WARNING:

All characters and the story upon this fanfiction is based are property of Dontnod Entertainment and Square Enix. I don't own anything.

Please note, that this is merely my take on the story and it will progress as the game did with a possible alternate ending (*roar* Pricefield for the win!).

Characters might be OOC at times (Max will definetly be OOC, as I wanted to put her character through similar situations as Chloe was during the 5 years they were appart and wanted her character to be different).

Chapters will contain up to four sub-sections as to make it easier to read (at least I hope it does... .).

As this is my first story to be published here, I will be happy about every reviews - both good and bad as only so I can know what I have to improve. :)

Rated M for crude and strong language at times, violence and mature content in later chapters.

NB! This is also a small and most probably unworthy tribute to the author of the Life is Strange fanfiction 'Black Swan' which absolutely stole my heart, as well as to other authors who inspired this particular story.

-Return to the roots-

It was strange to return to her old hometown. A place she had spent happier days in. A place where she had had friends. Friends she had abandoned when her parents moved to Seattle and took her with them. Hell… She had even abandoned her 'best friend forever' at a moment when this particular friend had needed her the most. Unintentionally the young teenage woman looked out of the window of the bus as if by any chance the strawberry blonde girl she remembered could be seen somewhere walking along the street as if nothing had changed. Well, like life would be so easy and let things happen for good and not for worse. Nothing stays unchanged. She knew that. She was a good example for it too. The young woman with brown and red short cut hair still reminisced about her friend from five years ago and her own fate, when the bus came to a halt at the Blackwell Academy and the driver signalled for all who wished to get out at the bus stop to do so.

The last five years had changed much in the life of Maxine 'Max' Caulfield, and not always for the better. The death of her mother from a suddenly aggressively expanding lung cancer three years prior had changed a lot for Max. Although it was always her father who would be the cheery oddball of the family and indulge in any possible hobby Max had set her eyes on, to make her life in Seattle as enjoyable as humanly possible, Vanessa's death left Ryan utterly devastated. At first Max had been just in shock and denial shutting her off from the outside world. She lost her interest in most of her hobbies somewhere along the way. Nothing seemed to give colour to her life anymore regardless of how hard her father tried to provide the love and comfort she should have received from both her parents. Later however the initial shock and denial subsided to give room to anger and sorrow. Yeah, she had been angry. At the world for taking her mother from her, at the others in her school for not caring at least a little bit and being totally oblivious to the anguish she felt, at her father for not being able to provide the love she needed to receive from her mother, at herself for being weak and pitiful. She didn't deny it – those were all childish, irrational and downright stupid accusations, especially at her father. But she just could not bring herself to 'forgive and forget'. She had no right to and at the same time it was the only thing that reminded her that her mother had existed. That a happier time had existed. Maybe this was the punishment the world had decreed for her for abandoning her best friend, when she had needed her the most and was in a similar situation? A grieving friend she had abandoned and not once contacted in two years before her mothers' death and not even once afterwards... Who knows? She certainly didn't. She did not care. She was still angry – at everybody and everything. She had attended classes and had done fairly well despite the traumatic experience, but after running away from home (twice) only to be brought back by the police did not really help to maintain a good image in school. When the bullying began, the shy girl had at first changed schools, but after it started again in the fourth school she had transferred to in less than a year Max decided to turn things around.

'If you want to fight – fine! Let's fight! Bring it on, bitch!' were her exact thoughts during that time of her life. With nothing really to lose and no real motivation to do anything else, she turned to her father and asked for permission to take up Muay Thai. Ryan, who was at this point desperate to somehow get his little girl to see something positive in her life again, complied with an enthusiasm he had not felt for nearly a year since the death of his wife. Only later would he be informed that his daughter used the gathered knowledge to shut up any rumours or bullies… violently most of the times, as although she was short, over two years of training and hard workouts she had become quite ripped.

