get up from the campus garden’s soft, green grass.

“Hey, this interests me, okay? I never knew that sniping was so complicated,” Chris defended, waving the book about military sniping around.

“It’s barely 30 pages. How long does it take for you to get through it?” Ken asked, yawning as he and Chris walked over to their cars.

It was about 5.30, so they had some time before they had to go back, but they decided to adopt Leon’s style of approaching homework.

“I’d try and complete it as soon as I reach home. If otherwise, I’d just try my best to do it some other time. Hence the lack of sleep. And how I manage to fall asleep in class and not feel guilty about it.”

Kudos to you then, Leon….Chris muttered to himself as he plopped into the driver’s seat, dumping his bag onto the empty passenger seat.

“Too tired to drive, then?” a voice came out from his multimedia display.

“Yeah…mind driving me back, Eve?” Chris asked, the screen then glowing green as the car’s AI, Eve, smiled at Chris.

“Sure. I haven’t drove in awhile,” the purple-haired girl chuckled,

“Well, it’s a win-win situation then, right?” Chris grinned as he reclined his seat, slowly closing his eyes as he began to drift off to sleep.

Then the distinct sound of screeching tires only came mere fractions of a second before the loud, definite sound of metal bashing into metal pried Chris’s eyes open.

As he sat upright, Eve gasping, Chris looked over left and right to try and find the source of whatever crash just happened.

“Eve, status report,” he said.

Great, I’m starting to sound like Leon…

“Well, I’ve got nothing. Wanna get down and check?”

“Now that’s helpful,” Chris said, raising an eyebrow.

“Sorry. You tell me what’s up then, ok?” Eve said as she sweetly batted her eyebrows at him.

“Oh if only you were real…” Chris muttered as he stepped out of the car.

He could have sworn he heard a ticklish giggle coming from the inside as he shut the door, but didn’t bother to investigate any further. The busybody in him protested that whatever happened was more important.

He had no idea how right he was.

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No.

Not again.

This is not happening.

“Hey, are you okay, man?”

He couldn’t even open his eyes right. His head was throbbing painfully as he staggered out of the car.

This couldn’t be right. The crash wasn’t that severe. He shouldn’t be disoriented or anything. Yet why did it affect him so?

He crashed his car several years ago, and it wasn’t his fault. He wasn’t so sure if this one could hold the same excuse.

“Terry, Terry! You okay, man?” he heard a familiar voice call out to him.

The boy merely shrugged as his eyes remained shut, and suddenly felt himself grabbed squarely by the shoulders.

Not really accustomed to having been forcefully grabbed, he flailed his hands in reflex but found that he had no leverage.

He felt his left eye being opened and a bright, blinding light shining upon it.

“No pupil dilation. He’s fine.”

Terry shook his head as the real world started to come back to him, the swirl of colors that once disoriented him now turning slowly into place.

He could make out Ken’s hairstyle, and Leon’s earlier voice.

“What happened?” he asked. It was a question that needed no answer, but still, it never hurt to ask.

“You crashed. Hard,” Leon said.

“How could it be? I just came out of the stupid parking space,” Terry struggled, short freeze-frames of images running through his head.

He wasn’t even speeding anything, as far as he could remember. He couldn’t even understand why that accident ever happened.

“He zoomed into you. I saw it,” Ken said, helping Terry to get back up on his feet.

“Who?” Terry asked. Saying anything more than a few words was quite impossible for him still, but he tried to recompose himself as much as possible.

“One of our seniors. I’m not so sure what’s his name, exactly,” Leon said.

Terry saw the blurred outline of a yellow car next to what he gathered was his own. “Is that…?”

“Yeah. A yellow ’08 Camry. I think you got the worst of it, dude.”

Terry rubbed his eyes, an attempt to focus better on the wreck that was his car and the other’s, and his heart almost dropped once he understood the scale of the accident.

Almost the entire frontal left section of his Proton Persona was smashed badly, but the Camry suffered a badly-dented front and a broken headlight.

