I just added two new parts to this, so be sure to check it over again.

Ruth checked over her schedule again. It was nice having a structure, it felt safe and secure seeing it all written down on paper. “In Survival, you can ask questions?”

“Yeah,” Rona said, slipping on her pants. “As long as they're on topic.”

“And if you answer a question wrong, what happens?” she asked.

“If you get it really wrong, you get told that you're probably dead, and told in detail why. If it's wrong but shows you're thinking, he tells you why you're wrong but it's a lot nicer.”

Getting their bags, they headed out, at least they tried, there was a brick wall right behind the door.

“What's going on?” Ruth asked, staring at the door.

“I-I think it's Belle. She likes to prank people,” Rona said, running her hand along the wall as if looking for a secret handle. “It'll come down in a few minutes. We just have to wait. It will come down.”

Ruth sat on her bed, staring at the door, not really thinking of anything. If the wall would come down soon, there wasn't any reason to worry. Rona went to the window, staring outside.

Five minutes later the sounds from the hallway stopped. There had been some laughter from the girls and boys as they walked past, but no one tried to help. Rona started to pace, muttering to herself that they'd get out soon. That everything was fine. That there was no reason to worry.

“Rona,” she said, pulling out a piece of paper and a pen, “sit down.”

The glass girl sat down stiffly at the desk, her eyes once more focused on the window.

“Write down what your feeling. Why you're scared. What caused it. Anything you can think of, it helps,” she told her, putting the pen in her hand.

The pen started moving, the words were jagged, ripping through the paper. Tears fell smudging the few legible words. “I have to get out,” Rona whimpered.

“You said it would be a few minutes. You can wait. Belle won't lock us in all day.”

Running at the door, Rona slammed into it with her shoulder. It didn't budge. Watching helplessly as her roommate hammered on the door sobbing, and begging it to open, she came to a decision, they needed to get out of the room one way or another. She didn't have any explosives, they'd taken them away from her, but she had other things that would work just as well.

Going to her closet, sidestepping her roommate and friend, she pulled out her armour. Stripping out of her clothes she carefully put it on. There was no rushing, haste caused problems, allowing you to make mistakes. Isaac had rushed, and look what it had gotten him. Make sure everything was lined up and then do it without any hesitation, Sadist had taught her that. She heard someone on the other side of the door. It sounded like she wanted to help. That would be good if she could, but it wasn't necessary, she had the solution to their problems.

Looking at the window, she saw a fairy, it was too small to help, and it was trapped on the other side of the glass anyways. Ignore it.

With everything in place, she went to the wall. She had no idea how strong the brick wall was, better to go with known variables. Setting the battering ram to maximum with her tongue, she lined her fist up on a part of the wall where there were no support beams. She'd found all of them the other day in case she had to use the knowledge sometime. Bringing her fist back, she punched the wall, sending the forcefield forward. The wall didn't stand a chance.

Stepping out, she saw Absinthe looking at her, her mouth was open in shock. Rona came tumbling out, knocking the elf girl down. Ruth started to relax, her job done. Then she heard a voice, “Bloody hell, what happened?!”

Turning she saw Belle standing there. Hate filled her. How dare the girl hurt someone. What gave her the right to terrify others? Didn't she know what being scared and afraid felt like? How it felt to be helpless and alone?

She'd learn.

Lowering the battering rams strength, so it would only hurt and not kill, she punched Belle in the breast, aiming for the center of it, knowing from experience it would cause intense pain. Smiling, she watched the girl fall with a scream, clutching her chest. Turning the forcefield into a blade, she jabbed it into the wall and walked towards her, growling.

“Listen dip shit, you need to learn a lesson,” she said, bringing the blade slowly out of the wall, . “Never do something you can't back up.”

Fairies flew in front of her, getting in front of her eyes, popping as they came close , strobe lights made her vision blurry, her skin felt like it had been rubbed raw, she even felt a wave of heat wash over her face. She'd dealt with worse and kept moving.

