Back in the Day Part 2: Promise

Kaos's band of minions grew to include most of the school. He knew that later on in life students would learn better how to use their own wishes, and properly combat his support wish, but for now, it was enough.

Wishes were just like talents, everyone had them, but most people failed to train and nurture them well, this is what separated the Sen students from the Dek students, and this was also true for introductory school.

Young Kaos walked down the peaceful halls of students chatting. He sighed to himself, thinking about how easy it was for him to live a comfortable lifestyle.

He didn't care about healing people with his wish, or using people to benefit him, or really care about anything for that matter. Really all he particularly wanted to do was not do that much work, and not feel any pain from fights.

He saw a rather wild eyed girl walking towards him. Her left arm was skeletal all the way up to the elbow, and her mid-length hair was messy and unkempt.

"Hey kid! Are you Kaos?" She asked, stepping right in front of him.

"Yeah?" He replied, not recognizing her.

As soon as the word left his mouth, the girl's right fist slammed into his face, sending him off balance, and stumbling to the floor.

"What was that for?" He yelled, covering the right side of his face where the punch landed.

"I'm Sepra," she said blankly, seeming as confused as he was, "you're the new kid who thinks he's hot stuff and I'm the top dog here, so now I beat you up… that's how it works."

Kaos saw by her sheer confusion over needing a reason to fight, that reasoning was going to be impossible. Or maybe it wasn't.

"I can't fight though." Kaos said, trying to hide a smirk. He knew this much would at least get this lunatic's attention.

"What do you mean?" She replied quickly, slightly relaxing her fighting stance.

"I do support magic, so this isn't going to make sense to fight me. I'm probably one of the weakest people here without another person, so proving you are stronger than me doesn't make sense unless I have another person."

"Oh…" she said, seeming slightly disheartened, but then perking up after having another thought, "find another person, and meet me outside and then we can fight!"

If he didn't comply with this request, he figured she would just beat him up instead, so he just nodded and walked back down the way he came.

Out of all the students that he supported, Karn definitely was able to use the halo and wings the best. Not only did he have a knack for how to operate the wings, he even had gotten a much better sense of how to use them tactically. This girl was different, and if he wanted to win, he needed Karn.

Poking his head back in the classroom, he spotted who he was looking for.

"Karn," he said seriously, "I need your help."

"Let's do it!" Karn replied, energetically hopping off of the desk he was sitting on. He obviously thought this was going to be a normal fight, and Kaos wasn't going to tell him he was fighting the top dog of the class, in case he tried to chicken out.

Karn had gotten a bit cocky, maybe it was well mannered confidence, but the reality of it was, he now thought that he was invincible. With Kaos's halo, that might not have been too far off the mark, but even without the halo on him, he had been acting like he ruled the world, even as weak as he was.

These random thoughts left Kaos's mind as soon as they got outside, and he saw a crowd of almost all the kids in his school waiting to see the show.

Evidently this girl had gotten bored and fought someone in the few minutes she was waiting, because a seemingly unconscious student was lying on the ground with black and green smoke coming from his open eyes.

Then came the voice in Kaos's head again, "FIGHT! FIGHT! RUN! LIAR! FRAUD!"

The voice was right, he was a fraud for fighting using others, and as proof of that, he had lost the fight in the hallway against Sepra in just one punch, and he knew it.

"I don't care about fighting." he thought to the voice in his head, "I just don't want to get punched in the face!"

"THEN FIGHT!" It yelled back, drowning out the cheers of the students, waiting for someone to get beaten up.

"Woah woah woah!" Karn yelled, seeing Sepra standing over an unconscious body, "you didn't tell me we were fighting Sepra!"

Kaos turned, and with a false confidence, he put his hand on Karn's shoulder and said, "I got you. Trust me."

In reality, he had no idea what this girl's wish was, and really didn't know if this would work out, but he figured it was better for Karn to get knocked out than him. Maybe that was a selfish way of thinking, but it was truly how he felt.

Karn seemed to regain his former confidence, and cautiously entered the ring of students alongside Kaos.

Snapping her skeletal fingers, the unconscious student awoke in a daze, and quickly scrambled out of the circle.

"It's go time!" She called, getting into a fighting stance.

Kaos flicked his wrist, and the halo and wings appeared on Karn, and he slapped him on the back with an encouraging nod.

Karn burst forwards with more speed than he ever had before, maybe it was him getting a better handle on the wings, or maybe it was Kaos finally getting serious with his angelic buff.

Karn tackled the girl, raising a fist to begin pummeling her. But that wasn't going to happen. Her skeletal hand shot up and grabbed ahold of his throat, emanating the green and black smoke. He weightlessly lifted off the ground, and she stood up, still clutching his throat.

This wasn't going well. Karn was being healed from whatever this was, but at a slower rate than it was consuming his consciousness.

He needed to do something himself, but that was dangerous. He needed another pawn. He looked around the circle and locked eyes with another student who had fought for him a few times.

"Better together." Kaos said, pleading in his head that the student would do something.

The student nodded, and sprinted at Sepra. She saw him coming though, and had just enough time to raise her hand, still holding the still weightless Karn, and fling him at the approaching enemy, sending both of them sprawling on the ground. This seemed to be a net benefit to Kaos though, as Karn got back up with the help of the Halo's healing and seemed slightly dazed, but otherwise now free of whatever deadly wish Sepra controlled with her skeletal arm.

