☆Alex's POV☆

Alex got fired ..again.

It's most likely due to the fact he hates mingling with people or that he dropped a box of glass things at work.

Who cares? It was graveyard shift anyway, and it's too late in my life to change into a social type of person, I'm twenty three already, he thought.

Oh well, I can cry about it when I get home like the adult that I am, his thoughts rambled on.

This is the third time he got fired this month, and if he wasn't living off his would be college fund, (and whatever food his roommate Sammie makes) he should probably be more upset. His fund, though big, can only last so long.

How cute that mom, and dad expected a lot from him, he mused.

He walked in the lobby at four AM to see Sammie walking in front him. Her hair a mess and her jacket sleeves were cut off from her shoulders. Holy crap, was it burnt? Did she just get back for her jog? No, obviously not. What was she doing out so late? Why was she so fucked up?

He followed her, hiding behind lobby plant life. She eventually made it to the apartment without seeing him. He waited a bit then entered too. She must have been in her room. A snore rang out from her room, making him chuckle. Oh well, she'll most likely ramble on about her adventure tomorrow, he thought, heading to his room.

Tomorrow sounds like a interesting day.

☆Sammie's POV☆

Sammie had always loved boxing every Friday with her sister Angela.

Talking about boys, camping, or nothing in particular and then going for smoothies afterwards.

There was a certain something about landing spinning hook kick on the dummy Angela had make Sammie really happy.

It wasn't that fighting made Sammie happy, it didn't. Kickboxing, she felt, let her anger out.

Which Angela would usually laugh, and tell her that she possessed no such anger in her mind entire body. Sammie was too sweet, Angela would tell her.

If I'm so sweet, then how could I have hurt a living thing? Even if it was a monster how could I? Sammie jabbed and kicked the dummy as hard she could.

She was just lucky it was cold enough to wear long sleeves, and pants during her kickbox session. Though, she couldn't wear her favorite jacket as it was burned up, and if she tried to fake sick Angela would probably know, she wasn't a cop without being some sort of lie detector, too.

Not that Sammie ever cared, she never had the need to lie to her sister before. She was always careful with her hits, not wanting to hurt herself or damage the dummy.

So when saw the dummy fly a few feet after her last kick, she felt like she went insane. Bits of the stuffing, and dummy fabric was on the floor by her feet.

"Oh god," Sammie muttered to herself, eyes wide as she raises a hand to her mouth in alarm. Di-did I do that?

"Oh my god! A clean back thrust kick to the chest area!" Angela clapped her hands up over her head. She let out a war cry, and laughed.

"I'm sorry," Sammie muttered, as Angela swept her up into a crushing bear-hug. Sammie let herself be spun wildly by Angela who turned with her.

"Who cares about the dummy, you crazy fruitcake! That was amazing, we can use someone like you on the force!"

Angela set Sammie down, and affectionately head-butted her. Laughing, her sister asked. "So what you say? Will you join us?"

"Um, I think I'll stick with being a cashier at a thrift store," Sammie said, unable to muster up much excitement. She had desperately tried not to set anything aflame, but it looked like she still did some serious damage. "I sure messed up the dummy, I'm so sorry, Ange."

She rubbed at her forehead, where Angela headbutt her. Why is Angela so happy about this? Well, truth be told Sammie would have been to, but that was before-

"I can't believe you did that! My sweet little sister, who used to pee the bed until she was ten!"

"Ang!" Sammie yelled, blushing. God, don't bring that up.

Angela walked over to the wreckage that is her boxing dummy. She ran her hands over the tearing. She looked serious for a second before she covered it with a smile.

"Man, get wrecked dummy!"

Sammie smiled a bit, Angela was using weird lingo again. But still guilt-ridden, Sammie could only nod. Her sister always thought that bigger was better. She valued pure strength over everything else. What if that pure strength was used against her? Would Angela still like it then?

Angela's jabs an kicks had all the subtlety of a brick to the face. As awesome as she was at boxing was, Sammie always assumed it would Angela that hurt someone, not herself.

She really hadn't meant to kick that hard, only hard enough to not look different than any other Friday. What if it had been Angela standing across from her instead of a dummy? She looked down at the bundle of splinters, and torn dummy fabric on her sleeves, suddenly feeling sick to her stomach.

She couldn't hurt anyone anymore, she needed to talk to Samuel right away.

"Hey, you wanna go get smoothies yet?" Angela asked, obviously trying to bring Sammie's head out of the clouds. Sammie felt grateful for the change of topic. She brushed a stray lock of hair back.

"Sure.." She tried to smile at Angela.

