Bound - Part Two free porn video

Bound Part Two By: Light Clark Warning: This story involves some mental manipulation which I know can be disconcerting to some readers. It's also set in the Whateley universe, but doesn't require you to know any of the characters or plots from that universe. It only borrows some basic world details and thematics. Chapter 18 - Day 25 - Wednesday Crashes and explosions buzzed out through laptop speakers as images of some epic action scene flashed along the screen. I didn't see any of that, though. In fact, at that moment, I wasn't even aware that there was a laptop in the room with me. My thoughts were all on the lips pressed against mine - their feel, their taste, and the heat they inspired within me. My partner, Doug, seemed no less enthusiastic than I was. The handsome blonde boy's hands held me close. One cradled the back of my head, fingers tangled in my hair as it pressed me into the kiss, while the other stroked my shoulder, prompting desires that it would venture to more daring locales. For all of my delight, though, none of the many kisses we shared between gasps for breath felt like the first one had. These were hot and exhilarating, fanning a desire within me that was strange and new. They created need not contentment - not that I minded at the moment. Off somewhere, I faintly heard the metallic click of a door knob being turned. "Hey ma-Whoa!" a male voice gasped. Startled from our kissing, Doug and I broke contact, pulling away from each other. I didn't even bother to look up and confirm that Doug's roommate had caught us making out. Instead, I just turned my face, flushed a warm crimson, down and away as if I could somehow hide from my embarrassment. "Dude!" Doug growled angrily. "Sorry!" came the reply, followed almost instantly by the sound of the door swinging closed once more. Once his roommate was gone, Doug turned back toward me. "Sorry about that. He was supposed to be gone longer," he apologized, starting to lean back in for more kissing. "Now, where were we?" Unfortunately for Doug, now that the moment had been shattered, I was in no mood to continue. Activating my powers, I shifted my vision from Doug's room to my own, and with a puff of black smoke, vanished from Doug's arms to appear on my own bed. There, I rested my head in one hand, taking one long shuddering breath as I did. "What the hell came over me?" I muttered to myself. Shaking my head in confusion, I clenched my thighs together tightly as I wrapped my arms around myself. I felt so weird, hot and antsy, with an odd, wet, warmth between my legs and tingling tightness in my chest. Oddest of all, was an insidious desire to teleport myself right back to Doug's room, so that I could get right back to kissing. It took a few moments before the sensations started to subside, leaving me feeling faintly anxious and disappointed. Once that had happened, I slumped back against the wall and sighed. "I can't believe I kissed a boy." Of course, I'd done more than just kiss Doug. The first one had just been a kiss - harmless curiosity really - but once it was over I'd wanted to do it again and again. If his roommate hadn't come in, I knew that we'd probably still be making out. Even just thinking about it now prompted a strange mix of queasiness and interest to fill my thoughts. The latter only made the former stronger. An entire lifetime as a boy had taught me that I wasn't supposed to want to kiss boys, yet now I did. "Stupid girl body," I grouched, glaring down at my unfortunately female anatomy. My body had failed me a lot over the last few weeks, first by becoming female and then by developing the impressive curves it now possessed, but this betrayal was different from the others. It had messed with my thoughts and feelings, and I didn't like it, not one bit. Growling in frustration, I shoved myself off my bed and started walking over to my dresser, stripping out of my clothes as I did. Once there, I quickly snatched out some workout attire and set about getting dressed. I needed to clear my head of all these awkward new feelings, and some nice, strenuous exercise sounded perfect for that. Once I was dressed, I lifted my gaze, catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror over the dresser. I'd always looked pretty girly, or at least childish, but my reflection still bothered me. My hair, currently two-toned with drab gray for several inches at the end and a brilliant silver-white above that, was long enough to brush my shoulders, accentuating a face that was more mature and feminine than I'd had before. I gave that reflection a glare to let it know that I hated it, before activating my powers and zipping off to a new location. Black smoke preceded me as I arrived outside near a tree behind Hawthorne. Quickly, I flipped my powers around, turning off everything but my psychic abilities as I approached the tree and raised my fists. It would serve as the perfect enemy to vent my frustrations on. Normally when fighting, I used my psychic abilities to wrap myself in a PK shell, enhancing my already impressive physical capabilities. Doing so now, though, would just result in a destroyed tree and some very angry faculty. I didn't really care if I got in trouble, but