credits: marie_curly3

credits: jiyongstan

credits: Pinkheart0815

There was a rush of movements around her, everyone moving in panic. Her shouts were drowned by the commotion. Her eyes widened in terror as she watched everything unfold.

Dara pressed herself against the wall as the students crowded the hallway, pushing each other as they dashed towards the stairs while the guys tried to block the outside gangs that were wreaking havoc inside the Arts Building.

“Riko!” She shouted again to catch the attention of the girl who was standing rigidly at the end of the hallway, unable to move because of fear. Riko’s face was becoming pale as she darted her eyes around in fright, not knowing what to do and where to go since almost everyone was running in every direction.

“Riko!” Dara struggled to get to her. When she finally reached her, Dara grabbed Riko by the shoulders and shook her forcefully. “Riko! We have to get out of here!”

“D-Dara”, she mumbled in a breathless voice.

“Follow me. Let’s go to the rooftop instead of going down. I heard the outside gangs are blocking the entrance of the Arts Building.”

Riko did not utter another word and followed Dara, their hands linked together as they dashed towards the empty hallway to the left. Her chest was constricting in panic whenever they pass by brawls in the hallway and in those moments, she felt Dara’s grip on her hand getting firm, as if assuring her that everything will be fine. When they were about to reach the stairs going to the rooftop, Riko finally let out a sigh of relief, but her relief did not last long.

As they turned to the corner going towards the stairs, the two girls yelped when Hawk suddenly blocked their path. Still gripping Riko’s hand, Dara was about to run in the opposite direction but Hawk suddenly lunged towards her and grabbed her neck, forcibly pushing Dara against the wall.

“Found you”, he said menacingly. “After what Montecillo did to me, I’ve been itching to do this”, he muttered between gritted teeth, the scar across his face from the wound that Jiro caused making him more frightening.

“DARA!” Riko screamed in horror as Dara let go of her hand and tried to pry the guy’s grip on her neck. “Let go of her!” She yelled, hitting him in the face and to whichever part her fists could reach.

“!” Hawk released Dara, who slid on the wall and coughed while nursing her neck. “YOU !” He stepped towards Riko and punched her on the stomach, her body jolting back with the impact, causing the girl to kneel on the floor. With a satisfied smirk, Hawk turned towards Dara again.

Dara gasped in fright, her eyes widening in horror when the guy rapidly approached her and strangled her again, pushing her against the wall, his fingers digging on her skin. She tried to fight – clawing his face and throwing punches at him, but the guy is strong. A mixture of helplessness and terror crept inside her, but with the last ounce of logic left in her fading consciousness, Dara struggled to fish out her phone and threw it at Riko.

“O-One”, she mumbled.

Still kneeling on the floor, her other arm wrapped on her stomach, Riko immediately hit her speed dial.

***

At the bottom of the stairs of the Arts Building, a crowd of outside gangs were terrorizing the students. When Jiro together with the Black Dragons finally arrived, a roar of approval and cheers filled the air. Picaro and Bonsai immediately made a move, punching the gangsters out of the way.

Jiro delivered an elbow strike to a guy who tried to block his path and kicked another one who dared to attack him. There was a dangerous air surrounding him as he urgently ascended the stairs, his eyebrows mashed together.

He rushed towards the room where Dara’s last class was, ignoring the ongoing brawls around him. His heart was hammering hard inside his chest as he sprinted along the hallway, panic and worry engulfing him. Hawk is here. What if he did all this to get back at him for what he did? What if Hawk uses Dara to take revenge? .

When he finally reached the classroom and did not find the girl there, Jiro rushed outside and darted his eyes around in alarm. He was about to go downstairs again to search for her when his phone rang. His chest constricted when he saw who the caller was, and he immediately hit the answer button before the second ring.

“Ramirez-…”

“ROOM 3J! HELP US! HAWK IS-…”

He heard a loud grunt and the line was left open but nobody was answering anymore. Without wasting any more time, he hastily made a move, ascending to the third floor and running towards the direction of the stairs going to the rooftop near where Room 3J was. When he turned in the corner, Jiro’s eyes immediately squinted in tiny slits, his face contorted in pure rage after seeing Hawk pushing Dara by the wall, his hand gripping the girl’s neck while Riko was lying unconscious on the floor, her face bruised. His expression was instantly shrouded with darkness as he charged towards them.

“HAWK!” He yelled, catching the guy’s attention. Upon hearing Jiro’s enraged voice, Hawk grinned evilly, pressing his fingers on Dara’s neck harder. The girl was becoming pale as she struggled to remove his grip from her, but to no avail.

Dara heard his voice, but she wasn’t sure if she was just confusing reality because of lack of oxygen. Riko was able to make the call before Hawk kicked the girl and knocked her cold, but Dara could only pray that Jiro understood what Riko told him over the phone. She could feel her consciousness slowly fading but she refused to succumb to it, still trying to fight Hawk and struggling to wiggle free. But when Hawk put more pressure on her neck, her arms hung limply on her sides and blotches of black swam on her vision.

Before Dara lost her consciousness, she saw a fist with a dragon tattoo slamming hard on Hawk’s face; then everything became dark.

***

Dara’s eyes slowly fluttered open, her mind still a bit hazy. She stared at the ceiling and realized she was in InterSAT’s infirmary. Slowly, everything that happened forcibly registered in her mind and she instantly sat up. She blinked in bewilderment when Stone parted the curtains of the divider, noticing a couple of bandaids on his face.

“You’re awake”, Stone stated and approached her. “You have a bruise on your neck but the nurse already applied cream on it. Are you alright? Do you want to be admitted in the hospital?”

“What happened? Where’s Jiro?” She asked, ignoring his question.

Stone pulled a chair and sat beside the bed, directing his gaze at her. “The profs called the cops, and some of the InterSAT gangsters were also taken for questioning, including Jiro. WAIT!” Stone gripped Dara’s arm when the girl was about to get out of the bed, her face drawn with concern. “Spade is already taking care of it. Do you know Spade from Sparrow Gang? He’s like the oldest brother of all InterSAT gangsters. Spade’s parents are lawyers and his brothers are cops. So, you don’t have to worry. Besides, we were the ones who were attacked and we just defended ourselves. The school will back them up and they will just settle it.”

“W-What about my friends? Bullet? Namee? What happened to Riko? She was with me when Hawk found me.”

“Bullet was also taken in, and his parents are already there. Namee and Picaro are with Bonsai because his dad is throwing a fit. Riko is at the bed by the wall. She’s fine, but a bit shaken. She doesn’t want to call her parents so I asked one of my gangmates to drop her home. I wasn’t taken in because I was in the infirmary with you when the cops came, and I bet no one ratted on me that’s why they didn’t come back for me. We found you and Riko unconscious on the floor while Jiro was beating the out of Hawk. So my gangmate and I took care of you two and I let Picaro handle Jiro.”

“Oh my God”, Dara buried her face in her palms, her voice trembling a bit. She lifted her gaze again, her eyebrows deeply furrowed with worry. “Will Jiro still be able to graduate? What will happen? What happened to Hawk?”

“Dara, this is InterSAT. This isn’t the first time that this happened and I assure you, everything will be alright. Even if this school is messed up, the professors and the management values their students. And everyone here knew Ice Lord and they know he wasn’t the one who started this chaos”, he informed her. “Hawk will not press charges s