Chapter Text
Mean Girls (2004) is a fantastic example of a timelessly relevant and thoughtful movie. This is because teenagers will never cease to be selfish, image-obsessed mongrels.
It isn't Hunter's favourite movie, but it's up there in the best human fiction he has yet to encounter. It so eloquently explains itself and its message: that reprehensible behaviour is appealing and attractive to people who want to belong to an in-group, and that nonconformity and kindness is a moral responsibility under such conditions.
Mean Girls (2004) is what came to mind when he stepped into the Plant Classroom to see the eviscerated remains of Patricia on the paved floor, an utterly distraught Willow clutching her broken leaves and heaving out pained sobs.
There was absolute calamity. The sounds of crying, arguing and Amity's shrill scream as she stepped into the room with him. The smell of wet soil hanging heavy in the air, and the acrid notes of tree sap.
Patricia was dead. Her whorled wood lay limp across the floor, her pot upturned entirely and spilling out across the cobbled floor, her leaves shredded and scattered.
In the four weeks that Willow had been nurturing Patricia, a sentient and terribly mischievous Whipping Willow, he'd tasted fatherhood and the bitterness had not pleased him, but by Titan, Willow loved that stupid plant which meant he loved that stupid plant.
Patricia would flick at his ears with her branchlets to irritate him purposefully, curling fondly around Willow with one branch as she laughed at his red face and indignation.
There was no doubt that Patricia was alive, and capable of thought. To find her knocked down and cut open is unthinkable.
Now, this classroom is practically a murder scene as far as he's concerned. Willow's cries sound like she's trying to evict her diaphragm, and it's making his ears hurt and his throat tight.
Luz's clearly preoccupied with her attempts at consoling Willow, murmuring softly and her arms wrapped right around her, and decides it's best to leave them be for a while.
“I'm so sorry, Lo. It's gonna be okay, oh pobrecito.”
The Plants teacher is talking to an animated Amelia, gesturing and glaring as she apparently regales him with details. Amity walks over to Patricia's corpse, searching around for things while he processes and thinks.
Willow makes a sound like a kicked dog, and Hunter has to get away, now. It's just too much to listen to. Luz has her, can take care of her well enough as his pulse hammers in his ears.
Grabbing Amity by the upper arm and dragging her away, so it's quiet enough to think, he collects himself quickly.
"Who would kill a tree?
“Hunter, you're hurting me.”
Hunter lets go of her arm like he's allergic, and runs his fingers through his hair enough times that his breathing isn't strained.
She's watching him like a hawk, and he'd think it would be distrust if he wasn't so used to and comforted by her cold pragmatism.
There's a machete, stained green with blood. Sap. Blood. Sap. Something. Amity holds it out by the spine to him. This is indeed a murder then. He can feel his pulse in his throat now, and a faint whining in his ears like hitting a wall is the only thing that can let it out before the pressure overboils.
"This needs to be reported to Bump. Immediately."
"You know who did it."
"Yes, and it's information to be shared with Principal Bump so that he can deal with it. Do not go and white knight your way into more problems, Hunter ."
She's mad. Incredibly so. She's red-faced and the stress-induced skin fold between her brows has appeared. Which means this incident is personally upsetting her, which means it was fucking Boscha back on her usual bullshit.
He turns around, boots scraping on the cobble paving, and flashes away until he can't hear Amity's yelling anymore.
---
"It was so funny when she like, walked in. Clueless like a blind bird. Waddled around in her stupid little costume.”
Boscha's new friend Rebeccan, with the horns and the permanent sneer, laughs with a cruel and sour note into her lunch. Hunter always thought she was somewhat brutish, cruel for the sake of it. The perfect accompaniment for Boscha's thoughtful and targeted maliciousness.
"Still can't believe she actually thought it was real. No pamphlets, no one else knew what she was talking about. She's so precious, honestly."
Margie has a grin of too many teeth and almost as many eyes, mandibles flickering slightly. If Hunter knew anything about Margie, he didn't remember now and he frankly didn't care. Her complete lack of self identity and independence made her even more susceptible to Boscha's grooming than Rebeccan.
“She asked me if the catering had arrived yet. Her fucking face when I said 'who?'"
Cackling loudly, Boscha slams a hand down on the table. A first year student flinches as they walk past, and Margie sneers as they scurry off.