being forced to sit around and wait for a punishment would be unbearable. Therefore, instead of using my shell to enhance my abilities, I used it as drag on them, making it feel like I was trying to move through water, or something even thicker. With just a slight nod to the tree in acknowledgement of its service to me, I lunged forward, muscles straining against the shell around me as I put my whole body behind a punch. My right fist cracked into the tree bark with force more appropriate for a strong baseline, far less than it would take to do any kind of serious damage to my hand through my PK shell. I didn't stop there, though. I immediately yanked my left around in a hook while pulling my right back in preparation. From there, my movements turned into a quick flurry of blows as I beat my frustrations into the bark. Vaguely, through the pounding of fists, little things needled at me. The first was that even with a sports bra, the hefty breasts my link with Doug had inflicted upon me wouldn't quite sit still. They jiggled around a bit with my movements. The second was the much bigger nuisance, which was that my hair whipped around, occasionally swatting me in the face. Both nuisances just fueled my efforts, causing me to press to even greater speeds. "Doesn't that hurt?" Doug's voice remarked from behind me. Furious at the interruption, I turned to toss a sharp look at Doug while flipping on the powers I'd need to teleport away. Doug apparently realized this as he held up his hands in a stop gesture. "Wait! Don't leave!" The request got me to pause for a moment, leaving me standing there glaring at Doug with my jaw and fists clenched. "I warned you not to abuse the fact that you could find me." Doug reeled a bit from the hostility. "Sorry, but if you just take off without saying a word, I'm gonna come looking for you. What the hell happened?" "I just ..." I began, only to trail off as I struggled to find words to explain the situation. "I just didn't want to do that anymore." "Do what? Kiss?" Doug questioned, his brow furrowed in confusion. "I thought you liked it. You said it was nice." "It was," I admitted before catching myself. "I mean ... no ... I mean ... it's weird ... kissing a boy ... and ... I don't know." Doug just looked at me as I fumbled for words, clearly confused. "I don't understand. The other day when we talked about you not having ever been into ... that stuff before, you seemed open to it whether it was with a boy or a girl as long as you liked it, and you clearly liked it. I've kissed enough girls to know when they're enjoying themselves." The reminder of how ... enthusiastic I'd been in the moment had me blushing bright red, driving my gaze down and away to hide my embarrassment "I'd just never done anything like that before. I was curious ... that's all." "That's bullshit," Doug spat. I winced at Doug calling me out on the lie. "No it's not. I-" "Stop lying to me, Erin," Doug commanded. "There's no way you'd get this upset just because someone saw you 'experimenting'. I doubt something like that would even phase you, but even if it did, you'd have just threatened to beat the shit out of him if he told anyone what he saw, not just let him walk out and then vanish without so much as a word. What's really going on?" "Look, it's just weird alright?!" I blurted angrily. "Kissing you ... it made me feel things ... stuff I've never felt ... I don't like it. I don't like what it means." "What it means?" Doug questioned. "What does it mean?" Shoulders slumping, I let out a defeated little sigh. "It means that more has changed than just what I look like." "So? Isn't that supposed to be one of the good things about all of this; you finally getting to experience stuff you couldn't before?" Doug inquired. "Yeah ... I guess, but it all just feels so out of my control," I explained. "I thought who I was was safe. That no matter what I looked like, I'd still have all the same thoughts and feelings, but I don't. I'm supposed to want to kiss girls not boys. That's what I always expected. That's what seems right. Not this ..." My response elicited a skeptical look from Doug. "I don't know, Erin. I mean, no one gets to choose who they're attracted to, and it's certainly gonna make you feel different when you just suddenly have these new ... urges after having nothing like that at all. Other than that, though, you've seemed like your usual short-tempered, anti-social self throughout." "Hey!" I exclaimed indignantly at the insulting adjectives. Doug shrugged. "What? It's the truth." "Yeah? Why don't I find someone to turn you into some jackass's sex fantasy and see how calm you are about it?" I shot back. Doug chuckled. "Alright. Fair enough. The point still stands, though. You still seem like the same person to me." "I guess ... " I conceded reluctantly. "Still not a fan of the whole kissing a boy thing, though." "Well, it's not like you have to kiss me again if you're not comfortable with it," Doug replied. "I'd be lying, though, if I said I wasn't hoping to do it again." "Really? Wow. I'm so glad that I have your permission to not kiss you. Thank you so much, master," I remarked sarcastically, rolling my eyes. Doug grinned. "Master, huh? Kinda like the sound of that. I don't