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It was a beautiful fall day. The leaves were finally taking their full colors, the air was crisp, and the smell of burning leaves filled the air. Two teenagers were shuffling along the sidewalk the girl kicking some fallen leaves now and again and the boy keeping his hands in his pockets to keep them warm. The brunettes were having their routinely deep discussion. Sisboombah
"I'm just saying that if leprechauns are so powerful how come he can't keep his cereal away from a group of little kids? All the guy would have to do is wave his hand and blow them up or something." Eric Saber, a tall blue-eyed boy, watched his friend kick some more leaves.
"True, but there are probably a ton of laws against that kind of thing. I mean, leprechauns are good. So blowing up a bunch of snotty kids is probably against some leprechaun code." Rea Aaron, a short brown-eyed girl, shrugged and stuffed her hands into her own pockets. They slowly approached their school. It was still a little early, but the two liked to hang out in the choir room before class. It had been Rea's first period class since high school started. "Aerix, we must lead the most boring lives ever." Rea hardly ever used Eric's real name. But then he rarely comes to it himself. In second grade another boy named Eric had transferred into their school. The teacher started calling them Eric S. and Eric H. in order to differentiate between the two. Eric S. was soon shortened to Erics. The spelling change was just to make it look cool.
They walked up to the school doors and Aerix opened it for Rea. They had the kind of relationship that everyone expected would just lead into a big romantic episode one day, but that day never seemed to come. It was a touch annoying having to explain that they weren't dating to complete strangers.
"What I don't understand is what self respecting rabbit would eat a sugar coated puff of corn shaped like a piece of fruit." Rea took a seat on the piano bench when they arrived. Aerix leaned against the baby grand. Absentmindedly Rea began playing when Aerix responded.
"It's those kids that bug me. Good night! Just let the thing have some cereal already. It's not like it'll cause the downfall of man kind because a white rabbit wants to eat some breakfast."
"They let the rabbit have some one time. A few years ago, it got one bite. Just enough to get it hooked. Now it's a frikin cereal junkie just wanting to get a hit." Rea continued to play. As their conversation grew momentum, so did the song. Rea always had a knack for providing the perfect background music. Just as Aerix was going to respond the bell rang. Rea got up and huffed a sigh. "Another day of getting totally ignored by our peers." She gave him a smirk and headed out for her first quarter class.
"Wait, where are you going?" Aerix asked when they walked out together.
"Uh. I'm not in choir anymore." Rea cleared her throat and tried to leave again.
"So what are you taking?"
"What? Oh. Uh. Personal Computing?" Rea was a terrible liar.
"Personal Computing? We have that class? I wanna take that class!" Aerix got excited.
"Actually, I think I took the last seat. So. Bye!" She ran off. Aerix gave her shrinking figure a confused look. They wouldn't see each other again until lunch.
"So is that little midget caveman so poor that he can't even afford cereal?" Aerix brought up as he and Rea stood in the lunch food line.
"I'm not sure, besides, in their time, it's just brightly colored little rocks anyway."
"True, they're not that great."
"Maybe he's just a klepto." Their friend Johnny, a blonde haired green-eyed boy with a peach fuzz goatee, joined in the conversation. "He has to steal something, so he takes it from someone he knows so he wont get a felony charge."
"That would make sense." Aerix grabbed his lunch followed by Rea and Johnny. As they took their seats Jessie, a bright-eyed blonde waved eagerly at them from a distance. The conversation came to a sudden halt as she joined them at the table.
"So, what were you guys talking about?" Jessie asked in her usual chipper tone.
"Nothing." Rea declared bitterly before Johnny could answer.
"No, really. I know you were talking about something." She smiled sweetly at them.
"We were talking about mascots." Johnny told her. Aerix placed his face in his hand.
"What like football mascots?" Jessie brightened.
"No, cereal mascots." Rea stabbed her fork into her meat with a murders flare.
"Oh." She trailed. The three braced themselves for the usual question. "Why?"
Before Rea could strangle his girlfriend Johnny interrupted.
"So, what do you want to talk about?" He asked. That usually got Jessie going. She began to rattle on incessantly about her day, her day yesterday, and what she wanted to do that night. Aerix began to twitch and Rea banged her head repeatedly onto the table. Finally sweet salvation came in the form of a bell. Lunch was over.
"So, that crazy rainbow colored bird is implying that his cereal has a notable odor." They strayed onto another similar topic as Aerix and Johnny walked down the halls during 4th quarter. One of the benefits of being a senior was that if you had enough credits you could go home early. "Since when is something with a noticeable odor good?"
