“Ow!” she shouted. She stumbled backwards and fell on her butt on the grass.

“Whoa! Sorry, Victoria!” said a boy's voice. They looked up. There was Kirk Steller, jogging over. Alicia had recently noticed that whenever he did this, she saw it in 0.5x speed. Her appointment with the optometrist was scheduled for the following week.

“Here he comes,” teased Lindsey. “The future Mr. Steller.”

Since the implication hidden in this statement was obviously that Alicia would therefore be the future Mrs. Steller, she stomped on Lindsey's foot.

Kirk arrived. He was a big, handsome boy, with thick, soft-looking brown hair and a face whose jawline and cheekbones were very neatly defined. Despite his size, his looks had a sort of goofy, youthful innocence to them, mostly manifesting in his wild blue eyes and his persistent, playful smile. He stooped down and curled his hands under Victoria's arms to help her up. “You looked open,” he joked.

“Not funny!” she barked, yanking herself free. “Get your hands off me, you clumsy dolt!”

Alicia tried to help her up next, but Victoria snapped at her, too, so they just let her stand up on her own. Her hands flew to her face to conceal the damage. “Mirror!” she demanded.

The cheerleaders looked around at each other. Everybody had left their bags in the locker room. “Come on, come on! A mirror! Any mirror!” She still sounded mad, but there was a bit of whine in there too. “Ohhh, I just know he gave me a black eye... I'm going to look hideous for the big game!”

“Here. Let me see,” volunteered Alicia in a soothing voice. Slowly, gently, she took hold of the girl's skinny little wrists.

Victoria whimpered a little and begged her not to look. She wasn't shouting anymore, which they took as a good sign she actually wanted Alicia to proceed. Gently, the redhead pried her hands away.

Victoria's eyes looked a bit wet but otherwise fine. There was no sign of a bruise or anything. “Well, you look fine. Sometimes it takes a while for a black eye to show, though. I would put some ice on it right when you get home, just to be safe.”

Kirk looked worried. “Gee Victoria, I'm really sorry. I was trying to pass it to Marcus but I overshot it,” He brightened up. “But hey, you have to admit, that was one heck of a tight spiral! Zoom! Like a missile!”

“It sure was, Kirk!” gushed Alicia. She noticed Victoria glaring at her, so she added, “Er, and also very irresponsible. Shame on you.”

Kirk looked up at Chase, and his face burst into one of his glimmering smiles. “Hey! Is this the new girl?”

“Oh! Yeah!” said Alicia proudly. She introduced them. “Kirk, Chase. Chase, this is Kirk. He's our star quarterback.”

Chase didn't know what to say to this. It sure looked like he had all of his back, to her eyes. Maybe it was a prosthesis. How sad.

“Aw, come on Alicia, you're embarrassing me!” chuckled Kirk nervously. “Anyone can do what I do. Our offensive line is where the real stars are.”

Chase shook his hand. “Ni hao, Kirk,” Her voice was very somber. “Am sorry for your loss.”

Kirk laughed. “You heard about that, huh? Well, yeah, we got off to a rocky start this season, but we're on a roll now! Coach really thinks state is in the cards this year!”

“State?” wondered Chase.

“State championships,” Caitlin explained. At Chase's continued confusion, she added: “That's where we go to get the trophies.”

Coach Carson's loud, tough voice sounded across the field. “Steller! Socialize on your own time! Get back over here!”

“Oh crap,” said Kirk, putting his helmet on and turning around. “I better go. Nice to meet you, Chase!”

“Nice meet,” she parroted.

Alicia's determination was refueling before their very eyes. “State! Sunnycrest can do it...” she looked over at the rest of the squad and announced, “...but we can't leave it all up to the boys! We'll have to do our part, too!”

The cheerleaders nodded and exchanged enthusiastic glances. Some called out things like 'yeah!' and 'we can do this!'. Lindsey burst forth with a spontaneous chant of: “Cac-ti! Cac-ti!”

“FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!” the other girls answered. Chase hadn't known Alicia particularly long, but she was already quite impressed with how easily the girl could get a group of people fired up. Even she was affected. The thought of getting one of those trophies possessed her all over again.

“Alright! Let's work out some of that energy on the pom pom routine!” beamed Alicia.

The girls chatted among themselves as they took their places for the pom pom routine. Before she started, Alicia looked over her shoulder. Kirk was jogging back over to his side of the field, but he wasn't so far gone that she couldn't catch him.

She looked at the cheerleaders. They were busy chatting and refreshing each other on the steps of the routine. Perhaps they'd be distracted long enough to give them a moment?

Her sneakers pounded the grass as she chased him down. “Kirk! Wait up!”

