“Thank you, again, boys.” Mrs. Dime told the three men, Jack, Taro, and Tea. The three were here to drop off their kill, the young boar. Jack was still exhausted, but he can keep being a regular person in social situations. He felt like taking a nap when he goes home. He hasn’t fully recovered from the ride back.
“No problem, ma’am,” said Tea, “The three of us will be over in the morning. I have to teach them how to make game last a long time.” Mrs. Dime just gave a knowing smile and nod. Taro seemed like he knew what Tea was talking about, but Jack only had a vague idea. It was either making it all into jerky, or learning how to cook certain parts of the meat. Either way, he hoped that he sleeps like a baby tonight so he isn’t so tired tomorrow.
“Actually,” Mrs. Dime realized, “why don’t I cook some of the meat for you three? The young men seemed to need a break.” Mrs. Dime was looking at Jack and his tired posture when she said that. “I don’t-” Tea tried to reject as he looked at the two students of his, but backtracked when he saw the state that Jack was in. “You know what, it would be nice to have a place of rest. Taro, Jack, follow Mrs. Dime to her home and learn how to cook boar.” Tea gave Mrs. Dime an apologetic look.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, but I have to get home to eat my wife’s cooking. She wouldn’t like it if I’ve eaten before eating her meals.” Mrs. Dime waved that off, “I understand, Tea. Please, go home and see to your wife and children.” She paused, “Ah, right. School’s not over yet. Just go to your wife and spend time with her. You still have a few more hours before school’s out. Just make sure she enjoys your time together.” She wiggled her eyebrows at Tea with that last line.
Tea laughed, waved goodbye, and left in his truck. Jack and Taro followed Mrs. Dime back to her home, but Jack was too tired to care or listen at this point.
You see, Jack’s idea of using his body enhancement technique at a lower intensity for longer periods worked wonderfully, but he has just hit something that he hadn’t encountered before when it came to training it. His body only had some sausages and toast for breakfast at 5 in the morning, and he hasn’t had much since. Sure, Tea brought some jerky for everyone to snack on, but Jack needed more than just some bits of well done strips of meat.
His body enhancement technique enhanced everything about his body. From strength, speed, recovery, and durability, it enhanced it all and then some. The “some” that Jack was talking about was his metabolism. Even at a low intensity that Jack had used for his trip back to the truck, his metabolism sped up an equivalent amount. At the time, Jack had already fully processed the breakfast he had in the morning and began to do some intense exercise in the form of pulling the equivalent of 500 pounds of weight with his body, while carrying an additional 150.
His body ran out of fuel midway through his trek and began to eat his body alive. It first targeted his fat stores, but those were already cut low due to Jack’s months-long exercise routine and somewhat frugal spending on nutritious food. Whenever he did eat food, he only ate at Tanaka’s Family restaurant and the Munchkinz. The Munchkinz were providers of some healthy food like veggies and meat, but they mostly subsisted on foods like white rice, white bread, and other foods not filled with protein. As such, his muscles haven’t been developing as he would like them to. He was much leaner now, but his muscles were only slightly bigger. At least he looked like a regular shinobi from Naruto, or the physique of one.
Anyways, the point is that Jack realized that he needed to eat more if he wanted to keep his strength rather than losing it all from low intensity body enhancement during fights or travel. This put a damper on his excitement when he realized that the low intensity technique was non-viable in the future. If he needed to eat more to make up for the usage of the technique, then…
Jack couldn’t think of anything further because of how hungry he was. He just stood there and zoned out as Mrs. Dime and Taro were talking about how to prepare the food. Mrs. Dimes noticed Jack’s situation first and told him, “Why don’t you sit down at the table while we make the meal? It’ll be quicker than you think, Taro already knows how to make the food. I’m just helping him. You can learn at a later time.” Taro nodded in agreement at this and guided Jack to the table, where Jack promptly flopped his way onto it and was almost falling asleep then and there.