"And what about his nephews? A bird, with triplet nephews, where have a heard that before?" The two boys waited for Rea's response then looked around as they walked towards the school doors.
"Hey where's Rea?" Johnny observed.
"I wonder if there is some sort of rift in the space time continuum?" Aerix asked.
"Have you guys seen Rea?" Jessie bounded up to them in all her bubbly glory. "She's late for practice."
"Practice?" Aerix hoped this wasn't going where he thought it was. "You mean like glee club's yodeling division's practice?"
"No." Jessie laughed. "That's next week. Today is cheerleading. Oh well. Maybe she's there already." She smiled, pecked Johnny on the cheek and bounced off. "Oh and by the way." She came back. "She wanted it to be a surprise. So when she tells you, try and fake it." Aerix stared at her with a look of total shock. "That's perfect! Bye!" She left again.
"Well that was unexpected." Johnny muttered. "Aerix?" He didn't respond. Johnny hit him on the head to snap him back into reality.
"NOOOOOOOOO!" Aerix yelled the very thing he was trying to get out.
"Dude, it's called mouth wash. You can get it for like a dollar." Johnny pushed Aerix out of his face. "What was that for anyway?"
"That's not a funny joke! We don't have a moment to spare!"
"No really, I don't know."
"Are you deaf?! She's on the cheerleading squad!"
"So?"
"So! She's gone over to the dark side!" Aerix grabbed Johnny by the arms. "We have to save her!"
"Dude, really I wasn't kidding. Mouthwash. I can let you borrow some." Johnny peeled him off.
"You know what, you are really useless." He walked off.
"Well, better make sure he doesn't do anything stupid." Johnny sighed.
"OH WE ARE FAR BEYOND THAT POINT!" Aerix yelled back.
The two made their way to the school's massive football field. It was obvious their parents money was going to the athletics department. As to not be seen Aerix hid behind the bleachers and Johnny reluctantly followed.
"Look at her there." Aerix watched the group of teens dance around. "It's as if she's been brainwashed. I mean look at that Johnny."
"Oh, I'm looking." He grinned a bit.
"I mean seriously. She looks like a different person. She looks so."
"Happy?" Johnny put in.
"She's happy with us. She just doesn't show it, because."
"She's not?"
"Look, that'. I. She."
"Admit it, she might actually like being a cheerleader."
"No! BLASPHEMER!" Aerix stood to point, but forgot he was under the bleachers and slammed his head on some metal. "Gah! Son of a! Gah!" Suddenly a figure silhouetted over them.
"Aerix? Johnny?" Rea wondered.
"Blast, they've spotted us." Johnny got out and was followed by Aerix.
"When on earth did this happen? When was the seed of evil planted on you?!" Aerix overreacted.
"Seed of evil? What are you talking about! Jeez! I knew this was going to happen!" Rea threw down her pompoms during her rant. "You ALWAYS do this!"
"Do what?!"
"This! Remember when I tried to join the pep squad? You locked me in my room for three days!"
"And it would have been four if Johnny here hadn't let you out to feed you!"
"Uh huh." Johnny replied to hearing his name. He wasn't really paying attention to the conversation.
"Did it ever occur to you that I might actually enjoy this?!"
"Oh I get it! You enjoy dancing around in front of a bunch of horny teenagers!" He gestured to Johnny. "Makes perfect sense to me!"
"Oh yeah?! Well you know what?!" Rea picked up her pompoms again. "Sisboombah!" She waved them in his face and left.
"What? That wasn't even a witty comeback! This whole thing is rotting your brain!" Aerix accused. "It's taking away your nerdy instincts!" He fell to his knees. "It's EEEVIIIILLL!" Of course he was completely ignored at this point. "All right fine. If you refuse to see the light I'll have to take matters into my own hands. I'll need to go home for some planning." He walked off, stopped and walked back. "Come on." He grabbed Johnny and dragged him away.
"So, how are we going to handle the cheerleading situation?" Johnny asked once they got to Aerix's house.
"I know what I have to do! This calls for a prank!" He proclaimed. Johnny just shook his head and sat in a random chair. "I see a bucket filled with," Aerix paced the floor.
"Water?" Johnny offered.
"No, too insubstantial! We need something with more substance. Something with more kick! Superglue! No, we don't know when this is going to happen and it dries to quickly. Blood? No that could be interpreted and I could get expelled."
"What about blue dye?"
"That might work."
"How about #6?"
"FOOL! Everyone knows #5 is the prefect prank color! 5 has no application! No one even knows why it exists!"
"Ok fine." Johnny was determined his friend was completely insane.
"Now how to set it up."
"Dude, we're talking about a simple bucket over the crack of a door prank. You're complicating it."