Her sister surveyed the mess again, puffing her chest up with pride. Angela beamed at Sammie.

"I feel like these boxing lessons taught me so much sis," Sammie beams back, hoping Angela wouldn't question too much on how from one Friday to another she got so strong. Even she herself didn't understand it. It had to do with that green magic.

Fucking magic.

All this started because of her magic, she bitterly thought. I wish I didn't have magic.

But Angela wasn't listening, staring hard at the mess. Sighing, Sammie went to get a broom, and dustpan. After collecting it all, she turned to Angela, who was still deep in thought. Oh no. Is she buying that it was just from boxing? What could she possibly be thinking?

Angela grabbed Sammie's arm, pulling her to the garage. Sammie was shocked but didn't fight it.

"Let's go, Sammie," she said quickly. "I'm seriously craving smoothies, so my treat."

"You're paying?" Sammie asked flabbergasted. Since when did she ever pay? It was always Sammie's treat since years ago. Something is off..

"You've really buckled down this past month. Don't think I haven't noticed how hard you've been working lately," Angels said seriously, opening the car doors.

"Yeah, lately." Sammie muttered thinking of the Wednesday that had just past. Samuel hasn't called her, maybe he forgot? She doubt it.

It had taken her forever to get home that night. Luckily, Alex always slept in or he would have called her out on it. He would get even crazier if he saw her bruises, all of which turned out much lighter than she thought they would. Thanks to the pink goop Samuel gave her. What would have happened if Alex saw them?

She would break down, and tell him, that's what. Alex was.... special to her. She had known him since they were both five. He was like a brother, or a bestie...

No.. not a bestie.

"We're here," Angela went on, getting out of the car. "But you've really proven how serious you are about self defense, and shit. I feel like it just isn't right for me to deny your dream anymore sis, I'm giving you to cottage." She smiled at Sammie.

"Sis, I just..." Sammie trailed off as her mind caught up with she hearing. "What? No fuckin way! Serious?"

This was happening now? Angela and Sammie's parents had left them a small cottage, outside the town edges, in their will to the girls. Meant for Sammie and Angela to share. Angela never wanted to live in it, and told Sammie she could never live there either. Mostly due to it being a major fixer upper, but she also felt Sammie would get killed by an axe murderer out there. The idea was thanks to her creepy pasta addiction. Angela's laugh shook Sammie back to reality.

"Yes, really!" She laughed. "You can start screaming and jumping up and down any time now."

"I-," Sammie mumbled, shaking off the dreaded feeling she felt. "I'm just shocked, I thought you said 'never happening' Angie."

"Yeah, but look what you did the that dummy. I'm sure you can handle it, plus I'll teach you how to shoot, and get you a gun. Boom all set!"

She was happy about this, right? This was her dream. She should have been screaming, jumping up and down in a very uncool way right now. Freaking out in a way that would make people stare at them like they were lepers.

But she wasn't.

She didn't want to live alone, with Samuel probably hanging over her everyday.

"I'm super stoked, Angie, really... just on the inside."

Sammie smiled at her sister. Whatever part of her that was responsible for the 'happy' feeling is broken right now. Out of business.

Angela nodded. "The cool facade that hides the excitement in your soul. Ha, suddenly feeling cool, huh?"

"Obviously." Sammie attempted a grin. She was sure it came off wrong, but again Angela didn't notice. Or did she..?

"Aw, c'mon, you can at least giggled like a schoolgirl," Angela rolled her eyes. "Come on, let's get the keys."

Sammie jumped. "You mean, we're doing this now? Like, right fucking now?"

Angela rolled her eyes again. "Well, yeah! Why wait? Just don't try to fix the place up yourself, I'll call Adam and see how much it will cost."

"Probably an arm and a leg." Sammie joked, and let out a very unattractive snort. Sammie shouldn't have joked about Adam's prosthetic leg.
Dang, was she was cool right now. She wanted to move in right then and there. Wait..what would happen to Alex? Would he stay behind or move with her?

"Wait, what about smoothies?" Sammie asked, looking at the shop. Her thoughts were just everywhere today.

"Do you want the keys or not?"

"I do want them!" Sammie screamed, waving her arms to Angela. She cringed at herself after.

People stared at them as they passed them, Sammie recognized one of them as her old math teacher. Ah, I haven't lost my touch after all, Sammie thought, blushing.

☆Sammie's POV☆

Back at Angela's home. Sammie anxiously switched from one foot to the other.

"Do you, Samantha Hale of Misaburn Town," she said, in suitably gruff tones, "solemnly swear on your very life to fight, and kicked the ass of all burglar's till next week?"