Over the course of those two years it became also clearly evident that the once shy, dorky girl was no more. In her stead stood a 'give-me-shit-and-I-will-break-you'-face-wearing, grim and bitter young woman that did not give a damn about school, rules or whatever. Somewhere along the road to this 'not-even-final-form' the happy, young girl with a tendency to fancy indie music and hipster-style clothes, had morphed into something else. The brown hair had been cut short, on one side to a pixie haircut and on the other – painted blood red. A black nose piercing and a silver tongue-piercing had also become somewhat of her trademarks. She had a tattoo on her left hand she had designed herself – a blue butterfly, as well as another on her neck. After playing the hell out of GTA V she just had to have the 'cut-here'-tattoo that Trevor had. It held also another meaning for her, for different reasons though. The hipster-style had been dropped and instead Max now sported dark jeans, various shirts with the logos of her favourite bands, a black leather jacket and matching boots.

Despite this, or maybe because of this the last year she had spent at her last school in Seattle had not sucked as much, as it might have, as she found two likeminded friends there – Kristen and Fernando, who themselves had been something like the outcasts of their class. When Max had told them that she could play the guitar (electric and acoustic) they had insisted of joining their one-girl-one-boy band, and although Max had been reluctant at first, she had joined them and actually enjoyed both the company and the additional possibility to vent her anger. Stoner-rock had its perks. However those happy days were short-lived as soon other troubling things found their way into Maxes' life.

And then had come the big news – she had somehow made it into Blackwell Academy, a private school for 12th grade seniors. On a scholarship even! It was more for the sake of changing the scenery and getting away from the city that she made responsible for her mothers' death, than the actual interest in the Academy in her hometown. Still, somehow, it made her smile to see the nearly unchanged town as she exited the bus. Her father had sent her luggage with an express delivery to Blackwell already two days beforehand, so she had just to find which room she had been assigned to and hope that nobody else would be assigned to the same room. She really did not want anyone sitting on her nerves here.

Putting her ear-buds back in and picked up her rucksack (black leather of course), which was marked by stitches and pin-ups of various band logos. Not all was black and grim however, as Max knew, as much as she liked her look right now, her taste in music was more like that of an omnivore with a sweet-tooth for specific genres.

'I wasn't there for you!' screamed Serj Tankian through her ear-buds, as the song Streamline from SOAD started to play, while she made her way to the dorms.

'Fits fucking perfectly.' Max thought with a sneer. It was time to see what life had in store for her.

To her surprise Max found out that she had a whole room just for herself. True, the girls' dorms had only one shower at the end of every floor, but she was fine with that. She couldn't be bothered less.

Immediately she set out to unpack the boxes containing her stuff and organising the room to her liking. It was not much, but it was hers and given the opportunity – why not make the best of the year in this 'oh-so-cool' Academy? At least she could make her room comfortable enough. The first thing to unpack was the laptop, which she booted right away after setting it on the table which was provided by the school. The next thing was the amplifier, which was promptly connected to the next-best socket and to the laptop. She put the volume on a comfortable level (for her) and continued to unpack singing to the song that was playing.

"She said 'I'll throw myself away. They're just photos after all. I can't make you hang around. I can't wash you off my skin." Max sang wistfully. This particular Queens of the Stone Age song held a meaning for her. Not an exceedingly happy one, but still happier than many others.

The hours flew by and by the time she had unpacked and arranged everything it was already time for the opening ceremony and the first lectures.

"Maybe-not-so-boring-ass-school life, here I come." Max muttered to herself as she set out to attend to her classes, a small smile on her lips, for maybe, just maybe this year could be different.

-A fucking crazy day-

It had not been even a full two weeks before she already found her new life in Blackhell, as she decided to call the school, vexing to a point of throwing up. Half of the classes were made up by jocks or puffed up self-righteous and oh-so-pretty rich girls, who thought everything that moved or not was theirs to command.

There were a few exceptions though. A shy little mouse of a girl named Kate Marsh, who despite her strong beliefs in the Church was forthcoming and kind to Max. Another girl called Alyssa Anderson, who was kind enough to Max, as for the rocker-girl to decide not to ignore the little overweight young woman. Yet another girl named Brook Scott, who was kind off a geek, just the female version, was pretty O.K. too, at least in Maxes' opinion. There was also a nerd named Warren, who seemed to have already a crush on her, although she had been only nice to him once as she needed to borrow his flash drive (she could not find her own and had to settle for borrowing, while the new one was delivered).