"No! That's too simple! They'll see it coming. Rea isn't completely stupid yet!"
"All right fine. So what do you propose?"
"We'll have to rig an elaborate pulley system! Complete with hovering helicopter and matching hats!"
"Ok, well while you do that I'm going to see Guy. I have an idea that might actually work." Johnny got up and left. Aerix continued to ramble, but followed Johnny anyway.
The two approached a massive building with a large neon sign on the top that read Guy's. A place known by the colony of nerds and gamers within their small town as paradise. The building was more than an arcade, it was a metropolis filled with every possible accessory for any classification of gamer, from your basic casual gamer to the hardcore junkies everyone was welcome at Guy's. Aerix and Johnny stepped into the entrance and the place's owner stood behind a large counter. He had the look of an old prospector, complete with grizzled white beard, but his manner of dress resembled that of a surfer. He seemed to own every tacky Hawaiian shirt that was ever available, and he had the money to do it with in spades.
"Hey, Guy." Johnny waved.
"Well, how you little kids doin' now? Let's see here. I just purchased one of them there dancin' machines that you kids seem to be raving about."
"Super Super Dancetime?"
"Yeah, it's a crazy thing. Watchin' all them kids dancin' all the time, they ain't goin' nowhere, jus dancin' in one spot starin' at the screen there. I tell ya, when I was a kid I'd a gotten whipped with an ol' shoe horn if I was caught dancin' in one place all the time." The senile old man continued to rant, of course Aerix and Johnny were used to this by now.
"That's great, but we have more important things to attend to." Aerix interrupted him. "We need a helicopter!" Johnny just smacked him in the face.
"You can ignore that, he's just gone off the deep end."
"So what can I do for ya, boys?"
"Well you know, we were just thinking how cool it would be to have a laser tag in town. I mean, it's fun shooting digital things, but as human beings we like to be able to shoot each other. It's the great American past time." Johnny declared.
"A laser shootin' range eh? I s'pose I kin add one a those upstairs."
"But, you don't have an upstairs." Aerix pointed out.
"I s'pose I kin build an upstairs." Guy rubbed the hair on his chin. "But then ya gotta wonder what kinda staircase we gotta put there, you kin add yer normal straight stairs, and then ye can add yer twistin' twinnin' stairs that make ya walk fer miles, I kin prolly make the whole shootin' match outta stairs." As he ranted on Aerix and Johnny left him to it.
"And what did that accomplish?" Aerix wondered.
"Well, unlike some people Rea likes some athletic activities in her schedule. I figured with a laser tag tournament for her to get involved in she wont have to torture herself with cheerleading." He explained.
"Aha! So you do realize it's evil!"
"No, I just realize that she probably doesn't like it."
"Yeah. Well still my point remains valid. We need to get her off the team. So how are we going to tell her?"
"I've got an idea." Johnny smiled and pat Aerix on the back.
A week passed, Aerix and Johnny lead a blindfolded Rea up some twisted stairs.
"This isn't going to be like the last time you blindfolded me is it?" Rea asked.
"I swear! We thought the goat was tame!" Aerix exclaimed and they walked into the doors of the new laser tag arena. Johnny took the blindfold off and Rea took in her surroundings. She looked ready to cry.
"Oh my god! It's beautiful!" She ran up and hugged Johnny. "Thank you!"
"Wait, how do you know it wasn't my idea?!" Aerix took slight offence.
"Oh please, you were probably coming up with some elaborate scheme that would require weeks of planning and a helicopter." Rea grinned and hugged him anyway.
"You know me too well." Aerix smirked.
On her next cheerleading practice Rea showed up and gave them all the finger before going to play laser tag with her best friends.
Aerix sat at his desk with lowering eyelids. The square root of 169 was obviously 13 but the dim redhead at the board couldn’t quite get to it. Mr. Bluebell sat at his desk wrapping his fingers along the yellow oak. Fifteen minutes in the girl arrived at her destination. Shock Factor
"Seven?" Mr. Bluebell stood.
"Well I have some good news for you. McDoogals will always need people to mop the floors. Just make sure they don’t let you anywhere near the registers." He remarked snidely. The girl lowered her head a bit and took her seat. "Well, is there anyone else in this class anywhere near the IQ it would take to come up with the right answer? Speak up, my four year old can handle this equation in half the time." Aerix sighed roughly and raised his hand, he didn’t want to have to stay in the class longer than necessary and Mr. Bluebell was notorious for keeping students in after the bell. Unfortunately he was having too much fun torturing his students to really notice the arm in front of his face.
