The day The First Bosniak High School introduced twelve new students was a weird and a rare one, but it definitely didn't seem like something too special. The thing was, the particular school rarely received such a large number of students at the same time. Plus,they were all Asian so everyone definitely wondered how they'd ended up at the particular place.

Rumors were going around that they were Chinese, and some of the less-intelligent guys even said they were there to kidnap children from lower classes.

 

But none of that was particularly weird. What Aya didn’t understand why someone who was enrolled to Curriculum C would be constantly at the school. They rarely saw the other kids from CC, but these guys… They might as well have been in her class.

 

They were always around. At the school cafeteria, they kept coming back to take more plates of food - could they ever even be not hungry? They always took up all free space at the main hall, either fooling around or talking - or more like arguing - in some language she could not understand a word of.

 

She’d tried Googling it and came out empty-handed. It must be Chinese then.

Aya was very irritated by their presence, but she would’ve tried her best to just keep avoiding them and pretend they didn’t exist had they not provoked her.

 

Now she hated those twelve jerks. No, hatred was too gentle of a word - she loathed their presences and hoped they’d be deported back to Chinatown as soon as possible. She’d even tried reporting them, but the school secretary claimed they were here legally and did all their obligations so there was no reason to bother them about anything.

 

So she had to endure them bothering her instead.

 

Her blood started boiling as soon as she remembered the events of the previous day. That stupid - what was even his name - Ćamil? That stupid tall jerk made fun of her in front of the whole school.

Đema, the school psychologist, claimed it was his endearment for her. Yeah, right, calling someone a walking blanket was such a beautiful phrase to coo over. If only she didn’t have to take care of her grades and reputation, she would’ve kicked him where it hurt the most just to see him hurt and cry out in pain.

 

If only Lamiya hadn’t gotten sick again, she thought to herself. She’d think of something to get them back for this.

 

Today, it seemed, their newest target was a short guy with large glasses all nerds had to wear. Their usual opening was speaking gibberish in their yellow-race language - if only she knew what language it was, she’d learn to swear and then scream at them - and then starting to bother their victims in what could generously be called a heavy-accented English.

 

The truth was, nobody ever even understood what they were saying, except when they were making fun of someone. They seemed to exceptionally good at pronouncing insults.

 

She took a glance at the five boys - five freaking hyenas - who’d already started laughing at the poor freshman. Unsurprisingly enough, they were all tall - so much taller than the already too-short guy. The tallest of them looked so smug that she would’ve been the happiest person if someone would’ve just came up to him and punched him in the face, if anything to wipe that sinful smirk off his face.

 

“Why don’t you show us what you have in your bug,” the second tallest guy said, a baseball cap with the sign MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN barely covering his too big ears. He was so lame even at insulting people. Now that she thought about it again, Aya really did see the guy as a joke - his pants were barely even at his hips, and it seemed as if he would’ve tripped and fallen on his head if he tried to make more than two steps. His pink sweater was an insults itself, too small for his wide framer.

 

The guy she preferred to call Piccolo since his skin was kind of green-ish, plus the awfully big bags under his eyes, came over to the poor boy being harassed and began to pull his bag off his shoulders. “Yeah, man,” he said with great skill and intelligence, and Aya had a feeling it was the only sentence he knew how to say in English.

 

The tallest guy ran a hand through his honey-colored hair. He was the mastermind behind all the harrassing and the best at speaking English, but he did all the work from the background, never moving a finger and letting his brutes do all the work for him. Coward.

 

The fourth guy was even worse than the leader - he was also very tall, but he seemed to be in an entirely different league than the other three. The leader was obviously smart, the elf - Ćamil - was obviously a mindless puppet, and the green-skinned guy seemed like he could beat up a bunch of guys all by himself without breaking a sweat.