On the other hand she had already deducted that the local rich-bitch-family, the Prescott's, were basically owning the school and the teachers in it, and their youngest son – Nathan – to be an asshole to boot. The stares he gave her and the snidely comments made her want to punch him in the face, but at the same time she didn't want to end her scholarship in her first month at the school regardless of how much she disliked it.

Victoria Chase was another typical rich-bitch with an attitude, that Max could nearly see the young woman bristling with anticipation of a possibility to bully someone. She did not hate her. That would be too strong a word for that lowlife, but she clearly knew, if Victoria would try to pull any of that shit on her, she would make her pay.

And then there was the photography teacher - Mr. Jefferson. Something in his attitude made her cringe. It was like there was something behind his eyes, out of reach to clearly tell what it was, but still there visible enough to make it uncomfortable to be in his presence. Luckily (well, maybe luckily) she had not to interact with him all too much for her attitude and clear set principle to give teachers that bother her a hard time afterwards seemed to keep him off her back most of the times. The only thing he insisted on was for her to take part in some sort of competition for photography telling her all sorts of stuff of how 'talented' she was or 'what an eye she had for the true emotions in the distinct moments'.

'Bullshit! That creep can keep his competition and his comments to! On those terms (and as long as he keeps away from me) I will have peace.' She thought smiling at her own GoT reference, before settling in more comfortably in her chair, not paying any mind for said photography teacher droning on about the history of portraits and such. She did not remember falling asleep.

And suddenly Max was out there next to the lighthouse on the cliff looking over Arcadia Bay as a storm raged on. The wind howled as if possessed by evil spirits and then she saw it – a huge-ass tornado coming directly towards the shore and the little backwater town. Lightning strikes and suddenly the wind sweeps up a fishing boat which crashes into the lighthouse prompting the top of it to fall in Maxes' direction.

With a gasp Max woke up just to discover that she was still in the photography class and the creep of a teacher was still droning on. Rubbing the sleep from her eyes she took in the happenings in the classroom – Victoria was sucking up to creep-teach, Kate looked downright miserable and nobody was paying it any attention. The rest just pretended to give a damn about what Mr. Jefferson was talking about. Not really thinking about concentrating on class she just took up her old instant film camera and angles it so that the light falling form the windows was caught in her hair and snapped a shot. The Polaroid looked good and she allowed herself to smile a bit at the vanity of it all.

"I believe Max has taken what you kids call… 'selfie'. A dumb word for a wonderful photographic tradition. And Max-"whatever Mr. Creep-for-Pros was about to say was cut short, when Max snapped at him.

"Yeah, yeah! Whatever! Know what? I don't really feel like dwelling on this discussion, so why don't we just move on from where I interrupted your oh-so-interesting lecture, hm?" Max smiled radiantly, while her tone had been more than enough to signalise 'Don't fuck with me Tony! Don't you ever try fuck me!'.

"Oh, well in that case, as you clearly have interest to join our conversation on the history of portraits after capturing our interest in such a manner, could you please tell us the name of the process that gave birth to the first self-portraits?" came the calm answer from the teacher, though Max was more than happy to hear the annoyance weighting heavy in his voice.

"I don't know." She simply answered. Not caring for what happened afterwards or where the discussion spiralled out after her little stunt. Victoria of course jumped to the opportunity to suck up even more to Mr. Jefferson and gave the correct answer. Whatever it was. She gave also some kind of mean comment about Max being stuck in the last century or such, but Max couldn't really care less. She was still a little dazed from her dream and didn't pay it much attention. She would get back at Victoria some time; she had a whole year before her.

After this little incident the class went on for a little while and Max was satisfied to note that it was not even that late, when classes finished. On her way out she noticed Kate silently crying, drawing something in her notebook. Without thinking Max went over to the other girl.

"Hey, Bible-Kate! What's wrong?" she tried the cheery approach despite not feeling very cheerful herself.

