Each crunch of a leaf, a meow of a cat, the clunk of a pebble skipping across the asphalt made me jump. Things just are moving slower than usual and everything looks like it's about to kill me. Although, you have some random Anomaly attack you that knows who you are, where you live, can corrode just about anything then it melt into a steaming pile of goo, and not be paranoid.

I've been to preoccupied thinking about things to even notice that I was wearing shorts, a turtle--neck, one running shoe (excluding a sock) the other a flip-flop (with a sock), and the bag over my shoulders was a duffel bag and in fact not my backpack.

A cold fragile hand pulled me out of my thoughts and back. Saving me from a passing car that would've otherwise turned me into a pancake special for the dried tar.  You think that would have fazed me, but at this point I wasn't exactly processing much except for small noises making me jump and that the car was not Corrosion.

The hands turned me around and there I was, facing none other than Violet.

"What is up with you lately? " She asked, in a voice that I knew all to well. The 'I'm concerned for you but also hate you for doing this to yourself,' kind of voice. Before she gave me time to respond she continued her rant. "The last two days you've been off in your own thoughts and act like you're constantly waiting for something bad to happen. You haven't even complained once about anything and refuse to talk about it..." 

As she was ranting something caught in the corner of my eye. My gaze followed the blur behind a tree across the street. And what was behind the tree glowed a faint green and carried a backpack...

You've got to be kidding me, I bluntly thought. 

"...you're not even listening now." She continued, oblivious of what she was saying and how much of her scolding I actually missed and how much of it was actually important. 

"Ya uh-huh." I absently replied, barley aware what I was agreeing to, "I um...have to go, see you later." With that I aimlessly brushed past her and made my way towards the tree.

Wait...WHAT!? I've been jumping from the smallest things from the fear of Corrosion coming after me, and yet I'm walking towards a him!?

Yes. 

Okay just making sure.

"What's up Green Boy? Come to shoot corrosive liquid at me again?" I asked, unaware why I'm not freaking out like I was just five minutes ago, while leaning from the front of the tree on the opposite side he's on.

Without warning he swung around the tree to where we're face to face. Striking blonde hair. Brown eyes. About 5ft 9in. Sarcastic yet serious look on his face. An aura of faint fluorescent green. A pliable brown leather jacket with a brown hood. Wearing a green shirt and faded black jeans with patches in them, most likely from accidentally corroding it.

Yup, definitely him.

"Haven't you figured out that I was teaching you something yet?" He said in an annoyed voice.

"What?" He's kidding right?

"Lesson 1:If your ever going to attack someone from behind, make sure that you don't yell while doing it." He said way to proudly to be healthy for his already over inflated ego.

  "Lesson 2: Don't throw yourself into a sloppy charge." He said while trying to act casual although he was trying snuffle a laugh.  

 "Lesson 3: Don't shoot a powerful stream if you're not well grounded." For some reason he feels the need to say which lesson it is every time.

  "Lesson 4: Don't start a fight that you can't finish." I mindlessly rubbed my bruised rib cage .

  " And the last lesson I've taught you is; Lesson 5: Know your enemies capabilities." With his finish he casually leaned against the tree with a triumphant smirk upon his face and arms crossed, only having crossed ankles holding him up. 

Revenge time! Is all my mind thought despite what he just told me. I sat down nonchalantly where I was standing. 

"Um...what are you doing?" He asked, obviously not the reply he expected. I just looked him straight in the eyes, deviously smirked, and swung my legs out towards his and rolled out of the way. He fell with a cartoon-ish Whoof! going down and landed where I was just a second ago, in a heap of leafs' with the signature handful of leaf's flying up in the air and landing on his head.

He narrowed his brown eyes at me and gave me a playful smile. "Don't you remember Lesson 6?"

"Um...there was only five." I state, a little concerned what I just walked myself into. 

"Never loose the upper hand." With that he shot a stream to the ground underneath me. 

Quickly, I spread my limbs outside the perimeter of the corrosive liquid. 

"You didn't." I grit.

"Oh, but I did."

