Supernova

Chapter Eighteen - Deathmatch

"I think you might be my one exception," Demon told me afterwards.

"I told you I'd change your mind," I told him back.

I spent the entire first month with him and Needles exclusively. They treated me a bit like a pet, or a child. I trained with them, ate with them, slept in their room, in their massive oversized bed more often than my own, waking to the sounds of them going at it more often than not. Demon played a little with me too, when Needles was sleeping or busy, and I gratefully allowed him to treat me like an afterthought, drunk on the idea that eventually, I'd change his mind about that too. I became so comfortable existing alongside them so quickly that I nearly requested an exception be made for a three-person team, but before I'd even voiced my thoughts, Demon told me to forget about it.

Demon introduced me around. He'd been at the Academy for years by the time I got there. I did train, and mess around with, with some other unpaired individuals and pairs, but when I didn't remember any of their names beyond the first meeting, I took it as a bad omen and didn't bother with them any further. Everyone bored me.

At least, everyone Demon introduced me to did. He was extremely selective and protective over the process. He'd hiss and threaten a lot of people out of talking to me, informing them I wasn't interested before I'd even been able to decide whether or not I was. However, I liked him enough to trust his judgement. Nobody ever challenged him. That's also how I decided I wasn't interested.

"You sure seem to know your way around here," I told him, watching his eyes, waiting for a flicker of anything to occur in the blackness of them. "Don't you?"

"You've seen what I can do," he said back.

"Does that make you," I asked slowly, begging him to fall in love with me. "The best?"

"Best you'll ever have, I'm sure," he told me dismissively, refusing to meet my gaze. I wanted to believe him. I wanted so desperately badly for him to be the best, the last, the only. My best. My last. Mine only. "All I want is a powerful team. I know who's not worth the time."

"Who is the best?" I asked him. "Out of everyone?"

He seemed to really get a kick out of that question. A smirk came over his face and it did not fade.

"We'll show you, Princess Amerieager," he told me with a nod, looking down at Needles, who smiled a little and nodded as well.

I rode on Demon's shoulders, just like I had been doing since my first day here. I tried to ask about the person, and what they were like, what their quirk was, if I'd heard of them, but they just kept laughing to each other. I kicked my dense feet against Demon's chest, but it just made him laugh harder. He reached for my ankles and held them against himself, like I was an unruly child, and I settled solely because of how much I enjoyed the sight of him touching and grasping me. They took me to the foyer of the main building to the wall with the pairs of students and the numbers. They both looked up at it. Needles gestured his arms towards it. I looked up at it. I understood no more than I had when I'd walked by it on my very first day.

"Most of us don't really take the missions seriously, so coming back alive is considered the victory, and if we're still here, we're all even as far as that goes," Demon said. "But Deathmatch rankings really determine who's who."

Demon grasped a massive black hand around my neck and put me down. Needles clasped his small hand with his golden knuckles around my wrist and pointed to one of the photos as he pulled me over towards it. It was the two of them, Demon with his arms crossed over his heavily scarred and incredibly delicious bare muscled chest, covered in more smoke than I'd ever seen him, and Needles in front of him in the all white canvas outfit he always seemed to be wearing, showing off the pins on the back of his hand. Under their photo was the number 69. I scoffed and hit Demon on the arm. He started cackling again. Even Needles laughed a little, a small chipper sound from behind his small smile.

"What the fuck are these numbers?" I laughed.

"Matches undefeated," he bragged. I rolled my eyes. Needles laughed more. "We stopped there and threw the next one because we thought it was funny."

"And you haven't beaten it yet?" I asked him mockingly. It didn't bother him. He just shrugged, grinning, fangs visible and forked tongue wiggling. I looked up at the largest photo, the girl with liquid hair and the electric boy. "Who is that?"

"Leo Claeson and Iliana Ragnor," Demon said with a nod. Needles sighed quietly. "Fucking legends. The best pair ever to move through The Academy. She's got water hair that she can do pretty much anything you can think of with, and Leo can send electricity right through it. They've got wicked quirk complementation. If they ever come back as an alum special guest pair, we'll go. Watching them fight is a fucking thrill."

I turned to Demon and motioned up towards all the photos. "What is all this?"

He grinned at me, sensing my hunger. His dramatic paused lasted so long I'd nearly threatened to storm off and find out for myself, only to have him grip me around the neck and face and tell me, alright, no need to get my corset all out of sorts, come here, he'd tell me. It began as a casual branching of training activities with nothing on the line but gym bragging rights, until it became a club run game recognized and supported by the school. Pairs face off against each other, sometimes randomly, sometimes against a pair of their choice. You signed up to do it and there was an entire gym dedicated to it. The more matches you had undefeated, you could sign up for better times and more people showed up. Sometimes, you could even challenge the staff. I immediately filled with a desperate need to be the best at this.

"Settle down, Princess," Demon told me. "You have to find a pair first."