"Oh, Max! N-No, it's… it's fine. Just thinking too much…" the girl weakly replied seeming even more miserable than humanly possible.

"Know what? I've been thinking a lot lately too. Wanna grab a be-… erm… maybe let's drink tea sometime together and tell Karma what a bitch she is?" Max thought that was a pretty good save there.

"Thanks, but not today, Max. I have homework to do." Kate answered, still looking downcast. 'Whelp, you can't cheer up anyone, now can you, Mad Max?' Max thought.

"No probs. If they give you shit and you want a *cough* beer *cough*… and just wanna hang out, you know where my room is." She gave the other girl a toothy grin, this time Kate smiled weakly, which was more of an achievement in Maxes' record books. She knew that Kate would never touch alcohol, but her act of not caring for the school norms had earned herself a smile from the religious girl, which was good. She hated to see the normally cheerful and kind girl in such low spirits (pun not intended).

With that she stepped out of the classroom and into the hallway of the Academy. Plucking in her ear-buds she quickly shuffles the music on her cell phone and settles on Syd Matters – To all of you. Hey, who ever said that a rock-girl couldn't like some indie or alternate music too?

'Man, I need a rest. Restroom seems good enough to just freshen up a bit.' Max thought making her way along the hallway.

Upon entering the girls' restroom Max suddenly saw a bright blue butterfly fluttering around. Now this was creeping her out big time. She had only seen such a butterfly three times in her life and none of them were in the slightest bit good. The first time was when her parents had declared that the y would move to Seattle and she couldn't even properly say goodbye to a friend that was like sister to her at the time, especially as her father had recently deceased and she had needed every support she could get. The second was when her mother was diagnosed with late stage lung cancer and died merely a month afterwards. The third time had been when her then-girlfriend had broken her heart and ditched her for some jock with more cash on his hands. It was the symbol on her left sleeve – a reminder how much could go wrong in life. And now this beautiful little show of fate putting up a big 'FUCK YOU!' sign right in her face was fluttering around the girls' restroom before settling on the bucket behind the restroom stalls.

As morbid as it might be Max simply couldn't resist taking a photo of this messenger of fate.

"Karma, you bitch! If you make me ruin this photo somehow, I will seriously punch your teeth in." Max hissed as she slowly crept towards the sitting butterfly. After lining up the perfect shot, she shot the picture and was more than satisfied by the outcome. Suddenly she heard the agitated voice of Nathan Prescott, rambling on about not letting people manipulate him, of how tired he was from the constant shit people gave him. At some point he even tried to calm himself mumbling something about how much money his family had and that he should not be afraid of anything.

She already wanted to come out behind the restroom stalls, when a blue-haired punker-girl came into the girls' restroom.

"So what do you want?" he said not looking up from the sink as the blue-haired girl checked the stalls if anyone was in there.

"I hope you checked the perimeter, as my step-ass would say. Now, let's talk bidness-"she answered in a tone which was light but at the same time provoking. 'Point for you blue-chick.' Max thought as she watched on.

"I got nothing for you." Nathan shot back at her, anger clearly audible in his voice.

"Wrong. You got hella cash!" the punk replied.

"That is my family. Not me." Nathan spoke up again clearly not wanting this conversation.

"Oh boo-hoo, fucking rich kid. I know you've been pumpin' drugs and shit to the kids around here… and I bet your respectable family would help me out if I went to them." The girl did not even think of letting the matter drop.

Max was kind of zoning out as she tough this was just some random bullying and seeing Nathan get pushed around was kind of satisfying. Thus she was completely taken aback as the conversation of the two had an abrupt twist not only in volume, but also in content.

"You have no clue with whom you are messing, bitch!" Nathan snarled as he levelled a Glock at the girl.

"Where did you get that? What are you doing? Come on, put that thing down!" the distress in the blue-haired girls voice was quickly turning into pure fear.

"Don't EVER tell me what to do! I'm sick of people trying to control me!" Nathan snarled as they wrestled over the gun, which he held against the girls; stomach.

And suddenly everything went by as if in a lightning flash.