 

The fourth guy she once heard the others refer to as deer - though it was probably just another mispronounced words, judging by the fact they couldn’t spell a three-letter word right - did not seem like a bully at all. He was tall and very skinny, he kept looking at the ground and did not have the face of someone who would’ve enjoyed seeing a kid cry and get pushed around.

 

Linked to his arm was another skinny, beautiful Asian with a body that seemed as if it would break upon touch, but he was not as harmless as the other one. This one seemed as nearly as maniacal as the leader of the group, moreover because of the insane color of his hair, or more like the rainbow that was his hair color. He also seemed pretty satisfied watching Piccolo push the kid and making him fall to the ground.

 

They all laughed. Even the seemingly harmless guy.

 

“This school is a total joke,” Elf said, turning towards the leader. “They don’t even try to fight us. Do they even know how to sp- spok-” he stammered.

 

“Speak,” the leader said, taking his black Ray-Bans from where they were attached to his shirt and putting them on. “Tao, it’s enough. It ain’t fun when they don’t fight back.”

 

“Prada,” Piccolo - Tao whined, taking a perfume out of the abandoned kid’s bag. “Fashion!”

 

“Let it go, Tao,” the leader said in a very cold voice, making Tao spring up and drop the newly acquired perfume on the floor. “Hyung will buy you plenty of more expensive stuff. You don’t need this filth’s leftovers.”

 

Tao nodded weakly, probably not understanding half of what the diabolical leader even said, and in his hurry to join the group of bullies Elf had reached a long time ago, Tao accidentally - though it could’ve been acting - stepped on the boy’s hand.

 

The boy screamed, probably finally waking up from the unresponsive state he was in since he was pushed to the ground. “You stupid jerks!” the boy - Aya finally remembered his name was Ammar - shouted, clutching his wounded hand to his chest. “I write with this hand! I have a test today, how am I supposed to be able to write it now?”

 

The world was still for a moment. Tao froze in a half-crouch, still not having been able to get up. The deer and the rainbow maniac made a face full of disgust, whereas the Donald-Trump supporting elf showed a feral grin.

 

The leader turned, raising his eyebrow. “What did you just say, caterpillar? Did you just call me a jerk?”

 

“Acta- ac-” The elf stammered again with his superior English vocabulary.
 

“Actually,” the deer finally said in a small voice,looking briefly over to the now very-exasperated-looking leader, then going back to stare at the floor once again.

 

“Yeah, what he just said, he called us stupid jerks, Kris.”

 

Kris ignored the elf and reached the now-kneeling boy in two long strides. Even if Ammar was standing, Kris would’ve looked like a giant next to him, but now he looked like a titan that was about to squash a bug. This was not good. Not once did anyone show any signs of a retaliation while being bullied by these guys. Not once did anyone ever insult them. This was going to get ugly pretty fast, considering how the leader’s self-confidence seemed to be higher than Mount Everest and he did not like when someone tried to touch it.

 

“Tao, Sehun,” the leader said as he continued to kneel in front of the terrified boy with a blushing face, “Let’s give this guy a lesson in good manners. Is this how you treat a sunbae?”

 

He slowly took the boy’s glasses off his face, passing them over to To, who was frozen in position. He took them and put them on. “Not Prada,” he said with disgust, throwing them to the ground and crushing them with his foot. “Desgusting.”

 

Kris tsked, shaking his head at Ammar, who looked like he was about to cry. Meanwhile, Sehun had untangled himself from his unresponsive counterpart and joined his leader. “You see, if you treat someone older than you in this way,” and then Kris grabbed him by the hair,” and if you insult someone who is superior to you in every way,” he suddenly got up and started pulling him through the main hall by the hair, “and if I ever hear you speak a single word or breathe a single breath in front of my gang, I am going to personally slit your throat and make a shw out of you. I was going to do just that, but you are lucky I’m in a good mood today.”

 

“Yeah, man,” the elf piped up.

 

Kris threw a scobbing Ammar on the floor, leaving him like a bag of sand at the center of the main hall. He looked at him for the last time, snorting in what seemed to be self-satisfaction.

