A/N: Hey everyone, back again with another chapter of The Devil of Barden. I hope you guys like it, and I'm sorry it took so long. Real life has a way of interrupting my writing schedule at the worst possible times. And there's also some blame to toss at Zap for this one, which is why he wrote his own note here.

Zap's Note: This delay is on me. My sleep schedule's gotten all messed up and a friend was going to drop off her laptop for me to fix yesterday, and I just got too tired to do the beta. Then this morning bed was comfortable so I lounged there longer than I should have, and I also had Star Trek Online things that took priority. Hope you enjoy it, no clue what will come next, but I've got a question. Anyone seen Pushing Daises?

A/N: So, yeah, that was his thing. I don't have much else to say except thank you ever for your continued support of this and my other stories. Hearing that you guys enjoy what I'm (or we in some cases) are doing makes it much more enjoyable to continue doing it. So if you like it, if you don't like it, if you have questions, leave a comment and I'll do my best to get back to you on them. Thanks everyone, and enjoy the latest chapter!

The Devil of Barden - Chapter 4

The quiet shutting of the massive, oak front doors sound deafeningly loud in the thunderous silent that filled the large hall. Dozens of rows of wooden pews stretched forward towards the raised dais at the end of the room. Hanging there, above the raised stands that currently stood empty of their choir was a large carving that Beca had a feeling was set in a way to gaze disapprovingly over the empty church.

After the reverberations of the massive doors closing quieted down, Beca continued to stand near the entrance and just take in the feeling of the stillness around her. There were very few places in which Beca, with her extremely heightened senses could stand and find a moment of peace, but she had usually found such solace in older Catholic churches such as this one. And Beca could use a bit of solace right then, and perhaps a little guidance.

It had been over a week since her little tryst with Stacie in the shower had ended up many hours later with the two of them falling in exhaustion to her sheet covered bed. A few hours of sleep had followed before Beca had been awoken by Stacie turning over in the bed. Just shy of two hours later Stacie had left Beca's room to go change and get her own shower supplies. The tall brunette's words had fairly succinctly summed up the situation as she'd said, "That was fun. Maybe we should do it again sometime…"

Beca hadn't answered. She'd simply lain on the bed and contemplated the past, the present, and the future. She'd spent a lot of time contemplating over the few days that had followed. Stacie had shown up later that afternoon right as Jesse and Benji had knocked on her door. The two boys were delighted to see them both and insisted that the pizza they'd missed yesterday had been the best ever. So after a little cajoling, the two girls had agreed to go for pizza. Taking her queue from Stacie's behavior Beca and the brunette had gone back to acting like they had the day before, friendly and a little flirty.

But Beca had noticed something else that hadn't been there the day before. Stacie seemed much calmer in the presence of the two boys. If Beca was one to lie to herself she'd have told her that she'd hoped that would be the outcome of their little tryst, giving Stacie back some of the confidence she had only projected during the day. But Beca wouldn't lie and say that that had been her primary reason.

Still, it was good to know that the taller girl was recovering from whatever ordeal she'd gone through. Beca wished she could have said the same thing for herself. While it wasn't Beca who'd been accosted by those frat boys at the Activities Fair, she had heard, had felt what Stacie had been going through. She also had a bad feeling about the situation.

Which was how she had found herself the following night dressing in black clothes and slipping from her dorm to slink across the campus. Most people, she had realized over the years, were more blind in the dark than Beca had been just after the accident. Still, it was useful though, for when she had been sneaking across the crowded campus towards what she hoped was the frat house of Sigma Beta Theta.

Finding the frat house had been easy enough, it seemed like there was a party going on there every night basically. At least that's the impression Beca had gotten as she had watched the place fairly solidly for the next few nights. It wasn't until the Tuesday before classes had started that Beca had noticed something that stood out to her.

She'd overheard a conversation between two SBT members, Howie and someone else she hadn't known, about getting more supplies. Howie had said cryptically that they were "running low" and would need more product if they were to "keep up with the demand". The other guy, the one she hadn't heard before or since, had said that there were some problems with the supply, something or someone kept catching their couriers and beating them up, but that a big shipment had just gotten through, so they'd have more product soon.