"Excuse me, Mr. Bluebell?" Aerix was determined to attract some attention to himself. "I know the answer."
"What? I’m sorry, I don’t speak moron." He grinned smugly. The bell rang soon after that and not one other student had risen from their desks. It was going to be a long class.
After having to stay behind for a solid thirty minutes due to the incompetence of his peers he slowly walked to his study hall. He could hear Ms. Whitehead’s shrill voice and he wasn’t near the classroom yet. "You’re talking aren’t you?! You horrible little street urchins! I should club you and eat your bones!"
"Good night, I’m glad I don’t have her class." Aerix walked to the room next door. Ms. Harlot (pronounced Harlow) felt that since study hall wasn’t a class her presence wasn’t really required. The students treated the hour and a half like free drinks night at a strip club. The janitors didn’t even bother to clean the classroom anymore. Aerix shuffled his way through the waded paper and other random items strewn into the floor and took a seat. Usually he would spend this time actually studying, but he was much too tired at this point and decided to take a nap instead. As soon as his head was lying onto his desk a wad of wet paper stuck itself to his neck. Its brother and sister wads soon joined it. Aerix sighed a bit and just let the kids have their fun. Once he did manage to get to sleep he woke up to find the room empty and realized he was late for lunch.
Rea, Johnny, and Jessie had already taken their seats and started off on another tangent. Aerix waited in line overlooked as usual, one student after another walked around him as if he were a column in the middle of the cafeteria.
"Hey, excuse me." Aerix tapped the shoulder of one girl who had butted her way in line. "I was in front of you."
"No you weren’t." She gave him the kind of attitude only a spoiled teenage girl could pull off.
"Actually, yes. I was." Aerix was beginning to regret having responded to her.
"I didn’t see you." She turned to face him now.
"But, I was here first."
"What, you wanna fight about it?! Huh?! Oh right! Let’s pick on the helpless little girl! She’s obviously easily intimidated by anything with a PENIS!"
"What? No, I didn’t mean that at all."
"Is this guy giving you a problem, Jenny?" A buff guy wearing a football jacket approached.
"He was trying to take my place in line." She cooed for his sympathy and got it.
"Forget it…I’m not even hungry." Aerix began to walk off, but the jock stopped him.
"What? You a little wimp? Huh? Afraid of a little bruising?"
"No, I just don’t think that violence is the best answer."
"Oh! So we got ourselves a little pansy here! I’ll bet you’d move to Colorado before fighting in a war!"
"What? Hang on. I gotta translate this…co…oh, oh you mean Canada."
"Don’t back mouth me bi-" He reared his arm back for a punch.
"Hey!" Rea came to the rescue. "Why don’t you pick on someone half your size, like you usually do!"
"You gonna do something about it, punk?" He turned around ready to do some carnage until he saw the short brunette behind him. He almost cracked a grin.
"Yeah, I’m gonna do something about it. I’m gonna go to the principal’s office and have them call your mother!"
"What are you some kinda snitch or something?"
"What? Like I have any real social standing to keep me from doing it?" Defeated the man walked off. "What is it with you and ticking people off at the most inopportune moments?" Rea walked back to the table where Johnny and Jessie had watched the show.
"Hey! You….aw man…" Aerix just plopped into the empty seat.
"No cynical retort? No bash to my ego? You feeling ok?" Rea rested her feet against his chair when she sat.
"Ugh." Aerix let his forehead whack onto the cool artificial wood.
"Geez, it’s only twelve in the afternoon and he’s already in one of his moods."
Johnny stabbed his spork into his empty milk carton a few times. The bell rang for lunch to end and even Rea and Johnny left without really observing that Aerix hadn’t moved from his place. Oddly enough Jessie stayed behind to stare.
"I know I’ve only been a part of this group for a week or so, but…are you gonna be ok? I mean…that Landon guy is kind of a jerk anyway."
"It’s not that…I have biology next."
"Biology? What’s so bad about that?"
"Hello class!" Ms. Ellen came in and placed her things on her desk.
"Hello Ms. Ellen." The room chimed.
"I trust everyone knows what day this is?"
"Wednesday!" Everyone but Aerix cheered.
"That's right. And does everyone remember what we DO on Wednesday?"
"Hands on!" This was one well-trained classroom.
"Exactly. I want everyone to get your lab coats because today we're going to dissect a pig!"
Everyone ran about selecting their lab buddies and avoiding Aerix as if he were a leper. Finally only him and one other girl remained.
"Fine, I’ll take Derrick." The snippy blonde shuffled up to her lab partner.
"It’s Aerix." He answered with a sigh.