"What do you mean, don't loose the upper hand? I never had the upper hand." Yes, for some reason I feel that is the most immediate thing I need to do.

Corrosion just stood up, ignoring the number of twigs and leafs' all over his body. "Oh, I was talking about me. Haven't you ever heard the saying, learn from others mistakes?" 

"I hate you." My arms and legs are holding up my body pretty well considering I feel like I'm crawling backwards but standing still, with no ground beneath me.

"Harsh, see you later."

"You can't just leave me hear." I protest, with knowledge that it's pointless to argue with this nut case.

"You are absolutely right!" He yells excitidely, and outstretched his right leg over my stomach. 

Oh great.

And he applies pressure until I loose my leverage and fall for what feels like eternity. I eventually land on the bottom back first, effectively knocking the breath out of me. The last I saw of him was when he peered down into the hole and laughed, at least ten feet above me, and no, he wasn't flying. Just then the bell rang. He silently laughed, and said "Good luck with that."

_____________________

The class room door was at the top right of the room and all the teacher does is mindlessly read from a history book and tells us to pay attention. I open the door as slowly as I can but the click of the door knob already gave me away.

I peered into the class room and tried to play it off with a cheeky smile. Mr. Henderson just remained standing there with his reading glasses in the book and his fat belly testing the limits of the brown sweater vest he wore. "Ms. Graves, can you please explain why you are fifteen minutes late-" Mr. Boring cut off as soon as he looked up at me.

"Ms. Graves," his dull voice dragged. "Can you please explain why you are covered in brown crusty liquid with twigs and leafs?" 

Queue laughter of the entire class and of course, the signature pictures from everybody.

"Um...I prefer not to." I numbly say. 

________________________

"Violet I'm telling you, I fell into a puddle of mud." I try to convince while walking out of the girl changing rooms and into the gym. 

"Mm hmm. In the fall, when we haven't had rain in three months, and everybody has given up on growing grass, while where I last seen you was a block away from school all of which is just the cement and road. Sure. If you don't want to tell me that's all you have to say." Before I can say any more she walked away to her assigned spot on the gyms floor. With that I split to my seat.

"Kendal Hannah Graves. What a pleasure to see you again." Came the annoying, sarcastic, arrogant, voice of Corrosion.

"You've got to be kidding me," without really thinking I stood up and turned toward him. "Are you stalking me now? You didn't even know my name before, now you know my whole name-" I stopped because I noticed something, something I did not approve of. "Why are you dressed in P.E. clothes?"   

At these words he smirked, and turned when a small brown haired boy jogged up next to him and asked, "Hey, who's the girl?" He got a sly glint in his eyes but before he could dig me into a hole I budded in and said "I'm Kendal, I was just telling, what did you say your name was?"

"Quinten." The little brown haired person oh-so helpfully informed.

I had to stifle a laugh at this and just looked at Quinten with my eyebrows cocked. Controlling a laugh and the smile that brought to my face. "Ah, yes Quinten, how could I forget? I was just telling, Quinten, that I would not do his homework for him because he feels, he's to insignificant and small minded to comprehend his studies." I lie way to cheekily to really be me, good thing this kid doesn't know me.

"What! Wait! No I wasn't!" Protest Quinten. 

"Yes you were. It's okay you don't have to be embarrassed." I 'sympathetically' reply, "or are you saying you were discussing something else with me, and are lying to your, I'm guessing, good friend?"

"What? No! I wasn't saying that!" He freaks. 

"Were you implying it?" I ask inquisitively.

His short friend turned to him and looked up looking extremely hurt. "Were you?" He asked in the smallest, most hurt voice that has ever squeaked in this gym.

Defeated, he looks down and sighs. "No, I'm having trouble in school and was asking-"

"Begging." I add.

He shoots me daggers. (I'm happy he doesn't have heat vision.) And huffs, "Begging, for her to do my homework for me."

"Hey, man you could've asked me to help." Short dude says, "If you cheat you're only cheating yourself.-" 

"Hey man, I rather not talk about this in front of..." He shoots me a quick glance, "you know."

