The Mysterious Demon

-Nickolas’ POV-

A week has passed and the face-offs were among us again and just like last time, my gang and I were participating. Unlike last time though, our main goal wasn’t winning, it was supporting Dominic. It was her time and her stage alone. She was going to win, I had no doubt in that.

During this past week, Dominic had spend days and nights training her ass off at different clubs, learning different techniques and even getting to know her stage by doing matches at the place where the face-offs were taking place- which was in a different place to last time. We had hardly seen her but when we did, she used that time training us and you could definitely tell she was a lot stronger than before. I didn’t even know it was possible to gain that much more muscle in a span of a week. She didn’t go easy on us either. She was just as strict as when she gave us a lesson at the gym.

Seeing the number of fighters walking into the gym made me excited. It was then when I realised why Dominic loved her job. Being able to show your strength and fight for yourself in front of so many people who want to do the same and gain their respect, what more could someone want?

But before I went in myself I walked to the back of the bar in order to meet my sister. We couldn’t exactly meet inside of the bar or else people could get information about her from seeing her with me by ourselves so we decided to play it safe and hidden.

I was a corner away from where she told me to meet her up when I heard a familiar voice of a male behind the wall.

“Since when did you start fucking smoking?!” I heard him yell and straight away knew the voice was Xavier’s.

“Why does it matter to you?” I heard Dominic reply calmly. I turned my head a bit to see what was going on and saw her looked up at him, posture screaming out with pride and confidence, anger and determination in her eyes with the cigarette comfortably settled in between her lips. Xavier was standing inches away from her, glaring down at it with hate radiating from him.

It was my sister’s confidant stance that made me stay behind the wall, she didn’t need my help yet but I was ready to go out and defend her if needed.

“Why does it matter to me? Demon, it’s always mattered to m-” “Shut the fuck up Xavier! Like hell would you actually care!” I froze when she shouted that. You could hear the pain in her voice. Xavier seemed to have a similar reaction. “Smoking is a problem now? Not the fact that you not only tried to make me quit my dream but also replaced me-” Dominic tried to carry on arguing but was cut off by a coughing fit which made her hunch forward, the cig falling out of her mouth at the same time.

“Demon-” “Don’t touch me!” she yelled, slapping his arm away when he tried helping her. That was my queue to come out and help her instead.

“Dominic?” I called gently, walking up to her and putting a hand on her back, rubbing it until she had finally stopped coughing and was able to regain her breath.

This wasn’t something new. Dominic had been having these fits regularly recently. I had told her to get it checked with a doctor but she said she had and insisted it was fine.

“Nick?” Xavier questioned and I looked back at him with a stern look on my face. “What?” I asked sharply which made his eyes darken. The way he’s been treating my sister wasn’t right and if she was going to distance herself from him, I was too.

“You knew didn’t you?” He carried on, “Well yeah, she’s my sister, of course, I’d know if she was smoking or not,” I replied which made him growl.

“Don’t you know that’s bad for her-” “Nick I’m going in, the face-offs are starting soon.” Dominic cut him off with a glare and turned her back to leave. I was going to leave as well when Xavier held me behind.

“Wait,” I heard him say and we both waited until Dominic left before he could talk again. “What do you want?” I asked rudely but when I turned to face him again my demeanour softened when I saw the hurt on his face.

“Treat me whatever way you want, but The Men of Mayhem will be here tonight. They may use this chance to attack,” “even with all of these people here?” I asked and he nodded, “You can protect her with your gang in a way I can’t so please, protect her.”

I smirked and nodded, “I will.”

—Nôvel(D)rama.Org's content.

Four hours have passed since the face-offs began and everything so far had gone normally. So normally, I had almost forgotten that The Men of Mayhem could come out of anywhere at any time.

My gang, for the most part, had all been beaten at this point, myself included, but we did do significantly better than last time. Now during the quarterfinals though, the only one of us that was still fighting was Dominic.

“Nick, who’s the guy?” Blake asked, nudging me from beside me whilst mentioning towards someone in the distance. I turned to see a guy coming to congratulate Dominic for winning her 15th match. I had seen him back in London and once I recognised him I answered Blake’s question. “Destroyer. That’s his street fighter name. He’s England’s strongest fighter, fourth in the world. He was training with M. D while she was there but lost to her countless times, why?” I asked amused slightly.

Blake didn’t reply though and instead ended up walking straight towards them. He’s usually good at hiding what he’s feeling or thinking but when it comes to his jealousy, it radiates off of him like a bad smell and it never failed to bring a smile to my face.

I followed behind him and watched as he wrapped an arm around Dominic’s waist protectively. I shook my head but it made me also kind of happy when Dominic looked up at him for a moment and didn’t argue against the arm being there. I trusted Blake and couldn’t think of a better person for my sister.

“M. D, you close to this guy?” Destroyer asked with a mischievous grin on his face. “We have a funny relationship.” Dominic starts replying, “His leader stubbornly wanted me to join his gang and ever since, this guy been stuck to me under his instruction. Don’t think of this as a good way of getting anything out of me bro.”

I cringed slightly at what she had said about me, knowing I probably deserve it. Yet, at the same time, I was also impressed at how easily she could come up with things on the spot.

I decided to step in here though and joined their little conversation. “Talking about a man behind his back isn’t a good habit M. D.” Dominic laughed back at me. It was then when I noticed that Dominic had also done well in training herself to not only speak a little differently but also laughs demonically and hold herself differently as well when she’s M. D. When she says that she and M. D are different entities of herself she really means it. Although it’s not much of an excuse, it was probably one of the reasons why I couldn’t tell it was her in the beginning but now it stuck out to me.

Destroyer at this point was looking back at me with curiosity. “Nickolas right? You’ve got some guts to be asking this chick to join your gang, mate. I’m Destroyer by the way.” He introduced and extended his arm forward for a handshake which I did cautiously. Dominic didn’t seem to happy about this either.

“Woah man,” she said, gently pushing our hands away from each other, stepping out of Blake’s hold in the meantime. “Nick, don’t get friendly with this guy. He likes askin’ his questions and he won’t leave you alone until he gets his answers. He still hasn’t left me alone,”

Destroyer laughs before grabbing her arm towards him and locking it behind her back whilst dragging her with it too. This worries me and I get ready to make a move, as does Blake, but we both spot Dominic’s other hand which was up signalling us to stop which we did hesitantly.

“And I don’t plan to, not until you spill.” “Never.” She replied back and they both chuckled. “Come on M. D, we’re friends are we not?” He asked in her ear and she scoffed back at him. “Friends? I don’t have friends.” She stated and then lifted a leg and kicked his shin roughly which made him let go of her. “Ouch. That was a good one,” he the complimented before throwing something at her in which she caught.

I looked into Dominic’s hand to see a new pack of cigs. ” Expect the best from me and thanks.”

.