By the time the food was done, Jack was no closer to an answer for how to make the low intensity body enhancement technique viable for utilitarian use. If he had to do something like he did today, something that required more power than his regular body is capable of exerting for a longer time, how can he lower his calorie consumption? The first solution he thought of was to pulse it like he’s been doing for the full power technique, but if he wanted a pulse then why not just use a pulse of full power? It would make it easy for him and would only use slightly more than a low-intensity pulse when it comes to calories. It was like the difference between 1 calorie burned and 1.75 calorie burned.
Also, he hasn’t had the same problem he had with the full powered technique. He managed to train it everyday at maximum power, and he never had such a food problem. Something funky was going on with low intensity body enhancement, but he’ll have to figure that out later.
No, the solution must deal with long term low intensity enhancement. Carrying heavy objects like today, running for a marathon without a break for breathing, or his one day dream of tree-hopping. Jumping from branch to branch in a forest of trees. His regular body wasn’t strong enough, yet, but he could theoretically do it with his body enhancement and eventual use of tree walking, whenever he got to it.
His second solution was to carry the needed calories with him, but that just exacerbated the problem. If he’s carrying such a huge amount of food, it would weigh him down more and cause him to burn more calories. He would burn less calories as he ate more and more food since he was losing weight by turning it into carbon dioxide, but it would still only give him maybe an extra 50% to 100% more duration for the technique. Plus, the weight would be slowing him down in other ways as well by holding momentum. Jack would want to suddenly turn one way, but his gear and food would still keep going in the direction he’s been going, or not move at all if he moved suddenly at a standstill.
He couldn’t think up of a third solution yet, because he was suddenly given a plate full of boar meat to chow down on. He quickly looked at the two of them with tears of gratitude in his eyes and told them, “Thank you,” before shoveling the meat down his gullet.
As the plate of meat disappeared in just a minute, Jack held up his plate. “Do you have any more? I’m still a bit hungry.” Mrs. Dime and Taro just looked at him in disbelief. Their own plates were only half as big as his, and they’ve barely taken a bite before seeing the savagery that was Jack’s eating.
“Ah, uh. Yes, Jack.” Taro let out. “I’ll, uh, go get you the rest of the pan.” Jack grinned and told him once more in gratitude, “Thanks, Taro! Man, your food is still the best in town.” Jack saw Taro’s shoulders straightened in pride as he walked over to the kitchen stove.
Mrs. Dime finally snapped out of her shock. “My goodness, young man. What happened to your manners?” Jack just looked at her in confusion before looking down at his plate. It looked like the slab of meat he ate got its grease everywhere. His sleeves already had some grease stains on them, and he could see some small droplets on the front of his shirt. He picked up the cloth napkin sitting beside him and had to find a place on it that wasn’t covered with grease to wipe the same substance off his face.
Jack could feel the heat in his face and ears. He spoke to her in an apologetic voice. “Ah, sorry about that, ma’am. I didn’t know I got so hungry.” He looked down at his shirt and the very dirty napkin in his hand. Yeah, he wasn’t going to get this cleaned up. He put down the napkin and started to pull off his shirt. “Sorry.” He told Mrs. Dime before his shirt got in his way.
Once he pulled it off, he folded it up in his arms. “Sorry to ask this, but do you have a washer he-” He stopped because he saw Mrs. Dime’s face. She was covering it with her hands, but her eyes peaked out in between her fingers. “M-My goodness. You really are a barbarian, aren’t you?” He saw some kind of line of transparent liquid that he could only deduce was saliva running down her chin.
He didn’t know how to feel about this. On the one hand he was flattered that he was hot enough to drool over. On the other, he really didn’t want to be stared at by a near senior citizen of a woman. Jack decided to take the win, ignore the other bit, and just stood up. “Oh, the washer is just i-in there, sweetie.” Take the win, Jack. Focus only on that.
