Watch Your Back

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"No one should be left to suffer alone."

                        - Anonymous

Athena made it as far as five doors away from the gym room, her head turning back every second like a broken machine.

The incessant screams followed her and she admitted defeat.

She couldn't bear to leave knowing everyone had dug their own grave early just for her while she cower away. She also didn't want anyone to get hurt in spite of that someone being her assailant and got his own taste of medicine.

She threw the goddamn tempting fries and burger a side, hearing her heart crack as she strode back with newly found tremulous confidence.

The door broke open. Athena felt a wave forcing itself from her stomach to her mouth. "STOP!"

That was it. The roof went off and her vocal cords broke.

She needed doctor immediately, but when was she ever lucky?

To her surprise, the one word that came across as useless in her entire life actually worked.

All eyes were framed on her as they checked their surroundings, seeming like they succeeded in snapping out of a wicked spell casted upon them.

Thea got off the top, so used to being there that she had to be on this complex one.

Deliberately, the students began breaking ways, some did it lightning fast, scared stiff of their demises in the hands of the God of A-list while some got up exceptionally gradual, hoping to stay longer while they were alive.

Xerus didn't wait for the pile that compressed him to clear as he rose to his feet, head hung lowly and shoulders exceedingly slumped to the front, breathing in quick, short breaths, as though he had sustained through an onslaught of zombies, the only sole survivor.

Thea gasped at the sight of Xerus.

Thick crimson fluid dribbled down the side of Xerus' head, making his hair slightly damp as several very visible, deep cuts unveiled on his arms behind his shredded coat when he staggered.

Immediately upon lifting his head a little, fear found the students.

Blood was also present at the corner of his beguiling lips that smudged towards his neck and his cheeks were covered in dreadful abrasions all the way to his eyes.

These injuries were no doubt from the pedicured nails of the students.

Dead.

They were all dead.

Not as in their lives but their family, their people in their neighbourhood, hometown, even those who they had so small connections with.

And the students?

Their souls will never get to heaven before they get clobbered by Xerus first.

"Oh Jesus Christ! Xerus! Oh my goodness! Oh my God! Oh my God! What do I do?!" Thea freaked out, examining his face holding his head in her hands but he pulled away roughly, looking at Thea, but not really.

He was looking at the person behind her.

"You," he uttered under his uneven breath, eyes twitching in detestation, never could he bring himself to speak of her name.

"For how long do you plan to watch me in torment before you're satisfi—" He choked on his words, gasping for air as he wiped the blood from his temple, showing Athena what dire things her presence always brought him.

Xerus spat his blood onto the face of a bulky guy and he was the happiest to have swallowed it.

Xerus directed his attention back to Athena. "You enjoy this, don't you? You are laughing inside seeing me like this. You fucking go as far as to change your name to fucking fuck my life over again? There's no fucking wonder why you stole it from me. You fucking planned this. Or are you going for Theo this time, huh? Is this why you date him? You're a fucking gold-digger! A bloody gold-digger who loves the rich cripple at your feet! You fucking think you can go on with this forever?!" He seethed in wild anger, chanting curses.

Normally, he's always empowered in every sort of circumstances. In this case, Athena had the upper hand, for Xerus himself could hardly have the power to stay sane, and it could all only depend on her answer. Her and the students' lives.

Everybody prayed for her to be smart for once, but she had to say what seemed so wrong from the beginning. "Oh my God! Would you stop? I literally have no idea who you are let alone know what I did which I'm sure I didn't! But the one thing I know is that I have no intention against Theo. What we have is real."

No, it wasnt.

The sizzling rage that bubbled at the depths of the Devil overflowed, drugging Xerus into compliance once again.

He launched to her, this time having no one to protect her anymore, she was on her own as this was reality, fear over goodwill anytime, especially for someone they barely knew, someone who had crossed Xerus.

Xerus seized her shoulders brutally, his fingers digging into her flesh, causing her to wince. "Fucking drop your act right now! Show your true colours, Athena Rose. I know you, the real you." His eyes glistened from the might he exerted, ramming his finger at her chest profusely when he tried to unmask her.

He was so close to her that she could feel his boiling, scorching breath fanned across her face and the metallic scent of blood that oozed out of his wounds rushed into her lungs, but what she noticed most was the intensity in his tone and the true meaning behind his words, there was a great deal of confined emotions.

It all mirrored into the window to his soul. It brewed with anger, hate, quease, disappointment and... pain?

Why would he be hurt?

It must be his injuries, she concluded.

"Look, we can talk later in private but I think you really need to rush to the hospital for now," Athena suggested.

If this was really her acting, Xerus'd pay the Oscars a fortune to get her an award.

He laughed lowly. The fresh bloodied gashes was barely a speck of dust compared to the old wounds that never seem to dissappear in his heart." You mean funeral. When have you ever fucking cared for someone?"