He stopped and turned around, just as she reached him. “Oh, hey Alicia. What's up?”

She looked around to make sure Lindsey wasn't in earshot, then lobbed a sweet, cute look up at him. “I just wanted to let you know... I'm not doing anything after practice.”

The boy looked confused for a second, then he grinned. “Hey, that's great! The game's still a few days away, but it's a good idea to be rested for it. I'll probably just take it easy, too. Welp, see ya!”

..............

For Chase, the rest of the week went by with little fuss. There was an incident where Alicia's dad accidentally got snared in a booby trap Chase had set in the backyard, but to Chase, this was the difference between 'little fuss' and 'no fuss whatsoever'.

The night before the game was the most fussless of all. A quiet settled over Sunnycrest as the city turned in for the night, a small town silence that the locals were used to, but which outsiders were quick to compare to the heavy stillness of a crypt.

But even while the rest of the city slept, the police station did not. Especially not Chief McBride, who was hopped up on five cups of coffee and pacing his office with a fury that had not abated since news of the botched theater mission had reached him.

A knock on the door shook McBride from his thoughts. “What is it?”

Johnson eased the door open. He had a folder in one hand, which McBride could already tell was bad news by the coffee cup peace offering in Johnson's other hand.

“Hey, Chief,” he said, in a forcibly casual way, as though trying to make his words tiptoe on their way out of his mouth. He held out the styrofoam cup. “Er... coffee?”

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“No, thank you,” he gruffed. “What's in the folder?”

Johnson opened the file and read from it. “The, uh, autopsy report is back for Holt and Delgado,” he announced. “It looks as though Holt died from, uh...”

“Having his guts fed through a film projector?” asked McBride.

“Well, 'intestinal cinematography' is what they wrote down. But yeah.”

“It took those lab rats four days to deduce that? I figured that out on my own,” he grumped, sitting down at his desk. “And Delgado?”

“Er, well...” This was the result he wasn't thrilled about sharing. “It appears he died of... asphyxiation.”

“She strangled him?”

“Not exactly, Chief. Swelling of the throat. An allergic reaction. To nuts. Stomach contents and abrasions inside the mouth suggest he was force fed a candy bar containing nougat.”

McBride slowly clenched his fists on top of his desk. The desk seemed to hold its breath, expecting these fists to jump up and slam down on it, but they remained where they were. “That bitch. She's toying with us. Sending us a message.”

Johnson looked back down at the report and scratched his head, as though it contained some kind of hidden code. “What kind of message?”

“What do you think?”

The rookie thought about it. “We'd have to be Nuts to think we can catch her?”

McBride broke up one of his fists, so he could put his face in his palm. He looked up. “No, you idiot! She's telling us no matter what we throw at her, she'll beat us. She's telling us she's out of our skill range, that she's so good she can kill one of our best guys with nothing but a candy bar!”

“Oh!” said Johnson. He paused. “So, pretty much what I said then.”

The chief frowned. “Well... I guess the meaning is the same, yes. But... no.” He suddenly looked very tired. “I'll have that coffee now.”

Johnson handed it to him. A cup that had been a large when Johnson was holding it was now a small. McBride took a thick gulp that probably drained three quarters of its contents.

The room was silent for a while, while the chief thought deeply on their situation. “What... should we do, sir?” Johnson finally asked.

McBride didn't look up, his gaze fixed on his coffee. “We end this, Johnson. We end this.”

“Sir?”

He looked up. Their gazes met for only a second before Johnson was forced to look away. The chief looked livid. His stare was a skewer.

“I was handling that brat with kid gloves before. Now, they're coming off,” he announced. “Tomorrow they have a game, isn't that right?”

“Uh, I believe so.”

“Then we shall have a SWAT team in attendance.”

Johnson was shocked. “Another SWAT team? Sir... are you sure that's a good idea?”

“Of course it's a good idea. The last one we sent in was able to take down four of those rednecks. Now, they're just up against one,” explained McBride. “A little girl, at that.”

“Sure, but... at the game? That's... so public! What happened to being discreet?” asked Johnson.

McBride gave a dismissive wave of his hand. “We will be discreet. No one need know we were the ones who took her down,” said McBride. “Bring them in. We'll outline this plan right now.”

..........

The next night was much more lively. As the sun set, people from all over the county began to arrive at Sunnycrest High's football field. Gameday was here and so were the fans, ready for a night of good football.

“Wow, that crowd sounds wild!” commented Caitlin. Her right foot was propped up on a bench as she pulled a sock up to her knee. They could hear the sounds of the stands loud and clear through the high, open window of the girls' locker room. “We could probably take the night off!”

