CHAPTER SEVENTY FOUR
[74]
song: when i'm small by phantogram

"ARE YOU A GAMMA?" A blonde girl says as she quickly approaches Daisy, an excited look on her face.

Daisy flinched as the girl steps towards her, as she didn't see her coming. Daisy stops in her tracks, glancing at Kai and then back to the girl. "Am I a what?" She asks, confused.

"A Kappa Gamma!" The girl responds, making a hand sign with her fingers.

Kai made a little snorting noise under his breath, and Daisy struggled to keep a rude look off of her face. "I am n—"

"Well are you rushing?" The girl asks, that robotic smile not leaving her face the entire conversation.

"No—" Daisy begins, but Kai cuts her off.

"Yes, she is." He nods, stepping into the conversation. He crosses his fingers and holds them up. "Hoping for Kappa Gam." He narrows his eyes and nods. Daisy gives him a confused look.

The girl claps excitedly and turns back to Daisy, "Maybe we'll be sisters—"

"Where's The Tomahawk?" Kai asks, interrupting the girl.

The girl looks back to Kai, her smile faltering for just a split second as she was interrupted. "The bar?" She raises her eyebrows.

Kai nods.

She thinks for a second, then gestures towards the other side of the large lawn separating them from other large brick buildings. "It's a little bit off campus. It's super cool we have parties there all—"

"Thanks." Kai says, putting a hand on Daisy's back and walking her away along the sidewalk, abandoning the girl. "Sorority girls. You just have to nod and smile." Kai says as they continued walking.

The campus was big, it looked typical to what any college would look like- but Daisy didn't have much to compare it to. She'd never had any college tours or anything, though she'd seen them in movies.

Students sat on blankets on the huge lawn that sat in the center of the campus. They read books and took notes, or they typed things on the very small computers they had on their laps. The weather was much nicer here than it was in Oregon. It was chilly, but wasn't as miserably cold. At least the sun was out.

Kai stretched his hands, flexing his fingers over and over. Daisy glanced at them and back to his face. "Does it feel weird?" She asked.

Kai looks at her, then focuses back to their path of walking. He nods a bit, continuing to flex his hands. "Feels empty." He says. "I'm gonna have to get used to not having magic at my disposal again." He lets out a little scoff, Daisy frowns.

He grabbed the cell phone from his pocket, holding the screen out away from his face could attempt to read the small text it displayed. She watched confusedly. "I don't understand how that thing even works." Daisy says, as they walked down the sidewalk. "There's no chord." She shrugs.

"And it's too small- I can't read anything." Kai says.

"You need glasses." Daisy takes the cell phone from him, looking at the small screen. "That girl pointed over there, and it looks like it's right across from..." Daisy looks up from the phone and her eyes land to the pointed roof of the church building. "That church." She says, before looking back to the phone. "Holy shit- is that your sister?!" She says, holding the screen closer to her eyes to get a better look.

The girl in the photo had the same blonde curls she had when she was a baby. She was posed leaning behind the bar with a few other people, all wearing the same black bartender uniform.

"Olivia." Kai nods, looking around the campus. "She works at the bar."

"What's a facebook?" Daisy asks narrowing her eyes at the phone.

Kai shrugs. "I don't know but I found her on it."

Daisy clicks her teeth and shakes her head, handing the phone back to Kai. "That's not very smart." She says.

"What isn't?" Kai asks, taking the phone and putting it back in his pocket.

"Putting your location on the internet. Doesn't she know about cyber safety?" She shakes her head ashamedly as she jokes. "You know, a crazy guy could find where she is and kill her."

Kai let's out a scoff as he smiles, looking towards the church where the bar should be. "What a shame." He sighs happily, then turns back to Daisy. "I'm gonna go deal with her, why don't you hang here and I'll meet you when I'm done."

Daisy narrows her eyebrows at him. "What?" She says. Kai looks down at her with a raised eyebrow. "You're going alone?"

Kai nods. "I can handle it."

She shakes her head. "You don't have any magic."

"Yeah- that's why I'm taking hers." He responds. Daisy takes a deep breath, crossing her arms as she bit the inside of her cheek. Although she didn't say anything, it was clear that his lack of magic wasn't the reason she was upset about him going alone. He frowns watching as her eyes falter over to the direction of the bar. "I don't want you getting hurt." He says, but quickly realizes that's probably not what she wanted to hear- but maybe she needed to.

