Chapter 11

"Let me know when you are ready." Elizabeth's voice rang out towards Martha as she put her hair in a ponytail. A soft smile came across her face as she and her daughter stood outside in the warm sun. She always loved this time of the year when it came down to training. Not too hot, with a slight warm breeze blowing through the grass while some of nature's smallest creatures mosey about their day. Today was indeed a beautiful and relaxing one. Elizabeth's eyes then went down to Martha, who was putting on her favorite sparing gloves. She didn't put her hair up like Elizabeth but had it situated to not be in her face at any moment.

"Breath in. Then breath out," Martha told herself as she tightens the strap on her gloves. Her eyes looked towards Elizabeth, who was watching her with a soft smile. They were at most 80 feet away from each other if she was to take a guess; even with that distance, she knew Elizabeth had the advantage with her bow. "Close the distance and disarm her." Martha thought to herself while taking in deep and relaxing breaths.

Elizabeth could see Martha's expression change as she became more focused.

"She focused and knows what her goal is for the moment." She thought to herself as she reached down, picked up her bow, and drew an arrow from her quiver. She did not ready her bow just yet as it wouldn't have been a fair start. She then yelled out to Martha.

"Remember, even though this is training take the fight very seriously. Also, let's try to have fun. Okay, sweetie?" Elizabeth supportively said, almost too cheerfully.

"Yes, ma'am," Martha yelled back. She took one last deep breath as she could hear the leather of her gloves tightening along with her fingers popping as she balled her fists. After rolling back her shoulders and loosening up her body, Martha lowered herself down towards the grass as she needed to get into a running position. Her eyes darted, left to right, as she drew out a path towards her opponent.

"The first target is to get rid of the bow." Martha reminded herself again.

Elizabeth's smile quickly faded as her face became serious and relaxed. A sharp inhale of air went into her mouth before quickly escaping through her nostrils. Everything around her seemingly faded away as she was completely focused on the battle and her daughter. She readied her bow and pointed it towards Martha. Her body became still as she felt and saw the breeze snake through the grass. She pulled back the string, reading to being. Her eyes moved ever so slightly as she tried to figure out her opponent's moves and micro-adjusted for the wind.

From the outside looking in, it would appear as if Elizabeth and Martha were frozen in time. However, this was the first and most crucial part of their battle. Mental warfare and seeing who would make the first move. Martha knew that one wrong step and she would be bombarded with arrows, while Elizabeth, on the other hand, knew she couldn't let Martha get close to disarm her, or it would turn into a hand-to-hand fight. The very first lesson Elizabeth taught Martha was to figure out her opponent's move, then make her own plan and adjust from there.

"Now!" Martha told herself as she took off in a sprint towards Elizabeth, trying to close their distance. She began to zigzag to throw her mother off her aim. She moved left and right as she got closer. She felt a rush of air go past her left arm as Elizabeth released her first of many arrows.

"Tch," Elizabeth let out as she pulled another arrow from her quiver as her first one missed by a few inches. She drew the arrow back and adjusted it to take in for the breeze as she fired once again. She then fired another, and then another.

Martha adjusted her footing as she saw the other arrow coming right toward her left leg. Her reflexes made her step back and do a turn causing her to run more outward from Elizabeth. Yet, she came to a full stop as an arrow flew right past her stomach. From the corner of her eyes, she forced herself fully back and watched as an arrow flew inches from her head. Only catching strains of her hair. She did a backflip to avoid more, and using that same momentum; she forced herself into a backward cartwheel. She could hear the arrows moving past her and felt the air from them. With a final flip and even a spin, Martha landed on her feet. She grabbed an arrow coming for her chest and used it to knock another out of the air. Taking a quick inhale of air, she continued on her sprint with her eyes focused on her mother.

"I need to mover faster," she noticed to herself with a few close calls.

"She's clever as always." Elizabeth noticed as Martha was able to dodge effortlessly from so far and was only 60 feet away. She never stopped firing after her daughter batted one arrow away. As she watched Martha ducked, bobbed, and weaving past each arrow so far, Elizabeth could feel her quiver getting low after each draw. She probably had about a half dozen or so left. "Maybe I should kick up the speed a little." She thought as she changed her footing and the rate she fired.

