The warehouse was still. The kind of silence that settles after terror. The kind of quiet that only exists when the prey knows it has nowhere left to run.
Samantha was gone. Ren was safe.
Only Lexie remained.
And the fifteen thugs? Still here. Still breathing.
That wouldn't last.
Lexie Xanthe Villareal stood in the center of the warehouse, surrounded by the same boys who had laughed and jeered just minutes ago. Now they were quiet. Wide-eyed. Trembling.
She was different from them. Not just in skill, or strength, or speed. She was different in nature. Lexie was a predator. They were nothing but animals pretending to be wolves.
She took off her jacket and laid it on a nearby crate. Rolled up her sleeves.
No words. Just movement.
The first boy to run didn't even get past the exit before she was on him. Her boot cracked across his shin, sending him sprawling with a shriek. She dragged him back by the collar of his shirt, like a parent yanking a disobedient child.
"Let's start with you," she whispered.
She knelt on his back, pinning him easily. Her hand clamped over his wrist. She extended one of his fingers.
"You touched her, didn't you?"
"I-I didn't mean to—"
Crack.
The finger bent sideways. The boy's scream was raw, animalistic.
She held up another finger.
"This one?"
Crack.
Tears spilled freely. His feet kicked uselessly against the cement floor.
"Please, please!"
Lexie leaned close, her voice steady.
"There is no 'please' for people like you."
Crack. Crack.
She shattered each finger slowly, deliberately. She made sure he felt every tendon tear, every ligament snap.
By the time she stood, he had passed out.
Fourteen left.
She turned, her face splattered with blood, eyes cold.
"Strip."
Kenji stepped forward, trembling. "Wh-What?"
"All of you. Now."
"Why?" one of the boys whimpered.
"Because you don't deserve the protection of your clothes. You're animals."
They hesitated.
She moved.
A backhand across a cheek, hard enough to spin the boy's head and knock a tooth loose. The others obeyed immediately, dropping their jackets and outerwear, some sobbing in fear.
Kenji tried to speak. Lexie silenced him with a look. Then she approached him.
"You remember what you said to Samantha?" she asked.
He shook his head frantically.
"You said you wanted to taste her. You said she should scream for you."
Kenji pissed himself.
Lexie pulled a small blade from her back pocket. It gleamed in the dull light.
"Here's what's going to happen," she said calmly. "You're going to take this knife. You're going to cut off your left ear."
He blinked. "W-What?"
"If you don't," she said, "I'll cut off both ears. Then your lips. Then your dick. And I'll leave you alive to enjoy the rest."
Kenji screamed. "P-Please—No! No, I can't—"
She began to count.
"Five."
"No!"
"Four."
The other boys backed away. No one dared interfere.
"Three."
Kenji sobbed. "I'll do it! I'll do it!"
He took the blade with shaking hands. Held it to his ear.
Lexie watched without flinching as he sawed through flesh. It was slow, brutal. Blood streamed down his neck, his screams nearly inhuman.
The ear fell to the floor with a wet plop.
Kenji collapsed, clutching the side of his head.
Lexie moved to the next boy. The one who'd called Samantha a 'doll to be broken.'
She didn't speak.
She slammed him against the wall, gripped his arm, and began to twist.
He screamed as his shoulder popped free of the socket. Then she let him drop and stomped on his elbow, shattering it with a wet, sickening crunch.
Twelve left.
She grabbed another. Slammed his face into the ground. Blood sprayed. His nose broke instantly.
She pulled a rusty nail from a nearby beam and hammered it into his foot, pinning him in place.
She made him watch her torture the next one.
This boy was crying before she even touched him.
"Please…" he whispered. "Please, Lexie…"
She didn't answer.
Instead, she used her blade to peel the skin from his palm, layer by layer, exposing raw flesh.
He shrieked. Scratched at the wall. Tried to crawl away.
She stomped on his leg.
"You wanted her to crawl too, right?" she said.
Then she took the blade and cut across his Achilles tendon.
He wouldn't walk again.
The next one fought back. Swung a metal rod at her.
Lexie ducked, slammed her fist into his throat, and swept his legs.
He collapsed, choking.
She drove her heel into his stomach. Again. Again. Cracked his ribs.
Then she knelt over him and slit his cheek open, exposing the muscle underneath.
Ten left.
The next tried to plead. Claimed he never touched Samantha.
"But you watched," she said.
He nodded. Too afraid to lie.
Lexie dragged him to the center. Forced him to his knees.
Then she used zip ties to bind his wrists. His ankles.