"Nobody is gonna miss your 'punk-ass'!" Nathan screamed as the girl pushed him away with a 'Get away from me you psycho!'.

The gun went off.

"NO!" Max screamed and reached out to the falling girl with the gunshot wound in her stomach.

Time itself seemed to slow down, becoming pudding or at least very thick oil and coiling around Max like a chain.

-With great power comes great stress-

And then she was back in her class gasping at what she had just witnessed or thought she had witnessed as she took in her surroundings.

Creep-for-Pros was still droning on about portraits.

'Whoa! Ok, what the fucking hell did just happen?!' Maxes' mind was racing. 'Ok, Max, just calm down. It was all a dream, a very fucking weird and realistic dream.' At that moment Taylor threw a small ball of paper at Kate and Mr. Jefferson just continued as he had done already.

'Ok! Hold on a minute! What is happening? This is so surreal. Is this some bad joke or did I somehow got stuck in a loop like in 'Groundhog Day'? Max thought in disbelief. Victoria's phone rang – just as it had done so before. It startled Max so much she knocked over her camera as she set up straight in her seat. It fell and broke against the floor-tiles and as Max reached out time again seemed to slow down, coil around her.

"Wait! What the actual FUCK?! Can I slow time or rewind or some sort of stuff?" she muttered in utter shock. However, she did reach out to this strange feeling that had built up inside her brain as she reached for the camera. And indeed time did rewind! Like it never happened! Her camera just glided from the floor up to her desk assembling to appear just as new as it had been before. The paper-ball Taylor had thrown flew over into her hand and the hand settled on her lap as the girls head returned in a position to watch if the teacher was looking her way.

And then it all started over again. Taylor throwing the ball at Kate, Victoria's phone ringing and Mr. Jefferson just blabbing on about portraits.

Just to test if her camera was really functioning after this, Max took a 'selfie'. Immediately Jeffercreep started his annoyed pointing out to Max as to what she had just done was 'taking a selfie and such'. Max felt seriously stressed and needed to leave this room as soon as possible before she would hyperventilate.

'The girl in the restroom!' it suddenly shot to her mind. 'She is going to be killed if I don't do anything!' Before Creepy-teach could even conclude his monologue and ask her whatever he was going to ask, Max already had grabbed her stuff, stood up and walked towards the door, just mumbling something about not feeling well and needing to go to the restroom as she passed the teacher. She did not even wait for him to respond.

As soon as she was out of the classroom she darted towards the restroom only to find the irritating blue insect fluttering around. Not taking any chances and not knowing if this was a trigger or not, she decided to take the picture of the butterfly again. This time around however she saw the fire alarm on the wall at the back. A plan simple, yet maybe functioning plan formed in her mind.

Just as before, Nathan stormed into the restroom soon followed by the blue-haired girl. Their argument started just as it had and soon they were again at gun-point. Literally.

This time however Max didn't let that fucker pull the trigger at the punk with blue hair. With a well-aimed kick she shattered the glass of the fire alarm with the heel of her boot instantly pushing with said heel the button causing the fire alarm to go off.

In that moment the punk-rock-girl pushed Nathans' hand holding the gun away from her and landed a heavy kick with her knee against his groin prompting the young man to whimper pathetically and fall to the ground. She swiftly swooped up the gun Nathan had dropped and backed out of the restroom. Recovering quicker than thought Nathan pushed himself up and followed suit stumbling out of the restroom. Damn, she had wanted to kick him just for good measure.

Max quickly grabbed her stuff and ran out herself afterwards but was thwarted by the security of the school, who inquired why she had not left the school building when the fire alarm had been activated all the while eyeing her suspiciously. Cooking up some lie was easy. She had learned how to deal with school security giving her the evil eye.

Finding her lie convincing the security guard let her run along, but Max was not paying him any mind. She already thought what she should do next. Telling the principal should be a safe bet, for although he was bought by the Prescotts there was only so much money could get you and a school could only overlook so much of breaking rules and endangering its students.