"I can handle myself." She responds, although in those case scenario, the remark probably doesn't stand strong.

"I know you can." Kai says. "But you're also smart- and you know that if we both walk in there together; she's gonna-"

"Go for the weaker one." Daisy huffs. "Got it."

Kai frowns. "You're not weak-"

"No, just human." Daisy interrupts, but as she kept speaking she realized she sounded really whiney. Although her feelings were true, saying them out loud felt dumb. She shakes her head, then glances around the lawn for somewhere to wait. "Go deal with your sister, I'll be here."

Kai hesitates, not taking his eyes off the girl despite the fact that she was avoiding his eye contact. He thinks for a few seconds, "Wait," he says. "I just remembered I'm gonna need a distraction and-"

Daisy shakes her head, letting out a quiet laugh as she stops him from going on. "Kai, it's fine." She says, knowing he was just trying to make her feel useful. "I'll be here. I have sorority business to attend to." She jokes.

Kai smiles softly, "Right, right." He nods. He reaches into his pocket and gives her his stolen phone. "Here, I'll call you when it's done."

Daisy nods as she accepts it, squinting as the sun was beginning to set right behind his head. "Be careful." She says, the notion feeling heavier than usual- as she remembered that there was real danger here, with real consequences.

Although Kai left her with a confident nod before he left, she couldn't help the anxious feeling that grew. She lingered on the sidewalk, not paying any kind to the students that passed by her as she watched Kai make his way to the bar, catching a football from two guys playing on the lawn and throwing it back to them.

When he was out of view, she let out a quick sigh as she looked around. Her eyes landed on every person, each and everyone of the students here had their own little groups- studying together, eating together.

She went and sat on the nearest bench, trying to look like she was keeping herself busy as she was just watching all the people walk by. Every single one of them completely unaware of what she had been doing these past twenty two years. Completely unaware of witches, and vampires and prison worlds- and she wished she could go back to when she didn't, either. Because it was horrifying knowing that there were stronger forces at hand, stronger forces that did not comply to the laws of the government- stronger forces that could kill you and get away with it.

After sitting there for a few moments, she realized that she maybe shouldn't be dwelling on this stuff, at least not right now. She glanced down at the cell phone in her hand, still completely lost as to how it operated.

She held it up, and pushed a button, to which the screen lit up to an image of the beach. She examined it for a few seconds, before tapping the screen over and over until something happened.

Eventually, the screen changed and opened back to that picture of Kai's sister. Daisy admired their resemblance, despite the difference in hair color. She recalled how Kai said that he had found Olivia on the phone, and if he could find her so easily- she wondered who else.

She moved her finger around on the screen, holding it far out from her face as if that would help her navigate the object. At the top corner, there was a white bar with a magnifying glass next to it- just like the search bar she learned about in high school during computer class.

After clicking on that, a keyboard appeared and she thought for a few seconds before typing a name. Although it took her a while, eventually images began to appear on the screen along with names.

Jennifer Chang, the screen read, along with different photos of all of the Jennifer Changs. Daisy brought the phone up closer to her face as she examined each face- until she found the one she was looking for.

Daisy gasped with excitement, slapping a hand over her mouth as she saw a picture of Jen- posing with a dog at her feet in front of what looked like The Grand Canyon. "Holy shit." Daisy laughed excitedly, clicking on her name to see if that would do anything.

The screen buffered for a few moments, and after that- it brought up an entire page full of pictures and text which was assumedly written by Jen. It was like a public email forum. Daisy's cheeks hurt from smiling as she read on.

Jen had graduated from Wayward High School, then got a degree in political science at the University of Oregon- and now she's a public relations specialist in San Jose, California.

So grown up, Daisy thought shaking her head in disbelief at all of the things Jen was doing with her life- who would've thought she'd have a real adult job and a real adult family.

Jen was married to a woman named Rebecca Turner-Chang, who Daisy didn't recognize from the pictures. She had one young daughter named Alyssa, and a dog named Carl.

Daisy read on and on about all the things Jen had written about on Facebook- about her family, and all of her achievements. She had cut off all of her hair to donate it to cancer patients, and she had gone to China with her wife and daughter, and she had bought a house, and she celebrated birthdays, and holidays, and she went to festivals, and she went to restaurants, and she was living a normal, happy, content life.