Beca had been about to move, to go and have a little chat with the two, but she'd heard them start walking away, back towards the party. At the same time, she was having a serious internal war about how to approach the matter. On the one hand the lawyer-to-be in her wanted her to take it to the legal system. And if campus security was turning a blind eye to it all as it seemed then she'd have to go above them to Vestal PD. The other part of her, the part which had become more dominant since she'd met Stacie, wanted her to rush over and beat the information out of Howie and his friend.

That internal debate was how she had found herself where she was. Her superhumanly acute hearing taking in all the noises of the large Catholic church just off the campus of Barden. Despite many of the things she did, especially those with whom she sought comfort and release, Beca still considered herself a devout Catholic. Up until the time she'd left Hell's Kitchen she had attended mass fairly regularly, and her priest had even told her, when she'd mentioned moving to Binghamton with her father, that a good friend of his was the bishop at the local church closest to Barden.

As she started walking up the aisle, her cane tapping along the floor, she heard soft voices coming from the confessional booth, if what she was hearing was any indication. Knowing that it could be sometime before the person in there was finished, Beca found a seat for herself about halfway up.

Sitting on the pew, she quietly folded her cane up and laid it beside her before taking a deep breath and turning towards the front of the room. She couldn't see the large carving hanging there, but she didn't need her gifts to tell her that it was. This was a Catholic church, after all. For a moment she considered trying to say some half-remembered prayer, to ask her questions of the man who hung before her. But she had found that wasn't always the answer to her problems. And she was fairly certain it wouldn't be the answer to this one.

Instead she closed her eyes, more out of habit than anything else, and began to meditate. As she did, her thoughts drifted back to the times she'd spent in churches just like this one in Hell's Kitchen. Some of them were good memories, others were more difficult. The hardest ones were the ones that held her mother.

In a delicious twist of irony, Beca at least had to give Him some credit for enjoying a funny joke, her thoughts were still embroiled in past recollections of her mom when she heard the door to the confessional open and the girl who had been in there stepped out. She didn't seem to notice Beca as she moved to the front of the large room and started to do whatever penance the priest had proscribed. Beca stood and unfolded her cane, making her way relatively quietly towards the now half empty confessional.

It was a fairly short walk, and Beca still wasn't sure what she was going to say, how she was going to get the help she needed, when she finally opened her side of the wooden chamber. Well, jumping into things headfirst without a plan had always been one of her strongest traits, so she decided to do just that. Taking a seat on the bench, she folded up the cane once more as she heard the little door covering the screen between the two sides of the confessional slide open. Opening her mouth she jumped right in to what was on her mind.

"Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It's been, uh…" Beca paused, unsure exactly how long it had been since she'd given a confession. One of the things she knew, though, is that lying while sitting in this chair was one of the stupidest things you could do. While there may be judgment in the extreme everywhere else, while inside the confessional there was only forgiveness and guidance. Running her left thumb nervously over her right she started up again, "It's been too long since my last confession. My mom and I, we used to go to this church back in New York when I was a kid. She was a fighter. Old school. A boxer. She lost more than she won. Had a 24-31 record before she, uh…"

Just thinking about her mom brought a smile to Beca's lips, albeit a sad one. The sadness overcame her for a moment as she thought about how that sentence ended and she couldn't go on. She wasn't sure why she was going this far back for just a confession. But something about it felt right. Through the screen she could hear the priest sitting quietly, shifting ever so slightly as she gathered her thoughts and came back from the sad memories. Inhaling deeply she went on, "But she could take a punch. Jesus she could take a punch."

"Language." The old priest said and she couldn't help a slight wince. Memories of Catholic discipline bloomed in her mind before she dismissed it with a nod of her head.

"Sorry, Father." Picking up the thread of her story took a second, but since so much of it was ingrained in her memory it wasn't hard to find her way back. After a moment's pause she went on, "Yeah, some of the people she went up against said it was like hitting oak. And on nights when she was outmatched, her strategy was to just let 'em hit her until they broke their hands."

She wasn't sure why she found that to be so amusing, but she found herself chuckling at the thought. Maybe it was more at the memories of seeing her mom come home to their dilapidated apartment and being able to see, then later smell, the blood on her. But her mom was almost always smiling, despite how much pain she must have been in.