suppose -" "Not a chance," I cut in before he could even finish the thought. Doug shrugged. "Oh well. Anyway ... I had fun tonight. We should hang out again sometime. Maybe actually watch that movie." I nodded cautiously at the idea. After all, it's not like I could honestly claim that I hadn't enjoyed myself, even if that enjoyment had freaked me out. That wouldn't be a problem if we just watched a movie anyway. "Maybe." "Great," Doug replied. "Well, I'll leave you to your ... tree punching then. See ya." "See ya," I told him, watching him turn and walk away. It wasn't until he was out of sight that I activated my powers to teleport back inside. *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 19 - Day 27 - Friday Sitting there at my desk with my chin resting in my hand, I tried very hard to not just drift off as I listened to the teacher's prattling. If only they could manage to be a little more interesting, it wouldn't be a problem, but there was little chance of that happening. Since coming to Whately I had learned that school was almost always boring. Having been removed from education for two years between my abduction and recovery, I'd spent the two and half years years since then with private instruction to get me caught up on what I'd missed. Private lessons always moved at exactly the right pace, my pace, but classes couldn't do that. For someone like me with all sorts of mental exemplar benefits, combined with good intuition and learning ability, class, even at a place like Whateley, tended to drag. It was quite frustrating. I let out a long weary sigh as I sank lower into my chair, the weight of my head resting more heavily on my propped up arm. Like many times before, I wondered if maybe someone else out there was learning something fun. I could always peek in on Doug or something. I doubted Doug's class would be any more interesting than mine, but I was really just looking for anything to stave off sleep at that point. With a quick activation of my clairvoyance, my vision shifted, taking away my classroom and replacing it with Doug's. At the moment, the blonde boy was mimicking my posture nearly perfectly, slumped in his chair with his cheek resting against his hand and his eyelids drooping. A soft chuckle escaped my lips as I watched his eyelids drift down and his head start to dip, followed by him jerking back up, momentarily wide awake again. I guessed that he must not have slept that well the night before. He was too diligent to just be slacking off or anything like that. Well, maybe if his teacher was being incredibly boring, but even then, I doubted Doug would do such a thing. He'd never risk giving up an advantage like that. With a faint smile on my lips, I just sat there and watched as the psychic fought against his sleepiness. It was a struggle he alway seemed to be on the edge of losing, but he never quite faded into sleep. On the edge of my focus, I could hear my own teacher droning on, getting just enough of my attention to make sure that I didn't miss anything that I didn't already know. I would have sworn only a minute or two passed while I was off watching that other class, that there was still half of class left to go, but suddenly, class was just over. I yanked my vision back to my own classroom in surprise, watching the other students rising from their desks and gathering their things. It took me a moment to overcome my bewilderment and start gathering my own things to get ready to leave. "Hey, Erin," a male voice said from behind me, catching me just as I was rising from my seat to teleport away. "You got a sec?" Glancing back, I saw a decent-looking guy around my height with brown hair standing a few steps from me. I took a moment to try to fish for his name or some other indication that I actually knew him, but I didn't seem to. All that I could remember was that he sat a couple rows over from me and one back so I had hardly ever even had reason to see him much less interact with him. I was tempted to just ignore him and teleport away - it wasn't like I actually wanted to talk to him - but I figured I could spare a few seconds just in case it was actually something important. "What do you want?" I demanded impatiently. "Well ... you see ... some friends of mine and I are having this ... thing this weekend, and I thought maybe you'd like to come," the boy answered. "Y'know, if you're not busy or anything." "A thing?" I questioned, screwing my face up to show how dubious I was of the ambiguous term. "Y'know, just me, a couple of my friends and their girlfriends. A thing," the boy explained, trying to retain the ambiguity as best he could. The explanation prompted a frown and narrowed eyes from me. I'd been hit on by guys enough times to recognize exactly what this 'thing' really was. "You mean a date." The boy made a wishy-washy motion that was half nod and half shrug. "Yeah ... sorta ... I guess ... as like a group, though." I started to open my mouth to give my usual response to such things, that I was actually a guy in spite of my looks, but I stopped. I suddenly realized that my normal excuse didn't apply to me anymore. I actually was a girl. Worse, if what had happened a couple of nights ago was any indication, I even seemed to like