NOVEL NEXT 53 – She’s evil!
First day of high school. Normally, this would be a big and important day for anyone. But for Max? Well, a lot of big and important things had been happening all the time in his life lately.
It was hard to get worked up about Math or making friends at school, when just the other day he had fought a demon alongside the magical girls and then his newly appointed demon general boss had told him that, yes, the world was, in fact, gonna get destroyed if things went south.
Another thing was that this was the same high school Jessica and three of the magical girls went to. He hadn’t actually told Jessica about the heroines’ secret identities. He’d… kind of forgotten after she had dropped everything on them. Well, she would probably soon find out herself anyway, since they wanted to speak to her.
Max sighed as he turned the corner.
His eyes immediately landed on a woman down the street walking in his direction and he froze, the blood in his veins turning into ice.
The woman stopped as well and her eyes widened.
“Max?” she asked, and her voice felt like a dagger stabbing into his heart.
He couldn’t move. He couldn’t breathe. All he could do was tremble as he looked at the woman who used to be his mother. They weren’t supposed to ever meet again. So why? Why was she here? Did she want to take him back? Lock him away and beat him again? Why –
The woman scowled and continued walking, speeding up her pace.
Max flinched, unsure of what to do. He felt like the walls were closing in on him as the woman walked closer, her glare trained on Max.
Just as she got within an arm’s distance away, he screwed his eyes shut and…
…
Nothing.
The footsteps passed by him, turned the corner, and disappeared again.
It took him almost a minute to realize that the danger had passed.
He opened his eyes again and glanced in the direction where the woman had disappeared to. His breaths were labored as he leaned on a nearby building.
It had only been a coincidence. She wasn’t out to get him. Not anymore. The courts would punish her. This was just bad luck running into her. Nothing more, nothing less.
“Oh, hey, Max,” a soft voice greeted him. When he turned around, he spotted Nicole, Pretty Bloom, in her school uniform. The moment she saw his expression though, hers turned concerned. “Are you okay? Did something happen?”
He took a deep breath to try and calm himself down.
“Yeah… I’m… I’m fine. Just a bit of a… an unpleasant reminder, I guess.” He shrugged.
Luckily, she didn’t push any further. Instead, they walked to the school together as they chatted about this and that. It was a nice distraction.
Since they were quite early, she also showed him around the school, warned him what not to ever order in the school cafeteria, and even walked him to the first-years’ classroom.
What a nice girl. Max found himself smiling subconsciously.
Eventually, Erika and Sarah, Pretty Flame and Spark, arrived as well and exchanged greetings. And then, they went straight to the main topic.
“So… where’s Jessica?” Sarah asked while not-so-sneakily looking at Max. “Is she… back from her little business trip?”
Right. He should probably tell them the story Jessica was going with.
“She is… but…” Max started, frowning at the ground. “Something’s wrong.”
Erika immediately looked alarmed. “What do you mean?”
“She… changed. She’s more cruel and vicious now. Commandeering like Salem. She even forgot about me and Cody… kind of.” Max looked up and met three sets of widened eyes. “She’s evil now.”
He felt awful lying to the three, and his act was probably terrible, but if letting them know the truth was somehow dangerous…
“W-what do you mean? What happened? Did a demon possess her?” Erika asked in a shaky voice.
“I… don’t know?” Max tried. “I don’t know. Possibly. Something must have happened at the trials. Maybe… Maybe they knew about her being a traitor and lured her in on purpose…” Max repeated what Jessica had suggested.
There was a moment of silence.
“Fuck,” Sarah summarized.
The four looked at each other, expressions dire.
“Are you okay, though? Didn’t you and Cody work closely with her?” Nicole asked.
“Well, yeah… But she seems to have forgotten?” Max should have really thought this through more. This story had way too many holes in it. “She forgot about the rebellion. Or maybe she was made to forget? Either way, she still remembered that me and Cody worked under her, but not about the whole conspiracy thing…”
“Dammit…” Sarah cursed. “So the whole end of the world thing was a lie? The demons are the bad guys in the end?”
“I… guess?”
Max cringed on himself. He really didn’t like lying. Much less lying to the heroines who were supposed to be saving everyone about what the true danger was.
Was this really the best way to handle things? Shouldn’t he tell them the truth, after all? What if –
“It’s okay, Max,” Nicole soothed as her hand landed on his shoulder. “It’s not your fault. And we’ll do everything we can to bring Jessica back and beat the demons back!”
“Yeah, as soon as she comes back to school, we’ll ambush her and Nicole will fix whatever the demons did to her!” Sarah declared.
Erika nodded. “We’ll do our best. Jessica is our friend. We’ll save her.”
Max forced a smile on his face.
It still didn’t feel good to lie, but, well, whenever Jessica arrived, it would be her problem to deal with. It had been her idea anyway.
Naturally, no matter how long they waited, Jessica never came to the school on the first day.
At least, not as a student.