If anyone had hoped that Boscha would smarten up, outgrew her childish preoccupations and realise the errors of her arrogance in the face of her failed and condemned leadership of Hexside, then they were wrong. They held too much faith in the power of forgiveness, people's ability to self reflect, and the idealism of Mean Girls (2004).
Those people had a name starting with L and ending with UZ.
Hunter grabs the nearest loose chair and drags it with him to the end of the table, uncaring for the squealing as it scrapes along the floor. When the noises reaches the table, Boscha turns. Whatever biting insult ready for an overconfident shmelt dies on her tongue when she sees Hunter inviting himself to the table without shame.
"Oh look, its the fascist."
He sits down slowly, almost lethargic and bored, and picks a handful of fries off Rebeccan's plate. Chewing slowly and loudly, staring at Boscha with a completely empty look, he ignores Rebeccan entirely despite her hiss of offence.
"Hey man, if you're hungry, I'll buy you something. Feeding the poor, right?"
Margie snorts, but she is very still as Hunter chews and stares down Boscha, hands on his knees. Boscha ignores it, gesturing vaguely at him and talking at her friends like he's barely there.
"This is the guy I was telling you about."
Hunter swipes some more fries off Rebeccan's plate, childishly. They're sort of limp and sad, but he knows that a show of confidence is just as strong as any force.
"You know, you and Bec have something in common. You both played grudgby. Yeah, Bec was inside center for St Epiderm Dragons for 3 years."
Hunter looks over at Rebeccan once, a short glance like it's a chore to even acknowledge her existence, and turns back to Boscha. She bristles even more at being ignored, her claws screeching as she gouges a line into the tabletop before she quickly composes herself.
"My sister says you played one game in the Emperor's Coven. What happened, dude. Couldn't make it?"
She smirks, a condescending little twist. People like Boscha are fantastic at faking pity and compassion to kick someone down, to raise themselves up by standing on someone else's confidence. She did it to Willow for almost ten years.
Boscha, for all her strengths, was an amateur in comparison to Belos. It slides off his back like water.
"They kicked me off.”
He speaks honestly. Lying serves nothing, insecurity is a weakness that Boscha will pry open endlessly.
"Hmm. What for?"
She doesn't really care, and everyone present can see that. Stalling the inevitability of violence is her only plan, buying time to think. Unsteady, thrown off her pedestal and scrambling for options.
“Being too violent."
Someone gasps, and a chittering hiss slips out between Margie's mandibles.
Hunter doesn't take his eyes off Boscha, even though Rebeccan is shifting in her seat as if she's about to lunge. Boscha's sister in the coven clearly didn't mention why he'd only played one game in training, and the reprimand he recieved for breaking another competitors collarbone. On purpose. He was 13.
Boscha looks bored, but her eyes betray the gravity of the situation. She's flicking her gaze all across his face, trying desperately to read his extremely practiced neutrality of expression.
"You're interrupting our lunch," she sniffs, scratching at her nose to hide her discomfort, but it's not working. She can't meet his stare anymore.
He shifts away, looking out across the table instead of focusing so intensely, while Rebeccan quietly extricates her claws from the tabletop.
"What kind of a woman are you, Boscha?"
Boscha stares at him, third eye creasing with a frown. She says nothing, gives nothing away, so he continues.
"Are you a stupid woman? A bitter woman?"
There's students lingering about the table, watching nervously. Margie's very black eyes, all eight of them, are trained directly on his face now. The palpable tang of violent promises hang in the air like a foul smell.
"Are you just an spoilt, cruel, and insecure rich girl hiding behind Mommy's trust fund?"
Boscha's swallows, hard, and her eye twitches slightly. She, very wisely, says nothing now that an audience has gathered, hisses and gasps echoing over them. He looks around the table briefly, purposefully, even if he doesn't need to lock eyes with anyone to read them.
"It's not rhetorical, Boscha. I want to know what kind of person likes intimidating girls stronger then they'll ever hope to be."
There's soft murmurs from the ever growing crowd of students. He ignores them, and focuses on Boscha entirely.
"A girl who is, by the way, beyond intimidation."
Stunned into silence - or cowardly holding her tongue - isn't a very good look for Boscha, but its much better than fumbling an already spiralling conversation. Everyone knows that if she fights Hunter, she will likely not win. Losing her temper would only be an embarrassment and a childish impulse.
"I think. That I can guess what kind of woman you are."
He can't help it but smile, really. Boscha gives herself away so easily, so confident and unafraid of the honesty of offending someone. So unafraid of coming across as downright cruel, as arrogant and strong. It makes her impossibly easy to tear apart, to read "for filth".