She found the principal quickly enough but after starting up a conversation and explaining what she saw (leaving out the details of a certain punk trying to blackmail Nathan), she already understood that while the principal would eventually look into the matter, he would not press this issue any further than he must. Clearly money and sucking up to the Prescotts was more than enough not to bust Nathan for his doings.

Frustrated with the principals reaction Max left him standing there caught in midsentence as she practically spat at him in disgust saying 'And here I thought there was at least one figurehead in this damned town that still had morals.' Thinking about it a few minutes later, she quickly rewound time and simply left the principal to his musings after hearing him say 'Those are pretty serious charges!' and 'I will look into this.'

'Yeah, right. Like hell you will.' Max thought bitterly. Somehow she had seriously hoped that despite taking the Prescotts money at least someone in this town had still his morals intact and now she was seriously disappointed. 'Every school is the same. Same shit everywhere.'

As classes were suspended for the rest of the afternoon, Max decided that she really needed something to soothe her nerves and a bottle of beer and a small jam session would be most welcome right now. On her way to the dorms (and her secret stash of booze) she saw the other students busying themselves with whatever they could or liked. Some guys were playing ball, Alyssa was reading a book, Kate still looked miserable sitting alone on a bench at the far corner of the school-park, and Victoria and her cronies were sitting in the shade probably bitching about everyone and everything. Aside from quickly greeting Alyssa and inquiring about the book she was reading and trying to strike up a conversation with Kate, Max could not care less about the others gathering in the park. She was simply in no mood to play nice with anyone if it was no absolutely necessary right now.

As she entered her room, she simply dropped her bag and connected her electric guitar to the amplifier. She quickly put on some tabs on her laptop and began smashing. She did not care if it was loud. Everyone was probably outside and to be honest, she simply did not care. This whole day had proven to be more stressful than the whole getting back to Arcadia Bay issue.

Playing and singing along 'Lost in Hollywood' from SOAD, she left her mind drift. It was simply relaxing. Music had that effect on her. After a few more songs she concluded her mini-concert for herself with Depeche Modes' 'Enjoy the silence'. 'Oh, yeah, that I really did need right now.' Max thought tiredly as the song faded out.

-When you think it can't get stranger, just wait-

She put down the guitar and shut down the amplifier. A picture on one of the walls caught her attention and unwittingly she reached out and took the picture of the wall where it had been fastened with some tape. It showed her, when she was younger and her hair was long and brown, not like now. Next to her was another girl, showing the 'peace' sign with strawberry blond hair and a 'pirate-captains' hat on. Both of them were smiling. Those had been happy days.

"Chloe…" Max muttered and smiled sadly at the picture. If there had ever been a friend she needed more right now with all the stuff happening around her and this freakish new power to rewind time Chloe would have been that friend. They had been so close…

The buzzing of her cell phone indicated that she had just received a message. She picked it up from her bed, where she had carelessly thrown it too busy to get a stress-relief and not to focus on anything that could disturb her.

Only now she saw that it had not been only one message, but three. Warren asked for his flash drive, thanked her for sending her notes on Jeffersons' previous class and asked for his flash drive. In that order.

'Well, gotta give the guy his precious back, if only for him to stop texting me on webmail every hour to ask for it.' Max groaned with played annoyance. She could see that Warren was a good hearted young man, but she really didn't want to give him hope where there was none to be found.

'We shall bring the One Flash Drive to the parking lot of Blackhell, where it shall be handed to a worthier bearer.' She quickly tipped in a reply. 'Well, who is the nerd now?' she thought amused. It seemed one thing about Arcadia Bay had definitely remained the same – it brought her nerdy side to shine through more often than she liked to admit.

"Oh, damn. Didn't I give it to Dana? Or was it Juliet?" Max face-palmed herself as the quick search of her room came up without the wanted results. "Well, still gotta get that flash drive and bring it to nerd-boy before he turns the whole parking lot into a wizard's castle."

With a resigning sigh Max picked up her bag and stowed her camera back inside which had fallen out of it, when she had dropped the bag on her bed along with the phone. She closed and bolted her door as she went out into the hallway of her dorms and started off in the direction of Danas' and Juliet's room.

