The fallout from James Rowe's suspension didn't just shake a few circles on campus—it shattered the entire social hierarchy that Derek Holloway had ruled over for years.
By Monday morning, the whispers had already evolved into open conversation. In lecture halls, students leaned across desks to speculate. In dining halls, whole tables discussed the scandal. Professors who normally avoided gossip muttered about "a failure of academic integrity" and "the influence of privilege on justice."
For the first time since anyone could remember, Derek Holloway was not the subject of admiration, envy, or respect. He was the subject of suspicion.
The Campus Shifts
Ethan Cooper observed it all from a distance.
Walking through the quad, he noted subtle changes. Derek used to move like a storm front—students parting before him, nervous laughter echoing in his wake. Now, the same students made eye contact, then looked away deliberately, pretending not to notice him. Some whispered; some smirked.
Ethan caught Ryan's words one afternoon in the dining hall.
"Have you noticed?" Ryan asked, lowering his voice though his grin was plain. "People don't move out of Derek's way anymore. Last month, the guy was king of the school. Now he's… toxic."
Clara, across from him, stirred her food without appetite. "And Ethan?" she asked softly.
Ryan leaned back, his tone half-amused, half-awed. "He's untouchable. Like he wants people to challenge him just so he can break them."
Clara's eyes wandered the hall until they landed on Ethan, seated alone at a far table. He read a thick hardcover with quiet focus. Students sat near him, but not with him, forming a subtle circle of distance. Nobody dared mock him anymore. But nobody dared draw too close, either.
Clara whispered, almost to herself, "He doesn't even look human sometimes."
The Crumbling Throne
Meanwhile, Derek's kingdom was collapsing from within.
In the frat house, tension simmered like a pot about to boil over. Empty beer cans littered the carpet. Derek stood in the kitchen, his face red with anger and alcohol.
He slammed a beer bottle against the counter. Glass shattered across the tile. His allies—what few he had left—flinched but said nothing.
"James was supposed to be clean!" Derek barked, shards glittering at his feet. "One slip-up, and now it looks like I'm behind it all."
No one answered immediately. Then one of the guys—Marcus, broad-shouldered, usually loyal—cleared his throat. "Maybe… maybe just let it go, Derek. Cooper's not worth it."
The silence afterward was sharp enough to cut skin.
Derek turned, his glare burning with fury. "Not worth it?" His voice cracked, raw. "He humiliated me. Twice. If I don't crush him, I'm finished. My family's name—my future—everything rides on this."
The vulnerability slipped out before he could cage it, and for a moment, Derek looked less like a leader and more like a drowning man. Then rage swallowed him again. He grabbed his jacket and stormed out into the night, slamming the door hard enough to rattle the frames on the walls.
Shadows and Doubts
Clara left the library late that same night, her bag heavy with textbooks. The campus paths were dim, lined with skeletal trees swaying in the wind. Her footsteps echoed in the stillness.
Then she heard another pair.
"Clara."
She spun around, pulse hammering. Derek emerged from the shadows, his face drawn tight, eyes bloodshot.
"Derek?" Her voice wavered. "What do you want?"
"I need to talk to you," he said, voice low but urgent. "About Ethan."
Clara stiffened. "I don't want to get involved."
"You're already involved." Derek stepped closer, his desperation leaking through. "You're always with him. You see what he's doing. He's dangerous, Clara. He's manipulating you, manipulating all of us. You think he's some poor underdog? He's a predator."
Her chest tightened. Ethan's cold precision did haunt her. But Derek's voice—so full of venom—felt like poison.
"You framed him," she snapped. "Or did you forget that?"
"That wasn't me!" Derek's words tumbled out fast. "James went rogue."
"You expect me to believe that?"
"Clara…" His tone shifted, softer, desperate. "You don't understand. Cooper doesn't care about you. He doesn't care about anyone. He's using you to look normal, to look human. The second you're not useful, he'll drop you. I know his type."
The words struck deeper than Clara wanted to admit.
Ethan's gaze, Ethan's control, Ethan's cold indifference—it all replayed in her mind. A part of her wondered, What if Derek is right?
But she didn't let him see that. With trembling hands, she clutched her bag tighter and walked away without another word.
A Predator's Smile
Ethan noticed the shift in Clara immediately the next day.
She sat beside him in class, pale, distracted, her hands fidgeting. Her gaze darted around, avoiding his.
"You ran into him," Ethan said quietly.
She blinked, startled. "How do you—"
"I told you," he said evenly. "Predictable men. Derek cornered you, didn't he?"
Her throat went dry. "He said you're dangerous. That you don't… care about anyone."
Ethan finally turned to look at her. His eyes were calm, unblinking, like still water. "And you believed him?"
"I— I don't know what to believe."
For a moment, silence stretched between them. Then Ethan leaned closer, his voice low, sharp enough to cut.
"Clara, do you think I've survived this long by being soft? Do you think people like Derek would hesitate to destroy me if I let them?"
His gaze was relentless, holding hers captive. "You don't have to like the way I fight. You just have to decide whose side you're on."
Clara's chest tightened. She wanted to tell him people weren't all enemies, that life wasn't a battlefield. But the memory of Derek's venom in the dark silenced her.
The Boiling Point
Derek snapped that same week.
The library steps glowed under yellow lamplight as Ethan walked out one evening, the weight of quiet victory in his stride. He had predicted Derek's trajectory: anger, isolation, desperation. Now came the collapse.
"Cooper!"
The voice rang out sharp. Students froze mid-step, turning.
Derek strode forward, fists clenched, his face a twisted mask of rage and exhaustion. His tie was loose, his shirt untucked, eyes bloodshot from nights of drinking.
"You think you're smarter than me?" Derek's voice cracked with fury. "You think you can humiliate me in front of everyone and just walk away?"
Ethan didn't flinch. He spoke with surgical calm. "I don't think it, Derek. I know it."
Gasps rippled through the onlookers.
Derek lunged. His fist swung wide, fueled more by desperation than aim. Ethan sidestepped with effortless precision. Derek stumbled, crashing against the railing, skin scraping metal.
"Pathetic," Ethan murmured.
The crowd whispered. Phones appeared in hands. Some recorded.
Derek turned, blood on his knuckles, eyes wide and feral. "I'll ruin you!" he screamed. "If it's the last thing I do, I'll ruin you!"
Ethan stepped close enough for Derek alone to hear. His voice was ice.
"You already have. Yourself."
And with that, he walked away. The crowd parted for him like water, murmurs swirling in his wake. Behind him, Derek's voice cracked into the night, half-scream, half-plea.
Reflections in Glass
Clara stood at the edge of the crowd, her heart pounding.
She saw Derek—broken, furious, a prince stripped of his crown. She saw Ethan—cold, flawless, untouchable.
And she heard Derek's words echo in her mind.
He doesn't care about anyone. He's using you.
When she looked at Ethan now, calmly dismantling Derek without raising a hand, she felt a chill spread through her. Was Derek's warning not a lie… but a mirror?
That night, she lay awake staring at the ceiling. Ethan's voice, sharp and certain, whispered in memory:
"You don't have to like the way I fight. You just have to decide whose side you're on."
Her chest tightened.
Because she realized she wasn't sure anymore which side was safe.