Bringing her hand down, causing the tip of the force blade to tear plaster from the wall, destroying a handful of fairies that were trying hold her at the same time, seemingly intent on slicing Belle in two. The girl screamed in terror, creating a wall of metal to block the blade. But Ruth wasn't going to kill her, the blade had vanished even as she swung. Twisting, using her momentum to go even faster, she brought her foot down on Belle's thigh, with all of her weight behind it. The muscle immediately cramped up, and the scream turned into a shriek of pain.

She raised her foot, ready to stomp on the bully's stomach.

A fairy came flying down the hall, then everything went black.

She paused, blinking furiously.

A second later, still blinded, something huge grabbed her, shoving her into the wall hard enough to dent it. Screaming she hit the suits thrusters.

**

Rona looked up, still having trouble breathing when Belle screeched. She blinked in amazement at seeing her roommate standing over the girl, what little of her face was visible was full of hatred. Her fist rose up, the air shimmered around it.

A single surviving fairy flew right into Ruth's face, before erupting in a bright light. Ruth staggered, shaking her head. Belle raised her hand, white ectoplasm came together, forming a humanoid shape, a second or two later Tony the Tiger appeared, slamming Ruth halfway through a wall.

Ruth's scream of rage filled the hallway, and a jet of flame erupted from her back. The tiger seemed to flatten and deform as they flew across the hallway, making a second door into the bathroom. The sound of punching echoed in the hallway.

Absinthe got up. “Let's get Belle and run,” she said.

Together they grabbed the senior who tried to help, even with her one leg useless and twisted from the charlie horse.

“Belle,” Ruth called out, slowly moving out of the bathroom, ectoplasm dripping from her hands. She touched the wall as she blindly followed the sobbing. “Did you know there's three types of people in the world. Most people are useless, turning food into shit, they're not good or bad, they just exist. Then you have people like you and Sadist, who want to hurt others for their personal amusement. Because it's funny. Because it's good for a laugh. Because they can. I hate those people, they don't deserve to breathe. Then you have those who stop them. The good people.”

The trio made it to the stairs and started heading down.

“I don't know where I am in those three,” Ruth continued, starting to shout. “I'm not good, I can't be anymore. I don't want to hurt people for fun. I don't know if I'm useless. What I do know is that you hurt my friend. If you do it again, I will teach you real pain! I'll MAKE YOU BEG ME TO PUT A BULLET IN YOUR BRAIN!”

Mrs. Horton met them on the stairs, carrying a shotgun. “What's happening?” she asked, pointing the gun at the door.

The three girls started talking over each other.

**

Ruth sat in the hallway, stripped of her armour, shivering in her underwear. Her sight had returned a few minutes ago, and as she looked at the holes in the wall, she wasn't sure if she should cry or not.

She remembered what she'd said, and shook with revulsion. Sadists words had come out of her mouth, what kind of monster was she? She wasn't safe. They should have thrown her in prison with Sadist. She felt empty, drained of emotion, nothing good was left in her. Grabbing the suit, she threw it away from her. If she had a knife she'd slash it into ribbons.

“Ruth,” Mrs. Horton called, “are you there?”

She couldn't look at the housemother, keeping her eyes on her feet, “Yes, Mrs. Horton.”

The housemother stepped into the stairwell and gasped at the damage. “Come on child, let's get you covered up, we don't want security seeing you half naked.” She hurried over, picking Ruth up and not quite dragging her into her room. Ruth followed along, not trusting herself to make a decision, she always made the wrong choices.

Ruth got dressed under the watchful eye of the housemother, making sure to tie her bandanna around her hair with special care. Her mind was in the distant place, where reality didn't seem quite so bad, and fear was kept at a reasonable distance. As if in a dream, she saw security appear, one of them was holding her armour. They told her to go with them, so she got her coat and boots and surrounded by officers walked towards Kane. She noticed that a young woman in a security outfit was eyeing the holes in the wall very carefully.

She was led into a small room, where an older man was sitting looking over some papers. She waited patiently until he told her to sit down.

“I'm Chief Delarose, Ruth. I'm going to ask you some questions and I'd better get some good answers, do you understand?” he asked.

“Yes sir.”

“What exactly happened this morning?”

“Belle locked us in the room. It scared Rona. I got us out. And Belle was there. She was watching. She had heard Rona screaming, begging. She didn't do anything. She thought it was funny. She thought it was funny scaring Rona,” she said, her hands gripping the arms of the chair so hard they had turned white.

