Jack squirmed in place, trying his best to get his sight onto Merci from his vantage point. Of course, he also tried to cling tightly to the branch he was on just so he wouldn’t fall off. In front of his face and hiding him from below was a good smattering of leaves from the branch he was laying on. Finally, after a good minute of trying to get a good angle of sight to watch Merci and failing to do so, he just decided to think ‘Screw it!’ and pushed the leaves aside with one hand. The other hand was clenching even tighter onto the branch below.
There, after clearing his vision, he could finally see what Merci was up to. He strained his ears to listen in on what she and her group were saying.
Down below were a group of kids. One boy and four girls, not including Merci who was off to the side and messing with something that Jack couldn’t see. The boy was the one Jack saw back when he picked up Merci after she got in trouble for a small ‘prank’ that she did to a girl named Lacey. Noat Buuk, having a new pair of glasses, was dirtying them up as he seemed to pick up worms from the ground.
The other four girls were kids Jack didn’t know too much about until he started to investigate Merci just a few days ago. They were in Merci’s grade and seemed to be holding onto various ingredients. Craola Craon, a redhead 9-year-old girl, was holding a bag full of sugar. Pen Ciel, an 11-year-old black haired girl who was held back a grade, was holding a bag of flour. Shi Elf, an asian looking 10-year-old with purple hair, was grasping a box of butter, a bottle of oil, and a bottle of… something that Jack couldn’t tell. The last girl was Spra Ten. She was a 10-year-old girl with blonde hair and a deep tan, as if she were from California and spent her days at the beach.
Spra Ten was holding some eggs in her hands. How many, Jack couldn’t tell exactly. It might’ve been three or four eggs. Either way, Jack could already tell just what they brought the ingredients for. To make some kind of cake. Worm cake, if he were to extrapolate that Noat was gathering worms to put in the batter.
However, every girl other than Merci brought an ingredient, and he couldn’t figure out if Merci brought an ingredient too or if she was doing something else. Either way, it was time to snoop in on what they were saying.
Jack reached behind him to his back, where he was sticking a microphone and tape/recording device on himself with the Leaf Sticking Technique. He pulled out the microphone with the ‘long range’ attachment that will allow him to record voices without the sound of wind messing it up too badly. He clenched his teeth onto the handle of the microphone and adjusted it towards the group, before putting on the headset that’ll allow him to hear what the microphone picked up and recorded. Then he picked up his disposable camera hanging around his neck and prepared himself to take pictures of anything incriminating.
Hopefully, he can get a good listen on what they were planning. He couldn’t hear them at all for the past few days and, so, he couldn’t figure out their plan earlier.
Just gotta wait for the right moment.
Line Break Here
Noat was making sure to keep a good hold on the worms wriggling in his hands. He really wanted to fix his glasses, as they became skewed, but he didn’t want to bring his face any closer to the worms in his grips.
He walked back over to where Merci and the others were. Merci was mixing something into the bowl in front of her. Some kind of white powder was fogging up the formerly clean water she brought. He didn’t see what she did to make it foggy white, but he was sure that it was nothing good.
Merci was pretty much the definition of evil.
… Okay, sure, apparently she had a ‘tragic past’ in the form of bullying, but who cared? He remembered some of what he did to Merci and other girls, but did that really necessitate him being tormented by Merci for the past few years? As far as he was concerned, he was a victim of Merci’s machinations.
Anyways, back to the group. Once Noat got close enough that he was noticed by the girls, he asked them, “Why do you need me to get these worms, again? I thought you agreed when I said that people would notice them in a cake.” Spra, the closest to him, couldn’t help but sneer at the worms in his grasp. “Ew.” She said under her breath, only Noat hearing her. “Get those things away from me.”
Noat felt indignation rise up as well as the impulse to shove a handful of worms into her face, but stopped and decided that he wasn’t going to do that in front of Merci. She might just make him eat them.
Shi nervously looked back and forth at Merci and the worms in Noat’s grip. Her shy nature rising up as she held up her bottle of olive oil in front of her face. She muttered something that Noat couldn’t hear, but it was probably just something about how ‘we shouldn’t be doing this’.
