Chase desperately tested Louise's grip again. Still, she could not move. “Us not need fight,” she insisted. “Am not Campbell. It fake name.”

“Think she could be tellin' the truth?” asked Louise skeptically. “There's somethin' funny 'bout this girl. You said so yourself. She fights like a beast an' don't speak no proper English. Maybe she just pulled that name outta a hat t' try an' fit in with th' civilized folk.”

Lila Jean wasn't sure. She took a hand off her gun to scratch her head, then sighted Chase's face once again. “Reckon it's just a typical Campbell trick.”

Chase struggled harder, but she was just amusing Louise. She couldn't believe it. After everything she went through, was it really going to end here? Like this?

Lila Jean's finger tightened on the trigger. “Well, see ya around, Miss Campbell. Thank you for the hunt, you've been a good sport.”

Before she could pull the trigger, though, something whacked her on the back of the head. Lila Jean's head jerked forward, then she dropped her gun and fell to the ground.

Chase was shocked. In the low light of evening, it took her a second to recognize her savior's identity.

Torey! In his hands was the same bat that had been used to knock him out.

Louise looked up at him in shock. “What in the hell-”

Whack! He swung the bat against the side of her head, knocking her off Chase. Her hands left Chase's wrists. Chase was free!

“Tor!” she gasped. He grabbed her healthy hand and helped her to her feet. “Why you here?! You nuts?!”

“I-It's like I told you before. I couldn't let you do this alone,” he said.

Chase couldn't believe it. “Dumb. Dumb Tor...” But even as she chastised him, she couldn't help but be moved. Even though she was upright now and could stand unsupported, she continued to hold his hand. “Thank you.”

Louise stood up, working her jaw tenderly with her hand. “Grrr...you li'l snake in the grass... Hittin' Lila Jean while her back is turned...Makin' this a fair, two-on-two fight...whar is your sense of honor?”

She advanced toward them. Torey got between the two girls and swung his bat at Louise again. This time, though, her hands were free. She caught his blow in her cut, bleeding hand, then easily yanked the bat out of his grasp. Taking the bat in both hands, gripping it on each end, she raised a leg and broke the bat over her knee like a toothpick.

“J-Jesus!” exclaimed Torey, alarmed.

Smiling at his reaction, Louise tossed the pieces aside, then stepped toward him. She didn't quite match him for height, but after the feat she just pulled he couldn't help but see her as imposing.

“Tor,” said Chase, putting a hand on his arm. “Much glad you come. Save life. But you not stay. Them much strong. Them guns. You get hurt. Must go! Let me!”

Torey shook his head. “You're barely standing, Chase. Get to safety. I'll hold her off!”

He swung a punch at Louise. Just like when Chase hacked at her with the tomahawk, she made no attempt to dodge. He connected squarely with her cheek, with a blow forceful enough to double her over.

But even though she doubled over, she did not fall. She stood back up. Her nose was bleeding. She turned her head, spat out some blood, then gave a faint smile. “You holding back cause I'm a girl, or is that all you got?”

Torey tried again. This time, she shot a hand up and caught his punch in her bloody palm. She grabbed his wrist, turned, and wrenched his arm back. Placing her other hand on his back, she drove him headfirst into the trunk of a tree. The branches shook from the force of the impact. She let go of him, and he collapsed to the ground, limp.

“Tor!” Chase shouted, horrified. She rushed past Louise and fell at his side. A cut spanned his forehead, and blood trickled down from it, over his closed eyes. He was out cold.

Chase's foremost emotion was fear, but once she saw Torey would be alright, fear gave way to utter awe and disbelief. Torey knew how heavily outgunned Chase was, and yet he was still willing to come fight on her side. He saw firsthand the terrible strength Louise possessed, and yet he readily rushed in to face her for the sake of giving Chase a chance to escape. Did he really care about her that much?

She was jerked roughly from her thoughts by an arm wrapping around her throat. The arm squeezed, and Chase felt a hand push against the back of her head. Before she could even raise a hand to defend herself, Louise had locked her in a choke hold.