"She never got knocked out, my mom. Well, knocked down, sure. But she, uh, she always got back up. She was always on her feet when she lost." Beca paused for a second, because she realized now why this story had been on the tip of her tongue. She had a feeling she could see now where her subconscious was taking her. With a slight smirk she said, "Every now and then, though, uh…"

Even knowing why she was telling the story Beca had to pause. To think carefully about how to phrase it. After a second she said, "Every now and then she'd get hit and… Something inside her would snap. My grandmother, she was the real Catholic. Fear of God ran deep. You'd have liked her. She used to say, 'Be careful of the Murdock boys. They got the Devil in 'em."

Beca couldn't help but chuckle again slightly. She hadn't thought of her grandma in years. It was surprising how quickly her thoughts went there now that she was back in a place that so reminded her of the old woman. Knowing she had a point to make, and other business to attend to that night, she picked up the thread of her story again, "Well, my mom wasn't a Murdock boy, but she was still a Murdock, and you'd see it sometimes… In the ring. Her eyes would just go dead and she'd start walking forward real slow… Hands at her sides, like she wasn't afraid of anything. And whoever she was fighting, they'd see that look, and try to get away from her."

"Nah. Mom would, she'd catch 'em and… tr-trap 'em in the corner. Let the devil out. Yeah…" Beca said quietly, pausing to swallow. It was weird, being back in a confessional. She didn't normally spend so much time talking, let alone talking about herself. But in here, well, that was kind of what you did. Except she wasn't, really, she wasn't exactly looking for forgiveness for something she'd done… Inhaling against she started to speak again, "Now, I didn't understand it, you know? What she was feeling deep inside, I didn't understand it… Not back then."

"But you understand it now?" The priest's voice was quiet and powerful. A man who was used to giving advice and having it listened to. Beca wondered briefly how long he had tended to this particular flock, but dismissed the notion. She knew she was nearly finished, and it would soon be time to do what had to be done. The priest, in typical fashion, said the thing that Beca had known would come from the moment she stepped into the booth, "Perhaps this would be easier if you tell me what you've done."

With an amused smile on her face that she knew he could see, Beca reached down to her lap and took up her red-tinted glasses and slowly put them on. After another deep breath and a moment of quiet thought she said, "I'm not seeking penance for what I've done, Father. I'm asking forgiveness for what I'm about to do."

"That's not how this works." The priest said, shock in his voice. Beca heard him turn in the booth beside her. She could almost feel his gaze on her through the screen as he asked, "What exactly are you going to do?"

"I may not be a Murdock boy, either. But I'm also still a Murdock." Beca said with finality before standing up. Taking her cane in her hand she quickly opened the door to the confessional and made her way towards the exit. Behind her she heard the door to the priest's side open up and heard him step out. He didn't call after her, but she knew that he watched her all the way to the exit of the large church.

The grand double doors leading into the Sigma Beta Theta house slammed open hard enough to rebound off the walls forcefully, but the figure who strode through them did so with such speed that they were slamming shut well clear of her. Her blond hair was almost streaming behind her in the wind as she stalked into the halls of Barden's most prestigious fraternity with fury etched onto her face. One advantage of the frat being the most popular on campus, Aubrey noted as she heard someone bounding down the stairs, was that it wasn't hard to find someone when she needed to. Thankfully instead of an intermediary, the boy she was looking for came down the curving stairs leading to the upper levels.

"Aubrey, always a pleasure to see you." The man, Howie, said as he stepped off the bottom step and moved towards the blond girl. He opened his arms up, no doubt expecting a hug, but instead she punched him in the side, hard. Grunting and gasping for breath he took a step back, clutching his side.

"Asshole! I told you to leave my girls alone!" Aubrey said, silent fury seething through her tone. The blond didn't follow Howie as he stepped back again and leaned on the railing of the stairs. She simply glared at him and hoped that that would be enough to drive her point home. Straightening up, Howie smirked at her, though it was ruined as he winced before getting to his full height.

"Awww, come on now Bree, don't be like that. I know for a fact that no one has bothered you or Chloe from my house. If I'm wrong, tell me who it was and I'll take care of it." The tall brown haired boy said, his eyes drifting over Aubrey as he spoke. The blond had to take a moment and mentally count down from ten to avoid punching him again and it nearly didn't work. Taking a deep breath instead she told herself not to make a scene as surely he wasn't the only SBT in the house.