She whispered, "Ever felt what it's like to suffocate?"
She covered his mouth with duct tape. Poured water over his face, slowly, carefully. Simulating drowning.
He convulsed. Choked. Panicked.
Then she stopped.
"That's what fear feels like."
The others started to beg in unison.
"We're sorry!"
"We didn't know!"
"Please stop!"
Lexie looked at them. All of them.
Fifteen boys bloodied, broken, and barely standing pressed their backs against the stained concrete walls, eyes wide with something beyond fear. It wasn't just terror anymore. It was dread. That suffocating, paralyzing realization that the thing in front of them wasn't a girl, wasn't a classmate—
It was vengeance wearing a human face.
And for a long moment… silence.
The only sounds were the drip of water from the ceiling… and the occasional moan from those already unconscious on the floor.
Lexie stepped forward, slow and measured.
"You hurt people," she said, her voice level. Not raised, not trembling. Just cold.
"You beat my boyfriend until he couldn't move. You tied him to a chair and made him watch. You kicked him. You spat on him. You left him gasping for air while he begged for his inhaler."
She stopped walking. Her shadow loomed over them like a guillotine.
"He almost died."
Her jaw clenched. Her hands, stained in red, curled into fists.
"He has asthma. And you made it worse. You knew. You heard him choking."
She looked straight at Kenji.
"You laughed."
Kenji whimpered, still clutching the side of his head where his ear had once been.
Lexie crouched beside him, just enough so he could see the fury simmering in her eyes.
"You ever hear what it sounds like when someone you love is trying to breathe and can't?" she whispered.
He didn't answer. He couldn't.
She pulled a crowbar from a nearby worktable, its rusted edge still wet with blood.
She stood up, turned to the rest of the boys.
"I'm going to make sure none of you ever hurt him again. None of you walk right again. None of you forget what you did."
She tapped the crowbar against her palm once.
"Now."
Then she moved.
The first boy she grabbed tried to run. Lexie was faster.
She hooked the crowbar behind his knee and yanked hard.
His leg snapped sideways, bone crunching with a sharp crack. He screamed as he hit the ground.
Lexie pressed her boot down on his thigh, trapping him in place. Then she raised the crowbar—
And brought it down on his foot.
Once.
Twice.
Each toe flattened, crushed under iron and fury.
"You like to kick people when they're down, huh?" she said softly as he screamed beneath her. "You did that to Ren."
She raised the crowbar again.
And kept going.
By the time she stood, his foot was pulp.
Another boy tried to crawl away.
Lexie grabbed him by the ankle and flipped him over, landing a boot to his chest to knock the wind from his lungs.
She pulled a pair of pliers from the same table.
"You punched him in the face, didn't you?" she asked.
He sobbed. "No—please—"
She slammed the pliers into his mouth, grabbed a front tooth, and yanked.
The scream tore through the warehouse. Blood sprayed her hand.
"One," she said.
She reached in again. Yanked another.
"Two."
She didn't stop until five teeth were in her hand like grisly trophies.
She dropped them on his chest and moved on.
The next one had called Ren a 'spineless loser' while they beat him.
Lexie dragged him by the hair to the middle of the room and tied his arms behind a pole.
"You like watching, right?" she said. "Let me give you a show."
She rolled up his sleeve and made a single deep cut down his forearm.
The skin parted. He wailed.
Lexie held up the same crowbar and smashed his elbow from behind.
Then again.
And again.
Until the arm bent backward unnaturally, bone cracking loudly in the air.
He sagged, whimpering. She leaned in close.
"You'll never hold anyone down again," she whispered.
Another boy, shaking violently, begged. "I didn't touch him—I just watched!"
She turned to him.
"And that makes you better?"
He froze.
Lexie grabbed his hand, placed it flat against the floor.
"You watched him suffer. Did nothing."
Her heel came down on his palm.
"Do nothing now."
She crushed each finger beneath her foot, slow and deliberate, until every knuckle shattered like dry twigs.
His screams echoed through the warehouse like sirens.
She turned to another boy—silent, trying to hold in tears.
"You dislocated his shoulder."
She reached down, grabbed his arm, and forced it out sideways.
"No—NO—NO—!"
She twisted hard.
The pop of his shoulder coming out of socket was immediate.
Then she rotated further.
A louder crack—his humerus snapped in half.
She dropped his limp arm like trash and moved on.
One boy had passed out from blood loss. Lexie woke him up—by throwing a bucket of cold water in his face.
"You're not done yet," she whispered.