"Halfway there." Martha reminded herself as she couldn't really stop and think as she felt the arrows still coming. So far, she was able to dodge the arrows but did have a few close calls. She could feel the scratches on her left arm, right leg and side, and even across her left cheek; however, she needed to keep moving. Martha then felt another arrow whizzed by her ear and immediately realized something.

"She changed up her speed." Martha thought as a small smile crept across her face as she knew she should do the same. As her right foot touched the ground, Martha felt her chest tighten as a sudden rush of air-filled her body. With that single push off the ground, she felt a jolt leave her leg and up her body as everything seemed to narrow as her mother became her sole target.

Elizabeth noticed this, and a smile came across her face as well. Martha was improving with each fight they had. As she pulled back the string on her bow and was about to fire, an unknown light source started to obstruct her vision. She removed her hand from the string, trying to block out the light. For that mere few seconds, she left herself open.

"Now's my chance." Martha thought as she continued. She felt herself getting low to the ground while clenching her left fist as green energy began to surround it. She was only a few feet away, but she needed to be ready for the strike. Her heart was pumping even fast as a rush of adrenaline spread through her body with anticipation. Using her free hand, Martha reached out towards Elizabeth's bow and forced her arm outward. Her action caused Elizabeth's eyes to go wide, and this split second allowed Martha to go for the strike at Elizabeth's side.

In half of that second, Elizabeth released the bow from her right hand and used it to catch Martha's punch. A gust of energy and air pushed from behind Elizabeth and caused the grass to lay back towards the ground before adjusting back to normal. As her hand tensed up from the pain from holding the force back, Elizabeth's right hand quickly ducked under Martha's hand and tired an open palm strike to the center of Martha's chest. However, Martha forced herself downward to dodge the strike, wrapped her free arm around Elizabeth's waist, and pushed herself forwards. Her action caused Elizabeth to go backward, while at the same time, she grabbed onto Martha's waist, bringing her with her. As her back touched the ground, Elizabeth tucked her legs inward to where she was kneeing Martha's stomach. This forced both girls to roll for a moment before coming to a stop, with Elizabeth now on top of Martha.

Elizabeth had her daughter pinned with her knee and her right arm. She had managed to grab an arrow with her left and held it to Martha's neck. While breathing heavily as they both looked at each other, Elizabeth began to chuckle. She felt something at her right side and looked down to see the arrow's tip-in Martha's hand. Somewhere during their tumble, she had grabbed one as well.

"Shall we call this a draw?" Martha asked, looking into Elizabeth's eyes.

Elizabeth let out a sigh as she lowered her arrow and got off of her daughter. As she stood up, she pulled the quiver off her back, allowing it to fall to the ground. The tumble had broken some of the remaining arrows, but that needed to be handled later. Elizabeth's main focus was attending to her daughter.

"Are you alright?" She concernedly asked her daughter and even reached out a hand to help her up.

"Yes, ma'am. I am." Martha reassured her and gladly took the helping hand. When she got to her feet, Martha scratched her head before rubbing her arm. "How did I do?"

"Not bad at all. However, it would help if you worked on your movements a little more. You also would have been hit if I didn't divert some of my arrow shots. You seemed to have panicked ever so slightly when I was going to strike the center of your chest." Elizabeth answered her daughter by giving her helpful criticism. She could see that Martha was absorbing this information and mentally taking notes on fixing her mistakes. "I will give you credit for blinding me with your bracelets and for adjusting your speed. Also, the tackle was a good call on taking me down. But try to take out my legs next time. Remember, get your opponent on the ground, not yourself. " Elizabeth said, raising one finger towards Martha.

"Right," Martha said while nodding her head. "Are we going to battle again?"

Elizabeth gave her daughter a soft smile before grabbing Martha's right cheek and pulling. She always loved her daughter's fighting spirit and the passion she puts into getting better. "You know the rule. The best of 3 matches. So let's do it again and this time, let's use some powers."