"Whatever, just put this on." She stuffed an apron, gloves, and goggles into Aerix's arms. He did as commanded. "Ok. Now go get a pig." She shooed him away.
"Why me?"
"Because you're the man. You're supposed to like all this gory stuff." She answered him.
"Actually I find this pointless and degrading." He told her but went for the preserved piglet anyway.
"OK!" The girl proclaimed as he put the slimly creature onto the table. "Take this and cut the baby open." She handed him the scalpel. Aerix didn’t argue and pierced the pig’s skin while preservation fluid sprayed into his face.
"Ew! You got that stuff all over my shirt!"
"Sorry…" Aerix muttered.
"You did that on purpose, didn’t you?!"
"Yes, I sprayed myself in the face with formaldehyde because I like it. Getting you on the shirt was just a perk." His voice was monotone as he spoke.
"Perv!" She promptly smacked him. He didn’t even respond and just waited until sweet salvation came once again in the form of a bell.
"Dude, there you are." Johnny leaned in the doorway.
"We had started to think you offed yourself or something." Rea instinctively helped Aerix wipe the table clean.
"I’m too damn passive aggressive to even do that…" Aerix mumbled.
"In a sardonic little mood aren’t you." Jessie popped in.
"Oooo, sardonic. Nerdism is beginning to rub off on you." Rea grinned.
"Is not!" Jessie was ready to defend her title as dimwitted cheerleader.
"Man, you really are depressed." Johnny walked over to Aerix while he packed up his book bag. "You’d usually be loving this." He referred to Rea and Jessie still arguing in their own personal fashions.
"I had a bad day…" Aerix unloaded the previous events on his best friend. He finished the story up by saying. "The students and faculty of this school are all morons and jackasses."
"Sounds like a normal day to me." Rea shrugged, she and Jessie had stopped fighting around the time he was talking about the lunch incident.
"Come on, you need to vent. We’ll head over to Guy’s and play a little Unnatural Tournament." Johnny put his arms around Aerix’s shoulders and they all walked out.
"I dunno; I’m not really good at first person shooters."
"I’ll have Guy put civilian skins on the bots and we can gang up on them." Rea offered.
"Yeah, ok." Aerix shrugged.
Twenty minutes later they were all at Guy’s place wearing VR helmets and toting plastic weapons. Rea and Johnny had taken their trademark blue and red leaving Aerix with the pink one, but he didn’t really care much at this point. The three made a pretty good team taking into account the fact that Rea and Johnny spent most of their time keeping Aerix alive. They had drawn a bit of a crowd and Aerix was beginning to enjoy himself. During his brief moment of confident bliss some bystander placed their soda can on Aerix’s console. When the boy shot his hand back to grab it the can tipped pouring the sticky brown liquid onto the delicate machine. A loud pop was heard and the short caused a bolt of electricity to shoot up the wire connected to Aerix’s VR helmet.
"Aerix!" He heard someone’s muffled voice before falling to the floor. Johnny and Rea ripped their helmets off and kneeled by their unconscious friend.
"Is he breathing?" Rea asked Johnny while he checked for a pulse.
"Don’t just stand there! CALL AN AMBULANCE!" Johnny yelled at the staring kids. No one moved.
"I’ll do it!" Rea was aggravated at the lack of help they were getting.
"Wait! He’s coming to!" Johnny yelled when she had gotten up. Aerix’s eyes opened and he looked around. "You ok?"
"Of course he’s not ok! He just got his head fried!" Rea grabbed the collar of Johnny’s shirt as she shouted into his face. Aerix sat up, held his head, and softly groaned. "I’m calling the ambulance."
"No, it’s alright. The shock wasn’t that bad." He stood and dusted himself off.
"This machine is toasted. It’ll cost a bit to get it fixed." Johnny observed.
"You kids ok over here?" Guy arrived a little late for the party.
"We’re fine, Guy." Aerix grinned.
"We broke you’re game though." Rea put in.
"So long as you kids didn’t get hurt."
"Why I’m sure when you were our age you got hurt all the time." Aerix pat his shoulder.
"An’ we didn’t need any darn fangled computers to do it neither. Why when I was a young’un I remember we used to play stickball in the middle of the street, but we didn’t have any stick so we had to use our heads, and we didn’t have any balls so we’d use rocks…" Guy went off into one of his long stories. Aerix just walked off. Rea and Johnny looked at one another and soon followed.
That morning Aerix was standing at Rea’s front door. She came out wearing her usual black hoodie and dark men’s jeans.
"Hey, Aerix." Rea slung her blue backpack on her shoulder and closed the door behind her before even really looking at him. "Ready to go?" She was slightly caught off guard by the fact he wasn’t wearing his anime of the week t-shirt, but disregarded it.