"Not Chloe or I, Howie. Stacie…" Aubrey said when she had composed herself enough. She should have known that it wouldn't have been enough information for him. At least his facial expression told her that he was even more clueless than normal. Rolling her eyes she added, "You know, tall brunette you guys were hassling at the Activities Fair?"

"Oh, the one with the nice tits. Yeah, she's a hottie for sure. But wait, she can't be a Bella. She's only a freshmen and auditions aren't until next week." Howie said, a dreamy smile filling his face as he obviously remembered Stacie, or at least her tits. Aubrey gritted her teeth and turned to take a few steps away before she lost control. Choosing instead to lean against the small table in the entryway she turned back to see him still lost in thoughts of the tall brunette freshman.

"She may not be official, Howie, but if she can carry a tune in a U-Haul truck she'll be a Bella if I have anything to say about it. Which, oh yeah, I do. I saw some of your idiot frat brothers pestering her outside the English building yesterday. She was not amused by their antics…" Aubrey said, her mind drifting back to the scene of an extremely nervous looking Stacie surrounded by three SBT logo wearing boys who were all standing far too close if anyone asked the blond.

She had been about to go over and rescue Stacie like she'd tried to do at the Fair, but the short, blind girl had emerged from the building and called Stacie over before Aubrey could make her way to her. The guys had drifted off, looking disappointed, but Stacie had seemed immensely relieved to be away from them, if the hug she gave the short girl was anything to judge by.

Aubrey had had to work real hard to ignore the jealousy she felt at the sight.

"Well damn, if she's going to be a Bella, then I can't wait to see your guys' performance here. You still planning to be here for the party on the 19th, right?" The taller boy asked as he moved away from the stairs towards Aubrey. The blond was too caught up in her memory of the scene outside the English building to notice until he was almost to her.

"Huh? Oh, yeah. We'll be here. Everyone knows that SBT throws the best parties on campus…" Aubrey said, taking a small step back. She glanced at her watch briefly as she did, realizing that she had to get back to her apartment soon or Chloe would worry about it. Before she could say anything, Howie's hand closed over her wrist and her eyes snapped up to his.

"Awww, come on Bree, don't be like that. Why don't you come inside and hang out for a bit. It would be like old times when the Bellas were here all the time under Alice. I promise, I'll be a real gentleman even." The smug look on his face as spoke, leaning in to try and kiss her, was enough to snap her fragile restraint.

Before Howie had even barely started to lean in towards her she whipped her leg out, impacting it solidly against the inside of his thigh. As expected it dropped the taller boy to his knees. Even as he was dropping she was twisting her wrist down and around, turning it so that she had a firm grip on his hand which was wrenched at a most painful angle as he dropped. Using the arm as leverage, she spun around and got a hand against his neck, pressing it into the table she'd been standing behind.

In less than a heartbeat it was done. Howie was gasping in pain, his face pressed firmly against the lacquered wood of the table, as his hand was about a degree from being broken by Aubrey's hold on it. Leaning in close she hissed at him, "I know you had an 'arrangement' with Alice, but I'm telling you now that won't fly with me. You keep your hands off me, and off of my Bellas, or next time I won't hold back."

Releasing his neck and wrist Aubrey stepped back, not even breathing hard as Howie collapsed to his knees. Rubbing his wrist, he groaned in pain for a second before turning to glare up at her. Hate was replacing the usual lust she saw in his eyes as he looked up at her, she only smiled at him. Using his uninjured hand he leveraged himself to his feet as he said menacingly, "Oh yeah? What are you gonna do, bitch? I could…"

"You could, what? Tell everyone that a five-foot nothing girl just took your ass down? And don't think it was a fluke, either. Leave the Bellas alone… But don't worry, we won't cancel our performance here, an SBT party is still the place to be." Aubrey said, flashing a confident grin at him before turning on her heel and leaving the frat house.