"Really?" Martha eagerly asked. The thought of this almost made her leap off of the ground with joy. The moment she saw her mother nod, she almost let out a squeal. She gave Elizabeth a big hug before running back to the other side of the field.

Seeing Martha smile and enjoy these moments always warmed her heart, and Elizabeth was glad she could experience them. She slowly began to make her way around the field to pick up her own bow and arrows. A small sigh escaped her lips as she began to think about how Lucas and Amay were doing. Even if Amay was upset with her, Elizabeth hoped she was having a good time and behaving herself with Lucas. She also hoped Lucas was enjoying himself. She knew he was always a unique child and wasn't much of a people person, so she hoped he was handling this well.

"I wonder what they're doing now. I hope they are enjoying themselves. " Elizabeth wondered to herself while looking up to the blue sky.

Meanwhile, at Noah's Mall.

"God, please kill me now," Lucas mumbled as his face turned a bright red.

This morning has been….interesting, to say the least. After finding out about everything and still trying to process it, his mother told him to take a demon shopping for clothes. Not just any demon, a girl demon, to be exact. So he's basically clothes shopping for a girl with a girl. He thought the best place to handle this task is to take her to the best mall around. Even with the news saying most of them are going out of business, this one has yet to be touched. It also had a fun comic store, so he thought, why not knock out two birds with one stone.

"Which one do you think? Blue or purple?" Amay asked Lucas while holding the two dresses with a big smile on her face. She was having a fantastic time. She knew humans were innovative, but she didn't expect them to build a place that held everything at once. She could pick clothing out of one place, then grab makeup out of another one. They even had delicious-smelling food here. This was heaven and reminded her of home a little.

"I'm leaning more towards the purple one." She said while looking at the purple dress a little more.

"I choose death," Lucas muttered to himself. He looked away from her to make sure no one he knew would see him with her.

"If you want to die, I can give it to you after we are done," Amay told him while placing the blue dress back and walking over towards him.

Lucas immediately stiffened up as a cold chill went down his spine. He watched as she then placed the purple dress in his hands before looking him dead in his eyes with a twisted smile.

"Or do you wish for me to kill you now?" She spoke in an emotionless voice as she flashed him her sharp teeth.

"I…" Lucas said, trying to find the right words, but was too scared to say anything.

Amay then let out a childish giggle as she could see the color fade from his face. She did a quick turn as she walked up ahead to another rack of clothing. "I'm playing. Like I told you before, I'm gonna be your partner. So relax and enjoy spending time with an actual girl for once." She teased him.

"Hey. Hey!" Lucas said, catching on to her joke. He caught up to her as started to laugh at him.

"She kinda right. I should try and relax a little. So far, she hasn't done anything to me, and she's got a reasonable amount of clothing for herself. Plus, explaining things to her is kinda funny at times." Lucas thought to himself as he followed behind her with bags of clothing. "Besides everything with last night and this morning, this weirdly feels....kinda normal...sort." His mind then remembered back to going to the store with his mom or sister at times.

"Which shirt?" Amay's voice snapped him back to the moment. She held up two shirts with her right and left hand. In her right hand, she held one that had the logo of a band Lucas knew about with a nearly all-black and gold-colored trim. The other one was just a pink plan shirt.

"Why…not both?" Lucas said in a low voice as he avoided her eye contact.

Amay's eyes went wide for a moment before a devilish smirk came across her face. "I'm sorry I didn't hear you correctly. That weird music overhead got in the way." She said, trying to get him to say his response louder.

"I said....why not get both," Lucas hesitantly said with a little more confidence. "I think both shirts are nice, and we are building you a wardrobe, so…."

Lucas caught himself as he saw Amay staring at him. He quickly avoided her gaze and could feel her continuously staring at him. He couldn't tell what she felt or what she was thinking, but she was impressed and smiling. "I mean if you want to."

Amay softly giggled as she approached him with both shirts and giving them to him. "So you're finally taking my advice? That's good. This will make shopping a little more fun." She told him before turning back around. She led the way as Lucas followed.

