Shadow Boxing

Chapter 2: The Fairest Of Them All

"Ouch... That one hurt..." Jack mumbles to himself as he prepares to go to class. He'd just received an earful from Christine before the two decided to completely cut each other off. While depressing, it wasn't enough to keep him from driving a good few miles to college and get ready for classes. Once he gets there, he realizes he has tons of parking space. Once Jack finds a good parking spot. "Well I say lucky me!" Jack chuckles to himself as he finds a spot near the front and heads inside the main building. It's there that he sees someone that looks awfully lost, and Jack taps them on the shoulder. "You lost?"

"Kinda. I'm trying to find my classroom, and I don't really have the number." The man replies. His gray hair and a navy badge on his coat seem to signify he served at some point.

"Try checking with the dean's office. If anyone can hook you up with your classroom number, it's gotta be the dean or someone there." Jack replies.

"Thanks man. Where is it?" The man asks.

"Just down there really." Jack replies as the man goes off in the direction Jack's pointed towards. Now just realizing that he doesn't know his classroom's location, Jack whips out his schedule and locates the room with relative ease, coming to an empty classroom. "Huh. Looks like the last class left early?" And with that, Jack pushes open the door. The lights flicker on as soon as Jack hits the switch, and he sets his stuff down on a random chair. It's not long before the same man that Jack helped out enters the classroom.

"Thanks for guiding me." The man says, shaking Jack's hand as he enters.

"No problem. Name's Jack." Jack replies.

"Call me Randy." The man now known as Randy says. It's still very early in the morning, so nobody has made their way in yet. Jack is about to catch up on the sleep that he missed when someone else enters the classroom, and Jack had to be an amnesiac to not be able to recognize her. Her short blonde hair, glasses and goofy smile practically stand out to Jack, and the girl in question also looks at Jack with a similar expression.

"Vanessa?" Jack says, breaking the silence. "Is that really you?"

"Jack?" Vanessa asks, bouncing the question back before the two run over and hug each other.

"My goodness I thought I would never see you again!" Jack says cheerfully.

"Same here, oh my god!" Vanessa replies joyfully. When the two part, Jack whips out his phone.

"You goofed up your number and I couldn't text you at all. We've got practically a whole semester to catch up, but let's make sure that mistake doesn't happen again." Jack says as Vanessa does the same and they exchange numbers.

"You two know each other?" Randy asks out of the blue.

"I got to know her literally the last day of the first semester. I didn't see her again until now." Jack explains. It's not long before more students begin to trickle into the classroom and another familiar person enters. She sports long, wavy black hair and clearly has southeast Asian roots, much like Jack. "Man this day just keeps getting better and better, is that you Princess?"

"And is that you Jack?" Princess says, bouncing the question back just like Vanessa did earlier. The two fist bump as everyone else begins to settle down and it's not long before the professor himself emerges. In that meantime, Jack decides to befriend another person in the classroom. He approaches yet another girl who has put her long, curly black hair into a bun and is showing off her toned legs.

"Hey." Jack says.

"What's up?" The girl asks.

"Nothing much." Jack replies.

"What's with the brace?" The girl asks, just now noticing.

"Karate accident. Kneecap was blown out." Jack says, putting it in a nutshell. The girl cringes hard and Jack winces at the memories.

"I do kickboxing and I couldn't even imagine how painful that must be for you..." The girl replies. "Anyways, I'm Margaret. I'm hearing from around that your name is Jack?"

"From these guys? Yeah." Jack replies as the two shake hands. Being only the first day of class the professor calls up Jack and Vanessa, having known the two from last semester, and they pass out a syllabus for everyone to get acquainted with. Once that's done the two take their seats and the professor begins going through every single thing in said syllabus. Realizing that there's nothing too new Jack decides to take a long nap as the professor drones on. Jack then wakes up a moment later upon realizing he needs to go use the restroom, so he excuses himself to do just that. Much to Jack's surprise the bathroom he has entered is almost vacant. After Jack does his business he looks into the mirror and sees something awfully off. "...What the hell?" In the mirror is Jack, but at the same time it's not. The reflection Jack is looking at has grayscale gray skin and all red eyes, but otherwise it looks just like Jack. Even more to Jack's horror, it's the first one to blink, not Jack. "Who... What are you?!" And just like that, the reflection vanishes, leaving behind just the normal reflection Jack is supposed to see. Clearly freaked out, Jack returns to the classroom and sits next to Vanessa. She then notices that Jack is shaking, but from what?

"Are you okay?" Vanessa asks.

"I think so... I just saw the freakiest thing in the mirror..." Jack replies. It's not long before class ends earlier than normal, and Jack and Vanessa find a mirror in the hallway. "I'm probably gonna be the only one that can see this, but just in case I've been seeing things..." And with that, Jack walks into reflection range. Sure enough, the same grayscale, red eyed entity Jack saw in the mirror appears, and the look on Vanessa's face says it all.

"I...I can see it too!" Vanessa says, horrified at this finding. The dark image vanishes, leaving Jack's normal reflection, and the two hug each other to try and comfort one another.

"God that was crazy... You saw it, I saw it..." Jack mumbles.

"Let's just hope this was just a fluke and we don't ever see that again..." Vanessa replies as the two part and run off.