“Did you try to kill her?”

“No. I just wanted to teach her a lesson. Let her know what it's like being scared. Being terrified. Being alone. Maybe if she knew, she wouldn't do it again,” she said in a monotone.

“Do you have proof of that?”

“When I hit her the first time. I could have put my hand through her chest. I could have cut out her heart. I could have shattered her bones like I destroyed the wall. Sadist did all of that. I know how from watching him. I didn't. I have enough blood on my hands. I don't want more. But she had to know what it felt like. She HAD to, so she wouldn't do it again.” She felt her eyes watering, but blinked the tears away.

He sat back, watching her for several minutes. Finally he stood up. “Wait here. I need to go talk to some other people.”

She nodded, looking down at her hands.

**

Rona sat in Dr. Bellows office, her feet on the chair, resting her head on her knees. The window was wide open despite the cold outside and the door was open as well.

“How are you feeling now, Rona?” Dr. Bellows asked quietly.

“Embarrassed. I didn't think I'd panic like that,” she said. She knew she had some problems with elevators and things, but she had it under control. She could sleep with the door locked at night, she didn't freak out in the tunnels, she had it all under control.

“What were you afraid of while the prank,” his voice had an edge of disgust as he said the word, “was going on?”

“I was thinking that I was going to be stuck until someone came to dress me up like a model to take my picture. That I was going to be drugged again and handed over to some pervert who wanted to... you know.” Her voice became very quiet, “And this time Mom wouldn't be there to save me.”

“Was this the first time you got scared being confined?”

She gave a small head shake. “No. I try not to use elevators, and I only lock the door in my dorm at night when I'm going to sleep. It took a few days to do that. I need to make sure I have an exit.”

“Why didn't you tell me?” Dr. Bellows asked.

“I thought I had it under control. I've got enough other problems, I wanted to believe I had something under control, that I didn't have to vanish from the world to make everything all better.”

He nodded in understanding. “What did Ruth do when you first realized you were locked in?”

“She just sat on her bed waiting. She does that a lot. She's in a lot of trouble isn't she?”

“They're discussing it now,” he admitted.

“She tried to help. She tried getting me to write out why I was afraid and what I was feeling. I couldn't, I needed to get out. I was thinking of jumping out the window. Then she broke down the wall, just as the brick wall disappeared. She didn't panic. Not until she saw Belle. She roared. I've only heard John yell like that, when he saw what my Mom and Janet had done.” She closed her eyes, trying to forget what Ruth had threatened.

“Do you still feel safe around Ruth?”

She thought about it. Usually it felt like she had to protect Ruth. The girl seemed to be lost all the time, watching everything like a scared little child. But there had been nothing childlike that morning. “She threatened to torture Belle until she begged to be killed, if she ever hurt me again. I don't know why I'm so important to her, I haven't done much. I don't want her being punished because of me. If I'd stayed calm, she wouldn't have done anything. She just wants everything to be nice and calm and in order. If I hadn't panicked, none of this would have happened. She should probably stay away from me. I'm too much of a basket case for her. Mom would be better off without me to.”

She couldn't say anything else, she was crying too hard.

**

“All right Absinthe, from the top, what happened?” Chief Delarose asked.

“I really don't know,” the elf girl admitted. “I had slept in, so I just wanted to drop off a fairy for Ruth like Mrs. Horton asked me to, and get some breakfast. I saw the wall put up by Belle, and was going to keep going, sending a fairy through the window when I heard someone crying and banging on the other side. I got a fairy to find Belle, and got her heading back to Poe. She got there, and I yelled at her to take the wall down. She started to when Ruth tore through the wall. The next thing I knew, Ruth had punched Belle, and sounded like she was going to kill her.”

“And what did you do then?”

“I hit her with every spell I had ready, even a fireball since she was in armour. Any one of those spells would have most people at least pausing for a second, she didn't. I know her forcefield couldn't stop all of them, she just didn't seem to care. The only thing that worked was blinding her, and that just slowed her down. So we grabbed Belle and ran for it.”

“Did she try to follow you?”