I guess imported cars arebuilt tougher…Terry winced, walking over to his car.

He could see the owner of the Camry crouching down, shaking his head at the damage on his car, mumbling things like “Oh man…oh man…”

Big deal, you idiot. My car’s more banged-up than yours.

“You okay, dude?” Terry offered to the guy, who only stood up and turned around.

Terry flinched when he saw the burning look on the boy’s face.

“Do you think I’m okay?! You smashed up my ride!” he roared, even Leon taking a step back from his position.

“Whoah, wait up, man. Let’s settle this like gentlemen, yeah?” Terry asked, his hands half-raised.

“Screw that! We’ll settle this like real men!” the youth yelled, cracking his knuckles and approaching Terry dangerously.

Backing up, Terry outstretched his arms to try and halt the boy, Leon and Ken instinctively trying to stand in between.

“Dude, calm down. It’s something that money can solve. We don’t have to make a big fuss out of this,” Leon said, holding back the boy.

It was ironic, really. Leon was the one that would be the first to jump into a fight, yet here he was, being diplomatic.

“Get out of my way, shrimp. My business is with him,” he retorted. That left Leon quite stunned for awhile, and so did it to Ken and Terry. Even if the boy was barely a head taller than Leon, calling him a shrimp wasn’t necessary. Neither was it wise.

“Now look here. This isn’t the right thing to-”

“You just get the hell outta my way, small fry!” the boy yelled, pushing Leon almost to the ground.

He then stormed his way towards Terry, who was already half-thinking of summoning Gladius. It was better to prevent a fight entirely, but if it had to come down to this, Terry knew he had no choice…

“You owe me a new headlight, pal,” he said, stopping mere meters from Terry’s face.

“And you owe me a new bumper, but who’s counting, exactly?” Terry replied, a gentle retort.

“I don’t owe you anything, dammit. You crashed into me!” he said, prodding a finger painfully onto Terry’s chest.

“Hey! Stop it!” Terry said, flailing the guy’s hand away. “Let’s just ask the eyewitnesses, alright?!”

Terry wasn’t really in the mood to play nice right then, but it took a lot of self-control to hold him back. He dreaded the thought of turning almost as trigger-happy as Leon would sometimes.

“Fine! Everyone! Who crashed into who first, eh?!” the boy yelled, raising his arms up.

The few people that lingered there started to whisper to each other, quite unsure as how to answer him.

“You hit Terry first.”

Everyone turned to see Ken standing forward with his arms crossed.

It took the boy a few seconds to register what happened before he said “…What?”

“You heard me. You crashed into Terry first with your yellow Camry,” Ken said, leering at him.

That left the boy slightly speechless as he tried to come out with a good retort.

“I saw it. Terry was slowly coming out of his spot when you, who was speeding throughout, smashed straight into him. I’m sure there are others who’d agree with me,” Leon said, crossing his arms.

The boy looked around, trying to find even a shred of support for him, instead of against.

“Give it up, dude. You’re at fault,” Ken said.

The youth merely gritted his teeth, stepping away from Terry, but his eyes scorching a long gaze towards him.

“No. You’re responsible for this,” he growled, Terry gaining back some momentum.

“Says who? Everyone’s siding with me, not you,” Terry retorted.

The boy’s fists balled immediately as Terry finished that sentence, and before he knew it, Terry got smashed for the 2nd time today, but this time, in the face.

Terry felt no pain. He felt nothing whatsoever except the very real sense of him suddenly being thrown to the ground, and he felt the cold, hard asphalt road grind his skin.

This was much worse than the accident itself. He couldn’t even get up from the initial sucker-punch, and Terry knew that a fight was imminent, unless someone intervened. Someone had to.

“Terry!” he heard Leon yell. It was expected, Terry guessed. Even if he wouldn’t think twice before arguing with any of them, Leon was fiercely loyal to his friends, especially when it came to situations like these.

“Stop!”