Daisy lips were trembling, although she was overjoyed to be seeing and reading about how Jen was doing- she couldn't avoid the knot growing in her throat. She quickly turned her phone off, letting it fall on her lap as she leaned back on the bench.

Instead of avoiding something that was making her sad- curiosity got the best of her and she found herself grabbing the phone again and opening it back up. She didn't even have to search for the name, as they were already 'friends' with Jen on Facebook and it was only a click away.

Graduated Wayward High School. Got a doctorate of medicine at Washington University. Worked in the US Army as a 68W Combat Medic, and is now a doctor and Professor or Medicine at the medical center of Whitmore College.

Josette Laughlin. She must've gotten married.

For a few moments, nothing clicked, Daisy kept mindlessly scrolling through the countless images until she realized.

Daisy's head snapped up from the phone. Whitmore College. She glanced around quickly, until her eyes eventually landed on a flag stand which had Whitmore College written all over it in thick red and yellow lettering.

She got to her feet quickly, an instinctive reaction as she tried not to let any form of panic settle. Her brain hadn't decided if this was a good thing or a bad thing, but her frantic glances made it sound like this was definitely a bad thing.

If Josette finds out that Daisy and Kai were back, she would alert her Coven- and everything would go to shit. Daisy's feet started carrying her across the lawn before she even got a chance to process that Josette was here. Here as in on this campus.

She had to get Kai, and they had to get out of here. At least so they had enough time to regroup. She kept her head hung low, using her dark hair to hide her face as much as she could in the slim chance Josette was near. Although none of these buildings looked anything like medical centers, she wasn't taking any chances.

As Daisy approached the church, her eyes then moved to the bar that sat across from it- and then to the guy who was quickly running towards the front doors.

Daisy's eyes widened, knowing that Kai was in there right now with Olivia and not expecting guests. She quickly ran across the road. "Hey!" She shouts, at the dark headed guy who looked like his eyes were about to pop out of his head.

He glances at her, then turned back to the doors of the bar. He goes to open them, but Daisy steps in front of him- shaking her head. "It's closed." She says, panting.

He looks at her in a mix of confusion and anger. "I—" He begins to speak up, but a loud clash of glass breaking and tables sliding around sounds from inside the bar. The guy gives Daisy a wide eyed look before pushing her out of the way and swinging the doors open.

Daisy rushes in after him, her eyes quickly landing on Kai and Olivia, who stood at the upper level of the bar- a barricade of tables between them.

Kai flung his hand out, a table flying towards the girl. Olivia ducked out of the way, the table hitting the wall and crashing behind her.

The guy who stood next to Daisy didn't hesitate before rushing up the stairs towards the action. "Shit." Daisy huffs, grabbing a broken table leg off the ground and going after him.

The guy was quick going up the stairs, but Daisy was right on his tail. She brought the table leg off and swung at the back of his head, hitting him so hard he about fell down the stairs.

"Tyler!" Olivia yells, glancing in between Kai and then back to Tyler, who held onto the rails of the staircase as he regained his footing.

Daisy caught glance of Kai charging after his sister, and she knew she only had to hold this guy off for a few seconds. Tyler turned towards Daisy, and she swung at him with a fist- not letting him take a second to breathe. Why she would even try to punch this guy- she didn't know- but when her knuckles connected with his jaw she knew she hurt herself more than she hurt him.

She retracted her hand, shaking it with a frown. "What the hell!" She whined at the pain.

Tyler rubbed his jaw, his eyes somehow wider and angrier than before- but instead of fighting back, he took the chance to run up the stairs.

He ran, making his way up the steps- but he didn't make it very far as Daisy lunged forward, crashing to the stairs as she clung onto his ankles. Tyler fell on the stairs, but her small hands couldn't hold him back for much longer, as Tyler shook off her grip.

Daisy knew she couldn't do much else, as Tyler was already up the stairs. "Kai!" Daisy shouted, as Tyler approached him from behind, but it was too late.

Tyler grabbed Kai's shoulders and shoved him off the upper level of the bar, breaking the safety rails and sending him falling onto the first floor.

Daisy's eyes widened in a mix of disbelief in fear. Her mind wasn't even on Tyler and Olivia as she scrambled to her feet, sprinting down the stairs towards where Kai landed.

