-- EYE FOR AN EYE [Josh]

Joshua did not run away from fights. Unlike most of his new and more pacifistic allies, picking a fight with him or wronging him in some way usually meant that you'd be on the receiving end of a punch sometime soon no matter how much stronger than him you were. At the same time, he did not have a death wish. The group of Thunders who had spent a lot of time heckling him during the last war and threatening violence were goofing off loudly in the back of his Biology class to the point where the teacher had actually threatened to kick them out and it was when one of them reverted to the childish habit of flinging erasers and other small objects around the room that Josh realised there might be a bit of a problem. A pen collided rather sharply with the back of his head and it took massive amounts of composure not to turn around and snap at them. Just ignore them, he thought, his grip tightening on the pencil he was holding to the point where his fingers started to go white. They were not throwing things at him in particular but that didn't matter to his temper problem. One had still made contact. That was enough. He relaxed his grip on the writing utensil and took a breath, shaking his head before going back to the essay notes. Though it would be typed up on the computer and sent in by email he preferred to do his notes freehand. It was an old habit from middle and high school where he'd not been permitted to have a laptop with him in the class.

Regardless of the fact that they'd been paying him little attention other than to occasionally misfire their ammunition and strike him with it, Josh made sure to pack up his stuff a little early and leave with the majority of the class rather than checking things over and moving more slowly. He didn't run from fights but he certainly wanted to avoid them if he could--especially when they were with people who clearly outmatched him. His power was superior to theirs by strengths and weaknesses but there were a number of them. He stood no chance and even the proud, stubborn Fire graduate could admit that. They'd almost managed to jump him one day in the halls; if his professor hadn't came by and broke up the fighting, he would have been a mess in the medical wing for the rest of the week. He was thinking such bitter thoughts about the Thunders and what he'd like to do to them if he didn't have to worry about getting into trouble that he didn't notice Hayden walk past him and similarly didn't realise that there was someone familiar in the stairwell. Unlike Devin, Josh always kept his eyes ahead and his stature proud. Old habits die hard, after all. In fact it was not until he noticed a Thunder divert their gaze and chuckle at something Josh had not seen that the Fire paused.

"Shit -- Devin?"

His tone was coloured with slight shock, not even comprehending enough to sound concerned quite yet. He stopped, giving a glare to the students who had just walked on by, and surveyed the condition of his friend with worried gray eyes. "What happened to you, man?" War was rough and so Josh understood this was probably just another result of the fighting that frequently went on but he had a sinking feeling that Dev had not deserved this. It was just like with Nell and a majority of the other Earths that he had gotten in good with--they weren't fighters, they hardly ever deserved what they got. Once upon a time he had been sided against his best friend but he'd always just ignored his best buddy in school, pretended that they didn't know one another. He'd stuck to his alliances, so much that he'd been elected as leader in his twelfth grade year. Everything had changed and now that he was seeing his old alliance from an outsiders point of view it made him uncomfortable sometimes. He'd never really considered wrong from right back then. The school had been divided mainly between 'allies' and 'enemies' and he'd never given much question to it. Josh stuck out his hand in an offer to help Devin up. "Which way'd they go?" he asked a little hotly. "'Cause I could get them back for you if you wanted." He was always willing to fight. It was probably pointless to ask his too nice bestie but hell, violence was his knee-jerk reaction to a lot of things.

Joshua did not react well to seeing a friend in so much pain. His instinctual reaction was to walk off and go find the person who'd done this to Devin, give him some injuries to cry about, but rationality reminded him that he did not know who had done this to Devin or where they'd run off to afterwards. "Fucking Fire elementals," he hissed under his breath. He got uncomfortable when others openly bashed his element being that there was still an ingrained part of him that felt that loyalty but at present it was completely overrun by anger for his friend's injuries. It wouldn't have bothered him half as much if he hadn't known Devin and the way he behaved around people. He treated his friends in Earth much the way he treated his little sister--he had a protective complex over them. He let out another string of cuss words for good measure and shook his head. "Shit." It was less profane than the rest of the words he'd just dropped but it was also quieter and more controlled. He was trying to get a good enough hold on his temper to handle the situation with a level head, which was quite the effort for a guy like Joshua. "No problem." His response to Devin's thanks was a little short but it was not his best friend he was angry with. His temper seeped into the cracks and saturated every aspect of his personality when it was set off for whatever reason--no matter who he was talking to, he sounded angry and impatient by default for a little while.

He gave Devin a searching look when he waved his hand and denied knowing where the boy had went. Sometimes it was hard to tell whether someone was telling the truth or else just covering up for something. It would be just like him to protect that asshole. He felt the same sort of exasperation toward Devin that he often did toward Nell but decided to just take his word for it in the end. Devin had been on the ground, after all, maybe he hadn't gotten a good look at where the guy that had attacked him had went. He ran a hand through the back of his dark hair, shaking slightly. He noticed the burns on his friend's face and chewed the inside of his lip thoughtfully. "Shouldn't you get that treated?" He was a Fire elemental and thus could reverse the damage done by burns but the fact that he did not offer betrayed the fact he did not trust himself at the moment. Healing took great levels of concentration and right now he was preoccupied by his anger. If he tried to help his best buddy out right now he'd probably end up making it worse. "It'll scar if you leave it too long." He was pretty sure that Devin didn't want to go around with burns on his face. Joshua knew what it was like to have scars on one's face. Unfortunately, his had not been inflicted elemental and thus he was stuck with it. He wouldn't wish it upon a friend. Maybe an enemy--no one said Joshua had very strong compassion or empathy, after all.