 

“Now give him a lesson he won’t ever forget, boys.”

 

Kris, the elf and the deer turned and left the room, while Tao and the rainbow guy started hitting Ammar as if he was a ball. His sobbing turned to screams, and he balled up in fetal position, giving up on trying to put up any resistance. The two laughed as if they were hitting a toy, not a real person. Aya felt sick to her stomach.

 

The worst thing was, nobody moved a finger to try and stop them. The teachers have probably locked themselves in their meeting room, not wanting to deal with what was happening because the Asians seemed to be some pretty important people’s sons who could get away with everything. The other kids just watched, horror etched on their faces. They were probably thinking that if they tried to interfere in any way, they would just end up on the floor beside Ammar.

 

Regardless, Aya could no longer watch this. She started to get out of her hiding place - the hall leading to the school stairs - but she hadn’t made a single step when a strangely familiar voice appeared.

 

“Ha-ya!” A strong voice shouted as a girl gracefully landed beside the bullies. “You stop beating up the boy, RIGHT NOW!”

 

Her sister looked like a superhero, full with the makeshift cape that was her indigo shawl swaying freely and uncharacteristically all around her. Aya suspected she’d deliberately taken a few pins out, probably to make her look more awesome.

 

She looked absolutely… crazy. Her hands were in a Bruce Lee stance, ready to chop any wrongdoer she thought should pay for his crimes as she swirled around like an endless tornado, screeching in her highest voice.

 

Rainbow hair started laughing like an even bigger lunatic. First he clapped like a seal but gave up after a couple of seconds and started rolling on the floor, clutching his stomach.

 

Tao, on the other hand, was a completely different story. He seemed to understand the ridiculous moves Menna was making, and he started making them too,  saying some foreign words over and over again.

 

Ammar thankfully tok the opportunity to get up and run away while nobody was watching. His lip was split and blood was gushing out of his nose, but he would be fine. Menna, on the other hand… Aya was worried. Her sister was strong, but these freaks seemed like they could beat up fully grown guys, let alone a crazy, skinny martial-artist-wannabe.

 

“Ni Hao,” Menna spoke confidently, a giant smirk on her face. She put her hands together as if in a prayer and bowed deeply.

 

“Ni Hao,” Tao replied in an apparent extasis, repeating the same movements.

 

The rainbow guy stopped laughing and got up, moving away from the center of the room. He seemed as if he’d seen this weird exchange happen before. He was calm, too, as if he knew who’d be the winner.

 

Aya was becoming really worried now. What was Menna thinking? The diversion was a great idea, but she should’ve kept spinning until she was out of the room and their reach. Her face mirrored Tao’s, though - the two looked as if they’d been waiting for this moment their entire lives.

 

Then all hell broke loose. An unspoken signal marked the beginning of the fight and suddenly Tao was on the floor, trying to move out from Menna’s headlock so violently that they both seemed like they had spasms.

 

He started screeching again, saying foreign words that did not seem nice at all and h managed to grab Menna’s legs, throwing her up and under him.

 

Menna punched him in the face, hard.

 

“Ah!” Tao screamed, moving away from her as if she was a snake who’d just bitten him. “Not the face! Sehunnie, did she just broke my nose?”

 

But Menna did not cease in her advanced. She took the chance to jump at him and punch him again, this time in his stomach. He made a gurgling sound and tried to move away desperately, but Menna was not a fly that was easy to swat away. She grabbed him by his shirt that, of course, had Gucci written on it, and did not let go.

 

A ripping sound was heard, and then Tao screamed again. The rainbow guy - Sehun - started laughing loudly. “You micho!! Crazy!! Do you know how much this cost?? This Gucci! Real Gucci!”

 

Menna was about to start clawing his precious face that was already bloody enough, but Tao stammered, moving backwards on his hands and legs, and somehow managed to stand up and run to his savior - Sehun. As soon as he was behind him, he made a very manly sob that sounded like a little girl’s.

