-Two years ago-

It all started when the King of the Hill came to me with a simple request.

"There is a monster sitting on my Hill Maddison Tramph." He smiled down at me disarmingly. "Would you mind slaying it for me, and taking its place?"

All I could do was blink at him speechlessly, as people do when a random guy comes up to you in the middle of a deserted hallway and asks you to join him on a quest to la-la land.

"...What?" I managed to get out, pressing my back further against the glass behind me.

Alan Floid sighed, leaning casually against the window on his side of the corridor, directly across from me. The late afternoon sun shone at his back, making his hair glow crimson.

"I have a problem. His name is Jack." Alan explained with a sigh. "He has crossed too many lines and needs to be stopped. To do that, I need you to challenge him and take his place on the Hill. "

Warily I bit my lip. "You're from the Hill, Like Nigel?"

After coming into contact with Nigel Fleming a few times, I had learnt about the King of the Hill. Now that I knew the reason behind all the fighting in this school, I had become even more determined to avoid getting involved.

"The King, actually." Alan shrugged nonchalantly, and I swallowed nervously.

This wasn't the first time I had come into contact with Alan Floid.

Funnily enough, Vain had been the one he approached first.

Representing the school council, he had come up to Vain only a few days after we had started at the school, asking the diligent boy if he wanted to assist the student council.

I could still remember the shocked look on Vain's face, and the way he had let this strange boy drag him off without a single word of protest.

Alan Floid held influential roles in both sides of the school system. With a mixture of respect and caution, I suppressed my instinct to just outright refuse him.

"Why me?" I asked instead, stalling for time. Vain would be finished with his after school duties soon, and when he arrived, I would have an excuse to escape.

The King met my eyes seriously.

"Well, out of everyone here in this entire school, no one looks half as bored as you do."

The King grinned at my shocked expression. Before I protest, he rolled his eyes playfully. "Being bored out of your mind makes me think you might be just crazy enough to take me up on my offer."

I tried to reply politely, but all that came out was a strangled noise of outrage.

"Maddison."

Relief washed over me as Vain appeared at my side. That relief froze in its tracks when I saw Vain's tense expression. Instead of looking at me, he stared coldly at Alan.

"Good afternoon Alan."

"Vain." Alan nodded back, giving the smaller an amused smile.

"You'll have to excuse us. The busses have already left, so we have a long walk home."

Alan only gave us a raised eyebrow, an amused smile still in place as Vain curtly took my shoulder and led me down the hallway away from the boy.

"You know Maddison, you kind of remind me of a lizard, sitting on a rock," Alan called after us nonchalantly, causing me to look back at him in surprise.

"You hold your breath to blend in, but sooner or later, you will need to build up the courage to do what comes naturally." The King winked. "Or else you will suffocate. "

It wasn't long after that that Jack found me.

Or rather, I stumbled upon him, playing with his fallen challengers.

"Hello, Maddison Tramph."

Jack straightened up, smiling at me in warm amusement. "I was wondering when I would finally get to meet you."

I had a lot of experience with fighting. Had seen the aftermath of many battles.

What Jack casually stood over that day is an image that still makes me cringe.

If I had had a chance to recover, I probably would have attacked him then and there. Not for the Hill, but in pure rage for what he had done to those people.

But I wasn't ready.

Before I had even realised what was happening, just how unprepared I was to face his level of skill, the Jack of the Hill had crossed the space between us.

And pinned me to the ground in a painful twist.

"Hmmm. Not much of a screamer I see." He had murmured gently as I gasped away the pain. I twisted desperately to look up at him.

Jack's smile was heartbreaking, so full of relief and happiness.

"I'm so glad."

It chilled me to the bone.

"You're going to be just as much fun as I had hoped."

Nigel found me afterwards, a devastating look froze on his face as he helped me walk. He didn't stop apologising for the whole way to the nurse's office, and once he got me there, he disappeared. Avoiding me was probably his last effort to keep me from getting dragged onto the Hill. Idiot, like he had anything to do with it.

Vain was furious when he found out. He knew better than to believe the lies I came up with about having fallen over..... Down the stairs. Not once, in the weeks it took me to recover, did he take his wary eyes off me.

We constantly fought in those last few months. After what had happened, we were both on edge, and all the resentment that had been building between us kept causing us to argue.

It was very much like that time at the Lake.

I wanted to swim across, and Vain wanted me to stay safe with him.

For the first six months, that is what I did. I stayed on the shore with Vain, avoiding the Hill and the fighting.

Even as he held me there, Vain could see that I was watching the water longingly.

Still, I valued Vain's friendship more than any thrill, and I never would have joined the Hill just to escape the boredom of school.

Then I met him.

Crouched behind the equipment shed.

Smoking a cigarette.

And just about put a crack in the brick wall next to his head with the force of my kick.