"You know people, Boscha. You know them very well."
"You knew I'd come after you when I saw what you did to Willow's plant. You knew I'd see you on the far end of the first table, next to the windows. One of the most obvious places in the cafeteria."
Panic is even more unflattering than silence, as all three of her eyes widen and her finger taps the table a few times before she slides it down under the table.
"You knew I would come in here, and cause a scene that would likely get me in trouble."
Rebeccan snarls something downright hateful, and Boscha's ears flush a sickly red. Someone ooos tentatively behind them. There's nothing but his pulse in his ears, sour anger at the bottom of his heart, and recklessness like he's never known. Biting at the bait never felt so gratifying and worth it.
"But you know what you don't know, Boscha?"
"Mmm. What's that?"
She blinks, leaning back from him almost unconsciously. Her boredom is fake, is a persona, is an attempt to cover her panicked floundering.
"What it feels like when I hit you. Because if you did, you would've never picked up that knife."
Boscha breathes in hard, resigned and sharp, and slowly pushes her lunch away.
"Okay."
Some of the crowd is backing away, wisely so. The tension is ratcheting up to unbearable levels, and Rebeccan's scowl is a promise of violence few could face.
"Now let me tell you something about Willow, Golden Guard."
She leans closer, as if to whisper. Every hair along the length of his back sticks up and screams at him, a whistle along the length of his spine and straight into the back of his head.
"That half-a-witch-"
The backhand sends her tumbling off the bench and onto the floor, a crack that bounces off every surface until it rings out across the entire room like a whip.
Rebeccan rushes him, a clawed hand reaching for his face. He picks up Boscha's lunch tray, upending the food on it, and holds it up to his face. Instead of goring his scar open again, her claws deflect with a horrid screech of metal and a flickering of sparks.
Kicking out at Margie, he gets the leverage to move away from the table and stand. There's screaming from the audience, students scrambling to get clear as he smashes the tray into Rebeccan's face.
Witches, somewhere along their biological development, probably thousands of years ago, traded physical abilities for magic. Their bile sac grew, while their heart atrophied. Their strength and endurance dropping for the benefits of magic.
A Grimwalker of a human doesnt have such restraints. His cardiovascular system is in peak physical condition, his scars mostly healed and his health better than ever.
He slams his elbow one, two, three, four times into the side of Margie's head until she slumps onto the table. While Boscha's trying to stumble to her feet, he kicks a chair at her face, hears the wet crunch of her nose like eggshell and the violent screech of pain.
Catching Rebeccan's head-down charge hurts, but she doesn't push him more than a foot away before he throws her aside into a trash can, which promptly starts chewing at her arm with voracious abandon.
"Stop this at once!" a teacher bellows, even as Hunter picks up a glass and smashes it over Margie's head, knocking her back down with a hard smack.
"Stop! Immediately! Stop it!"
There's a threatening ring, and when Hunter turns, theres a very nasty looking steak knife in Boscha's hand, blood dribbling out of her nose and down her chin, her third eye bruised and watering.
His hands lift in a defensive position, his breathing in and out as smooth as a kata, as smooth as four-fur. Margie makes a pained and broken sound, from somewhere on the floor.
"You fucking dick," Boscha spits, but it comes out more like a gurgle. She's swaying on her feet, eyes half focused, gasping for air. Either she is fighting hypoxemia symptoms, or she is very concussed. Either of them make a knife wielder much more dangerous.
"Put the knife down. Put it down."
Professor Hermonculus has a spell circle half drawn, watching them both with a shrewd scowl on his face.
“Boscha. Put it down. Please"
Amity's here now, wheezing as though she ran from the Plant Classroom to here, shaking on her feet with the same weakness as the tattered leaves of a dead Whipping Willow. She probably did run, and it probably feels like dying for her.
Boscha turns to her, her face crumbles into a sneer, and she throws it to the floor as more teachers rush in, pushing back the crowd of students.
There's an Abomination swirling around Boscha, a firm grip on her shoulders and arms, sliding forward until she stumbles, her feet slipping on the cobbled floor as it drags her out of the cafeteria.
“Hunter.”
“Hieronymus.”
In a defiance of physics, Bump's frown becomes even more severe. Suitably shamed for his cheek, he resigns himself to being dragged all the way to his office, staring at the blood-drop trail from Boscha's face.