"I do!" Sammie screamed, swept up in the hype of it. A half second later she realized she just said the thing people said at weddings.

"Excellent!" Angela yelled, either not noticing Sammie's mistake or not caring. "Here ya are sissy."

Sammie held on to the keys until they heated up in her hand. She had been expecting a little...more? She was happy for the first time since... but even that feeling was already beginning to fade. She clung to the feeling for as long as she could.

"I'm leaving already, okay? See you later," Sammie sputtered, hoping Angela wouldn't notice.

She didn't, again. "Right, well you'll want to tell your Alex the good news, and get your drunk on with your buddies." She howl laughter. "Yeah right, you drunk."

☆☆☆☆☆☆Sammie's POV☆☆☆☆☆☆

Sammie's yell bounced off the lonely warehouse buildings. The long road from Angela's to Sammie's was all but abandoned in the night, and there was no one to hear her cry out. Under other circumstances, she would have been relieved that no-one had seen her acting weird.

Samuel smiled brightly at her from where he'd popped up from behind a building to her right.

She should have taken the bus. She should have done anything, but take the road alone at night. The small town wasn't that safe. It seemed time had escaped her while she was at Angela's. Like usual. It wasn't too late, but it was dark out.

"Did I scare you? Geez, I'm sorry," He said, happily. The jerk face..

"You just startled me," Sammie looked away. The mere sight of him made her whole body on edge. "I'm not scared of you."

It was hard to tell what would upset by what she said. She would do her best to put forth the impression that she wasn't upset by his crazy behavior.

She was. Oh, god, she was so scared..

His smile seemed genuine, and she relaxed by a small fraction. It seems that had been the right answer.

"I'm glad," He smirked. "How was your boxing session, sweetheart? Anything major happen?"

Sammie suspected that he knew full well how her boxing with Angela went, but she couldn't accuse of him spying on her without possibly pissing him off.

"Good. Um," she said, messing with the hem of her sweat shirt. "Got smoothies. Got to beat up a dummy. Ya know, the usual."

"Oh!" He bounced on his heels. "That's cool."

"Yeah," Sammie practically whispered, " So um... c-can go back to normal? Chilling, and stuff?"

Or never talk again forever? Sammie would be more than happy with the latter.

Samuel's eyes blinked, then he laughed loudly.

"Aww, come on! You're gonna have to try harder than that," he exclaimed incredulous, "Think of the magical possibilities! No, we are continuing until your magic is at it's peak."

She should have known it wouldn't be that easy. He made a weird sound, obviously mocking her. Any lingering happiness from her time with her sister withered away. I got to get home now. Before something bad happens.

Samuel hummed tunelessly to himself, thinking. Sammie inched her way by, hoping he wouldn't notice. Sometimes he was like this. Completely lost in thought. Humming was usually a cue that Sammie should be quiet, and let him think.

"I think," Samuel said, making Sammie jump. "We should go hunting tomorrow night."

"Uh, okay if you say so," Sammie agreed quickly. Anything to just move things along, and go home.

"You just relax, and enjoy yourself tonight, okay?" He smiled sweetly at her, but she knew better. His smile was fake, just like the rest of him. "Just don't stay up too late. I want you good, and rested. Well, I'll see you tomorrow then. The usual time, and place."

"Right." She waited for him to leave, but he was just staring at her like as if he stared hard enough she would turn into something else. Or someone else. "Um..."

"I sure hope that you tear the monsters the way you took tore that dummy."

He had been spying on her. "Okay. I really didn't try to-"

"Nonsense! You're just getting stronger, that's all." He leaned forward, practically nose to nose with her. Wasn't yesterday that she would have swooned to have him this close? Too much changed in the past twenty four hours.

"It's a good thing you two weren't against each other today, huh?" He piped up again. What did he want from her?

The worry from earlier dragged it's way back to the front of her mind. Even if she held back, would she still-?

What would have happened to sissy if Sammie let herself become a monster? That was what she was becoming, wasn't it?

Sammie suddenly realize she was left alone on the road, staring at the wall Samuel had been been leaning on. It took her a moment to calm her nerves before she continued walking. Part of her wanted to run the rest of the way home, but she forced herself to walk. It'd be too obvious to Alex if she ran, and the last thing she needed was him to notice her acting weird.

Once she got home, she was going to have to tell Alex the good news. Which meant he would probably drag her out to some bar where they could have to have drinks, and have fun for few hours. Normally she hated bars, and drinking. The idea was getting more tempting every step she took home.

Unlocking the door, she sighed. I could use a drink actually, she thought.