Aubrey fumed the entire way from the SBT house to her and Chloe's apartment. She didn't know what she was more pissed off about, though, whether at Howie for being a complete ass, the reason she'd gone there in the first place, or what she'd just done. She only hoped that the threat of having to admit that a Barden Bella took him down and almost broke his wrist would be enough to keep Howie from saying anything. She was supposed to be keeping a low profile here. Just do her four years, then off to the Air Force.

Of course, Aubrey had known for many years that being angry got you in trouble, made you make mistakes. She realized hers as soon as she walked into the apartment she shared with Chloe. Her best friend in the whole world came bounding out of the kitchen, cell phone clutched in her hand, and panic in her eyes that was fading to relief.

But turned immediately to concern the moment she saw Aubrey's face, and the raw emotion painted on it.

"Oh my god, Bree! Are you ok? I was so worried. You were supposed to be home, like, an hour ago… Why are you so upset? Did something happen? Were you attacked or something? Oh my god, do I need to call the cops?!" Chloe's words tumbled out in a mangled rush of crammed together syllables, but Aubrey had had four years of piecing together excited-Chloe-speech and was able to decipher it fairly quickly.

"What? No, no, calm down Chlo'. I'm fine. I'm perfectly fine. I, uh, had to run an errand on the way home. Sorry I didn't text." The blond said, quickly forestalling the phone call that Chloe was already starting to make by grabbing the redhead's phone. After she took the device and set it on one of the end tables nearby Chloe stepped forward and gave her a hug. She wasn't really sure why, but with Chloe there rarely needed to be a reason.

"Oh thank god. I was freaking out a little… Uh, what'd you have to do that was so urgent? Bellas stuff?" Chloe asked after giving her another squeeze and then stepping back to only arm-holding distance. The innocent, curious expression on her friend's face froze her brain as she tried to come up with an excuse for why she was late. After a second she realized that she'd walked herself into a corner and would have to tell at least a bit of the truth.

"Oh it was nothing. Yes, Bellas related. I just had to swing by SBT to make sure we're still on for their party in a couple weeks." Aubrey said, waving her hand dismissively as though it wasn't a big deal. She was hoping that Chloe would forget the conversation and not mention it to anyone, especially Howie.

"Ooooh. You run into Howie? You know, I think he's got a thing for you, Bree. You should live a little and let him take you out or something." Chloe said, flipping her hair over her shoulder as she turned to follow Aubrey into the kitchen. Thankfully, with the redhead behind her, she didn't have to worry about hiding the disgusted look on her face.

"Gross, Chlo'. Howie is so not my type. Besides, we've talked about this. I'm not here at Barden for random hookups. School is my focus, and we're almost done. Come on, let's get some dinner made then we can go over our plans for the new Bellas…" She hoped Chloe didn't notice the evasion, hoped that the prospect of Bellas talk overrode any conversation about her love life that the redhead might have had in mind. She really didn't feel like going into how Howie, or anyone guy for that matter, were really not her type at all. Thankfully the distraction of talking about the Bellas seemed to work, though, as the other girl started yammering away about what they'd need to fill their sound out, how many girls they wanted to bring on, how many of each type. It was enough to help distract Aubrey from her earlier encounter, which she was thankful for, and it was something that they needed to work on. So two birds, one conversation.

Like a comfortable blanket night had once again settled over Barden University and wrapped the school in its dark embrace. But despite the night's best attempts to keep everyone cozy and warm inside their dorms, the school still bustled. Whether it was because it was still early in the term and the weather was still relatively warm out, or simply because it seemed that there was always one party or another going on around campus it was hard to tell. However the simple fact remained that just because it was night it did not mean that the campus was quiet. Quieter, for sure, as it didn't take Beca's enhanced senses to know that it got a bit quieter at night. But there were still folks out and about.

But the nice thing about the night, as far as Beca was concerned, was that most people paid far less attention to things that were a little outside the ordinary. Like a blind freshman dashing along the rooftops of the dorms and leaping the gaps between buildings.

She hadn't really had much of a plan, despite having been studying the things that happened at night for over a week now. Dressed from head to toe in black with her hood pulled up over her head as much as possible, Beca still felt awfully exposed. But she didn't have much choice, she had a reason for being out tonight. It was Friday night, the main party night of the week as it gave a full weekend to recover, and there was a party she really wanted to crash.