She felt and invisible force yank her back, and she was met with that familiar feeling of magic locking onto her body and flinging her against a wall.

The wind was knocked from her lungs, and as she fell to the ground she felt herself choke on her own breath as she gasped for breath. As she regained the slight loss of consciousness, she lifted her heavy head up and looked around- her world spinning.

She struggled to her feet, holding onto the side of her body as she most definitely had just broken a rib. There was no sign of Olivia, or Tyler. So she disregarded the pain, and she forced herself up and over to where Kai had fallen- behind the bar.

As she came around the bar, she crashed to her knees at the sight. She quickly scrambled towards Kai, uncontrollable panic overcoming all of her senses.

Blood fell from his nose and some covered his forehead, his eyes were closed and the debris from the railing that fell with him covered his body.

Daisy held her quickly moved all the broken wood off of his body before she leaned down, her first instinct to put her ear to his mouth and nose to check if he was breathing. She bent down, trying to hold her panicked breath so she could really hear.

Nothing, she couldn't hear or feel anything. She sat up quickly, her eyes darting around his lifeless face. "Kai," she said nudging his body- only to get no response.

She glanced up to where Tyler and Olivia had previously stood, tears in her eyes. She returned her attention back to Kai, trembling. "Kai, come on." She says, her voice cracking as she began to gently slap his cheek. "Come on!" She says, raising her voice this time, she pushed him around again- like trying to wake someone up from a deep sleep.

This couldn't be it.

"Kai!" She shouted, and as she raised her hand up again to give him another slap on the face- the loud gasp he let out froze her in place.

The sight of his eyes shooting open and his lungs refilling with air as he took in a sharp inhale, made Daisy want to fall to the ground in relief. "Jesus christ." She let out, quickly wiping away the tears that fell from her eyes before he could see. She panted quickly, letting some rationality refill her body.

He looked around, his body still weak. "They're gone?" He says. Daisy nodded with a sigh. "Shit." He says, letting his head fall back on the ground for a few seconds before he started to get up.

Daisy held onto his arms, helping him to his feet. "You're bleeding." Daisy says, worriedly.

"It's fine." He shakes it off, glancing around the now banged up bar. He then returns his attention to her, his eyes softening. "You are too." He brings his hands up and lifts her chin, examining the massive cut on her chin that led down to her neck. She hadn't even realized she was bleeding, and wasn't sure where or when she would've gotten that

She moved her head out of the way from his hands and shook it off. "Doesn't matter." She says. "We gotta get out of here." Daisy nods, grabbing onto Kai's hands and beginning to pull him towards the exit.

Before they could make it anywhere, he had tugged her back towards him. As she stumbled back towards him, she fell into his arms and before she knew it his lips were on hers.

His hands cupped her face, and although she was shocked by the sudden moment of romance, she soon kissed back, melting into his touch- and for just a second all of her worries were just an after thought.

Kai pulled away and let out a sigh of relief. "Why?" He asks, responding to her previous comment. Daisy gave him a weird look, but a smile was on her face as she looked up at him. It was as if that kiss was just something he needed to do before more action was to come.

Daisy shook the smile off her face, and hoped that the red she felt flush her cheeks wasn't too prominent. "Josette is here." Daisy says, returning to the serious atmosphere.

He narrowed his eyebrows at her. "Here, where?" He questioned.

"Here as in at Whitmore College." Daisy says. But now that Olivia was still alive and most definitely on her way to go and alert her entire coven that Kai Parker was alive and ready to get some revenge- the whole 'Josette is here' situation didn't feel as urgent.

"She's in college?" Kai questioned, not following.

Daisy shook her head frustratedly. "No- dumbass, she works here. Or- at the medical center or something. I saw it on Facebook."

"That Facebook thing is genius." Kai shook his head in amazement.

"I know." Daisy says excitedly, but then quickly shook her head and reverted back to being serious. "What do we do?"

Kai thought for a few seconds before speaking. "We get to her first."

a/n
y'all when i tell you i speed wrote this chapter......... yea
also SO sorry for not updating for a good week and a half i've been so busy and also haven't had like any inspo. but i hope u enjoyed !!

ALSO HEYYY if u want the tag #villainsofcircumstance on tik tok is full of VOC edits which i love if u want to check it out :-)

- i haven't edited or reread this chapter like at all so so sorry for typos lololol i'm tired
j