Chapter 11: The Rave'N Preparation
Nevermore transformed into something from a fever dream as Rave'N preparations consumed the student body. Every hallway buzzed with supernatural teenagers applying their abilities to decoration, creating displays that would have made professional event planners weep with envy or terror.
Bianca's Scales had turned the main corridor into an underwater palace, complete with flowing water that defied gravity and bioluminescent effects that pulsed in rhythm with unheard music. The Fangs countered with gothic elegance—black silk that moved without wind and candles that burned with flame colors that shouldn't exist. Even the Furs contributed, though their idea of decoration involved more fur and fewer actual decorations.
Supernatural pissing contest disguised as school dance planning.
I moved through Ophelia Hall using Unnoticed Mode, observing the social dynamics while staying invisible to the chaos. The psychological cost was mounting—each use left me feeling more hollow, more forgettable—but the intelligence value was worth the existential dread.
For now.
The sabotage happened in real time, right in front of me.
One of Bianca's followers—a siren whose name I'd never bothered learning—approached Enid's carefully arranged display of fairy lights and color-coordinated banners. The work represented hours of manic effort, the kind of obsessive perfectionism that screamed emotional investment.
Don't get involved. Not your problem.
The siren smiled with calculated cruelty and "accidentally" caught her heel in the power cord. Fairy lights crashed to the floor in a cascade of broken glass and twisted wire. Banners tore as she "stumbled" through them, shredding hours of work in seconds.
"Oops," she said to nobody in particular. "How clumsy of me."
Enid wasn't there to witness the destruction. She'd probably return from dinner to find her project destroyed, with no evidence of deliberate sabotage beyond her own paranoia.
Still not my problem.
But I remembered Eugene's kindness during my first week, the way he'd adopted me without question or agenda. Wednesday's alliance that had given me crucial intelligence and tactical support. The promise I'd made to protect people who mattered.
Enid matters to them. Therefore, she matters to me.
Utilitarian calculus. Protect the ally network.
The justification felt hollow even as I formed it. Truth was, watching someone destroy something that clearly meant so much to its creator made something protective and primitive coil in my chest.
Document the sabotage. Anonymous assistance later.
My phone captured everything—the deliberate destruction, the siren's satisfied smirk, timestamps that would prove premeditation if needed. Then I melted back into background noise and began planning.
Three hours of sleep wasn't much, but it was enough to execute the operation. Jericho's craft stores stayed open late during tourist season, and Familiarity Mode made purchasing replacement supplies trivially easy.
Temporary trust manipulation for good cause. Still violation, but lesser evil.
The store clerk treated me like her nephew, helping me find exact matches for the destroyed decorations without questioning why a teenager needed industrial quantities of fairy lights at midnight.
Power corrupts. But sometimes corruption serves justice.
By dawn, replacement supplies sat outside Enid's door with a note written in deliberately generic handwriting: "Saw what happened. This should help. — A Friend."
Anonymous good deed. Minimal exposure, maximum impact.
I returned to bed as Eugene's alarm started blaring, pretending to wake up naturally while guilt and satisfaction warred in equal measure.
"You're the shadow friend!"
Enid's voice cut through the afternoon air like sunshine weaponized for maximum cheerfulness. She'd cornered me while I helped Eugene organize his latest bee equipment delivery, apparently having conducted a thorough investigation into her mysterious benefactor.
Shit. Cover blown.
"Eugene talks about you constantly," she continued, bouncing on her toes with manic energy. "The mysterious roommate who appears and disappears like smoke, helps with homework, and apparently has opinions about proper hive management."
Eugene looked up from his equipment catalog with the expression of someone who'd been caught gossiping. "I may have mentioned you once or twice."
"Seventeen times yesterday," Enid corrected. "I counted."
Great. I'm a conversational topic.
Her brightness was overwhelming—colors too vivid, energy too intense, emotional range that made normal teenagers look sedated by comparison. My first instinct was retreat, find shadows to hide in until she got bored and left.
But she powered through my discomfort with the persistence of someone accustomed to social resistance.