guys. That didn't mean I wanted to go on this guy's little group date thing, because I definitely didn't, but I didn't know how to turn him down now. It was baffling. "Uhm ... " I stalled, floundering for a response to this situation. At least, I managed to get my head to start shaking itself no - somehow. "I'm sorry ... I uhm ... I can't ... I'm uh ... busy ... this weekend." "Oh ... okay. No big deal. Some other time, then," the boy responded, surprisingly accepting the awkward and pathetic excuse I'd stammered out. After that, he gave me a friendly wave as he started toward the door. "See ya." "See ya ... " I mumbled, even returning the wave, because I felt too lost and uncertain to resist the natural habit of it. Once the boy was gone, I shook my head, prepared to teleport away, and silently cursed my current gender. Kissing Doug, boys staring at and hitting on me, even how my body moved and felt, it was like every little thing that I should've been able to handle had to be awkward and confusing now. I hated it. *********************************************** *********************************************** All around me, the cafeteria bustled with students as I slowly picked at my food. Normally I ate quite fast, even on days when I stayed in the cafeteria, but that wasn't the case that day. Stress, anxiety, even a little bit of dread, had me too distracted to have my usual appetite. "Erin! Hey!" Cameron's voice greeted cheerily from behind me, just before the scrawny devisor stepped around to sit across from me at the table. "Where were you yesterday? Did one of your powers haywire or something?" I shook my head. "Nah ... just decided to take a nap instead." Cameron nodded, buying the lie since it was something I frequently did during lunch. However, I hadn't been around yesterday for another reason. I'd just been too confused and angry to be around Doug, but Cameron didn't need to know anything about that. "Must be nice to be able to do everything so quickly you actually have time for a nap during lunch," Cameron remarked. "I guess," I replied, giving a disinterested shrug. It wasn't like I particularly liked taking naps at lunch. They were usually just an attempt to recharge after a haywire. "You'd probably have time for a nap too if you stopped spending half of every lunch either building or chasing down one of your crackpot contraptions. Not that you'll ever do that." "Definitely not!" Cameron confirmed, grinning. "Building stuff is too much fun. In fact, you should try it some time." My jaw clenched at the very idea. "I'm not a devisor." "But you could be, right? Just copy my power, then we can build stuff together. It'll be fun!" Cameron exclaimed happily. "You can keep your fucking mental illness to yourself!" I hissed angrily, adding a glare for good measure. Cameron reeled back a bit from the hostility, looking for all the world like I'd just smacked him. He deserved it, suggesting something like that. "Sorry ... " "Whatever," I huffed dismissively. For whatever reason, the stupid kid loved being a devisor. I couldn't understand why, though. Devisors, even the ones that weren't outright evil, caused nothing but trouble. The idiot tore apart perfectly good items to build freaky pseudoscience things that went haywire half the time and sometimes even outright exploded. It was just demented. After that, Cameron and I drifted into silence, the devisor joining me in pointlessly picking at his lunch. The silence suited me just fine, leaving me free from the nuisance that was other people. That freedom didn't last long, though. Across the cafeteria, I caught sight of Doug coming inside, unusually late for him. As he stepped in, he held the door open behind him, allowing a girl to step through it as well. At first, I assumed Doug was just being a gentleman, or more likely fostering the image that he was one, but he fell into step beside the girl, the two of them talking. The girl was odd-looking, one of the mutants around Whateley whose appearance diverged quite noticeably from baseline. She had medium blue skin, long dark blue hair, and almond-shaped red eyes. Other than her odd coloration and a pair of long, pointed ears, she was quite pretty with a slim, nicely curved figure, although she wasn't as tall or developed as I was. Watching the two make their way toward the lines, I wondered what the girl was doing with Doug or more precisely what he was doing with her. I didn't recognize her, so I was pretty sure I'd never seen them together. Reading their lips told me they weren't talking about anything all that important - just some rumor about some people I didn't know dating. Maybe she was someone he was trying to add to his portfolio of friends or possibly a potential girlfriend? Feeling anxious and annoyed, I pointedly turned away from the couple and back to my half-eaten food. After all, why should I even care who Doug was hanging around with? He and I weren't even really friends. He could hang out with whoever the hell he wanted. "Hey there, Erin," Doug greeted when he finally sat down at the table next to me, before giving Cameron a slight nod of recognition. "Cam." I didn't respond; merely glanced over at Doug in annoyance before returning my gaze to my food. Just