As he returned from putting his shirt in the washer, and noticing there isn’t a drier, Jack headed back to the table where a Taro was looking at a red, daydreaming Mrs. Dime with a deadpanned expression. Taro looked over at Jack with it, and raised an eyebrow as if to ask, “Are you really trying to get with her?” Jack just tucked his lips in, gave an “I can’t believe you’re asking me that” look, and shook his head in a negative.
Taro seemed to accept that and just proceed to eat his own meal. “Don’t dirty yourself again, Jack. I don’t think you can leave like that.” He paused. “Or you could just use your pants, instead. But then you’d have to get down to your underwear to clean it.” Mrs. Dime, who just got out of daydream land, went right back in at Taro’s line.
Jack just sighed in annoyance. He sat down at the table, and began to eat his next meal very carefully. He ate the entire meal without any grease leaving the plate, yet his stomach still felt like it could handle just a little bit more.
Line Break Here
After leaving the house with a newly wet and washed shirt, since he refused to wait for it to dry, he headed straight back home. It was only around 1:15 in the afternoon once he got there, but he was still greeted by a member of the family. “Hey, you’re back early.” Disi said. She was dusting the house. “It was weird not seeing you at the table this morning. I got used to you washing the dishes after, so imagine my surprise when the kids left and I had to do dishes.”
Jack just gave a smile at the greeting. “Hey, I might not be able to do the morning dishes for the family anymore, but I lose out on your cooking.” He dramatically slumped down. “I think I just about poisoned myself.” Disi just rolled her eyes. Jack, though, looked around for someone else. “Hey, is Larry back, yet? I promised to help him out with his car today.”
Disi just stopped her dusting and turned to Jack, who had just flopped onto the living room couch. “He’s with the mayor. This morning, a man with a motorcycle came into town. He’s part of the World Army, and he’s got news on what happened.” Jack straightened up at that. He stared at her. “Well,” he ushered forth after a long pause from Disi not saying anything.
She cupped her chin, closing her eyes as if in deep thought. “Hmmm.” She hummed. Then she opened her eyes, gave Jack a confident grin and an enthusiastic thumbs up. “No clue! They didn’t tell me about it!” She said in a teasing and tittering voice.
Jack just slammed his head back onto the couch. His mouth agape with despair at the fact that he got pranked. Disi, though, just burst out into giggles once she saw Jack’s reaction. Jack closed his mouth and sighed through his nose. “Yeah, yeah, you got me.” Disi tried to respond, but it was interrupted by some of her giggles.
“Y-You know, hubbie said y-your face would be worth it. Snrk. He was right!” Then she bellowed out in laughter. Jack just stood up and walked back to his room. Disi tried to call him back, but she couldn’t over her own laughter.
Once Jack made it into his own room, he let the ‘disgruntled teenager’ act go. His smile came back. He was happy that Disi was so carefree right now. The past few days turned her into a worry wart. She was so wound up that she started snapping at everyone who dared to make even the slightest mistake in her eyes. She even said in a fit of agitation that Jack doesn’t do anything for the home, but Jack let it slide right off.
He understood, somewhat, what she was going through. She had to ration out meals until new shipments of food came in or until Jack and the others could hunt some food, like they did today. Her husband no longer had his usual job of waiting for a train. Her kids are in danger of no longer going to school, even with the mayor’s reassurances to everyone that it won’t happen. She can’t even talk to her parents and extended family that moved to East City.
She really was in a bit of a panic, but Jack didn’t blame her.
One thing Jack was surprised though was a change in Merci, the family’s youngest and only daughter. She’s been very agitated and sassy for the last few days, especially when her parents said that she couldn’t have what she wanted to eat or to go out into the town.
It made some sense, especially since Jack thinks that she just wanted to see her friends after school. Perhaps even that boy that follows her around. She might even have a crush on him, with how she really wanted to go see him after school every day.
In the end, she wasn’t allowed to by her parents. The town might be safe, for now, but their fears of bandits coming any minute now superseded Merci’s desires. Jack thought it may not be the correct call, but he could see where they were coming from.