Pen smiled enthusiastically, her tomboyish nature shining through. “Hey, are we catching fish later? I hope so. Dad said I couldn’t until the train comes back. I asked him why and he said that ‘I should just because,’ but I never really understood why. Did you know that my dad caught the biggest fish just a few months ago? It was as big as that meter stick Mrs. Spring has. Mom said that fishing is how she and dad met. How did-” “Shut up already!” Spra interrupted the motormouth.
Pen shriveled in a little. “Alright, but didn’t you have to bring 5 e-” “I did! Merci has it now, you dumb broad.” Pen tilted her head. “What’s a broad?” “It’s what you are. Now, shut up and hand me the flour and eggs.” Merci told both of the girls. She turned to Craola and Shi, “Your stuff, too.” They did as she commanded.
Noat raised his question once more. “Why did you have me get worms if we’re not going to use them in the cake?” Merci finally decided to answer his question as she was mixing all of the ingredients together. She had her tongue stuck out to the side. “Because it’s going to be Tate’s ‘present’ for his birthday. He hates bugs of all types, so we’re going to put them in the toilet and stop it up with dirt and worms.”
Craola, the youngest of them all and the most innocent, asked Merci, “Why are you doing that? Isn’t there only one toilet in the house? Won’t you need to use it, too?.” Merci stopped mixing and glared in her direction, Craola flinching at her look. Merci decided to explain as she went back to mixing. “I’m going to stop it up after I use it. By the time anyone else needs to use it, I’ll be at Shi’s house. Mom and Dad will have to blame the whole thing on either one of Tate’s friends at the party, Irah because he was ‘jealous’, or Jack because he accidentally contracted a parasite and brought it home.”
Noat and the other girls looked at Merci funny. He decided to voice their collective confusion. “Parasite? Like a tick? How is it going to end up in the toilet?” Merci just waved away in his direction. “Apparentally, worms can get into your stomach or something and come out of your poop. Mrs. Springs talked about it a few months ago during science. Jack is out hunting now and he could’ve brought home some worms to spread amongst everyone else.”
Spra scratched the top of her head, before shrugging. “I guess that makes sense.” She crossed her arms and smirked, “Aren’t you going after Jack maybe a little too much? If you’re not careful, he might just think that you have a crush on him~.” Merci immediately stopped what she was doing, stood up, and turned to stomp straight up to Spra. Spra tried to keep her face the same, but couldn’t help but lean back a little as well as sweat.
Merci’s tone was incredibly threatening, her anger clear and only held back by sheer will. “What did you say?” Spra, deciding that Merci in her face wasn’t enough of a threat to her, made her explanation. “W-Well, y-you normally just, you know, mess with them slightly. Scare ‘em with something or-or play a mean prank on them. Then you just, leave them alone for a few months. Jack, though, is s-someone you’ve been messing with for the past few months. You just, seem very fixated on him and him alone.”
Merci waited a moment to see if Spra said anything else, before calming down and smiling happily at her. “You know, Spra, that mouth of yours needs to know when to stop, because that ‘dumb broad’ over there knows more about when to stop than you do. Remember when you wanted me to stop Treyn for you because he wouldn’t stop asking you to be his wife?” Spra, now realizing she messed up, was slightly shaking a little, but nodded all the same.
Noat remembered Treyn. He was a pretty fat kid. He was so fat that his face still looked as round as the toddlers in Kindergarten. He took a fancy with Spra back then and continued to do so for 3 grades. Most of the time, he would walk up to her and ask her to be his wife. She would constantly say no, more annoyed than anything about how many times he’s asked her. Noat understood Spra, Lacey did the same thing to him back in Kindergarten and only stopped very recently. He didn’t know why, but one day Treyn just stopped asking Spra and tried to stay away from her for the last 9 months.
It must’ve involved Merci somehow, considering how she brought it up. Merci continued with her threat. “Good, if you don’t shut up, I’ll tell Treyn that you have feelings for him and want him to smooch you whenever he sees you. Do we have an understanding?” Spra, now visibly cowed, nodded.