“Gettin' sentimentiful, are ya, sweetheart? You let yer guard down,” said Louise. “You should know better'n that. You got strong blood, but that don't mean you should get careless.”

Chase couldn't get a molecule of air through the vice of Louise's hold. She grabbed at her enemy's arms, tried to loosen them, but abandoned this pursuit quickly. She knew well enough by now that Louise did not loosen.

Her mind was screaming at her to keep trying to free her throat, to somehow wrestle the arm away. Hard as it was to ignore this, she needed to forget her neck for a moment and focus on the bits of her that weren't constricted. Namely, her arms and legs.

She stomped hard on Louise's foot, distracting her, then slammed her elbow hard into the cheerleader's stomach.

Louise might have taken Torey's punch as an amusement, but it was a very painful realization to find that Chase was on a whole different level of strength than he was. The wall crumbled. Louise curled up in pain as the air was hammered from her lungs, and although she kept her arm around Chase's neck, her grip slackened ever so slightly. Chase swung her legs up into the air and backwards, flipping herself up over the titan's head. Louise could not readjust her grip before Chase slipped out of it, passing behind her and out of reach.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

Chase had done it. She'd escaped Louise's grasp. But Chase wasn't going to stop at just freeing herself. She was angry now. Louise hurt her. She hurt her boyfriend. Chase had a chance to strike now, and strike she would.

Her sneakers never touched the ground. As she slid down Louise's back, she locked her legs around the girl's waist. She wrapped the crook of her arm around Louise's neck, grabbed onto her own broken wrist, and used it to cinch her grip tight. A reversal. Louise had her try, and it was a very good try. But now, it was Chase's turn.

Louise's instincts in this situation were the same as Chase's: Free the neck. Her fingers coiled themselves around Chase's arms like steel bands, and she pulled at Chase with all her might. Chase screwed her eyes shut and resisted, putting every bit of strength she had left into staying solid.

She couldn't just hold on. She couldn't just weather this assault. She had to give the impression she was unmovable, as unmovable as Louise had been. Because if Louise thought she could break Chase, she would keep trying. And Chase knew that she would not be able to hold up to this sort of force for long.

Unbelievably, it worked. In her desperation, Louise gave up hastily and decided to try a different method for removing Chase.

She charged herself backwards, slamming Chase against the same tree she'd used to knock out Torey.

WHAM! Pain shot up Chase's back, but she held fast. She had a tiger by the tail. If she let go now, she'd most likely be killed. WHAM! WHAM! Louise tried again. And again.

This close to Louise, feeling her pulse against her skin, Chase could feel something change in her. Her strength scattered on the wind as discipline became disorder and cockiness became panic.

Louise leapt up into the air, turned, and landed on her back, crushing Chase beneath her mass. Chase winced as her back was battered by the rocky ground, but the energy she would have expelled by crying out, she put into her hold. She yanked her broken wrist even tighter.

Louise tried to stand and body slam Chase one more time, but she found herself stuck on her hands and knees. Her consciousness was fading. Try as she might, she couldn't get up.

In the end, her elbows buckled, and she fell forward, face down on the forest floor. Her hands made one final attempt to claw at Chase's arms, but her strength was that of a child. Finally, she went limp.

Chase held on for a few more seconds to make sure she was out before letting go of her. The girl slept quietly on the forest floor. If not for her bloody nose, she might have looked peaceful.

She put her bloody fingers to Louise's cheek, and brushed a lock of her brown hair behind her ear. “Am sorry,” Chase said to her. “Not want hurt cheer... but you make me.”

But was that really true? She thought back on all that she'd done that day and felt a bit sick. Could she have resolved the situation a different way? A way that wouldn't have put herself, her fellow cheerleaders, or Torey, in danger? She didn't think so...but maybe that was the problem. Alicia had found a way. Alicia had been able to prevent this kind of conflict once already, and Chase sensed that if she'd been around when Lila Jean showed up, she could have done it again. Perhaps Chase resorted to violence as a solution because unlike Alicia, unlike the other, normal Sunnycrest cheerleaders, Chase DIDN'T know anything else. And people around her suffered for it.