Jack did notice that Irah and Tate flinched every time they saw Merci get told no. He figured it was because they were either thinking about how restricted they were now compared to Merci, or that they were good brothers who didn’t like to see their little sis so angry.
Either way, the marshal state that the town was in, alongside the restrictions on movement, didn’t seem to bother the two brothers. They just did their own things. Irah skated up and down the street, while Tate was reading his entire mystery novel collection.
Jack sat on his bed and pulled open the drawer from his nightstand. He took out a stack of paper notepad leaves and immediately stuck one on top of his forehead. It instantly took hold and stayed there. He then tugged on it, but it wouldn’t move. He decided to do his last test and tugged hard. With a small rip, the side he was tugging on got pulled off, but the rest stayed there, including the area that was sticking to him.
Jack nodded his head and took off the rest of it. This exercise was extremely simple to do. It made sense, though. Naruto was around 8 or 10 when he first learned this exercise, and it was meant for a class of literal children to learn focus easily in a week or a month. Jack was an adult, and had a lot of experience in learning how to focus spiritual power thanks to his past three months of training his Chakra.
Now, though, it was time to step up. Jack felt excitement rise within himself as he picked up a second paper leaf and placed it on his chest. This time, he was going to try a fanon exercise. Fanon was a term used for fans believing in something that wasn’t part of the source material, but this piece of fanon felt very logical and grounded in realty. He was going to try and use the leaf sticking exercise on multiple leaves and in multiple places.
As he focused, he felt the leaf instantly stick to his chest and felt the leaf on his forehead staying still. His mouth twitched into a smile. He was getting better at Chakra.
Five minutes later, Jack was no longer smiling. He looked at the ten places all over his body, from forehead to feet, and the leaves that were all stuck there.
Turns out, it was easy as pie to adjust an exercise like his to do so for multiple pieces. It was still harder to keep a piece stuck to his feet, Naruto showed that the feet were the hardest places to control Chakra, but it still took at most a minute to be as proficient with all ten leaf papers as it did five minutes ago with just the one on his forehead.
Jack let all of the leaves fall to the ground, and dejectedly flop onto his bed. Jeez, first his low intensity technique became a flop, now his fanon knowledge is showing itself unhelpful. Today is just not his day. Still, Jack sighed and focused on why it was so easy to just scale up how many leaves he stick to himself.
… Maybe it had to do with the fact that it was spiritual power, and it not being a third dimensional construct? If spiritual energy was third dimensional matter, Jack would’ve had the ability to feel it within his body. If it was something like the scientific understanding of energy, then each use would only make him colder. No, even using it would let off heat, but it doesn’t. This means that spiritual energy like Chakra comes from something indescribable.
Of course, Jack always knew that Chakra was spiritual energy, but he never thought about it as something that just doesn’t exist on the physical plane. It can affect the physical world, but it doesn’t exist as light, heat, or sound. It’s an almost unexplainable phenomenon… So why can he feel it? It feels like a… warmth? No, he knows what warmth feels like. It’s closer to that feeling you have when someone compliments you. When someone says, “I love you.”
How can that become something that affects the real world? … Eh, whatever, he’ll just tell Pol En about this when they leave for East City.
Either way, the feeling changes based on what he’s using it for. He’s already talked about how body enhancement felt like a breath inhaling without stopping, and how the Leaf Sticking Exercise felt like learning to grasp. However, making multiple grasps was easy in such a way that it felt instinctive. Like when you’ve learned to grasp a cup with your right hand only, and now you’re doing so with your left hand.
Chakra doesn’t have hands, though… Wait, he just thought about how Chakra doesn’t make sense in the first place, so he shouldn’t go down that route again. Anyways, if Chakra can make an “inhale” that never needs to “hold” or “exhale” plus control the rate of its “inhale”, then it makes sense that “grasping” with multiple hands instinctively works too.
…Wait, the Leaf Sticking Exercise is almost always done before the Tree Climbing Exercise, and it before the Water Walking Exercise. Are they not exercises, but techniques like the body enhancement technique? Are they all the same technique, just given a polish?
