More than hazing

He stood up with a start when he saw her in front of him, not knowing if she was someone to flee from or not, he slipped when he stepped badly on the wet grass and ended up going backward hitting his head on the ground.

The woman in front of him looked at him compassionately and extended her hand to help him up, he ignored her and got up on his own, still somewhat dazed and dizzy from her blow.

After running for his life all day he had scratches on his arms and his jeans had ripped. Candace offers him a smile that tries to reassure him, however, Tanou's distrustful heart does nothing but shake in preparation for the escape that he would soon undertake, noticing his state of maximum alertness, the woman approached with her hands raised and extreme caution.

"I don't want you to get scared Tanou, the last time someone got too scared they left a free space for you in this place, we are recovering from one tragedy, we don't want another one."

"Don't you understand? I came here when I didn't even want to move, everyone greets me with threats and warnings-"

"I know, I told them not to do that, that it was ridiculous to get nervous ahead of time." The woman interrupts.

"My roommate is an idiot who has just made my life impossible, then everyone conspires with him to hurt me, they chased me all over the damn forest, they shot me, they cut me down, you are a guardian, you should be there to avoid those shit. "

The woman turned around and began to remove her sweatshirt, revealing the black T-shirt that she was wearing under her, and then she begins to take it off.

The boy turned her face away, he didn't mean to see her naked.

"It's nothing weird, just look," she said calmly, so calmly that Tan didn't refuse to look, "we've all been through this."

He opened his eyes very slowly and what he saw left him speechless, near her left shoulder blade, there was a scar with a square shape and projecting peaks.

"You're one of them," Tan said, backing away little by little, "you want to kill me."

When the woman turned again she was pointing a gun at the boy.

"Why would we want to kill you Tanou? We don't want to, we don't want to lose another one of the family."

"You aren't my family, my family-"

"He died. Chloe and Joshua Darawan, lovely people, their loss still hurts us."

"Did you know them?"

"Of course, we graduated together, they were excellent in everything they did, too bad they didn't educate you properly, maybe they were just trying to preserve your innocence, but they did you a great evil, coming here blindfolded is not easy"

Blindfolded? Without a doubt that seemed to be her situation, she was running blindly into the hands of these people, the first thing was to find out what she was facing, that's why she asked.

"What is Cloudhouse?"

"You finally ask the right question."

By the back an arm was closed around his neck, Tan pressed his chin to his chest as best he could, thus avoiding the attempt to suffocate, he better positioned his body finding his balance point and in an agile movement, he lifted on his back The attacker was thrown forward in a showy somersault that ended with Ryan slamming his back against the ground.

Nivi launched himself towards him trying to hit him several fists while Ohm tried to capture him from behind, with lightness on his feet Tanou dodged them both, causing Nivi to hit Ohm by mistake in the ribs, and he ended up lying on the ground, Nivi was distracted by the turn of events which gave Tanou the perfect opportunity to knock her down with a low kick that made one of the girl's ankles creak, and she cried out in pain.

Ginger appeared on the side launching a kick to the head that he did not manage to dodge, causing him to fall and leaving a sting on his cheek, he spat blood and stood up as fast as he could trying to recover, but one more kick Strong came from the opposite side, hitting his stomach this time, he coughed trying to stay upright, his arms were pinned behind his back and he was put on his knees, with teary eyes he looked at Candace who was smiling.

"As I said, it is a pity that your parents did not tell you the truth, but it is evident that they raised you for this, it is an honor to have such an incredible warrior among us."

The rest of the youths arrived and helped those who had been defeated to stand up.

Evangeline ran over to Nivi who was still lying on the ground holding her injured ankle from hers, brushed her hair from her face with one hand, and held her cheek with the other.

"Are you okay? Is something wrong with your foot?"

"I just dislocated my ankle, it's not a big deal."

The sweet Evie, who had smiled kindly at him the night before had disappeared, glared at Tanou with suppressed fury, as she wanted to cut him body into thousands of pieces. Then he turned back to Evie.

"I'll help you put him in it place."

The other nodded, barely gasping when her ankle was jerked and creaked once more. She thanked her for her gesture with a smile.

Ginger smiled with pride at having been the one who could land the first blow, Malik, who had given the final kick, high-fives with the blonde and received several compliments from their companions.

"Let's go home, our newcomer has a lot to process."

The teens obeyed and escorted Tanou all the way back to the residence. During the journey Tan was silent, trying to clear his mind, they hurt him, but they didn't want to kill him, they called each other family, Candace knew his parents, they had weapons and combat training, he had theories, but exactly what was going on?

While he was thinking the others were talking, two girls were talking about the new fashion collection of a French designer, Luk behind him was talking to Ohm about the food they wanted to eat for lunch that day, and further back he heard more voices talking about video games and a video that had gone viral on the internet.

Tanou was surprised how normal they could seem even after having done all that of chasing him, shooting him and threatening him with death, he also noticed that among the group of Kimi should not be, since there wasn't a trace of him, and I wasn't listening to her voice either.

Then he remembered that Kim had really tried to get rid of this, after the chase and talking to Candace he understood that it was not a hazing orchestrated by Kimi, but that it had to be something much bigger, that was beyond his control, of the Kim's and maybe none of the boys her age had a will in all of this.

After all, they were teens like him, they had surely been through the same thing.

Behind the straps of Nivi's blouse and Ryan's bareback, the same pointy-edged scar peeked out as on Candace's, the same one that was surely now healing on his own back.