"Did you leave these?" She produced the replacement decorations, handling them like precious artifacts. "The note said 'a friend,' but Eugene mentioned you doing mysterious helpful things, and the timing was suspicious."
Terrible at lying to direct emotional honesty.
"Yes."
"Why?"
Because watching people destroy things that matter to others triggers protective responses I thought I'd lost. Because your work was beautiful and destroying it was cruel. Because Eugene would be sad if you were sad.
I defaulted to deadpan truth: "Someone destroyed your work. That was unfair. I had resources to fix it."
Enid's expression cycled through surprise, delight, and something softer that I couldn't identify.
"Oh my god, you're NICE," she said, voice climbing an octave. "Eugene said you were nice but I thought he was just being Eugene about everything."
"I'm not nice. I'm practical."
"Sure you are." Before I could protest, she wrapped me in a hug that smelled like vanilla and something indefinably warm.
Physical contact. Unexpected. Not entirely unpleasant.
My shadows unconsciously curled toward her warmth, responding to something I couldn't quite process. When she finally released me, I felt strangely off-balance.
"Thank you," Enid said seriously. "For fixing it, for caring enough to fix it, and for not making me ask seventeen times before admitting it."
Genuine gratitude. When was the last time someone thanked me for anything?
"Don't mention it."
"Too late. I'm mentioning it to everyone." Her grin could have powered Jericho for a week. "Aron Bason is officially the nicest person at Nevermore Academy, and I have documentation to prove it."
Documentation. Of course.
Eugene watched our interaction with barely concealed satisfaction, like he'd successfully introduced two species of bee and watched them form a productive hive relationship.
Found family expanding. Eugene, Wednesday, now Enid.
More people to protect. More vulnerabilities to manage.
The thought should have been terrifying. Instead, it felt almost like relief.
Training became obsession as the Rave'N approached. Something was coming—I could feel it building like pressure before a storm. My fragmented memories screamed warnings about caves and darkness and Eugene in mortal danger.
Not enough time. Never enough time.
Shadow manipulation pushed to eighteen meters despite the splitting headaches. Unnoticed Mode held for fifteen-minute durations even when I temporarily forgot my own name. And somehow, during a particularly brutal session when exhaustion made consciousness optional, I discovered shadow travel.
Sink into darkness. Emerge elsewhere.
The sensation was indescribable—dissolving into component darkness, flowing through shadows like liquid, reforming several meters away completely disoriented but intact. The mental cost was staggering, but the tactical applications were obvious.
Teleportation through darkness. Game-changing ability.
Eugene found me collapsed on our floor at three AM, shadows still writhing independently around my unconscious form.
"Jesus Christ, Aron." He hauled me onto my bed with surprising strength for someone whose primary exercise involved bee maintenance. "You're pushing too hard."
"Not hard enough." The words came out slurred, my brain apparently convinced that syllables were optional. "Something's coming."
"Then you need rest so you can actually fight it." Eugene's voice carried unexpected steel. "Dead from exhaustion doesn't help anyone."
Logic. Unassailable logic.
"Can't sleep. Too much to do."
"You can and you will." Eugene pulled my blanket up with maternal efficiency. "Whatever's coming, you'll face it better with a functioning brain."
When did Eugene become the responsible one?
I let him fuss, too exhausted to maintain my usual emotional distance. My last conscious thought before sleep claimed me: Enid's laugh had been genuine, and I hadn't heard genuine laughter directed at me since transmigration.
Connection. Human connection.
Maybe that was worth protecting after all.
Wednesday's journal entry, observed through strategic shadow placement:
"Aron Bason cultivates connections with overlooked individuals—the beekeeper, the non-transformed werewolf. Either he's collecting allies strategically or he genuinely values those society dismisses. Both options suggest he's more dangerous than his background presence implies."
She underlined "dangerous" twice.
Dangerous. Good.
Let her think I'm strategic rather than accidentally developing human emotions.
Outside our window, something moved through the woods with predatory purpose. Three new sets of claw marks appeared on trees at the forest edge—the Hyde expanding its territory, preparing for whatever came next.
Tomorrow: the Rave'N. The cave. The moment everything changes.
Tonight: rest and prepare for war.
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