"Yeah, I’m actually looking forward to going to school today." He grinned with a sinister gleam in his eye.
"Right…are you sure you’re feeling ok? There was quite a bit of electricity going through your body, even for you." The two began walking.
"I’m ok." Aerix shrugged. Rea started going on her usual rant as they traveled. This morning’s topic was on the possibility of time travel.
"Ok, so according to quantum physics each decision we make creates an alternate reality in which another possibility emerges. Because of that there’s kind of a map of time allowing us to travel back but, but not forward. Right?" Rea looked over at her childhood friend, but Aerix was too busy thinking about how hot she was right now to really give a clear answer.
"Uh huh." He said as if on cue.
"So it’s pretty egotistical to think that we are the ultimate future, so technically if they can go to their past can’t we go to their future?"
"Yeah, sure." Aerix just stared at her some more.
"Aerix, are you even listening?"
"You know what, no. No I’m not." He declared. Rea stopped walking in a bit of a stun. "You coming or not?"
"Uh, yeah." Rea sped up to catch him. The two came up to their friend Johnny’s house next. Aerix walked up to his door and knocked. A short Asian man answered.
"Johnny! Your friends are here! Time to go to school!" Mr. Oasis yelled back into the house.
"Hi, Mr. Oasis." Aerix waved a bit.
"You know the sloth never catches a falling leaf." He looked the boy up and down.
"What the hell does that have to do with anything? Are you dipping into the fortune cookies early or something?" He leaned against the porch railing.
"What? You talk back? You are not Aerix!" Mr. Oasis was surprised.
"Bye, dad." Johnny squeezed through the opening between him and the door. They walked a bit in total silence.
"You feeling ok?" Johnny looked over at Rea’s dumbfounded expression. "You haven’t said much."
"What are you asking me for? I’m not the one who had his head fried!" Rea burst through her confusion.
"Ok, so I guess I can rule out my sore throat theory…" Johnny rubbed the inside of his ear after Rea had yelled into it. Aerix, who seemed to have been in his own world until now, slowed down and looked at her.
"You know, if your throat is sore, I have something for that." The sexual connotation was obvious in his voice. Rea stopped walking all together. Normally a remark like that would have earned some guy a sore jaw, but this was Aerix. How was she supposed to react to that? Johnny just blinked a few times as they walked onto school property.
Aerix had moved on to other things while Rea and Johnny hung around Johnny’s locker.
"Ok, so just to make sure we’re on the same page here," Johnny closed his locker door. "Aerix is being extra freaky today."
"I don’t know; there’s just something about him." Rea twisted the drawstrings of her shirt between her index finger and thumb. She watched as Aerix placed one hand on some lockers and leaned in on some random girl. They were both smiling and he must have said something to make her blush. She giggled and walked past the confused duo. Aerix hit the locker at the same time a profanity slipped from his mouth.
"You sure you’re feeling alright, man?" Johnny asked.
"I feel great!" Aerix sounded sincere and as he walked by he took the time to slap Rea in the butt. She jumped up with widened brown eyes while Johnny cracked his knuckles.
"We’ve gotta fix this." He declared. "Before he does something stupid…"
"Oh he’s already crossed that line." Rea glowered. The only thing keeping her from killing the boy was their life-long friendship, and that would only go so far.
Aerix walked into his first quarter class and took a seat directly in front of Mr. Bluebell’s desk.
"If it isn’t my favorite class, the retards. Because even if I were a monkey I would find this class a good ego booster to my intellect. Now, Mr. Saber." Aerix was already dozing. "Mr. Saber!"
"The answer is thirteen." Aerix muttered.
"But wait a minute…you…you can’t…that’s just…that’s disrespectful. You can’t give me the right answer! I haven’t had a chance to make fun of you yet!"
"Look, I’m tired ok? So if you’re going to give me any questions just get on with it." Aerix sunk into his seat a bit.
"Alright, Mr. Wiseguy." he said with an evil grin. Aerix looked up at him slowly with clear blue eyes. "Tell me. How many ways can you elect a 4-person committee from a group of 10 people?"
"Order doesn't matter, so 10C4 or 210." Aerix smiled.
"How many ways can you elect a president, a vice-president, a treasurer, and a secretary from a group of 10 people? The jobs must be held by 4 different people."
"Order does matter, so 10 times 9 times 7 equals P cubed equals 5040."
"What's the area of ABCD?" He pointed at a geometric shape on the board.
"The Area of ABCD equals the area of AABD plus the area of AABC equals .5 times 10 times 20 plus 5 times 10 and five prime times 30 sin 73.43 degrees does not equal 421,048."