Athena's eyebrows creased. "What? Why are you keep saying stuff like—"

He shook her by the shoulders with all his might. "IT'S FUCKING ME! Why the hell are you acting like you aren't the most heartless person I've ever met, huh?! Trying to ruse everyone?!" He roared.

For Xerus to call someone "the most heartless" person must have done something worse than what an asylum could do to an entrapped innocent.

She went nauseatic from all the shaking and when he finally stopped, they both had a moment of silence, just staring at one another, not a single muscle moved.

Her, striving to recollect if she ever met his foreign face though knowing it was to no avail, her memory was as good as dead.

Him, telepathically sending her the ghastly, abhorrent traumas he endured.

She shook her head slowly, relinquishing.

If anything, Xerus was the best at reading body languages. An indirect training whenever he inflicts people with the darkest, fearsome feelings.

He saw the pure sincerity that laced her expression, eyes and it circled her entire being. A humongous rock settled upon him, mashing him to a pulp, blending his emotions into a mix.

"You're not joking. You really have forgotten all about me." He expressed his incredulity through a scornful scoff. "You're so cruel, Athena. Everything was really just games and play to you. Why do I have to suffer while you just live your life without guilt," he muttered, comprehending how much a fool he was.

There was always an evil and honed shard that dwelled in his chest for years, a shard she had installed. The agony stayed so long that it deprived Xerus' sensation to it and soon it became a source to relief his affliction, it became home.

But as of now, the shard started stretching again, and Xerus' had no promises if he could ever sustain it this time.

If he could only order Derek to proceed a surgery where he could swap brains with Athena to forget, but the thought of having something of her in him appalled his guts.

"Uhh..." Was all Athena could say for the third time. If she really didn't know him, how the freaking heck was he able to know of her real name?

Though she had messed up her name thousands of times, she was certain she'd cover her shit with other names that popped in her head, definitely not her real one.

Looking at how unpredictable the situation was, Thea dialed the only number she had in her phone and whispered into it, turning away from Xerus, but side glancing at him, as if he was a difficult pest and she needed an exterminator. "Big brother, please get over..."

From no where, Xerus snatched the phone from her grip, slamming it to the floor and made sure the screen broke with a harsh stomp.

"Did she get in?" His sudden question to Thea made her speechless for a few seconds before assuming he was mentioning about the tryouts.

"Oh, umm... you mean Belle? No. She didn't make it through. W-why?" Thea, being the sister of Xerus' best friend also couldn't control her tongue without stuttering.

"That bitch's name is Athena. Change all the bullshit records of her and put her through," he spoke with a stormy pitch no one can decipher.

Athena was confuse to hell and back. She failed to decide which attitude of Xerus she preferred.

The super aggressive one or the one that just helped her but called her a bitch.

"I- I don't think I can do that. Theo would be upset with me. He clearly said only six can get through," Thea tried to reason mildly. She didn't know who to be afraid more.

"Who said anything about increasing the numbers? Get one out and let her fucking ass in unless... you can quit being the captain," he threatened, emphasising the last of his sentence slowly but extremely malovelent, driving those who got accepted crazy nervous.

Thea bit her lip, scanning through the students with hooded eyelids. "S-sure. Enrique, I'm really really sorry. You can try next year. " Thea forced herself to announce though feeling it was unfair and she wasn't the only one who felt that.

"Wait wait wait. Xerus, why are you suddenly helping me while you just expressed how strongly you hate me just a while ago?" Athena just had to question, a strange sensation piling when his name rolled off her tongue for the first time.

Xerus snapped to her direction. "Don't fucking say my name! If I ever hear you do it again, you will wish you hadn't," Xerus forewarned. His name had never been so ugly to his ears before until now.

Words could never describe how embarrass and awkward she felt in the eyes of many. "Oh, sorry and thank you," she finalised with two simplest yet effective words, well... as far as she knew, it was, not quite sure if it'd work with the cold Viper but it was still manners.

Xerus couldn't bear to look at her again as he answered her over his shoulder, his wounded hands seeking warmth in the pockets of his ruined steep coat. "Shut it. This is where the Thieves beg-pardon to you ends. From this day forward, the Thieves owes you absolute nothing!" He made clear to her, together with the public as witnesses.

When Athena thought he was finished, he said something that had her blood engorge, turning into frost.

"You've broken your promise that we'd be together forever. Now, it's my turn to break mine when I vowed to you I'd protect you forever. Watch your back, Athena Fucking Rose, I will make sure to destroy you like you did me. "

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Oh my god, my back hurts like hell! It's 6 am haha and I'm hearing the chicken's calling me to bed, not that my body isn't already but oh well... I love my readers to enjoy what I do❤️ makes me the happiest!

Until next time!

Also, I swear this is the last chapter in the gym room 😂 I myself can't stand it no more. I'm never stepping into gym room ever again!

Comment and share 💋💋

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