Chase stood up, feeling exhausted. Every bone in her body was aching. If she felt like this, even with endorphins doing their best to relieve her pain, she didn't want to imagine what she'd feel like tomorrow.

She walked towards Torey, who was still sitting, leaning against the tree. How would she drag him back to Sunnycrest in the shape she was in? Well, she had no choice but to try.

BLAM.

Just as she was readying herself to pick him up, she felt a bullet tear through her body.

Chase looked down. There was an exit wound in her stomach the size of a ping pong ball.

…..........

Mary Rose's tapered chin rested on her hand, head nodding with disinterest as her captive rambled on and on. This was not going as planned. Not that seducing a guy should require much planning. Generally, being in the vicinity and being hot had been more than enough to get the job done. And yet here she was.

“...and that sums up the intricacies of the pump fake,” said Kirk. “Now then, let's move on to the play-action pass. Rather than bore you with the details, I'll break it down into six sections.” He paused. “Uh, are you okay? You seem tired.”

Mary Rose jerked awake. She had dozed off for a second. She gave him a sweet smile and said, “Oh! Sure, honey. I'm fine.” She got an idea. Maybe it was time to turn it up a notch. “Just a li'l bit lightheaded, is all. Would you hold me?”

“Uh, well-”

She didn't wait for his confirmation. She got up and sat back down sidesaddle in his lap, leaning her head against his chest. She looked up at him and asked in a sensuous voice, “There we go, that's much better, don't you think?”

“Uh, I dunno,” he said awkwardly. “You know I have a girlfriend, right?”

Mary Rose was startled at this, then annoyed. She prided herself on her ability to make guys forget about their girlfriends. She was not accustomed to hearing them brought up in conversation. She crossed a leg over the other, letting her skirt ride up a little. “So?” she asked nicely.

“Well, isn't this the kind of thing that might give her the wrong idea?” he asked uncertainly.

Mary Rose giggled placidly. “Oh, you're so sweet. Of course not. You're simply looking aftuh me in my delicate state. I'm just sure she'd understand ev'rything once we 'splained ourselves.”

“Well, you're right about that,” Kirk conceded. “Alicia is pretty understanding. Now then, where were we? Ah, yes, the play-action pass.”

The cheerleader cringed, then gave him a lost puppy look. “Actually, can we take a break from the football talk? Ah'm startin' ta get confused. 'Fraid it happens to me a lot.”

“Well, alright,” said Kirk. She could tell he was feeling a little sorry for her and she reveled in that fact. Her 'I'm dumb, please protect me' act always got them in the end. “Do you wanna talk about something else?”

“Not really, there'll be plenty a' time for chattin' later.” She traced a hand across his chest, feeling his muscles through his shirt. “'Sides, Ah can think of a much quicker way for us to get to know each other.”

“Oh yeah? What's that?” he asked, genuinely curious.

She acted embarrassed. With an uncomfortable giggle, she stammered, “Ah-ah-ah'd rather not say! I'm a bit nervous. Y'see, it's actually my...my first time.” She'd used that line enough times by this point that she could say it without laughing. She assured him with a smile, then took hold of his wrist. Slowly, she moved it to her thigh. His palm felt warm. “But if you're ready, ah'm ready.”

“Whoa!” yelped Kirk, yanking his hand away. “I told you I have a girlfriend! Alicia!”

However, Mary Rose did not earn her reputation through giving up. She grabbed his hand again, and this time, tried to guide it to her chest. “It's okay, Kirk. Ah won't tell if you won't.”

Click. The lights came on. Mary Rose looked up in shock. “Excuse me!” said a female voice. Mary Rose immediately let go and jumped up to her feet, whirling around.

There was Alicia, standing in the hall entrance, brandishing the golf club. “Get away from my man.”