Pen put a finger up to her lips, “Who’s Jack, again?” Merci, now walking back to mixing her cake, snorted. “Exactly, Pen. Jack’s nobody.” Merci chuckled. Pen chuckled, before asking, “No, really, who is he?” Ah, good ole Pen. Knows how to relax a situation.
Merci ignored the question, but Craola answered it for her. “Pen, Jack is the homeless guy living with Merci’s family. Remember?” Pen tilted her head and crossed her arms in thought. “How can a man be homeless, if he sleeps in a home? I still don’t know who you’re talking about.” Craola sighed. “The guy who you said ‘Looks like Cra-Cra’s Dad, but bigger?’” Pen looked as if the dusty lightbulb in her head went off. “Oh yeah! He does look like your dad, Cra-Cra.”
She paused, “Do you think he’s stronger than your dad?” Craola just shook her head violently. “Nah, no way! Dad once picked up the couch to vacuum under it, Jack’s nowhere near as strong!”
Shi, still quietly standing in the group while poking her fingers together, mumbled something out. Pen and Craola turned toward her, causing Shi to fidget. “What was that?” Asked Craola in genuine curiosity. Shi took a breath before talking in a normal volume for others, but loud for her. “Didn’t-Didn’t Jack carry that b-big sofa to the l-library? Y-you know, the one with the stars on it?”
Shi shrunk in once she was done, and Noat could see Craola seemed to short out that brain of hers. “He-but-Da-he-did-I-” After stuttering, Craola finally snapped back into place. She huffed, pouted and mumbled to herself. Only Noat could hear what she said. “Dad could still beat him up.”
Noat shook his head at the two, and turned back to Merci. He was still curious what she was doing with the cake. “Why did you want to make a cake all the way out here? Shouldn’t you be doing this back at your house? Also, why are you baking a cake? I thought your mom was going to make one instead?” Noat’s felt his pulse quicken a little at the evil smirk Merci had on her face, her earlier anger forgotten.
Merci gave an evil chuckle. “I’m sooo glad you asked, Four-Eyes!” She held up a little something. It was two small halves of a capsule. “This is a lacksa-laka-la-” She scowled as she tried to say the word. Then she just decided to pronounce it. “Lacks-a-tive. This is a lax-a-tive. It makes someone poop quickly and for a long time. I’m adding it into the dough because I want to make Mom and Dad think twice about saying no to me.” She went back to mixing the dough. “Plus, my mom wanted me to get out for some eggs and butter for the cake. If I come back with the dough, she’ll definitely use it for the cake! Especially if I ask in that tiny girl voice."
She preceded to show said voice off. “Mommy? Can we use this for the cake? Me and my friends made it for Tate!” The rest of the kids just shuddered at the horror that was Innocent Ples Merci Munckinz.
Merci went back to snickering as she explained the last bit of her plan. “With the toilet blocked, everyone will have to go to someone else’s house to poop. Unless they can’t hold it in! Hehehe…” Noat could only feel a sense of relief at the fact that he wouldn’t be going to Tate’s party to eat it. “Oh, I also told Mom that I invited you to come, Four-Eyes. You’ll also have to eat the cake.”
Noat Buuk really hated the fact that he met Merci.
Line Break Here
Jack could feel himself sweat a little at the plan that Merci came up with.
Mostly because laxatives work very effectively to his digestion.
He’s not going to leave the toilet for hours if that happens…
Either way, Jack now had the evidence necessary to expose Merci! He looked at the tape and camera in his hands. All he needed to do was to have the film developed by Stova to get the pictures of Merci and her gang and…
Wait, shit! If he were to get these films developed by Stova in her gas station, she’ll see the pictures of Merci and her gang taken from afar without the proper context! She won’t know that Merci plans to use the bowl she was making the cake dough in to drug the party with laxatives. She won’t see the evil Merci, but a creep who’s taking photos of little girls and a troublesome boy.