His friend then guides him away talking his ear off with some imaginary problem I created for them to work out.

Suddenly the room went quit, the coach must have walked in. "SIT YOU'RE SORRY LITTLE MILLENNIAL BUTTS DOWN!" He belches out. "Now, today we are playing dodge ball! But, not any dodge ball! This dodge ball is going to require multiple teams! Each person will pair up with somebody else and all teams will then be against all the other teams! If you're down, then you sit in the spot you were hit! The only way to get back in the game is if your teammate gets the person that got you down, down! Remember if you catch a ball that does not mean that person is down, to get down you have to be hit! Now! Pair up now! You have thirty seconds!" 

I frantically looked around for somebody to be paired up with but if you haven't noticed I don't have a lot of friends. And the friend that I do have is mad and paired up with somebody else. I slowly started backing away from the crowed and towards the doors before somebody grabbed my arm and pulled me towards a pile of dodge balls. 

Infuriated that somebody would just assume I want to be there partner. I mean as long as it's not Corrosion. I mean Quinten, I'm fine with it, but still that's not cool. "Hey let go!" I yell while planting my feet on the ground.

"Kendal calm down." Will hisses at me. "Look at your hands."

With those words he turns to face me and yanks my arm so that only we could see my hands. In my hands is a small pile of copper flakes, most of it falling out of my hand and unto the polished floor. Almost like glitter as it coats my hand and glistens in the artificial lighting. I look back and see that it's near where I was sitting and where I've been dragged.

"You've got to get a hold of your anger, or this can end badly for you Kendal." Will stresses still in a harsh whisper. "Remember what happened when the world learned in Arizona, Kelly Geller has powers? They harassed her until she went missing. Who knows what happened to her, do you really want that to happen to you? Or worse?"

"Will, I know okay. I'm handli-"

"You're handling it? No you're not. You've been saying that for months and now you have powers. Are you even taking your anger medicine?" He scolds.

I look down to talk but he lifts my face back up to him and holds it there. "Are you or are you not taking your medicine. Because if not you have to. Not just because you might do something irrational but because that medicine just might save you from revealing yourself in front of the whole class." His eyes wide, the usual green but with some random black specks in them. 

I open my mouth to respond, right as I'm about to speak a "Thirty seconds are up pansies! Go!" Echoed throughout the walls of the gym. 

Without reason I threw myself to the right and rolling into the landing. I look up to realize that Will was just hit with a ball meant to hit me. Out of the corner of my eye I see that non other than Quinten was the one responsible, and aiming a ball right at me.

It all seemed to be in slow motion he threw it straight at my face the ball was drawing a path right at me. I stood up and waited, and waited, until it was a foot away. I jumped up and threw my body back while channeling my body weight and ended up doing a back flip and catching the ball. 

I feel my cheeks tug into a crooked smile.

 This is going to be fun.

"What Quinten? Think I'm going down that easily?" I tease.

"Well, you go down pretty easily, or should I say jump into the air to avoid confrontation?"

"Maybe I just didn't want to face some maniac that has some kind of secret vendetta to kill me." I say, quickly realizing we're in public. "Metaphorically speaking of course," I spit.

"Maybe you should've heard this metaphorical maniac out. Maybe he just needed your help, or I don't know...protect you maybe." He says with hatred in his voice, obvious he's already annoyed with me. 

Same to you bud.

"Maybe this maniac attacked me."

Suddenly a ball streaked past my face, instinctively I jolt my arm up and catch it without it even completing it's path past my face. I turn to see Quintens little friend. 

He looks up to Quinten, raises his arms up like 'come on man, take her out already,' and asks "What you doing man?" 

Little Dude obviously wasn't very intimidated by me even though he seen me catch the ball, with one hand may I add. 

So, you don't think I'm any threat now do you? Even though you're like two yards away, your head is turned, and I have two balls? I'll show you a threat.

I chuck the ball as hard as I can towards his face, more specifically his teeth. The red rubber 8 by 8 inch ball launched out of my hand like a bullet out of a barrel and right towards Little Dude. Right before the ball hit his face Little Dude turned towards it and only had time to gasp.