After deciding on a few more clothes and then checking them out, Lucas found himself having a little fun shopping with her. He tried his best not to pick every piece of clothing she asked him about and only helped when she was generally stuck. He even went as far as recommending outfits for her. So far, she had a good amount of clothing in her size and even found herself a few pairs of shoes.

"Alright. I think we got your clothing out of the way. What else did you want to grab before we break for lunch?" Lucas asked as he followed behind her with his hands full of different bags. He watched as Amay skipped a few feet ahead of him before turning and stopping.

"Oh, you know. A little more makeup, something to keep my hair up, bras and panties, and that should be it." Amay answered while counting on her fingers.

"Oh. That shouldn't be too hard." Lucas casually responded, not realizing what she said. As he thought about it more, an alarm went off in his head. "Hold up. What did you say a few moments ago?" Finally catching on.

"Should be it?"

"Before that."

"A little more makeup?"

"After that."

"Something to keep my hair up?"

"After that!" Lucas said, growing slightly annoyed with her.

"Hmmm." She said, trying to remember. "Oh. And."

"...."

Lucas didn't say anything but took in a sharp breath before exhaling while looking at her for a good solid second. He thought long and hard about his morals and fighting woman.

"God…Creator...It's me, your least favorite person. Please give me strength not to strike down my opponent." He said as he looked up for a moment.

Amay just looked at him with a smug smile as she knew what he wanted her to go back on. She was trying her best to hold back her own laughter. "I still don't understand what the big deal is."

"I'm not going to help you pick out -," He said, looking around to see if anyone was around to hear their conversation. "Bras and underwear." He whispered before checking again. Lucky for him, no one was around at the moment.

"Didn't do it then, and I'm not doing it now. I might have been through a lot, but I draw the line here. There is nothing you can do that will make me go into any store to help you with that." He said, crossing his arms.

"Nothing?" Amay said, raising one eyebrow while folding her arms.

"Not a damn thing," Lucas told her while standing his ground for once.

The next thing Lucas knew, he was in the women's department with his face bright red. He felt as if everyone was staring at him and judging him for being essential in a woman's only store. He was sitting in front of a changing booth that Amay was in.

Amay had threatened to kill everyone in the mall and blame him for their murder. So he did what any reasonable person would do and went with her.

"Damn my writer/author. " Lucas thought to himself as his face became redder and redder on different thoughts. He felt so uncomfortable with this situation and hoped she was joking or "playing around" again.

"Almost done." Amay voice called out towards him. "Pass me the red one."

Lucas didn't say anything as he got up, walked close to the door, and passed her the set before returning to his seat.

"How did you get stuck in this situation?" He thought to himself as he slumped back in his seat. "If only I knew someone knows this kind-" He was about to say as an idea suddenly came to mind. He quickly pulled out his phone and began to call someone. Just as he was doing that, Amay came out in her regular outfit from the morning. She looked annoyed and embarrassed for the most part.

"None of them fit just right." She admitted before looking at Lucas on his device. Her face turned to surprise and shock. "You have one of those things as well?" she said, pointing at it.

Lucas looked at her for a moment and was going to ask what she was talking about, but he realized she meant his phone and remembered her situation. "Oh right. You don't know what a phone is." He said, realizing this was gonna be something he needed to explain. "Yeah. I have one. But, I have better news for both of us."

"Oh?" She let out while raising an eyebrow.

"Yup. I have a female friend that's in the area. So she will be here in a moment to help you out." He said as a smile of relief came over his face. Ann was the one person he could count on to help figure out Amay's situation. She was a fashion nut, so she would know what's best for Amay.

"That's great," Amay happily said.

"Right!?" Lucas said, standing up before realizing something. "Wait. Oh no. Oh no." Lucas began to repeat as he grabbed his head.

"What's wrong?" Amay asked, tilting her head.

"She's going to see you."

"Yeah?" Amay replied, rather confused. "Isn't that what we want?"

"She's. Going. To. See. You." Lucas tried breaking it down for her. He forgot he was spending his day with a demon girl who looked nothing human with her red eyes, hair, and teeth. "Fuck. How are we going to figure this out." He started to panic.

