Heathen Chronicles - Changed

Chapter 14 - The Dragon's Retort

Dwayne's POV

Today was the day we had to present our artwork to Miss Zerine, along with a story about what is more important than her art lessons.

Most of the art students did the usual, spinning tales about how art was their most important subject. This brought a massive smile to her ugly face. They obviously didn't want her to hold a grudge and sabotage their grades—something she was very capable of doing. She'd done it before.

We couldn't help but giggle; we knew what we had to say would already piss her off. The artwork itself would just take it to a new level. We sat patiently, waiting. "Miss Satan" scowled at us before finally calling our group up to present. She looked on eagerly, expecting the hidden frame sleeping in the middle of our table to be a tribute to her. I had something extra spectacular planned for our show-and-tell.

Ntsakela stood confidently, picked up the artwork, and brought it to the front. She waited as, one by one, the rest of us stood beside it. It was now or never. Let's do this!

Miss Satan looked at us and hesitated before sitting back with her arms folded. She wasn't surprised we did this as a group; she probably expected it from us. Bitch. She likely assumed we had finally come to our "senses." Stupid ass bitch.

The white cloth covering the frame brought out more excitement from the rest of the class than anything else. Just as we wanted.

"What is MORE important than Miss Zerine's art lessons?" Ntsakela began with a smirk. The class giggled. "The answer is..." She paused. Silence crept in for a minute.

"Us," Tannah finished.

"US as individuals, and US as a friendship. It is way more important than any lesson in any subject," Ntsakela explained.

"The story we are about to give is a very, VERY summarized version," Taylor added.

"It is our artistic expression today, and it goes like this," Xelia started.

"It was a bizarrely hot day. We sat at our group's spot chatting about anything and everything—mostly nonsense. As you all know, we can talk a lot of shit just for laughs. Then! This one little bitch who used to be in our circle started to push us away just because she had a bitch-lover-pet-boyfriend who also used to be in our circle," I informed the class dramatically, not ashamed to say it as it was.

The class gasped and laughed. This was art class; we were allowed to express ourselves in any way we wanted. Perfect!

"She isolated herself and pushed us all away," Ntsakela added irritably. "We tried to talk to her and her boyfriend about it, but they excluded us. To them, it was just them against the world, and we clearly meant nothing. Which is okay; we understood. Relationships, right?"

"So, we gave up and decided to wait for them to talk to us when they were ready," Taylor said sadly. "But they never did—unless they needed something, but that's another story completely."

"Then we started to hang out without them," Tannah added angrily. "When we used to hang out with them, they would stay in their own world and completely ignore us, or worse, talk about us while we were right there. So, what was the point?"

"It was then that the trouble started," Ntsakela confirmed confidently. "She sent her boyfriend—her little puppy—to make us feel bad. We all shut him down and he backed off immediately. He didn't have the balls to do what needed to be done."

"Like any ordinary group, we took pictures when we went out," Tannah said, her arms crossed over her chest. "We posted them on our chat pages to show that we were actually having fun."

"She was so petty that she screen-grabbed our pages without permission and turned them into one of her art projects," Xelia hissed. "Then she proceeded to spread lies about us."

"She made us look like evil, malicious, backstabbing friends," Taylor affirmed. "As you know, our art projects get sent to museums. Those pictures would have been seen by important people with that horrible, fake story behind them. We were definitely not happy about it."

"So, instead of causing a scene, we decided to talk to her calmly," Xelia continued. "We asked her to take them out or blacken the faces and names. Not so hard, right? That's when she started to victimize herself."

"So... we decided to inform a specific teacher—who will not be named—because teachers are supposed to help with that sort of thing, right? Stay neutral and guide us," I remarked disappointedly. I had to force myself to stay calm. "We tried to explain the situation, but she dismissed our side completely and made us look worse!"

"She took the other side and left the project as it was," Ntsakela declared aggressively. "She told us that this girl was the victim and called us malicious without knowing the facts."

"So, we left it and cut her out of our lives permanently," Tannah explained. "We didn't want that toxicity. We grew stronger as friends and basically told the teacher—in a respectful way—to fuck off."

"Don't get us wrong, we are still upset," Xelia added peacefully. "But we pushed past it. We honestly don't trust her, her boyfriend, or any teacher anymore. Except for our favorite, who will also remain unnamed."

"And to this day," Taylor added, "those two ex-friends still try to force themselves back into our lives, and the teacher still tries to make our lives a living hell. We are not horrible people, so we just ignore the nonsense. Though we do question why we let them stay in the group for so long."

"This artwork represents us as a whole," I emphasized proudly. "It says that we don't take shit from anyone anymore, nor do we acknowledge the stupidity of others. Oh, and you are more than welcome to kiss our ass if you don't believe what we've told you."

The look on Miss Zerine's face was priceless; she turned a mixture of white and red, staring at the painting with visible regret in her eyes. We finally unveiled the artwork as slowly as possible. Gasps erupted from the class.

The painting was a creative collage of photos, paintings, and sketches of the whole group. It was crafted so beautifully it looked like a single medium. From afar, the images transformed into a magnificent 3D dragon, representing our collective strength. At the dragon's feet, blackened shadows depicted the people who had wronged us—though we left them as nameless, dark shapes.

It was glorious. We knew this would fly through the school, especially since I'd already left fliers of the artwork and our story in the public bathrooms. We had even used one of Raven's personal sketches for the dragon's form so she could be a part of this too.

The class erupted in cheers. I had also casually sent a mass email to the faculty as a "sneak peek" of our project. This would never be forgotten.

Miss Zerine looked away. She knew she was the teacher in the story. If word got out about her bias, she would be in big trouble. Once the class quieted down, she handed out notes. When she reached our group, she whispered for us to stay behind after school.

The bell rang. Victoria scrambled out of her seat, likely running to find Jeydon. We waited in awkward silence as Miss Zerine checked her computer. When she saw the mass email I had sent to the other teachers, she paled entirely.

Checkmate, bitch.

She stood in front of us, hands on her hips, a psychotic look in her eyes. She clearly had a lot to say, but for once, the words wouldn't come.

"How dare you!..."