"A vending machine operator sells 22,000 cans of soda monthly at a price of 60 cents each. She believes that for each 5 cent increase in price, her monthly sales will drop by 2000 cans. What should her selling price be if she wishes to achieve the maximum possible revenue?"
"Um…" The teacher started to walk away as if he proved his point, but Aerix went on. "If you let n equal the number of 5 cent price increases, then the revenue equals the cost per can times the number of cans sold. R times N equals .60 plus .05n times 22000 minus 2000 N. If you consider the domain to be n greater then or equal to 0, then this Revenue function has a maximum at n equals 0, meaning that it’s best to keep the price at 60 cents." He declared. "Of course, if you include also include negative values for n, in other words, if you assume that price decreases lead to a comparable amount of increased sales, there is a maximum of n equals negative 1/2. If it is possible to have selling prices in between 5-cent increments, this would give an optimal selling price of 57.5 cents. If the price must be a multiple of 5 cents, then 55 cents and 60 cents are the best possible selling prices." Aerix sat up.
"Now, I have a math problem for you. Two trains are on parallel tracks at two stations. A train leaves station A with 20 passengers which is exactly 1000 miles away from Train B with 30 passengers. Train B leaves station B and stops and station C and drops off the same number of passengers that are on train A minus 6. Train A stops a station B which is 250 feet away from station A and picks up the amount of passengers that were on Train B plus 3. Train A leaves station B going at the same rate that it went going from station A to station B after a ten minute break. After a 20 minutes break train B leaves station C moving at 30 mph now assuming that these speeds stay constant if the entire problem started a 12 noon at what time would the two trains collide and given their velocities at how many people would die in the crash?" Aerix put his head on his desk and napped as the problem rolled about the teacher’s head. Everyone else looked fairly blank until the bell rang for them to leave.
"By the way." Aerix said as he got up. "The trains were on parallel tracks, so they wouldn’t collide." With that he left the room and headed for his next class.
He made a pit stop into the women’s bathroom and stole some toilet paper from the stalls. Next he dumped them into a water fountain and carried the sludge to his classroom. Aerix stood confidently in the doorway and dropped the mess onto the teacher’s desk. No one was even paying attention to him as he mixed in a bottle of blue dye he had brought from home. One by one he grabbed a handful and plucked off each student with deadly accuracy. Even when they got the paper off their clothes and skin were stained with blotches of blue.
Once lunch arrived Rea and Johnny’s suspicions of their friends mental health hadn’t really been swayed. They took their regular seats at a rather beaten table in the back. Aerix waltzed in and stepped directly in front of Jennifer.
"Excuse me!" She snapped. "I was standing there."
"Yes, yes you were." Aerix basically ignored her.
"Look boys," Landon cracked his knuckles in front of a couple of his groupies. "Seems our little punk geek has decided to show up today and cause some more trouble."
"Oh, hello Landon. How’s the rest of the diminished brain cell sect doing?"
"We’re doing good," the big guy to his left replied. The guy on Landon’s right smacked him on the side of his head.
"Well it’s nice to see that one of you has an IQ higher then the sugar content in a health bar." Aerix cracked a small grin. When Landon reared his arm back to punch the smug brunette Rea almost got up to help him again.
"Hey, check it out, it’s the oldest trick in the book." Aerix pointed behind the dense trio. They all turned to look and he quickly swept his foot against the guy to the right’s ankles causing a domino effect of knocking all three to the ground. He promptly grabbed a tray of food from the table next to him and dumped it on Landon’s head. Aerix turned around, took two dollars from his wallet, tossed it in the spot where the tray used to be, and walked away. Of course the flock of jocks wouldn’t let him have the final glory. The left guy got up first and was about to pummel Aerix into the ground until Rea jumped onto his back. She boxed the bully’s ears a few times while Johnny attempted not to kill the right guy. Landon got to his feet and pursued Aerix who still hadn’t noticed the fray behind him. Just as the boys shadow began to loom over him Principal Reinhardt stepped into the cafeteria. Rea, who was still sitting on left guys shoulders, slowed down on pulling his hair, while the bull himself looked a bit wide-eyed. Johnny had the right guys arm pulled behind his back to the point it was obviously out of its socket.
"And what is going on in here?" He placed his hands on his hips.
"A personification of the epic struggle between geeks and the totally witless brought to life by one boys dream to kick my ass." Aerix placed his arm over Landon’s shoulders.
"My office now."
"Well it is the lunch period I’d like to get something to eat."
"You have no respect for authority do you?"