Polish! That’s what it felt like when he improved the Leaf Sticking Exercise. It felt like he just made a few touch ups or gave his technique a few details once he had completed the original Leaf Sticking Exercise. Does that mean that he is “forging” his techniques? That he bangs and bends and stretches his mental image of his technique until it is given form? Yes, yes that feels correct.
He was forging the Leaf Sticking Technique with his Chakra, turning the shapeless energy into a mold of grasping as a concept. Then, when adding more leaves, he just turned it from grasping one thing into grasping many. It wasn’t hard to multiply it, just to get that original grasping concept.
So, if he was “forging” techniques like this, does that mean he did something wrong with the body enhancement technique? Did he “forge” it wrong? He thought about his mental image of what the maxxed power body enhancement technique did. It was a pair of lungs that “inhaled” continuously. He only stopped “inhaling” when he felt a huge strain in his Chakra…
Hmm, it takes effort to breathe harder and deeper with lungs. Maybe he shouldn’t be using this imagery with the technique? Something else then…
Unfortunately, Jack couldn’t focus on his dilemma, as he smelt something in the air. He got up to see if Disi was cooking now, and apologize about the fact that he ate before coming home. She shouldn’t be cooking in the first place for him. Especially when he was no longer hungry.
Yet, Jack stopped. If he was only smelling something now, that meant there was a few minutes before the food was finished cooking. He could eat the food by using his flawed low-intensity body enhancement right now. In fact, he could use these few minutes to try and work on it before she finished cooking!
Jack went back to sitting on his bed, but this time in a meditative pose. He closed his eyes and focused on his imagery of what the technique did, both at maximum power and low intensity.
Maximum power was just one large inhale, as if he was panting and going past the limits of his lungs to do so. Minimum power was just one long inhale. The strain of going past a limit was still there, but it won’t last nearly as long.
… To be honest, his maximum powered technique just felt right with this imagery. If anything, it felt perfect as it is. Pushing his body into its overdrive felt comparable to just inhaling as hard as you can. Inhaling as slow as you can, though? That was, wrong, in some way. Your inhaling got deeper and faster the more strength you needed, and whoever heard of someone just staying with slow inhales and exhales when needing more than your maximum power?
No, Low-Intensity Body Enhancement required a different image. Something that showed how power was at rest at all times, and capable of staying at that point for hours at a time. What was it though? A muscle flexing? No, that felt wrong. It logically seemed right, but muscles couldn’t do anything other than contract and relax. There was no in-between. It may seem like a big muscle like your bicep could slowly contract, but that is just a certain amount of muscle fibers that are in “contract” mode. Muscles are binary, and he needed variablility.
A heart pumping blood throughout the body? … Closer, but still not there yet. It seemed like his “heart” was not compatible with this technique. It made sense, he wasn’t trying to “pulse” the technique, just to keep it at a steady pressure. Pressure… Maybe he could just go for the blood veins and arteries instead? Yes, that felt right. Just get rid of the heart an- NOPE! Jack cringed on an almost spiritual level.
Ah, ugh, ack… No, something about losing the heart made his Chakra cringe and rebel. It did not like that at all. Jack quickly brought himself back to his mental image and focused on something else about the heart and circulatory system. Okay, if losing the heart is a no go, then he’ll just have to try and focus on things that work like veins and arteries without a heart.
Maybe pipes? Metal pipes all throughout the body that pump water, or perhaps gasoline? No, his Chakra didn’t even register that as a thing. It felt, too alien? Inconceivable? … It clashed with Chakra? Yes, that was it. It clashed with what Chakra is on a fundamental level.
Then perhaps-
Jack snapped out of his meditative state when he heard Disi call for his name. He got up and felt the effects of what his flawed low-intensity body technique was doing to him. His hunger was back, but not nearly as bad as earlier. Still, he went out to the kitchen and noticed that Disi prepared a bowl of veggies and rice for him with an ashamed look on her face.