 

Meanwhile, Menna got up, too, and was waving a finger at Sehun, nudging him to come over and receive the beating of a lifetime too.

 

“Hyuuuuung,” Tao continued acting like a little girl as he took Sehun by the arm, “This girl is micho. She’ll just ruin your pretty face too. Let’s tell Kris and he’ll make her pey.”

 

Now Menna was the one laughing out loudly. “What, so you’re telling me you’re going to run like the cowards you are when facing someone your own size? What kind of bullies you are if you run to your mom screaming when facing a small girl capable of beating you up?”

 

Sehun shook Tao off him.

 

The next thing happened so fast Aya could no comprehend it. Sehun was next to Menna in a flash, but he somehow managed to kick her in the back too so she stumbled towards him.

 

Then he punched her in the face and the stomach, seemingly at the same time.

 

Aya’s sister was on the floor now, kneeling and panting, as if she was exhausted and could not breathe anymore.

 

Sehun crossed his arms on his chest and looked at Menna, sneering at her. “Consider yourself lucky. I don’t want to beat up a girl unnecessarily.”

 

Meanwhile, Tao was doing a crazy happy dance, saying “Ha!” over and over again, pointing a bloody finger at Menna. Then he turned to Sehun, who was still looking at the girl that seemed unable to regain her breath, saying gently, “Let’s go, hyung!”

 

Sehun closed his eyes and Menna immediately hit the floor with her head, still panting. Aya did not know what exactly had happened, but she immediately ran over to where her sister was, hoping there was no big damage.

 

“Yehet!” Sehun shouted, putting an arm in the air and then joining his friend as they victoriously left the room without taking a glance at the mess they’d left behind.

 

Menna was a mess in her sister’s arms. One of her eyes was shut and she still couldn’t seem to start breathing properly. Aya tried to help her calm down, inspecting her for any wounds to her head or body and suspecting the blow she took to her stomach must’ve been pretty bad.

 

Suddenly, the whole school seemed to have gone back to the way things were before the whole exchange happened, as if it had never happened in the first place. Freshmen started talking again, their faces still frozen in horror but acting as if nothing had happened. Teachers suddenly started walking all around them, nobody daring to look over where her sister was still making noises of a strangling puppy. People were walking by them, but nobody asked if they could help, nobody tried to help or do anything, like perhaps catching the people who’d done this to her and expelling them.

 

“Sis,” Menna tried in a raspy voice as she squeezed her hand, “These guys are not normal. He… it was as if a wind has hit me in the back. My breath was literally taken from me - I don’t know how but-”

 

“Shhhhsh,” Aya said as she started rocking Menna gently. “It’s okay. You fought bravely but he was stronger. I’m proud of you.” She did not have to make excuses - what she’d managed to do was pretty awesome. She’d managed to make at least one of them pay, and the other ones would get what they deserved eventually. Lamiya would find a way to make them pay without confronting them directly.

 

“But Aya, listen to me, I am not making this up,” Menna tried again, her eyes frantically searching her sister’s. “He couldn’t have hit me in the back when he was standing in front of me. You have got to believe me!”

 

Menna was obviously in a state of shock, Aya thought. After all, she’d never met someone who could overpower her before, so she was bound to have a mini-mental breakdown. Knowing that, Aya nodded at her sister, deciding enough battles were fought today. “I believe you,” she said gently as she got up with her bruised sister that was temporarily out of her mind. “Now let’s get you checked up. You hit your head pretty badly when you fell, and your back needs to be examined, too.”

 

As she looked around her, she could see one of the Asians that were rarely seen at school - a short blonde which was biting his lip in an expression she would’ve thought was regret and apology had he not been just another one of them, watching the two swerve through the main hall from a safe distance - and feeling his eyes leave them only when they started down the stairs that led to the school doctor’s office.