"You’re an authority figure? Oh, I’m sorry, I thought you were just some random hobo who wandered in on this." The principal’s face turned red when he said this and he merely pointed to the left. Rea climbed down and the six wandered that way.
"What is wrong with you?!" Rea slapped Aerix on the back of his head when the principal left them waiting outside his office.
"You know Rea, you are way too prone to having unnecessary violent spasms."
"Unecess…what?" She was obviously confused.
"I had almost forgotten the brain damage you suffered from that cheerleading escapade." Aerix sighed.
"Mr. Saber? The principal will see you now." The secretary didn’t even look up from her paperwork.
"Well, time to face my impending doom." He got up while Rea just pointed at him with her mouth open.
"That boy is dead…" Her finger relaxed.
"You know, I don’t think that’s Aerix." Johnny stated.
"You don’t? You think he’s possessed or something?"
"Nah, not this time. Maybe the shock to his brain just crossed some wires."
"That’d make sense, I guess. What do we do about it?"
"Well, on TV they usually hit them really hard on the head."
"That wont work, he’d have had to be hit on the head before hand."
"True, maybe we should just electrocute him again."
"And possibly kill him? Yeah ok." Rea was a little too quick to agree.
"As a last measure of course."
"Awwwww."
"Well, Mr. Saber." Aerix flopped into the seat in front of the principal’s desk as he spoke. "In light of the fact that no one was actually hurt in the incident and of course what you’ve done for the school…"
"You mean keeping the grade point average up high enough to get a basic assistance grant from the government?"
"Don’t push me son."
"Right…"
"As I was saying. I know you’re a good kid, and I’m going to chalk this whole ordeal up to you were just having a bad day. I’m going to give you an afternoon of detention for sake of tradition." Aerix opened his mouth. "Now don’t say anything to make me change my mind." It snapped shut as he waved Aerix out. Thankfully he walked out without a word.
Rea, Johnny, and Aerix sat at the same table in the Chem. Lab that moonlighted as a detention hall during the after school hours.
"Oh sure we get an afternoon of detention while those diffused jocks get to go home early. This is such a cliché."
"Not all the jock’s got to go home early." Johnny was referring to himself. "Just the elite few."
"Elite? Rea can play football better than those guys."
"I’m actually kinda glad girls aren’t allowed on the team. If Rea could play the school would be getting sued after every game."
"Hey! That guy’s foot broke two hours BEFORE I found that bone club! You can’t pin anything on me!" Rea stood and smacked the table in her defense. Two people looked her direction, and neither of them were Aerix and Johnny. She sat back down.
Thirty minutes passed. Rea and Johnny were conversing amongst themselves while Aerix had moved on to more pressing matters.
"So, are you the demon who broke my wings?" Aerix smiled at a rather cute Goth chick sitting at the table behind them. She smiled back revealing a pair of expensive fake fangs.
"Ok, this is getting weird." Rea glared. "We gotta put a stop to this."
"There’s a brick in my back yard that would be perfect for this." Johnny pointed out.
"You know what? I’m going to ignore the fact that you said that." Rea said after a few moments of silence. That was about when the teacher got up and left, signaling the fact that detention was over.
"I’ll get the sock." Johnny whispered and walked out first. Rea grabbed the back of Aerix’s shirt and started to drag him.
"Aerix we need to talk."
"Okay, later."
"No now."
"Wait a minute, I was gonna score!"
"No you weren’t."
"Well, I suppose it’s just as well. Those fangs would probably hurt."
"Look, I know that you aren’t being yourself. Just stay still until Johnny gets back." Rea held her grasp on his collar as they went outside.
"What are you talking about?"
"The electrical shock caused you to develop an alternate personality."
"No it didn’t. I just decided to stand up for myself for once and got a little carried away."
"Oh…" Rea let go. "Well if Johnny comes at you with a brick or a sock full of sand, just run. Ok?"
"Uh…sure…" Aerix replied as she walked off.
"By the way." She turned around and in one swift motion she slapped him in the face.
Fundamentally ChallengedSnipit:
"Hey, Jess." Johnny approached them. "The guys and I are gonna chip in for some pizza delivery during lunch. Wanna join in?" Aerix and Rea joined him soon after he said that.
"What kind?" Jessie asked. Sharon took her books out of her locker while they spoke.
"Cheese." Johnny answered. Sharon started to walk to class when she stepped on her untied shoelaces and fell face first into the marbled floor.
"Sounds good." Jessie opened her purse. Aerix, feeling a sense of duty, helped Sharon up and started to gather her scattered papers. He smiled politely and she stared at him all doe eyed. She dropped her things, grasped his shirt, pulled him into a kiss, and caught him completely off guard.