"If you have a death wish, I don't mind helping you out." I smiled at him darkly, my foot embedded into the wall beside his head.

The red-haired boy looked up, raising a mocking eyebrow, and for a split second, I thought that it was Alan Floid.

Then the boy spoke.

"Should I feel honoured?" He drawled scathingly, looking down as he flicked ash near his feet. "From what I've heard, the only person Maddison Tramph ever helps is little boy white wonder."

I gritted my teeth in frustration.

Alexander Floid.

I had heard the rumours, about Alan's almost invisible counterpart. From the rare times that he had interacted with other students, he was known as the messier, meaner version of Alan, with eyes the opposite from his twin.

Unfortunately for him, though, I was sick of random people whom I had never met addressing me by my full name and talking to me like they knew everything.

"Like you're one to talk, Mr I'm- such-a- BAMF- cause- I-smoke- when-no-ones-looking." I snarled. "Let me guess, you're another one of those assholes from the Hill, and you've got your knickers in a twist because I won't fight Jack?"

Something like that...Speaking of knickers though." He waved his hand, cigarette and all, indicating my leg and skirt. "With your leg propped up like that, I have a clear view of yours."

I felt that it was only appropriate that I promptly introduce Alexander Floid to my fist.

"This is what I get for being a gentleman," Alex muttered, rubbing his jaw painfully. "I should have just enjoyed the free show."

I was tossing up between hitting him again or just storming off, when I noticed the redness to his cheeks, the way he had been glaring firmly down at the ground as we spoke.

The cocky jerk looked just as embarrassed me.

With a sigh of defeat, I chose the third option.

Alex sent me a resentful scowl as I sat beside him, his jaw clenching as he bit down his surprise.

"So go on, enlighten me," I demanded, resting my chin on my knees. "What is it about fighting over a stinking Hill that makes you so much nobler than us lesser folk?"

Alex obviously wasn't expecting the calm question, if his startled expression was anything to go by. Then the surprise was promptly covered up by another scowl as he glared at anything that wasn't me.

"It's simple, really. So long as I sit on that Stinking Hill, that means there's one less spot for idiots like you sit."

This guy.....Is such an ass.

"Well aren't you just a saint," I muttered sarcastically and was getting up to leave when his next words stopped me.

"There is very little I hate more than admitting to my damn brother that he was right about something."

He inhaled and blew out a cloud of smoke.

"And one of those things is letting idiots onto the Hill. God knows that we have more than enough idiocy to contend with since it is near impossible to get rid of Nigel Fleming without killing the fool."

He met my gaze, his mix-matched eyes suddenly intense. "And now, because of that damn Jack, I'm being forced to do two of the things I hate most."

My mouth was suddenly dry. It seemed like he was trying to tell me something important with the confession. Somehow, the seriousness in his eyes was far more intimidating than any of his previous glares.

"So what?" I muttered, breaking eye contact to glare at my knees. "Is this your high and mighty way of bestowing your approval upon my joining the Hill?"

Alex scoffing before I could even finish.

"Yeah right. Like I could ever approve of a self-centred Brat whose only goal in life is to suck up to her princess in distress. All I'm saying is that even you are better than the Jack we've got at the moment."

Strangely enough, the words actually hurt. I felt sharp words of reply clawing up my throat.

But what came out was not what either of us was expecting.

"You're wrong." I murmured quietly.

Alex blinked at me in surprise, but more words were coming out before I could even realise them for myself.

"If I was just doing this for his sake, I never would have started fighting in the first place. Putting myself in danger upsets him more than anything those bullies have ever done to him." I admit softy.

"Protecting what I care about is only half of the reason why I fight." My eyes narrowed as my chest twinges with guilt. "The other half is for the same reason I intend to kick your ass as soon as I'm done talking."

Alex nearly choked on his next inhale of smoke, but I wasn't finished yet. I tilted my chin up, catching his eyes haughtily as I concluded.

"Because what you are doing is wrong, and it pisses me off too much to let you get away with it."

I pointed at the cigarette meaningfully.

"So if you don't want to break the speed record for preventable death caused by smoking, I suggest you start going cold turkey."

For a long moment, Alex only stared at me in stunned silence.

Then, with a long-suffering sigh, he crushed the remains of his cigarette into the ground beside him.

"You will join the Hill, you know. Eventually " He informed me nonchalantly, looking up at me calmly. "You won't like it, I won't like it, your Vain will especially not like it, but still, it's pretty much unavoidable."

He stood, stretching to his impressive height.

"And here I was, dreading the day that I would have to meet you in person. After all that stressing about your fate, whether what we were doing was right or wrong, in the end, none of us ever really had any control over it in the first place."

He smirked down at me, the mocking eyebrow making a triumphant return before he started walking off.

"It turns out that you're just one of those people who can't escape trouble, Maddison Tramph. Not with that good heart of yours always leading you back into it."