To her surprise she found Juliet standing before her door fuming and talking agitatedly with the other girl, who appeared to be locked inside the room.

"Hey! What's wrong with you two gal-pals?" she asked, dumbfounded by the sheer childishness of the scene she was seeing.

"Oh! And what do you care, Max? You constantly zone out and never seem to really listen to anything anyone is saying! So why are you so interested right now?" Juliet shot back glaring angrily at Max.

"Woah! Now hold your horses, Ms. Watson! Has Sherlock permitted you to just go off and piss on every helping hand extended?" Max rebuked, just raising a brow at the other girl. She was seriously too tired to care or get angry at the other girl. Yeah, Juliet could be vexing, but when she was in a good mood she was quite the nice girl for all Max could say.

Shock was clearly visible on the other girls' face, but to Maxes' surprise she didn't dwell on the harsh reply, but instead was baffled by the fact that Max actually remembered her surname.

"Well, shit me not! Max, the spaced out rocker, actually does listen to people." Came the snidely remark, but somehow Max could tell that the girl was actually interested in telling her what was going on, as if she needed someone to listen to her plight.

After a quick conversation with Juliet, a break-in into Victoria's room and a few rewinds later, Max had convinced Juliet to let the poor girl out of her room, as the reason behind the two friends fighting had proven to be Victoria giving them a hard time and trying to tear them apart over Juliet's boyfriend. Of course Max had proven it all to be a ruse and actually had chastised Juliet a bit for doubting her friend just because Ms. I'm-too-good-for-all-of-you told her something that stirred her jealousy.

After the two girls had made up and Dana had a small conversation with Juliet about the whole affair, she quickly retrieved the flash drive, which had indeed been in Danas' room and set out to find its rightful owner.

'A good deed a day or some junk like that, eh?' she thought as she crossed the park heading towards the parking lot. Just as she passed by behind Alyssa she noticed out of the corner of the eye a football heading towards her. The muscle-memory clicked and without thinking she had kicked the football hard using a Muay Thai move, which sent the football right back at the one who threw it hitting the guy in question hard in the stomach.

"Had it coming fool." She mumbled as she looked at the young man gasping for breath as he held his hands over his stomach. She did not care to rewind. Not for some shit that others had truly deserved.

She was already near the parking lot when she heard agitated voices coming from the front of the gate to the main campus, which also led to the parking lot. As she came closer she could see Kate being yelled at by the security guard that had also asked her why she had been in the restroom when the fire alarms went off.

She didn't even hear what the security guard was yelling at the distressed girl. Without thinking she just pressed on and interrupted the guard rudely.

"Hey! Leave her alone! What is it with school security loving to bully girls who are already having a hard time? Are you enjoying this? Is this some sick turn on for you or what?" She was furious. This scene reminded her too much of her own misery in the first months after her mothers' death.

"Wha-? Now hold on, missy! I'm just trying to do my job here!" The security guard exclaimed, eyes wide with surprise at the open hostility in Maxes voice.

"No, you are not! It is your job to guard this fucking place and not yell at schoolgirls who are clearly between a rock and a hard place, bullying them into telling you whatever you want!" Max nearly shouted, her hands were balled to fists and before she realised she was standing right in front of the security guard.

"This is no-! You know? You are part of this problem and I will get to the bottom of this all! I will keep an eye on you!" with that the security guard quickly walked off. He had clearly not expected such aggressively from a girl of Maxes' stature even as she was wearing black and looked the part like someone who could dish out as much as she got on her plate.

"Thank you, Max! I think you really scared him off for once." Kate was looking a bit pale, but otherwise unharmed. "I have to go now, but I want you to know it really means something to me that you stood up for me."

"No probs, bible-girl. The offer with the 'tea' is still standing." Max answered when she had calmed down a bit. As Kate passed her and went on her own errands, Max resumed her way to the parking lot.

It didn't take long for her to find the place, but it took her a little longer to spot the young nerd leaning on a used dark-blue car. As she walked over to Warren she passed an old looking truck and curiosity go the better of her, when she saw a box of 'Missing Person' posters in a box in the back of the truck. They were the same posters she had seen all over the campus and the bus station.