Well, maybe not crash per se, but disrupt at least a little bit.

The day after she and Stacie had tested out the acoustics in the showers, Beca's extremely heightened hearing had picked up a plan being formed. She hadn't known the voices at the time, but they had spoken about a party this Friday and "needing willing participants". It hadn't taken a genius to figure out how they got those willing participants after hearing Stacie's ordeal. And that was something that Beca couldn't tolerate. So she had found the best things she could for sneaking about, and was now sneaking about.

As she lingered on a rooftop near the quad, Beca cocked her head to the side, all her attention focused on listening. From this vantage point she was able to hear just about everything that went on across the campus, and it took some effort of will for her inner musician to not cringe at some of the really bad music that was playing. But punishing people's taste in music wasn't why she was here. She wasn't sure, actually, what she was listening for, but she was hoping that it would become apparent soon enough.

When she finally did hear it, the voice she knew she'd recognize, it was a lot closer than she had expected. From what she'd been able to deduce of the campus layout, she was currently perched atop one of the freshmen and sophomore dorm buildings. Something she had planned ahead of time knowing that that was likely where the voices she'd heard would be looking for said participants. But it still surprised her to hear the guy's voice who had said those words, with the special inflection on the word "willing", from near the entrance of the building below her. As soon as she heard it, however, she knew she'd found the right place, because a gentle gust of wind brought along something else aside from his voice.

The smell of chloroform.

It was faint, which means that the voices telling the girls about the "great party" they were off to were still in the process of luring the two girls out away from the dorm. Based on what she'd picked up from Stacie, the taller girl had been reluctant to speak on the matter, Beca figured that they would take them at least a little distance away from the well-lit dorms before the two men following the first pair made their move.

Listening briefly Beca determined what would be the best way down towards where the trailing thugs were at, the pair with the chloroform soaked rags, and with some creative jumping and drops made it to the ground floor just as the pair bringing up the rear were moving past where she was. Smiling to herself because she didn't think she could have planned it all better, Beca made her move.

Springing into action she quickly ran at the pair of boys who had just stepped into the shadows of the building. Her footsteps were muffled by the soft grass, a fact she was thankful for, and she knew that with their attention on their friends watching for the signal to move forward the pair wouldn't hear her approach over the sounds emanating from the dorm behind her.

She was only feet from the trailers when one of them must have heard her, because he was just starting to turn as she leapt in, straight at him. Her heavy booted foot slammed into the side of his face as she spun, hitting the ground quietly even as his body crumpled to the ground beside her. His friend stared in blank shock as the body bounced once, limbs falling akimbo. Beca was moving before he had even really taken her in.

From where she had landed, crouched on outstretched hands and knees, she skirted sideways towards him, her right leg darting out to impact his left knee. Beca did hear the telltale sounds of bone breaking and was unsure of whether to be happy or sad about that. She didn't take time to dwell on it, however, as the second of the two trailing men started falling to the ground.

Before he'd even settled, his body was still bouncing up after the initial impact, which had driven the wind from his lungs in a gasping rush, Beca was already climbing on top of him. A couple quick, hard strikes soon had him as unconscious as his partner in crime. That just left the two up front.

Apparently, however, her little scuffle with the pair intending to ambush the unsuspecting girls hadn't gone unnoticed. She could hear the girls confused questions about what was going on. Meanwhile it seemed that the pair upfront weren't entirely unprepared for interference. They had backed off a little from the girls, who were obviously confused by what was going on, and seemed hesitant to move at all.

Standing up straight, and wishing not for the first time that she was just a little bit taller, Beca turned to face the two men. Though boys might be more accurate as men didn't abduct women in the night, but that was a debate for the philosophy class she was making a point of skipping and not one she should really worry about at the moment. Turning to face the two confused girls she tried to make her voice as husky and deep as she could manage as she said, "Get out of here. You don't want any part of the 'party' these thugs were taking you to."

One of the pair still seemed a little unsure, but the second girl had finally noticed something Beca had detected almost as soon as the guys had started to back away from them. A drawn knife from underneath his jacket. She could still smell the oil he used to polish the blade wafting through the warm, night air. The girl who had seen it, probably by the glint of light from the nearby buildings, screamed and grabbed her friend's arm, dragging her off. They would no doubt head for campus security, but Beca didn't have much faith in them showing up to help anytime soon.