"Lucas," Amay said, trying to stop him.

"God. How do I explain this to her?"

"Lucas."

"Hey, Lucas?" Ann's voice spoke out as she found the exact store they were in no time.

Lucas nearly screamed until Amay placed a hand over his mouth. He then looked down at Amay, who had her finger pointed towards a mirror. His eyes followed her finger before landing at the reflection in the mirror. He saw a short Asian girl with equally long hair like Amay, but was black instead of red, wearing her clothing and standing in her place. He started to look at both, trying to wrap his mind around it.

"Remember the necklace." She whispered to him as she saw his friend get closer. "Act natural, and I will explain later when she leaves. " When she spoke, Lucas could tell in her voice of serious she was.

"Uh. What's going on here!" Ann said, raising her voice. She was a little surprised to see a girl with her hand over Lucas's mouth. She eyed down Amay like a hawk and then Lucas as she tried to piece together what was happening here.

"Explain yourself, Lucas." She said, crossing her arms while tapping her foot.

"Wha-Why would you think I'm responsible for this?" Lucas she raising away from Amay, who took a step back.

"Because you are always up to something. I swear Chris is a bad influence on you." She said, shaking her head a little. Her attention then turned back to Amay. She looked Amay up and down for a moment before looking back at Lucas. "Why is she dressed like this? Did he do anything to you?" Her eyes darted back to Lucas.

"What? No!" Lucas said, feeling flustered. He then saw a wicked grin grew across Amay face as she left him alone to explain. "No...She's the daughter of one of my mom's friends…..who moved from...Japan?" Lucas lied and looked at Amay, who nodded her head about the location.

"Hmmm. Okay." Ann seemed skeptical but bought Lucas's lie. "Why is she dress like this?" She pointed back towards Amay's clothing.

"Well, she lost her luggage on the flight. So I lent her some spares and was out shopping for new clothes." Lucas partially lying again. He then saw Ann nod her head once again, and she seemed impressed with how he reacted on his feet.

"Jesus. Why didn't you text me earlier? I would have come a lot sooner." Ann said before getting a lot close to get a better look at Amay and introduce herself. She then stuck out her hand to Amay.

"Nice to meet you. My name is Anna England, but everyone calls me Ann."

Amay smiled a little before taking the girl's hand. "Amay Yangu. It's a pleasure to meet you as well."

"I love your hair. It looks soft and very healthy. What product do you use?" Ann curiously asked Amay as she looked closer at Amay's black hair.

"Product?" Amay asked, unsure of what she meant.

"You know. What do you use to give it its silky texture and glow?" Ann said, examining Amay some more.

"Oh. I don't use any." Amay replied, feeling mostly unsure of what to say and a little embarrassed.

"Really? You're lucky. I had to do a lot to keep it from frizzing up." She said, showing Amay one spot of her sandy red hair that started to frizz. "We can discuss that later. Now, what do you need help with, sweetheart?"

"Oh." Amay was taken back by the compliment of her hair and how genuine Ann sounded. She began to fidget with her hair as she didn't look Ann in her eyes. "I need help picking out underwear and stuff." She said, feeling embarrassed when saying it out loud. "I was gonna have Lucas help me, but-" She then stopped when Ann held out her hand.

"Stop right there. That was your first mistake." She told Amay before turning her attention back to Lucas, who looked guilty even though he did nothing wrong. She shook her head at him before turning back to Amay. "Well, don't say anymore. I'm here to help you out."

"Really?" Amay asked, both shock and surprised

"Yup. Yup. Don't worry. I got you." Ann playfully said while winking at Amay. She then turned back to Lucas. "Give us a few, and we will meet you in the food court."

"Oh. Are you sure?" Lucas asked, concerned.

"Bye, Lucas," Ann said, smiling at Lucas as a visible vein appears on her head.

Lucas swallowed hard and grabbed the bags that were resting where he was sitting. He then handed Ann the card to pay for everything and did what she said. This caused Amay and her to giggle at one another as they went straight to work.