Shit, why did he think this was a good idea? Hmm… Maybe he could- No, film needs to be exposed to low level lights, mostly red light. He doesn’t know where to go to get any so he could find which film shots had the creepy photos and which ones were Tate’s projects.
Errgh… He’ll just have to bring the tape and hope that was enough to tip off Larry and Disi about their daughter.
Jack stuck the microphone and headphones back onto his back, and let his camera stick to his chest. He paused before having an idea. If he could get into Stova’s film development room, then he could safely take out the shots of Merci and her gang. He could also try and join Stova in how she develops film so he could sneak in later to develop the film on his lonesome at night!
Heh, Jack truly was a genius.
Until then, Jack was going to stay as quiet as he could up in the tree he was hanging out at so Merci and the others left.
Tate’s birthday, huh? He didn’t really get him a present. What can you get for a super smart 12-year-old boy for his 13th birthday? Jack would have to think on it, he only has two days before Tate’s birthday.
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Mayor Wrecking of Wasabi village was a bit stressed, to put it lightly.
Mostly because of the recent crisis that had happened. A couple weeks ago, all communication past Maya Village was lost, and it wasn’t until today that he found out why. Mount Chill, where Smoothieville and its corresponding train station resided, had been set ablaze! The army that had come there to help had been trying to put it out with helicopters pulling up buckets of seawater and dumping it at the edges of the fire for the past two weeks.
From what Larry, Maya Village’s resident Station Master, reported from the news, the water would only put out the fire for a small while before catching back on fire once all of the water evaporated. The amount of time it would take for the railroad to be diverted to the side and all the way around the hazardous area would take a couple of years. What with the chopping down of trees that were in the way, moving giant rocks out of the ground, and installing the new communication lines.
Yes, it would take quite a while till the next train comes.
And what hogwash! Not the news, but the solution to just ‘hunker down and ration’. He planned to make this town the next big thing! He had a contract made with a studio in East City to let them use his town as a setting or background for any movies, shows, or ads they made. They were supposed to come around the end of the year to start prepping their next movie, and Wrecking had set up the town to take in an influx of new workers and tourists that would come to see the spectacle of the filming.
His small village of 2,500 adults was going to surge and make this the new Orange City! Big banks would move branches down here. Construction crews were going to create new ten-story buildings. The village would no longer need to rely on their unpopular cash crop of Wasabia, a root that was used to make wasabi here in this town.
Now, Mayor Wrecking wasn’t an idiot. He wasn’t going to get rid of the wasabia farms. The land wasn’t very good around here for anything else but wasabia. Rice came out weak and sickly, wheat could barely grow more than four or five berries per stalk, and many other fruits and vegetables tried their best to live but couldn’t. Wasabia was the only thing that could grow here that humans could actually eat.
No, the wasabia farms and the small wasabi factory would be persuaded to become tourist attractions. Get some more money flowing, and thus more taxes for the village. Really make this growing town into a golden-egg-laying goose.
Now, he’ll have to cancel all of those negotiations for the next few years, until everything is back to normal. At least Maya Village was willing to send their harvests of rice and certain veggies to all of the villages in crisis down the line. That bit of news really calmed down the people of his town. School was still happening, people were still going to work at the farms and the factory, and the people were slowly starting to relax at this new pace.
You would almost assume that Wasabi Village wasn’t in crisis with how calm everyone is. The only things that showed their crisis was the signs in many food stores simply saying “restrictions on purchases”. The patrolling sheriff that Wrecking assigned was also having to calm everyone down as some people were getting antsy, but that was still going away bit by bit.
The only thing that could go wrong now is if they were attacked by bandits, but his sheriff force should be able to contend with any such people.
Yes, Mayor Wrecking was only a tiny bit stressed.
His stress rose quite quickly when his delinquent 16-year-old son was caught trying to buy cigarettes from a gas station one village down. He was driven straight to Wrecking’s office by the village’s local hunter, where the Mayor managed to convince the hunter that the boy would be given a swift punishment and sent the hunter on his way.