"So… You must be the bitch that attacked some of our other guys a couple nights ago. Description doesn't really fit, but it doesn't matter. You'll learn soon enough to leave us alone… We need some new entertainment for the night, since you scared off those other two, and I think you'll do just fine, once we get you back and get you into the right state of mind at least." The obvious leader, the one wielding the knife, said coldly. It was the same voice she'd recognized from earlier, the one from the other day. Cracking her knuckles, Beca smiled from under her hood even though she knew he wouldn't be able to see it in this light. She was going to enjoy this, she thought.

Without any preamble Beca charged at the pair, feinting first towards the man with the knife before quickly reversing her course and leaping towards the other. His first punch she dodged easily which put her into a good position for the follow-up she'd known was coming. Grabbing his wrist, she pulled him, using his own momentum against him, and slammed her knee up into his chest. Even as he was gasping, trying to catch his breath, she whirled and, using his arm for leverage, propelled him at the second man who had been coming up behind her.

The pair collided about five feet away, and Beca leapt into action. The first man, the unarmed one, was still trying to catch his breath, which gave her a chance to try and take the knifeman out of the picture. He was faster than his friends had been, however, and she barely managed to dodge the blade as it shot through the night, ripping at the air as it went. A second slash she dodged, followed by a third, trying to find an opening in his all-out attack to get inside his reach and somehow wrench the blade from his grasp. She finally got the chance as he wheeled back for a fourth strike, she could tell that the third, a powerful downward blow towards her head, had unbalanced him slightly, so she moved to capitalize on it.

It wasn't until she was moving in for her own counterattack that she realized something was wrong. His balance, which had previously been precariously set, suddenly changed and she heard the movement of his arm as it started to move. The man's feint had been well executed, but Beca was still quick as lightning. Twisting herself she tried to drop lower, hoping to avoid the knife blade whose polishing oil she could smell, but the sudden stinging streak along her left arm told her that she hadn't completely avoided the blow. Still, it didn't feel too deep, and that attack actually had left him off balance.

Quickly striking out, Beca snapped a kick at the man's knee, which staggered him enough for her to lash out with her right hand. Her aim, though not as precise as she'd have liked, was still good enough to hit a nerve on his arm. She knew, thanks to years of training, that his right hand had just gone completely numb, and the quiet sounds of the knife falling to thud into the damp grass confirmed it. Now suddenly disarmed, the boy backed up, yelling at his friend for help.

Seemingly mostly recovered from her blow that cracked his ribs, the other boy stepped up to join his friend. Before the pair had a chance to try and coordinate, to come at her together, Beca choose to act. Moving quickly towards the leader she threw a series of quick punches, more as a distraction than an attempt to do serious damage. Thankfully, due in no small part she figured to the man's still numb right hand, a few of the blows landed. But they were basically just a bonus, because her real target had finally come close enough.

Lashing out backwards with her leg, she caught the other boy, who had charged in to help, directly in his chest. She heard the already bruised ribs crack under the force of her combat-booted foot's impact and heard his breath rush out in a yelp of pain. Spinning quickly she followed the hard kick with two faster, targeted strikes, one to his left leg and the other to where she knew his head would be after the first blow landed. A solid impact against the side of the boy's head was her reward, and she heard his body drop to the ground in a motionless heap. He was still breathing, which was good, but he would be wishing that he had the worst hangover of his life when he woke up because it would be a treat in comparison.

That just left the "leader" of the little group. Turning to face him, she smiled again at the fact that he hadn't really moved from his previous position. Granted her takedown of his final accomplice had only taken a few seconds, but she was still a little surprised. She realized, quickly, that it had finally dawned on him that he was now alone with her. Looking quickly left and right, he did what she expected him to do. He turned and ran.

Bullies almost always run when confronted and outmatched.

A sharp pain in her own left arm stopped her from chasing after the final thug. She knew she needed to take care of it sooner rather than later, and she'd gotten her point across, she hoped. If nothing else, she'd saved the two girls from having to go through Stacie's fate, or more likely much worse.

All in all, Beca mused as she turned to head back towards her dorm, it was a pretty good night.