"Don't follow me," Akio ordered.

"No."

"I'll let you join if you stop following me!"

"That's not going to work this time! I won't follow orders until after you let me join the team."

Akio grumbled at her, but stayed quiet as she followed his pace. Running through the hallways, Akio could barely recognize the place. The school was once falling apart. Paint withered off of the walls, ceramic tiles were broken. There was nothing to boast about the school except empty space and quietness.

Now it seemed like an entirely different building. New paint and trims decorated the walls. The metal doors were decorated with bronze window frames, everything about the school had changed over the course of the summer.

And with his help, it was kept clean too. Jade, without knowing the difference from last year, asked aloud, "who the heck cleans this stuff?"

Akio only smirked proudly towards her. By the time they reached the source of the sound, Akio and Jade found themselves at the front of the girl's shower room locker hall.

"Shit," Akio said patting his head.

Jade squinted at him, "you're kidding, right? You can't do your job because of a girl's sign?"

Akio hissed, "last year girls couldn't enroll, this wasn't a problem until now!"

It was true. As well as this being the first year that deviants were allowed to enroll, it was also the first year that girls were allowed to enroll as well. With it previously being a non-deviant, all boys school, Akio's stature as president of the Edict Committee became all the more important. With his reputation on the line, he could neither go inside nor do nothing as the victim cried for help.

Jade pointed a thumb to herself, "don't worry chief, I'll handle this one."

Akio bit his lip. He couldn't protest. He didn't even have other girls on the committee. Jade stepped inside the steam filled room. Closing the door behind her, her eyes widened at the sight of the shower room walls.

Splashes of black liquid covered the wall and ceilings. A skank smell filled the room with hot gases and heat. The floor was covered in tar. Rather than the shower section being clean with soap and water, it felt like a swamp had rolled over the room, intoxicating the area with a disnausiating aura.

Jade crouched down and tapped her finger tips against the black muck, "what is this?"

"Help!" A girl yelled from behind. Jade looked over and her eyes widened in shock. It was a girl, stripped naked with nothing but a bathroom towel covering her waist. Envy overtook her as she compared her own chest to hers. She was gorgeous, and Jade wanted to flaunt over her pristine skin and robust physique.

"Hi," Jade said blushing.

The girl pointed behind Jade, "he's behind you!"

Jade turned around and a whip of black muck slapped across her face. She stepped back as she rubbed across her cheek. Looking forward, a boy covered in checkerboard patterned marks stood in front of her.

"Out of the way bitch," he said to Jade. "The little cunt had this coming."

The boy was wearing a school uniform. Identical to Akio, except his jacket wasn't buttoned, which revealed portions of his muscular chest. He was wider than Akio, and a swirl of black tar circled around his finger tips.

Jade entered a strong stance and glared down at him. "Under the authority of the Edict Committee, you're under arrest!"

The boy raised an eyebrow at her. The checkered ink across his skin dissipated. Beneath it all revealed his natural white skin. His chin was square, and he had bright amber eyes with green and black striped hair in his bowl cut haircut.

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"Guess that makes you a dickless tracey then, don't it?" His voice came out like venom. The teeth on his grin looked sharp, like they were finely cut to mimic a shark's mouth.

Jade didn't falter. "I don't know why you did this, but I'm ending it!"

The boy dispersed into a puddle of tar. He dropped to the floor and joined with the rest of the tar on the shower room floors. The toxic like liquid morphed into a balck cloud, and it pushed itself onto Jade's body.

Jade raised her fists to cover her face. Jade held still as the liquid wrapped around her body in a whirlwind of tar. Frustrated, he morphed back to normal and glared at Jade, "you're a fucking deviant?"

Jade stood up tall. Her body had become encased in solid rock to resist the toxins. She was a crystalline blue color, with an outer shield of rock resilient against whatever he could shoot at her.

The attacker yelled, "since when the fuck were deviants cops?"

"Since deviants like you exist," Jade pounded her fists together and charged towards him.