“I apologize for that joke I made earlier.” Said Disi. “I-” “Now, hold on there, Disi.” Jack cut her off, a smile on his face. “I may have wanted to know what happened to the line, but I was super glad about the fact that you were making jokes.” He shook his head, and crossed his arms. “You had me and your family worried these past few days with how tight you were.” Desi rubbed her shoulder. “Still,” She began, “I know that you’ve been wanting to hear about it just as much as my hubbie.” “Hey, I already forgive you. Though, this food you made is definitely a good bonus.”
Jack chuckled as he sat and ate the food slowly. He wasn’t nearly as much of a hurry as he was earlier trying to eat. Disi smiled at him. “That’s good. Though, the food was more of an apology for what I need you to do this afternoon.” Jack looked at her with a chewing mouth and a raised eyebrow. She continued with, “I need you to go and pick up Merci at school. Apparently, she got in trouble with fighting one of her friends.”
Jack’s lone eyebrow was joined with its twin as they shot up. That was surprising, indeed. Merci seemed like such a good kid, perhaps she was goaded into it. Either way, he just nodded to her in agreement with an “Mhm!” from his full mouth. She smiled and lost all of her tension in her body and face. “Good! They’ll be in the Principal’s Lobby. Just go there and bring her back, okay? After you’re done eating, of course.” Jack nodded once more and got right back to eating.
Line Break Here
Jack walked down the hallway of the Elementary/Middle School. He was trying to find the principal’s office, but there was no one up front to guide him. As he was looking around trying to find it, a woman left a door down the hallway and was speedwalking towards him. As she came closer, Jack could see that it wasn’t just speedwalking, but it also looked like she was trying to “hold it in”, if you know what I mean.
“Uh, excuse me, ma’am?” He called out to her just as she was about to open a door. He looked up at the sign above it. “Toilet”. Yep, she definitely needed to go really quickly. She looked panicked and sweating as she paused and looked at him. “Y-Yes, what do you need?” She said in a ‘hurry up!’ tone. Jack decided to be blunt. “I’m here to pick up Merci Munchkinz at the Principal’s Lobby, do you know-” “Right where I came out of!” She blurted out and quickly entered before slamming the door.
Jack just nodded and moved on. As he walked, he noticed the sounds of his footsteps on the tile beneath him. He remembered the lecture he got from Tea this morning, and decided to just walk stealthily for daily life until it became second nature. As he did so, the sounds of his heels hitting the floor quieted until there was no longer an echo coming down the hall. ‘Heh,’ Jack thought to himself, ‘I really am a genius when it comes to training.’ He quietly went down the hall until he reached the door.
“Principal’s Lobby” said the letters on the wooden door in front of him. Jack was about to slam it open when he realized that it would be incredibly noisy doing so. As such, he carefully and slowly opened the door, but stopped at just a crack when he heard what Merci just said.
“-if you don’t say it was your fault, I’ll just tell my mom that you tried to kiss me. Got it?” Merci had such an… Evil, tone when she said that. He thought that it was some other little girl, but checking through the crack in the door he made showed that there was just Merci and the only boy that was in her friend group. Despite her small stature, she was standing on her chair and gripping the boy’s collar as she loomed over him.
The boy, who Jack just noticed is wearing a pair of broken glasses, just stuttered out his response with a rebellious look on his face. “I-I, I won’t. You were the one who, who put gum in Lacey’s hair, and-” The boy was interrupted by Merci using her grip to shake him. She growled out, “You will, and you’ll say what I want you to say.” She let go him and watched as he flopped back on his chair, fixing his skewed broken glasses as he did so.
She crossed her arms and fell back in her seat, too. The boy just looked back at her. “Why are you doing this in the first place?” He asked. She scoffed. “Because Lacey said-” “Not what you did today,” the boy interrupted, “I mean how you try to ruin everyone’s day. You’ve been doing this as long as I’ve known you, and I still don’t get you.” He slumped in his seat.