“At first yeah. She was yelling at Belle, calling her a sadist or something. Saying all Belle wanted to do was to hurt people. She said she'd put a bullet in Belle's brain if she hurt anyone again. What happened to her? She always seemed scared, only really happy when she was alone with one of my fairies.”

**

“Belle, what were you thinking playing a prank like that on Ruth and Rona? I know for a fact Mrs. Horton told everyone in Poe to take it easy on Ruth,” Chief Delarose demanded, several hours after talking to Ruth.

Belle held an ice pack against her chest. The doctors had declared her healthy, except for two spectacular bruises, which were going to heal quickly enough with the medicine she'd been given, but until they did, it was going to hurt.

“I just played a joke on them. It's the usual welcoming them to Poe, everyone gets it. How was I suppose to know she would freak out?”

“When you get a cottage wide statement saying to take it easy on a girl who's had a very hard time recently, it should be common sense. And just so you understand, Ruth isn't the one who initially 'freaked out'. It turns out Rona has severe claustrophobia, she was begging Absinthe to be let out. Ruth was getting her out in rather spectacular fashion, when she saw you. Right now Rona is talking to Dr. Bellows, still trying to calm down, after helping Absinthe get you away safely.” He glared at the girl, wondering if she understood.

“I didn't know,” she muttered.

“No you didn't. You played your prank and walked away, not caring about the consequences. Why shouldn't I give you detention for a month?”

“I'm the one who got beaten and thought I was going to die. It was only luck and thanks to Absinthe that she didn't kill me”

“Hardly. As Ruth explained and the evidence of her suit and the results agrees with her, if she'd wanted you dead, you would have died with that first punch. She wanted to hurt you, a lot more than she did admittedly, but she was going to let you live.”

“You're taking her word for it, she was bonkers?”

“She destroyed a wall with one punch, if she'd hit you with that same force, you'd be lucky to survive long enough to reach Doyle. We also tested the suit. Your ectoplasm would have been sliced in two and you with it, if she had kept the blade active. She was angry, just this side of a rager probably, but she had that little bit of control to make sure she didn't become a murderer.” He let that sink in. “Now I'm asking you again, why don't I give you detention for a month for provoking the incident when you'd been told to do as little as possible that might aggravate this girl?”

She glared at him for a few seconds, before looking away from his very angry face. “I think I've learned my lesson.”

“Good. Detention for two weeks at Hawthorne, maybe you can learn how to use your powers to entertain and help people without resorting to childish pranks,” he said. “Those are Headmistress Carson's word, not mine. Now get back to your classes, and then rest up tonight, your detention starts tomorrow.”

The glare came back, but she wisely didn't say anything. Instead she silently limped out of the office.

**

Ruth looked up when Chief Delarose came in. She hadn't moved from her seat in all that time. He sat down across from her, his expression was very grave.

“Do you know what an ultraviolent band is, Ruth?” he asked.

She shook her head.

“It's an armband you wear, it lets people know you are dangerous and could hurt them. You are also put on a board for special attention, and you have to report to security every few days.”

“Thank you,” she said, interrupting him.

“What?”

Keeping her head down, it looked like she was talking to her hands. “I am dangerous. You should warn people about me. Thank you.”

“I wasn't proposing to give it to you yet. I was going to warn you it would be used if you attacked someone again.”

“I want it.”

“This isn't an honour, it's punishment.”

“I understand.” She really did, she was little better than Sadist, continue his habits even after he was locked away. The more people who knew what she was capable of the better. She deserved to be alone.

She watched him, silently as he struggled with how to respond. He seemed to reach a decision. “Fine. I was going to give you detention, but if you're so set on getting the UV band, it's yours. Wait here.”

She waited a few minutes, staring at the same wall she'd been looking at for several hours, until he came back with a white band, that had UV stitched on it in large black letters. “You have to wear that whenever you are outside your dorm, you will come here every Monday evening to check in. If you can overcome your violent protective streak, we'll remove you from the list.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Placing the band on her arm, she left the office, keeping her head down. She hadn't eaten that day, and it was well past lunch, looking at her schedule she had chemical engineering in twenty minutes. Running to her dorm, she picked up a small PFG and then headed into the tunnels, jogging along so that she wouldn't be late. She could eat later.