"I'll take you all on!" She yelled with a fiendish grin on her young face.

"All of us?" Kaos replied with a chuckle, looking around the circle of students. He flicked his wrist again, and his wish transferred from Karn, to the student who was still on the ground wheezing. The student almost instantly caught his breath, and stood back up. "It seems to me like after all that, you're the one who ended up with the most damage taken." Kaos continued with a smirk.

While Kaos's confidence was fake, what he had said was true. Sepra had done enough damage between the two students to put a whole class out of commission, but both of the students looked like they had never been better. She, on the other hand, had still been tackled to the ground, something that might not have been the worst, but still looked to have at least done something to her left leg, which caused her to limp ever so slightly.

Sepra gritted her teeth, and shook her injured leg, as if in an attempt to pop something back into place. Whether she succeeded or not, nobody could tell, because as soon as her foot touched the ground again, she began closing the distance between her and Kaos.

Kaos put the halo back on Karn, who zipped over to intercept Sepra, but only landed one kick to the torso before being incapacitated by the skeleton arm and flung to the side.

Kaos didn't have time to leave the halo Karn to heal him all the way back, and swapped it to the other student, who had already gotten closer to intercept, by the time this student got flung behind her, Sepra was dangerously close to Kaos.

But then a third student stepped into the circle, and a fourth and a fifth. They dropped like flies while fighting Sepra, but as soon as they did, Kaos brought them back in less than a second.

"Who is this girl!" he thought, part in frustration and part awe. "She's taking on five people!"

Truthfully this was impressive, but five infinitely resurrecting enemies were still too much for her to handle. After one lucky punch got through and she was off balance, a barrage of kicks and wild punches followed.

"CHEATER!" Came the voice in Kaos's head.

"I'm winning though!" he mentally retorted, "I don't get hurt… that's the only goal!"

This wasn't fun to watch, something about this didn't sit right with him. This wasn't right. This wasn't wasn't fair. He could tell himself that "he didn't care", or "he was just using his wish in the best way", or whatever other excuse that he could come up with, but truthfully, something in him did care. This feeling wasn't the same as the voice in his head, but it was still sickened by what he was doing.

"Stop!" he yelled at the five kids who were still kicking at Sepra, who was now on the ground. Karn and one other kid stopped and looked at him questioningly, but the other three kept going.

"I said stop!" he yelled again, but the three kids kept going. They must have had some grudge against this girl, no wonder they stepped in the ring like that.

"Screw you guys!" he growled and flicked his wrist. The halo and wings didn't appear on Karn, or the other student that heeded Kaos's instructions. Instead, to everyone's surprise, the halo and wings appeared on Sepra, who was now defensively curled into a ball. The other times, it felt wrong to use his wish how he did. This time though, something about it felt right.

She laid curled up for a few seconds, before realizing that something was different and exploded off of the ground, half using her own strength, and half, unknowingly using the power of the wings. She immediately grabbed the arm of one student with her skeletal hand, causing him to immediately crumple to the ground.

The other two kids retreated after seeing Kaos's betrayal, but it was too late. With the speed from the wings, and the power of her wish, they didn't last more than ten seconds. Kaos looked around, and found that Karn and the remaining student had stepped back into the crowd, leaving him standing alone against Sepra.

She had a vicious look on her face, like that of a wild beast. She was covered in dust that had turned to mud around her eyes from tears. Thanks to the halo, she was no longer physically wounded, but her pride had been clearly damaged. Kaos took a step back, maybe he deserved this. All his allies were a bunch of goons who he never even tried to treat like friends.

Sepra walked to the edge of the circle of students, and grabbed one with her skeletal arm, flinging him to the ground. After seeing that they weren't safe, the rest of the students scattered, running in all different directions, and completely out of sight of the two.

"You made me cry." Sepra growled at him, wings and halo still glowing around her.

Kaos didn't respond, he didn't know how to. The situation was too confusing now. She picked a fight with him, she hit first, and she was the bad guy, right? Then why did it matter how he fought back? No, he was right, she was the bad guy in this situation… but then he realized something.

"I'm also the bad guy," Kaos said under his breath, "the good guy doesn't act like me. Not with their friends, not in fights."

"I don't like you." Sepra said, having an internal struggle of her own.

"I don't like me either." Kaos replied, no longer looking her in the eye. "I'm sorry."

"It was a fight." She said, wiping the tear-made mud off her face and for the first time, looking at the wings on her back. "I like fighting, and fighting isn't wrong…" She stopped talking and looked at the ground.

"But something about that was wrong." Kaos replied, finishing the sentence she started.

Both of them stood in silence for a moment, before Sepra looked back up at him.

"I like fighting." She said slowly, "I'm going to keep fighting people… but I'm going to do it the right way."

"Keep at it for seven or eight years." Kaos replied, "It sounds like the arenas would be perfect for you."

"What about when you fight?" Sepra asked, finally looking him in the eyes, with a slight smile from his compliment about the arenas.

"I don't think I'm going to be fighting anymore." He replied quietly.

She walked closer to him, and put her pinky up.

"You're a fighter, and I can tell." She said, extending her hand towards him, "just promise me that when you fight you'll do it right."

"Okay." Kaos replied, reluctantly locking his pinky with hers, "I promise."