He didn’t even have to see it to know that Leon was now rushing towards the youth, either his M4 or his katana wielded and ready.

Rubbing his cheek –that was now beginning to sting persistently-, Terry got up and walked over towards Leon, who was still stuck at mid-sprint, his katana at the ready.

“This is my fight. Lemme handle this bastard,” he said, patting Leon on the shoulder and cracking his own knuckles.

“So, you want me to beat the money out of you?” the boy asked, cracking his knuckles too like it was some form of a reply.

“On the contrary,” Terry said, flexing his right arm, and then small tendrils of light forming to around it.

The menacingly large sword known as Gladius apparated within that second, Terry then swinging it across his shoulder like it was weightless.

“Oh, that’s supposed to intimidate me?” the boy scoffed, Terry shrugging.

“It’s a two-way thing, really. It’s either I scare the crap outta you with this sword, or I hit you once with it and knock you off your rocker. Either way, I win.”

The boy merely blinked before smirking.

“You think you can hit me with that? News flash, kid. I’m a speed-based fighter. Your huge sword doesn’t stand a chance of hitting me,” he grinned.

“We’ll see,” Terry said, readying his huge broadsword.

The boy reached into his back pocket to reveal a pair of gloves that looked extremely bulky.

“I’ll beat you to a pulp before you even swing that stupid thing once,” he smirked, putting the gloves on swiftly and flexing his fingers.

“We’ll see who hits who first,” Terry said before he gestured the youth to make the first move –the only thing was, Terry was gesturing him with a rather rude finger.

“You overconfident bastard. I’ll mutilate you so hard your own mother won’t recognize you,” he seethed, walking slowly, -but threateningly nonetheless- to Terry.

“I’d say the same thing, except for the fact that your mama died once she gave birth to you. ‘Know why? Face-problem,” Terry retorted, Leon laughing appreciatively at that comment.

Apparently there were some hidden meanings to words that only Leon and Terry’s Graphic Design circle knew, then.

“You’re so dead,” the youth growled, rushing at Terry with such speed that surprised even Leon, who actually flinched.

Whoah, he wasn’t kidding…Terry muttered to himself, dodging the charging youth as he swiped once.

Swinging his sword at ease, Terry almost cleaved the guy, but missed as he leapt away from Gladius’s threat range.

“Too slow!” he yelled before slamming his fist into Terry’s outstretched left arm –a last line of defense.

Terry then back-swung the sword to slam its blunt –and broader- side onto the boy, who practically flew back several good meters.

Balling his left fist, Terry only then began to feel the pain of the boy’s punch, for all it was worth. It wasn’t a searing pain, but it was gradually beginning to arise to that level, and Terry couldn’t afford to have one of his arms in a handicap in the middle of the fight.

“Shouldn’t we help him?” Ken asked Leon, who only stood by and observed, arms crossed.

“He can handle himself. Hell, he’s almost as good as we are.”

“I can’t argue with you there.”

Both Ken and Leon turned behind to see Chris standing there, observing as well.

“When did you get here?” Ken asked.

Chris merely shrugged. “I was here since the fight started. I just didn’t say anything.”

Oh.

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He had to be honest. This fight wasn’t going in his favor, that much was certain.

Terry budged slightly to the left, dodging a swipe by the boy’s metal-plated gloves by merely a whisker. He swore he could even feel the air around the glove scrape his skin.

“I told you, kid! I own you in this fight!”

Terry swore in his mind, not wanting to actually waste his breath on the bastard, instead putting more energy into trying to cut him into 2 pieces, or more.

He swung Gladius again, stopping in mid-slash to bring the sword down onto the ground, taking the boy by surprise.

Sidestepping, he dodged the slash, but wasn’t spared from the flying debris that came from Gladius slamming onto the dirt road.

“You were saying?” Terry asked before slamming his own left fist squarely into the boy’s face, sending him flailing backwards.

It was as good as over, then. A punch straight to the nose was good enough to break it, no matter how strong the other guy was.