Rather than fight, the boy morphed into an ink cloud and escaped from the locker room. He also made sure to throw ink at the victim's face before leaving. Turning solid once more, he sprinted outside and crashed into Akio.

Akio tumbled back. He pulled a crystal in his pocket and pointed it towards the assilaint. Glancing at him, Akio said, "Lockhart?"

In the aether Akademia, the established rules were; every scholar learning the art of crystal programming was required to 'tame' a single deviant in the school. That meant being assigned a deviant powered partner, and having complete responsibility over their learning and success within the Akademia.

Lockhart was Akio's deviant. The pair typically left each other alone, rarely speaking with each other and never truly interacting. But a few days earlier, they had entered their first argument.

Akio looked down at the poster of Sally, "this won't help her."

He glared at him, "why the fuck not?"

"Because nobody cares about her. When nobody cares, nobody helps. I could tell all the enforcers to look for her, and they wouldn't do anything. I'm sorry, but this is just the way things work."

Lockhart grabbed him by the collar, " you're the fucking president! Its your job to give a damn!"

Akio tapped his crystal against his hip. Lightning coursed through Lockhart as he recoiled back in pain. Akio said, "don't tell me what to do. You're a deviant, you're supposed to do what I say. I'm telling you right now, no one is going to find this girl."

Lockhart's eyes glared deep into Akio. Rather than say anything, he morphed back into tar and shifted through the halls and away from them. Droplets of black ooze were left in his wake.

Akio shouted out, "I just cleaned that!"

Inside the locker room, Jade crouched down to the victim to offer her hand in aid. "I'm Jade. What's your name?"

The girl took her hand and stood up, "I'm Maria."

"Do you know why he attacked you?"

Maria hissed, "because all deviants are the monsters."

Jade frowned. "I'm a deviant too."

"Yeah, but you're one of the useful ones."

Jade frowned at her. It was a backhanded compliment. Jade unbuttoned her outer jacket and rested it over the girl's shoulders. Jade said to her, "we're all students here, and that means we're all stuck together too. So help me help you. Are you sure there wasn't a reason he attacked you? Anything helps."

Maria glanced over to the side with her face red in shame. Her mindset against deviants was strong, but in the presence of someone being kind, it was hard to hate against that. Maria answered, "my thrall, the deviant I'm supposed to own... Ran away."

"Ran away?" Jade thought for a second. "You mean Sally?"

Maria nodded. "That bastard thought it was my fault."

Jade bit her lip, "was it?"

Maria glared directly at Jade, "what do you think?"

Jade raised her hands back in defense. Before she could answer, she marched out of the locker room on her own. "I don't need a fucking thrall telling me what to do!"

Maria stomped out of the locker room with only a jacket and towel covering her body. Akio noticed her passing him, and his eyes widened from the near-naked sight of her. Maria didn't break stride as she walked passed him. "Prick," she called out.

Jade appeared behind him, and yanked at his ear, "stop gawking you minuscule pervert."

"Ow," Akio said tilting his head back. "I can't help it!"

Jade rolled her eyes. Looking back at the destroyed locker room, she sighed aloud, "he got away."

Akio looked over to the side. Lockhart dropped a poster of Sally before disappearing. Akio let out a sigh, "yeah he did."

Jade stepped back and bowed down towards Akio, "I'm sorry, please give me another chance! I'll catch the next one I swear!"

Akio shook his head, "no I'm not doing that."

Jade just repeated herself, "I'm sorry I swear I'll do better."

Akio shook his head harder, "let me rephrase that. You don't get another chance because I'm letting you join."

Jade's head shot up, "excuse me?"

"You're right. We need someone like you. I wouldn't have been able to capture him even if that sign wasn't a problem. Deviants have to fight deviants with scholars like me supporting them. I'll let you be our first deviant recruit, then I can recruit more if this works out."

Jade almost shrieked with joy, "I won't let you down chief!"

"Please don't call me that. But there is one condition in letting you join." He raised Sally's poster towards Jade, "I need your help finding Sally."