He was still a bit worked up in terms of anger when his friend grabbed his arm. It was a mark of their friendship that Joshua only stiffened rather than instinctively punching him in the face. He was very reckless and tended to act on impulse when he was in a temper and it wouldn't have been the first time that a simple gesture ended in physical violence. He'd never hurt Devin before but he couldn't guarantee even to himself that he never would. He gave a stiff nod and forced himself to relax a little bit. "Sure thing." A couple of Fire elementals they passed gave them dirty looks but he was glad that no one had the balls to mess with them. Joshua was angry enough that he would dish out relentless damage in a fight at the moment but his fighting style when enraged was not necessarily safe for a cramped place like a hallway. He preferred the open air and enough space that he could blast his enemy without worrying about anyone else (especially someone like Devin) being on the receiving end as well. Normally he would have sought out his girlfriend in the mess hall and sat with her. He still remembered the day back before they'd been so much as friends when she'd insisted on sitting with him. But hey, Dev needed his company more right now. The Academy students could be ruthless--if you were weakened they wouldn't usually cut you a break to be fair but attack you twice as much.

Kind words and a soothing demeanour did very little to placate the temperamental Fire elemental, even when they came from his best friend. His anger was not something that could be readily calmed just because it was inconvenient to a situation and Devin probably knew that himself. A small part of Josh appreciated the effort but that small part was currently buried beneath the mountain of anger that was crushing his other senses at the moment. A part of him was almost glad that he had not made plans to hang out with Nell because in his current state he would have had to cancel so as not to get snappy toward her as well. He should maybe have felt bad for Devin as well but considering if Josh hadn't found him someone else less friendly might have, the alternative was not preferable. Besides, his capacity for guilt was very low and usually didn't involve feeling bad for more than one person at a time. Underneath all his stoic demeanour he felt bad about a lot of things but he would only allow himself to acknowledge it on rare occasions so that he did not have to come to terms with the bad things he'd done to the people he actually felt for in his life. He did indeed 'drop it' when Devin suggested doing so but it was with a fierce expression and no ounce of humour even as his best pal tried to lighten up the mood a little. He generally had to be in good temperament for joking to have any effect on him and as standards went this was far from 'good'.

Of course, being who he was Josh did not necessarily approve of the Earth boy's decision to avoid a trip to the medical wing. This showed in the way his default scowl (default when he was angry, at least) slipped into a bit more of a disapproving but concerned frown. At the same time, he also understood. He got the whole 'pride before a fall' thing and just hoped that Devin didn't have to endure the falling bit. He wanted to insist upon it but didn't want to come across as a hypocrite--since when did he go to the medical wing for injuries, after all?--and so he just gave a reluctant nod to accept this, his features relaxing back into their scowl. Could that even be called relaxation? It was actually more of a reverse process. It was not until Devin cracked a joke about scarring that he got a real sort of reaction from Joshua. It was an immediate and very noticeable change in demeanour as his gray gaze hardened and went cold, actually glaring slightly as he fixed Devin with a look. "Oh, do they?" His voice was scathing. "I've never had that experience." It was unfair to treat his best friend like that when Dev had only been trying to lighten the mood but scars were a sensitive subject for the Fire. Not even Nell could fully evade some sort of negative reaction--she'd gotten his self-consciousness rather than his anger, but it was still clear that it affected him greatly. He hated the scar on his face. Even if girls did 'dig' scars, that was hardly consolation for the fact that many people saw it as a mark of a bad person. After all, how else would someone get a scar on their face apart from criminal behaviour?

Not only that, but scars were reminders. They didn't vanish overnight and for several years, perhaps even the rest of his life with how badly it had healed and left a mark, he would have a constant mark of the gang with him. He had other scars, too, ones that weren't as immediately apparent. Devin probably didn't even know about those, save for the scars on his ribs. They'd been subtle enough that he had always just made up excuses when he'd taken off his shirt and people had asked. Now he hardly ever removed his shirt in front of others (except Nell, accidentally, who had freaked out) so that he wouldn't get the questions. The gang had changed him. His best friend didn't know the story and so judging him was, again, unfair, but, again, that did not matter to Joshua. He at least tried to relax as they walked to the mess hall, having enough respect for his buddy that he didn't just walk off to find other company. He might have been touchy about the scars but that didn't mean he'd abandon an (injured) friend in the mess hall to fend for themselves. Especially when that friend was Devin. "How's that girlfriend of yours?" he asked conversationally, making an attempt to divert the conversation back to something less sour. "Marianna, wasn't it?" Sometimes it was hard for him to keep up with who Devin was dating at any given time. Josh had only 'dated' once and he was still with her but he supposed his countless number of one-night-stands had been pretty hard to juggle internally as well.

[... I feel bad for Dev. Josh is so... angry. x.x]