But when the boy got back up, he only smiled as he wiped his nose. It didn’t look broken, though.

What the…?

“You think I’ve never got my nose broken before? I’m a close-range expert, dumbass. I can take a punch as well as deal a bigger one!”

He then dug his foothold onto the ground once, and then sprung out, catching Terry by surprise.

It was too late for Terry to do much but try and defend himself, using Gladius’s broad side as a shield.

It worked, but it also caused the sword to slam back into himself as the boy kicked Gladius, sending both the sword and its owner backwards.

“Owning such a ridiculously large sword isn’t such a good idea, no?”

With that, he grabbed Terry by the collar and kicked him in the gut.

“Dammit, we gotta help him!” Ken urged, moving forward.

“No! This is his fight. We step in and it’ll only look bad on him,” Leon said, grabbing Ken by the arm.

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He really had his hands full this time.

The more he tried to attack, the faster and swifter the boy could dodge him. He only managed to hit him once per every 10 hits he was dealt.

“What’s the matter? Too fast for you?”

Yeah, but like hell I’m ever gonna admit that.

“You’ve gotta be running out soon, dude. You don’t stand a chance much longer,” he said with a grin, hitting Terry again in the gut.

The first one hurt like hell. The 2nd one didn’t make things any better.

Bending over –for once, not from laughing, but from the excruciating pain, Terry struggled to get up, but his chin collided with something hard. The boy’s steel-plated knuckles.

Flying backwards, the sky the only thing he could see, Terry found it to be a very ironic situation. He was looking at something peaceful; while here he was, getting the living err…goodness kicked out of him.

When he landed with a loud thump, Terry couldn’t even get up. He was just too beaten-up to fight.

“Hmph. Pathetic. Simply pathetic. Just goes to show that you can’t beat someone that’s almost as fast as lightning.”

That sparked something in Terry’s mind.

You want lightning, eh?

Holding onto Gladius, Terry struggled to get up, the boy only looking at him with a skeptical expression.

“You still wanna go at it? You can’t beat me, ding-dong! Just pay me up and let’s get this settled!” he said with a taunting overtone that annoyed Terry.

Terry came with no retort. He just stood there, Gladius held in his right hand, and then brought it forward.

”What is he…?” Ken asked.

Leon looked reminiscent for a second before his eyes widened to the diameter of a Coke can.

“He’s gonna do it. He’s really gonna do it…”

“Do what?” Chris asked, patting Leon’s back.

“You’ll see,” Leon replied, crossing his arms. “And you guys might wanna stand back.”

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The red mechanical orb in the center of Gladius was strangely rotating fast, as if it was a gyroscope or a bearing of some sort. Leon once explained that the orb was what kept the gravity around Gladius altered so Terry could lift such a heavy thing up.

“What are you doin’, man?” the boy taunted.

Then something happened.

The sword upright, Gladius disassembled itself. The seemingly one-bladed sword separated into neat, systematic parts that floated close to the still-spinning orb, Terry holding on to the handle –which was actually elongating itself.

“What in the…?” Ken muttered as the metal segments began to glow, and gathered onto the orb.

The segments started to re-join in a different formation, constructing something entirely different. The handle guard changed from its horizontal orientation to almost vertical, the blades now forming into one distinguishable weapon.

Terry’s broadsword was transforming into a scythe.

When the last segment attached itself onto the main body, what replaced Gladius was a scythe with a main blade that remained straight instead of bending, and above it, 2 smaller blades. The entire weapon looked like a rather lethal effigy of a strangely jet-black sunset.

“Whoah…” Chris said, looking as Terry held his new weapon two-handed, bending over slightly to support its seemingly heavy weight. Ken noticed that the orb stopped spinning once the transformation was complete.

“Dalgius…”

“What?” Ken and Chris asked Leon, who muttered that one word.

“His scythe. Dalgius. Twice the size of his Gladius, twice as lethal.”

