Caught in the Crossfire

"C'mon Louis! You can do better than that!" Wren hollered.

Louis grunted a reply and swung his fist to give a mighty punch on Wren's punching mitts. The force however, didn't do much as the girl was still in her original position, feet firmly in place. The tanned lad gave an exasperated cry and threw both his hands in the air.

"I give up! This is hopeless!" he yelled.

Wren and Louis had been sparring deep inside Stratford forest, throwing kicks and punches to each other. Seeing that Wren took up mixed martial arts and had been training since she was eight, the brunette clearly had an upper hand over the lanky lad, who had no experience in self defence whatsoever.

Wren dropped her arms by her sides, pulling the mitts off her hands. Brushing aside a lock of damp hair off her face, she breathed out a loud sigh and glared at Louis.

"So that's it? You're giving up?" she asked sarcastically. "I didn't know you were a bloody wimp, Lou."

Louis shrugged off Wren's remark and continued to pack his things into his knapsack. It had been a long day and he figured it was about time that the both of them made their way home.

"I'm talking to you, Louis."

"I know. But we have been sparring from morning and I'm tired, and I know you are too. It's time to go home and continue again another day," he reasoned. Louis hastily threw what's left of his belongings into the bag and zipped it shut.

"Lou!"

Louis sighed and turned to face his partner. "I already told — What's the matter?" he asked after seeing Wren's face creased with worry.

She slipped her mobile into her sweatpants pocket and answered Louis.

"Pen called. It's an emergency."



The atmosphere surrounding the ten youths in the large room was awkward and tensed. Everyone seemed to be on edge except for Harry, who was calmly sipping his iced lemon tea, a bored expression etched on his handsome face.

Wren gave Penelope a little nudge before the bespectacled girl walked nervously to the middle of the room to address them all.

"H-hi everyone. Th-thanks for coming to our very first meeting," she stuttered.

"No problem, love," Harry replied loudly, raising his glass of tea while others murmured their responses.

Penelope nodded and continued. "We're all gathered here for a purpose and I'm sure we all know what's the reason."

"Umm, I think you skipped the introductions, sweetheart," Harry piped up, smirking. He received a glare from Ashton and a hard nudge to the ribs with that.

"Ow!"

Liam stood up and walked over to Penelope. "I'll take it from here," he whispered to her. She gave a sigh of relief and made her way back to her seat.

"Let's start from the beginning," Liam said in a loud, authoritative voice. "My name's Liam and that's my partner, Penelope. All of you must have known that both Penny and myself have taken the initiative to come to each one of you, asking for help."

"Each of us are special individuals who possess certain abilities in which I think, can be made to good use in fighting crime."

Liam went about introducing each person in the room starting with Harry, since they had decided to base the team in his house.

"I see you've been busy, Pen," Wren mumbled softly. "But awesome work, babe."

"Ah, yes. I've got to give you credit on managing fire boy as well," Penelope replied, winking.

"So yesterday's attack on the London Eye left a lot of innocent people scarred. Thanks to Harry and Ashton here, we managed to stop the fires from spreading," Liam said.

"Which maniac would do this?" Louis asked suddenly.

"Some crazy pyromaniac, I'd guess," Harry quipped. "There had been a lot of explosion and fire reported throughout London these past few weeks or so. Someone must be too happy, playing with fire."

Wren glanced at her partner and saw Louis' ears turning red. She caught a flash of amber in his ocean blue eyes. The lanky lad stiffened before standing up abruptly.

"I have to go."

Louis made a dash to the door despite the calls from his team mates with Wren chasing after him.

"Louis!"

"What's the matter with him?" Harry asked, running a hand through his mop of curls.

"His ability is manipulating fire, Mr Sensitivity," Liam answered sarcastically.