He trembled.
Lexie tied his arm to a beam, took a serrated hacksaw from the wall.
"Don't worry," she said. "I'll stop before the bone."
The first cut opened the skin, the saw's teeth ripping through muscle. His shrieks rose in pitch.
Second cut—deeper.
Tendons snapped like rubber bands.
Blood sprayed, thick and fast.
She stopped just above the bone and stared into his eyes.
"You feel that?" she asked. "That's your body remembering pain. So you'll remember him. Every time your arm aches in the cold, you'll remember."
She dropped the saw. Walked away.
Another boy tried to fight. He stood and ran at her with a jagged metal rod.
Lexie didn't flinch.
She sidestepped the swing, caught his arm mid-strike, and drove her knee into his ribs—three quick, surgical strikes. Something cracked.
He stumbled.
Lexie grabbed the back of his neck and slammed him face-first into the ground.
Then she took a hammer and drove it down on his spine.
He twitched. Then stopped moving.
Not dead—just broken.
She stood over him and whispered, "That's what happens when you raise a hand to someone better than you."
Now there were only a few conscious.
One was sobbing, curled in a fetal position.
Another was trying to pray.
Lexie ignored them.
She walked slowly through the blood-slick floor, eyes sweeping across what remained—fifteen boys who had believed themselves untouchable.
Fifteen who had chosen violence, cruelty, humiliation.
Now each of them was broken. Maimed. Humbled.
She stopped at the center again. Raised her voice just enough to be heard.
"You thought no one would come for him. That nobody cared."
She looked down at her blood-soaked hands.
"You were wrong."
Then she took a final step toward Kenji—trembling, barely conscious.
She grabbed his arm and pressed a small carving knife to his wrist.
"You hurt the boy I love."
He whimpered. "Please no more…"
"You think you deserve mercy?" she asked.
He nodded desperately.
Lexie shook her head.
"Mercy is for victims."
She began to cut.
The blade split the skin slowly, deliberately. Kenji screamed, flailing weakly. Blood poured down his arm in thick streams.
She cut deeper through fat, through muscle.
The knife scraped bone.
She let go. Let him scream. Let the pain sink in.
Then she whispered, "You'll live. But you'll never forget what you did."
By the end, the warehouse floor was soaked in blood and tears. Not a single square foot untouched by pain.
Lexie stood among the wreckage—her hands trembling, not from fear… but from restraint. Her breathing was calm, too calm. The silence was broken only by the whimpering of her victims.
Fifteen bodies lay groaning, crying, their limbs twisted at unnatural angles. Most were barely conscious. Some couldn't move at all. But Lexie? She wasn't finished.
She walked up to one of the boys still twitching on the floor.
"Still breathing?" she asked coldly. "Good."
He opened his mouth to beg—
—but she stomped on his ribs with her full weight.
Crack.
He screamed, a bubbling cry from deep in his throat.
"You think crying gets you out of this?" she hissed. "You think whimpering makes you a victim now?"
She grabbed his arm already dislocated and twisted it further until the joint popped again.
"You all thought he was weak because he was kind. Because he smiled. Because he didn't fight back."
She yanked another boy by his collar, dragging him through a smear of blood. He was limp, dazed.
"'Asthmatic freak,' that's what you called him, right?"
She kicked his stomach so hard his body lifted an inch off the ground.
"You made him choke! You mocked him while he suffocated!"
She brought the crowbar down on his shoulder. Once. Twice. Until the bone crunched beneath it.
Another groan nearby.
Lexie turned to a boy sobbing quietly into the floor.
"You're praying now?" she asked. "You should've prayed when you tied him up."
She stomped on his ankle, heard the break, then grabbed a pipe and beat his leg until it went silent.
Still, she moved.
One by one.
A face already purple with bruises. A stomach already covered in boot prints. A hand half-crushed from before.
She revisited each of them, as if ensuring the punishment matched the crime.
She pressed her knee into a neck not enough to kill, but enough to remind him he was one gasp away from death.
She peeled the skin off another's shoulder with the blade not fast, but slow, deliberate.
The screams returned. Hoarse. Ragged. But still alive.
"You don't get to cry your way out of this" Lexie whispered. "You get to live with what you've done. Every broken finger, every crushed bone this is what justice feels like."
Only when none of them could speak did she stop.
Only when even their cries were nothing more than breathless sobs and gurgles did she rise.
She didn't look back.
She didn't need to.
Justice had not just been delivered.
It had been carved into their bones.
And none of them none of them would ever touch Ren again.