Ken blinked, and then asked. “You mean he has 2 weapons?”

“No. Just one. But Gladius has the ability to transform into another weapon. Dalgius.”

The boy looked slightly intimidated, but held his ground as Terry held the scythe with a dark look on his face –something so un-Terry like.

“You think that scythe’s gonna make any difference? It’s even harder to hit me with that thing!” he laughed.

Terry then let the scythe stand upright on the ground, keeping his right arm on it.

“Who said anything about me hitting you with this?”

“What?”

“You call yourself lightning-fast. Boy, you don’t know anything about lightning.”

And with that, Terry snapped his fingers once.

Nothing happened for a good 3 seconds.

Then a loud grumble from the heavens averted everyone’s attention.

“Hey, look!” Ken said, pointing at Dalgius.

The orb was spinning again, but this time, what appeared to be electricity was channeling within it.

The boy peered into it, but couldn’t make out whatever he wanted to see.

“What’s going o-“

He never got the chance to complete the sentence, as a blinding flash and an ear-splitting screech crashed down upon the area, voiding all sense of sight and sound alike.

Chris knew he yelled out, but he could hear nothing. He could see nothing either. Whatever happened had disoriented everyone.

It then suddenly ended as fast as it swiftly as it began.

Rubbing his eyes, Ken could hardly make out anything, except the fact that he could see Terry, still holding Dalgius.

Once he refocused, he could see the boy too, but something was wrong. He was as black as charcoal in the night.

Ken noticed that the ground around the boy was also blacked badly, and could see a smoke trail coming from his hair.

“Ugh, I hate it when he does that,” he heard Leon say.

He turned to see Leon wiping his glasses, almost unaffected by whatever came before.

“Anti-flare lenses. Works well against flash-bangs and lighting,” Leon said, smiling at Ken as he offered to get him up.

It took Ken a few good seconds to understand Leon’s comment.

“Wait, lightning?” he gasped.

Dusting off his shirt, Leon then crossed his arms. “Do you know he has a Japanese call sign that he likes to use? It’s called Byakurai. It means white lightning.”

“So…you mean…” Chris asked, wiping his specs.

“Peter is a master of the Wind element. Ken’s master of the Ice element, you Chris, have been learning and mastering Fire techniques. Terry, on the other hand, controls the Lightning element.”

They all then looked up to see the boy taking several steps before falling to the ground, out cold.

“Hmph. So much for lightning –fast…when it came down to the crunch, you couldn’t even stand up to real lighting.” Terry scoffed, turning around to walk over to the others.

“Nice job Terry, but a warning next time would be lovely,” Leon said, high-fiving him.

“Whoah, Terry, that was wicked, man!” Chris said appreciatively, high-fiving him too, Ken following suit.

“Thanks,” Terry replied sheepishly as Dalgius disappeared.

“So…you gonna force him to pay you? You won, after all,” Leon suggested.

Terry merely shook his head before answering.

“Nah. He’s learnt his lesson, that bastard. I toned down the lightning bolt to only turn him off for a few minutes. It’ll still hurt, though.”

“Good job, then. So you wanna go home first or what?” Leon asked.

“I’d love to. But before that,” Terry replied, brushing his hair back, trying to look cool –and actually pulling it off for once.

“I’d like to take a short nap.”

And with that, he fell face first onto the dirt, startling Ken and Chris.

“Hey, Terry, Terry, you okay man?!”

Leon checked Terry’s vitals before sighing, turning him around to not let him suffocate on dirt and grit.

“He’s fine. He just used up almost all his energy on the fight. Poor idiot,” Leon said, ruffling his hair with a smirk.

“Besides, nothing can kill him. He’s just too ridiculous to die.”

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A/N: There! Finally, Chapter 13 is done!

I’m really sorry to y’all for not updating for so long. Seriously, free time is a rare privilege for me these days!

Terry has been nagging me for ages to get his weapon, Dalgius into the picture. So here it is, you big idiot! Hahaha! ^^