“You’ve treated me as the fall guy for all of your little schemes, but you won’t even let me go and create new friends. Your girls in your group fear you more than they do their own parents. You’ve even convinced every adult that you’re perfect. Straight A’s and full attendance. Not a single bad thing about you.” He looked at her with anger and confusion.
“So, why do you do all of this? Why make everyone in this school your enemy? Heck, you even told me about how you stole the money from that guy living in your house to buy a new doll.” She did WHAT?! “Why do you treat everyone like this?” He looked at her, hoping for something she said to convince him to forgive her, just as he did all the other times.
She sneered at him. “Why? Simple, because I’m selfish, just. Like. You.” She punctuated the last few words by poking him in his chest. The boy sputtered in indignation at that. “W-What? I’m not-!” “Zip it!” She pinched his lips closed. “Perhaps you’ve forgotten, back when we met.” His eyes showed his confusion on where she’s going with this. “I remember, though.” She let go of his lips, and sat back.
“We all met, back in Kindergarten. When we were just 5 years old. I was dropped off by my dad on the first day, and I was given candy to give to everyone so they can be my friend. Yet, when he left, everyone took my candy, but didn’t want to be my friend. You, Billy, Lacey, Darcey, Gwen, everyone, just took my candy but didn’t want to be friends with the ‘baby’ of the class.” She raised her head and looked down at him. He looked confused, as if he couldn’t remember any of this.
“In fact, everyone pulled my hair, took my crayons, and even pulled my seat from under me when I went to sit. When the teacher got onto you all, I felt relieved. Yet, it just made you all do it outside of her sight. At the end of the day, I told my parents all of this and got you all in trouble. The mocking and bullying finally stopped, and I was happy it did.”
The boy spoke up here, “But, if we had already been punished for it, why-” She interrupted him, “However, no one played with me. They didn’t want to be friends with the girl that looked like a baby and cried to their parents like a baby. So they left me alone. I tried my best to join everyone else in their friend group, but they just all rejected me. Yet, as I had no one to play with, I also noticed things that even the teacher didn’t notice. For instance,” She paused here, pointing at the boy, “You, Noat Buuk, liked to pull Lacey’s hair.”
She grinned at this next part, seeing the realization on his face. “I threatened you by saying that I would tell the Teacher if you didn’t become my friend, and it worked! Everytime you or someone else did something wrong, I just threatened them into becoming my friend. Then, I noticed that you guys would try and get on my good side by being nice to me. I tried to make genuine friends here, but I was betrayed by that ugly girl, Terra. She spilled my milk carton on me and blamed me for it. The teachers at the time didn’t see what happened and went with her word over mine.”
She flipped back her hair here. “There, I realized that being nice, yet useless, in a relationship got you walked all over, and I was tired of being walked on. So, no matter who it was, I manipulated them to do my bidding.” She covered her mouth and chuckled a little. “Really, all I had to do for you was just to bully you a little and you stopped hurting others and fell in line.” She looked condescending at Noat as he looked confused.
“What, did you think pulling a girl’s hair was all you did? No, I watched you give other boys wedgies, give them noogies, wet willies, names, and shoving them down in the dirt over the years.” She smiled at his face, which showed his realization or remembrance of the events she was talking about. “Yep, that’s right, you’re just like me. At least, you used to be. For some reason, you’ve got it in your head that you’re somehow a decent person.”
She bobbed her head back and forth, “Then again, it has been a few years since you’ve actually done something despicable. Sooooo, I guess you’re half-way decent. For a stupid boy, that is.” Noat looked shellshocked. However, he shook it off, and asked one last question. “W-what about that guy? His money? Didn’t you also say that you took your brother’s pet snake and left it with him on those first few nights? And that toothpaste thing, w-where you spread dog doo-doo all over it? What did he do to you?”
Jack, having been quiet and listening to this shocking information, also wanted to know this answer. He strained to listen.