Now, his son, Ralph, was sitting across from his father in the Mayor’s Office. His father was staring straight at his son, fingers steepled in front of his face. The son was just looking away out the window with a slight scowl on his face. The clock ticked.
Finally, the father breathed in deeply. “Son, this is the third time this year.” Ralph just nonchalantly glanced at his father before staring back out the nearby window. The mayor grunted. “Ralph.” The son didn’t deign to give his father another look. “Ralph, look at me!” The sterner tone caused Ralph to snap his gaze back to his father. The son’s ingrained instinct to listen to his father greater than his instinct to be as relaxed as possible. His instinct to show that the world can’t affect him.
The mayor sighed through his nose. “Son, I don’t know why you are doing things like this. I did them when I was your age, and I certainly wasn’t smart enough to understand the consequences. I mean,” He shook his head. “I get the dalliances you had with all those girls in your school. I get the desire to smoke cigars and cigarettes, I did so with my father’s pack and boxes. I even get your desire to beat the shit out of someone for no other reason than they just pissed you off.”
The son didn’t say anything, he just stared at his father. He tried not to show anything going on in his mind.
The mayor shifted his jaw back and forth. “... I didn’t like my dad back then. He would beat me and my siblings for all the stupid shit we did. We deserved it, make no mistake about that, but he was still an angry man when he did so. I tried not to do the same thing with you, thinking that not getting beat was better for your learning than getting a bruise on the face, chest, or butt everyday. Yet… You’re doing the exact same things I did. I did them to not remind myself of everyday life, because it was fun to do them.
“Why do you do it, son? Why do you get yourself into trouble for… nothing? Do you just like it?” The father paused here, trying to see if there was even a hint of something other than apathy. The son’s face didn’t change, other than his fists clenching on the armrests. The father continued his rant. “Do you do this just to get my attention?” Again, no change but clenched hands. “Do you do this to hurt my reputation?”
There, a twitch of Ralph’s nose. Something about his last question got to his son. Perhaps…
“Are you trying to make me lose the re-election coming up?” Ralph’s body, but especially his neck, tensed. Ah, there it was. The father sighed once more. “Son, I’m going to win this election by a landslide, as I did four years ago, and the four years before that. You being a delinquent will not make my chances of winning fall.”
Ralph just grunted, before speaking for the first time since he got there. “Mom’s not doing well, you know that, right?” The mayor blinked at this sharp turn. “I don’t see what your mother has to do wi-” “She knows about Medi.” That one statement sent a sharp cold fear straight through the father’s chest.
“I-I don’t know what you’re-” “Save the crap, father.” Once more, Ralph interrupted his dad. His voice started to show his inner thoughts. “You’ve been spending less and less time with us for the past six years. I caught you seeing Medi last month. I tried to come and talk to you about it, but…” Here, Ralph’s voice began to crack and wobble as the turmoil within him began to show, despite his attempts to reign it in. After a few deep breaths, Ralph continued.
“I couldn’t even get you to speak with me about something important for more than 5 minutes. I had to resort to all of this-” Ralph dramatically swung his arm in front of him, “-just to get you to talk to me alone for more than just a word or two.” Ralph’s breathing began to pick up as his momentum of the conversation followed.
“It didn’t even work the first few times. It took me having to air out my secrets to everyone who’ll listen and try to get arrested so you can try and get rid of the problem that would stain your career!” Ralph’s angry eyes had some tears balling up, and the hurt began to make his nose start to get a little runny. Despite that, he kept going.
“When I couldn’t get ahold of you to talk about it, I had to tell Mom without you there! I told her everything about how you just don’t care about this family! How you ignored us-Mom, to go and fuck some 22-year-old! You weren’t even subtle about it! You haven’t gone back home in over a week. You don’t call us. You don’t write to us. Hell, you don’t even talk about us in any interviews! Every time someone brings up the family, you just brush us off!”
Finally, Ralph couldn’t talk any longer, his gaze now fallen to the floor. All he could do was breathe in and out, as deep as he could. It was as if he had run a marathon. His shoulders were shaking, in rage or sorrow or something mixed between. Still, Ralph didn’t speak up again.