Big mistake.

You could hear the echo from the hit throughout the gym and hear it echo down his throat. From the energy of the ball he fell backwards, stiff as a board, and laid there for a second. Quinten ran to help him up but I could see him trying to hold in a smile.

After he's up we discovered it got lodged in his mouth stuck behind his teeth and unable to open his jaw to the required angle to get it out...Quinten had to take him to the nurses. 

Worth it.

_______________________

"Dad! Listen to me!" I plead, we've been arguing for the past two hours because he got a call from the principal about what happened in P.E.

"No more excuses young lady! The kid lost a tooth! And his parents are trying to make me pay for the dental work! You are grounded for 3 weeks!"

"But dad! It was an accident! It's not like I meant for that to happen!-"

"You and I both know you don't regret it and that you haven't been taking your Celexa for months now! This is on you!" 

"Dad-"

"No. Kendal this is serious and I'm putting my foot down. Three weeks. No phone, no tablet, no laptop, no T.V, and no long boarding."

The electronics didn't really matter to me, but long boarding, that's what did it. I felt the heat come, more vicious than before and my blood feels like it's about to freeze. Liquid Nitrogen. I clench my fist together and take deep breaths. I could feel my face starting to twitch with the thought to act upon my impulses, but I just try to keep as still as possible. 

"Is that really necessary?" I ask, slightly deep and slow, I must sound like a maniac.

"Are you threatening me? That voice sounds awfully threatening, three months if you keep that tone with me." At this I clench my jaw and try to muster all the normalcy in my voice as possible. While tucking my hands into my pockets, wide aware that the nitrogen is dripping out from my palms.

"Understood, sir. May I please go on a run?" I need to get some anger out, or at least explode somewhere that won't ruin my room. 

"Be back before it's dark." 

At these words to took off up the stairs and quickly changed into my black running jacket, black running leggings, and my usual black running shoes. Within a minute I'm out the door and down the street. The sky is pink along the clouds along with a tinge of tangerine, clear that I have maybe an hour.

Five minutes into the run hear an odd noise like water jets heading my way.

Not water jets, Corrosions jets.

Not bothering to look back I start sprinting down this hill as fast as I can. But I randomly hear a muffle from overhead and a slap in my eyes. I'm grabbed by the shoulders and swooped into the air still running as we fly off the cement. Immediately I try to squirm away but all he does is tighten his grip and spit into my eyes. 

Gross.

"What the heck are you doing! Somebody is going to see me with you!"

"Aww is somebody keeping the secret they have a secret boyfriend?"

Immature.

"First off gross. And second they're going to see me with an Anomaly! You don't think that's going to raise suspicion?" I point out, straining my vocal cords to yell over the roar of the wind.

"Well of course, that's why I put a mask on you, black, it matches your suit." He chuckles along while saying this.

"I'm not a villain such as you!" I state.

"Of course not, you're so much lamer. You're the hero!"

"What! No! No, no, no, no, no. I don't feel like fighting a bunch of random thief's and the occasional Anomaly!" I hollar after chocking on a bug. "Wait, doesn't that mean I'll have to fight you?!"

"Yup. It's part of our plan don't worry!"

"Our? Do you mean you, the villain, and your imaginary friends?"

"You're closer to guessing the plan than you realize."

I become aware that we're already across town and in downtown Albuquerque. My eyes bulge as I slowly become aware what his plans is.

"Um...what are we doing here!?" 

"Declaring you a hero and putting a big fat target on your back for all the Anomalies in this state."

"Um...what?" Okay now his plan is just a blur now. 

"Don't hate me for this but I'm going to knock you out right about now."

Before I could respond he dropped me twenty feet in the air and sent me hurdling towards the sidewalk head first.

_________________

A/N

Hey, so the picture is what I imagine the jacket Kendal is wearing along with the leggings. So what do you guys think of Quinten? Any input? Questions? Constructive criticism? Anyways thanks for reading hope you enjoyed.