'Damn, if someone was only this dedicated to me someday.' Max mused and shuddered a bit as she retracted her thoughts, 'Well, the same level of dedication, less from the 'Missing Person' stuff though.' She had read what the posters said – Missing Person: Rachel Amber, 19 years old, last seen…, etc. At first she had not paid it any mind, but after a week and constantly finding new posters asking for any information regarding the whereabouts of the missing woman, she somehow had become attached to the case. It was not like she would go investigating or any stuff like that, but at least she would keep an eye open to any possible evidence that could be used to find that girl. She didn't know why exactly she had decided to do so, but the thought suck in her mind, that if she had known this girl, maybe they could have been friends.

'She reminds me of Chloe a little bit. That sunny smile…' she was still deep in her thoughts when a hand shot up in front of her, waving before her eyes.

"Earth to Max! Earth to Max! Can you hear us? Huston, we might have a problem here." It was Warren who teased her light-heartedly. Little did he know that Max was so shocked by the sudden appearance of her classmate out of the blue that she nearly would have punched him with one of her priced Muay Thai moves. One doesn't just win a junior championship by staying idle and thinking with one's brain. Much depends on reflexes and trained muscle-memory.

"Whoa there! W-Warren!" She stuttered a bit still shocked that she had fallen so deep into though as to not even notice that she had passed Warren and walked on not even looking at anything in particular. "Sorry. Didn't notice you back there. Well, I mean, I did notice you, but I kind of zoned out a bit…"

"Yeah, no problem, Max." he leaned in as if to give her a hug. She quickly stepped back a little and took out the flash drive she had borrowed holding it up to Warren.

"Oh! Yeah, thanks!" He took the flash drive, pocketed it quickly whilst rubbing his neck and looking very uncomfortable in his own skin. Still somehow they managed to get a conversation up and going. Max teased the teenage-man about the emo-vampire movies on the flash drive, but followed the conversation closely as to not sound too interested in the man himself as that could spark only new hopes in Warren and that was the last thing she needed now. Despite all of that she knew the nerdy guy could be good company and actually listened to people, so when the conversation shifted towards the more obscure movies, she tried to strike up another tone and talk about what she had experienced in Mr. Jeffersons class that day.

However, right as if on cue to prevent her from telling anything that happened, Nathan Prescott walked over the parking lot towards them.

"Max Caulfield, right? You are one of Jeffersons photo groupies. I know you like to take pictures, especially while hiding out in bathrooms." Nathan was practically yelling at her when he stood right before her. "You better tell me now exactly what you told the Principal!"

"Go to hell, dipshit! I will tell you precisely nothing!" Max growled back. "But maybe you will refrain from going into girls' bathrooms in the future, eh? Or go you actually like getting kicked in the balls?" Max couldn't refrain from grinning. Not for all the money in the world.

"You fucking-" Nathan started as he tried to grab Max by the throat, but Max being stronger and faster than most people gave her credit to be quickly reached up and caught his hands in hers using his momentum to spin him around and smash his head hard against Warrens car. It seemed it would leave a bruise. She let him go and wanted to start off as she heard him get up with an angry, incoherent shout. Before she could do anything Warren had already launched himself at Nathan and the two guys were wrestling on the ground.

Just as she was about to turn and give Nathan a good hiding the old truck pulled up to a full-stop next to her, nearly knocking her over.

As she regained her balance and turned over to see who the driver was, the blue-haired punk-rock-gal at the steering wheel exclaimed in disbelief: "Max?"

"Chloe?" Max asked dumbfound, as suddenly everything fell into place like the pieces of a puzzle and she finally recognised her old friend.

"You again!" Nathan shouted as he was getting away from Warren after punching the nerd hard in the face. He had not even taken a few steps as Warren launched himself gain at the other man.

"Come on, Max! Get in!" Chloe said as she opened the door of the truck and waved Max in. She didn't even wait for Max to close the door properly as she took off in high speed. All Max could see from the side-mirror was the security guard rushing towards the two struggling men while she and Chloe drove away.