The benches were surrounded by a horseshoe of lockers. The floor was smooth cement, polished by generations of feet, with a large drain in the center. A large, open, tiled room with a similar drain contained ten shower heads, and was partitioned off from the locker-and-benches area by an opaque, sliding glass door. A couple girls had opted to shower before the game but ultimately this room wouldn't see much use until afterward. Up against the wall near this partition was a large water heater, which Rebecca was leaning against as she sent off a text.

Lindsey straightened her skirt in a body mirror, then struck a playful pose. “We'll just have to drive them even more wild.” she teased, giving herself a wink.

“You're flirting with your reflection again,” said Caitlin.

The blonde froze, then gave her a shocked look. “I, I am?”

“You told me to let you know if you did it again.”

“Yeah. I remember,” said Lindsey. She turned away from the mirror, visibly shaken. “Thanks.”

The police were not the only ones with sinister designs for the big game. As she pulled on her top, Victoria's little heart pounded. Her plan was so risky. Oh, she knew it would work; it wasn't risky in that sense... but it was dangerous.

She steeled her resolve. It didn't matter. If it got that freak off the squad, no risk was too great.

While the other girls changed, Chase sat on a bench in her street clothes, looking down at the cool cement floor. Her uniform still hadn't arrived, and with only five minutes until they had to be on the field, the situation was pretty dire. This gave Victoria a confused sense of annoyance. Although preventing Chase from cheering was her ultimate goal, tonight she needed Chase on the field, giving her all, to set her plan in motion.

Alicia had darted out a few moments earlier to make a last minute check of Sunnycrest High's mail office. Chase did not seem as nervous as one would expect. She didn't pace, she didn't fidget. She just sat with the solemnity of someone who had nothing to fidget over, having already given up. Caitlin felt obliged to sit down on the bench next to her and put a comforting hand on her back.

“I'm sure it'll be there,” she said.

“The site said two-to-three days for shipping. It's been four now,” she said.

“Even if it's not there, we've got another game next week,” she said.

This finally elicited a response. “Next week... no good,” answered Chase, giving her a sad look. “Work hard cheer THIS week. Want cheer now, with all of you.”

Caitlin was confused. Lindsey sat down on Chase's other side, and added her own arm. “It's okay, Chase. We know you're excited, but it's a long season! Especially if we go to state! There'll be lots of games for you to cheer at!”

The cannibal was quiet for a moment. She tried to think of how she could best use her limited vocabulary to put things in terms they would understand.

“Cops still want me, Lin.” she finally explained. Her voice was quiet and delicate. “Them no stop till catch. Big lots, got guns. Big lots who mad cause I done them wrong. Chase try best, but just one girl.”

Her voice began to crack, and she lowered it further. Whether she lowered her voice to make it harder for the other girls to hear their conversation, or herself, it was difficult to say.

“Might be jail next week. Might be dead.”

The two girls were crushed. “Don't say that,” Caitlin whispered in a shaky but firm voice that scolded Chase for scaring her so badly. She took Chase's hand and her voice softened. “Look, Chase. You're not in this alone. You're not just one girl. You're one of us now. A cheerleader. We look out for each other.” The fact that she was also a dangerous cannibal could not have been further from Caitlin's mind. Right now, she saw her for what she really was: a friend, who needed a friend.

“That's right,” concurred Lindsey. Chase looked like she wanted to say 'no offense, but you don't fight. What could you possibly do?' Even though she didn't, Lindsey prepared an answer anyway. “Matter of fact, if your uniform isn't there, you can use mine!”

Chase was astonished. “You let me wear?” she asked.

Lindsey nodded. “Sure, we're about the same size. It'll be perfect.”

She looked at Caitlin, as if to make sure Lindsey was being serious. Caitlin was smiling, but not in a pranky way. It was a warm smile, an assuring one. “But... then Lin no cheer!”

Unfazed, Lindsey gave a shrug. “Like I said, there'll be other weeks.”

“We know how important this is to you. If it's got to be tonight, then no matter what, you're going out there tonight. That's enough for us,” assured Caitlin. “It's really no big deal. We'd all do the same thing.”

Caitlin could say it wasn't a big deal all she wanted, but Chase was moved beyond words regardless. Really? They would? They'd put themselves out for her, an outsider, just because they were a team? Just because they were friends? A familiar feeling rose within the girl, which she couldn't quite place. A warm, safe feeling, one that cocooned her from head to toe in peace of mind. Whatever it was, she hadn't felt it since she'd left the woods. And it made her feel very huggy.

“Ah, there it is,” said Lindsey, as Chase hugged her. She patted the cannibal on the back. “There you go.”

And then, a joyous voice announced: “It came!”