Merci chuckled. “Why? He lives in our home rent free, a freeloader like him is nothing more than a servant to me. He should be glad I only took that much money from him, and not all of it. He hasn’t found a single job other than what that Mayor gives him, is gone all day doing who knows what, and only comes back in time for dinner. He’s a loser, if ever I’ve seen one.”
She flipped her hair once more. “I don’t understand how my parents even let him into the house and not order him around constantly. I, myself, ordered him to move my bed an entire afternoon, just to leave it where it was in the beginning. His face was sooooo funny.” She giggled, before stoning her face. “Now that you know why, shut up, and take the fall.” She turned away, looking closer to the door to the hallway. The door was closed.
Jack, meanwhile, felt anger at what this young girl was doing. She was the quintessential “Queen Bee” that every teen movie or show had, but 10 years old and worse! She stole from him, tried to get his mouth infected with dog shit, and frustrated him with that one time where she had him move her entire bedroom all by himself! His anger kept building and building, and he just wanted to enter this room and spank her just as much as she needed to. However, once he thought this, he stopped himself completely and forced himself to calm down.
He couldn’t actually harm this girl, she was the daughter of the host family he lived with. If she came back bruised and crying to Disi about what he did, the mother and father would have every right to throw him out on his ass for what he did, regardless of how deserved she had it.
Jack couldn’t think up any solutions right away, what with all of this anger clouding his mind, but he needed to bring home Merci all the same. So, as he breathed in deeply to calm himself down, he focused on just getting in, taking Merci, and getting out. Unfortunately, he would have to hurry this up as he heard the sound of a toilet flushing down the hall, where the secretary went.
So, he put on his best smile, loosened up his stance, and went in to quickly leave this school. Then, later, he was going to get a camera and microphone equipment to show exactly what she was doing to her peers to all of the adults. Yep, catching her in the act will certainly give her a punishment she so deserves.
All he had to do was stalk her…
WAIT! HOLD ON! HE DOESN’T MEAN THAT IN A CREEPY WAY! HE’S NOT A KID LOVER AND-
Line Break Here
Meanwhile, 100 miles south of Maya Village, a group of tents filled with over 50 men, weremen, and lizard men hung out and ate the food of a nearby village that they just pillaged. This was a local bandit group named the Moon Bandits, for they only attack at night when the moon’s out. They were all relaxing and eating, with the most food going towards the group’s leader. Moon Shine.
As Moon Shine was stuffing himself, another member walked up to him, and waited to be called on. Moon Shine swallowed the food he was eating and said, “Go on, tell me what you’ve got.” He then went on eating as the other man reported to him. “Sir, the last village we raided had some news about the Rail Line up north. Apparently, three villages are cut off because something happened in Smoothie Village.”
Moon Shine perked up at that. “Oh, is that so?” He put down his food, and stood from his chair. He was a Bear Man, at least 10 feet tall. He was big in the way that you could tell that there was a bunch of muscle underneath his fur and fat. Of course, the sight of this caused his subordinate in front of him to start shivering in fear a little, fearing that, for some reason, Moon Shine was mad at him. “Y-Yes, sir.”
Moon Shine chuckled at the sight, “Relax, my good man. This is wondrous news! Three whole villages, ripped with food, vehicles, and other tech from East City!” He walked over and slapped the nervous man on his back. He let out a guffawing laugh. “Why, this is something amazing! We must leave as soon as possible. Tell everyone to pack up as soon as we’re all done eating. We’ve got some new targets to plunder. Especially before other bandits hear about this!”
The subordinate nodded enthusiastically, “Yes, sir! Right away, sir!” As he left the tent, Moon Shine chuckled and walked his way back to his seat. As he picked up his giant T-Rex thigh, he licked his lips and thought about how much more meat and treasures he was going to get in the next few days.
Besides, it’s not like any of these villages have anyone capable of puncturing his fur, his hide is too thick to be penetrated by regular bullets or knives.
AN: Sorry for the late post, I just never really got anywhere that made the chapter feel right. Even now, it doesn't feel right. Still, I hope this is good enough.