The father, however, was now focusing entirely on what to do about this. Finally, he slumped his posture and sat back onto his giant leather chair. He squirmed a little, trying to get comfortable about this next bit.
“Son,” Ralph looked up, waiting for whatever his dad was going to say next. “Do you think your mother doesn’t already know?” Ralph could feel his entire world still at that question. The adult in the room nodded towards his son. “Hm, I see you didn’t know. Let me enlighten you on something, then.” The father, as he was saying this, took out his box cigars from his desk and lit one.
He puffed out once before explaining. “Six years ago, I had found something your mother didn’t want me to see. A tape she kept hidden from me for a long while. It was dated almost 17 years ago. On it, was your mother and six other men, making you.” Silence.
Pure. Utter. Silence.
Ralph’s mind couldn’t keep up after just getting over the fact that his mother knew about his father cheating on her. Now this? This just made him let go of any voluntary actions, like standing. He flopped back onto the chair he stood up from. His father, however, wasn’t quite as merciful as he used to be and kept going.
“Yes, indeed. I found out that you are most likely not my son. It was around the time where I was working 12 hour shifts in the local, new wasabi factory. I was so tired that I usually didn’t have sex with my wife before going straight to bed. Sometimes I would on my two days off, and I assumed that you came from those joinings.” He took another puff, before talking while clenching the cigar in his teeth.
“Turns out, my wife wasn’t ‘satisfied’ with me providing for the family, and found a group of drifters to spend time with while I was working. According to your mother, ‘They made me feel like someone who was loved.’” He snorted. “Sure, they loved her. Loved her so much that they banged some man’s wife and then left soon after she told them she was pregnant, and it was possibly one of theirs.”
He crossed his legs and took another puff. “Apparentally, your mother was so ashamed that she kept the baby and lied to me for ten years. Once I found it, I was already deep into my first term as Mayor of this village. I couldn’t divorce her at all so long as I kept my seat, and she couldn’t threaten me with divorce unless she wanted to lose the case since I’m friends with our only judge.
“So, me and your cheating mother came to an agreement. So long as there were children under the roof, I wouldn’t divorce her and she wouldn’t air out any dirty laundry I had. Dirty laundry, like my various mistresses over the years.” Ralph was still in shock at all of this information, and wished for it all to be over already.
It wasn’t.
The father began chewing on his cigar and loosened up his tie. “Your mother must be incredibly jealous of the fact that I’m getting so many girls that are not just younger than her, but more loyal than her cheating ass gave me. The reason why I wasn’t around often? I didn’t want to see the only thing that messed up my marriage, my life.” Ralph knew exactly what he was talking about. His son. Or, well, his ‘son’.
The man growled a little. “Know this, now that you understand the situation, I won’t help you anymore with any trouble you get in. You get arrested? You’re now a convict. You get some girl pregnant? You’ll have to face her family and the legal consequences on your own. Someone tries to ruin your reputation? I won’t be there to smooth it over.” The man finally sat back and relaxed, before shooing at his ‘son’ with his free hand. “Now, leave. I got work to do.”
Ralph, too much in shock, did as his ‘father’ ordered. Once the door shut behind him, the Mayor stood up and walked to the window. He opened it and began to puff out his cigar smoke into the air.
That should get rid of one problem of his life. He wasn’t lying when he said that Ralph couldn’t ruin the mayor’s reputation. He made sure of that with all of the time he spent with his PR manager. His re-election was in the bag.
Suddenly, his phone on his desk began to ring. Mayor Wrecking walked over to his desk, put his cigar down on the ash tray, and picked it up.
“Hello? This is Mayor Wrecking Spe-”
…
“The Moon Bandits?”
AN: Yeah, sorry about the delay. Here is the full chapter, plus some more at 5.2k words! Please, do forgive me about my mistake of not saving it before losing all of my progress.
I won't be able to talk today thanks to the fact that it's Mother's Day. I respond to any comments tomorrow.
AN 2: Uh oh. I think I forgot to publish this one.