having him sit there made me feel even more anxious than I'd been earlier. It was so aggravating being around him after what had happened. It was enough to make me consider teleporting back to my room rather than putting up with it. Meanwhile, Doug didn't seem put off by my obvious moodiness at all. He just turned to talk to Cameron. "So, did ya ask her yet?" The devisor nodded glumly in response. "Yeah ..." "Yikes ... that bad huh?" Doug remarked, wincing sympathetically at Cameron's defeated tone. "What the hell are you two babbling about now?" I growled, angry at being out of the loop. "Cameron and I were talking about your power yesterday and how neither of us has ever actually seen you mimic someone," Doug explained. "I suggested that maybe he should ask you to copy his power." I rolled my eyes. "What nonsense. Why the hell would I even want to be a devisor?" Doug shrugged. "I don't know. Cameron likes it a lot, and it's always seemed fun to me." "Well, it's not," I huffed authoritatively. "Oh? So you've tried it out before?" Doug asked. I shook my head fiercely. Like I'd ever let that horrid shit into my head. "Nope. I've got enough shit randomly fucking up my life. I don't need more of it, and that's all being a devisor is good for." "Well I'd have you copy mine, but you already have psychic abilities," Doug replied, rubbing at his chin thoughtfully. "Why are you two so damned interested in seeing me copy an ability anyway?" I questioned. "There's no flashing lights or anything." Doug shrugged. "Because you have a cool power. You can just get whatever ability you want." "I've got more than enough abilities already," I countered. "Oh, are you slots full?" Cameron spoke up, suddenly interested again and not just moping about my denigration of his mutation. "Slots?" Doug repeated the word, looking confused. Cameron nodded. "Yeah, power mimics have all sorts of different limits. At least for some of them, everything they copy takes up a slot and they only have so many slots to use." "Is that true?" Doug asked me. "Do you have some kind of slot limit?" That made it my turn to nod. "Yeah, I only have so many slots, but no, they're not all full." "So you could get more powers if you had a use for them," Doug mused. "We just need to find you something useful to copy." "Argh! I'm not copying any more powers so just drop it!" I snapped, as tired of this line of conversation as I was of the devisor shit that had preceded it. My outburst shut not just Doug and Cameron up, but people all around us as well. The quiet didn't last long, though, as people quickly returned to talking when they realized it hadn't been the precursor to a fight. Neither of the boys started talking again, though, leaving an awkward silence between us. "So, who was the girl you came in with?" I inquired after the silence dragged on long enough to get me to feel sort of guilty about it. "Huh? Oh, that's Gwen," Doug answered. "She's one of my more fascinating friends. Not only is she smart and beautiful, but she can actually induce a waking nightmare in people along with creating and manipulating shadow constructs. Really amazing stuff." "Whatever," I muttered disinterestedly as I rose from my seat to go. "See ya." Doug furrowed his brow in confusion at my sudden desire to depart, but didn't try to get me to stay. "Alright. See ya, Erin." *********************************************** *********************************************** The view from the roof of Hawthorne was starting to lose its novelty, but it still managed to be calming. There was almost no one who would bother me up there, just Mr. Geintz, and even he only did so when it was something important. Up there, I could truly be alone with my thoughts. The isolation wasn't the only calming part of it. From high above, things always seemed simpler, probably because everything looked so small. Somehow, everything in the world seeming smaller made my problems feel smaller right along with it. "Too bad other things aren't smaller," I muttered to myself, tossing a quick glare down at my chest. I couldn't really manage to stay mad at my awkwardly sized chest, though, or really any one thing in particular. I knew I was mad from the antsy desire to not sit still and go punch something as hard as I could, but I couldn't quite figure out why. There were lots of things I could be mad at, my gender, my appearance, being trapped at this school, kissing Doug, the weird way thinking about kissing Doug made me feel, and countless other ones. While occasionally one or the other would pop into my train of thought, none of them seemed to be the reason at the moment. The best I could figure was that maybe it was the culmination of all those problems that had me upset. Maybe it wasn't any particular thing, but just my inability to have any control over any of it. Maybe it was something else entirely. I didn't know. All I knew was that I was angry about something. Sighing, I leaned back, propped up on my arms and looked up at the sky. "What the hell am I supposed to do about 'something'?" The sky didn't have any answer for me. It never did. That was the problem with looking up for answers. There wasn't anyone up there to give them. "Would be nice if at least Doug was dealing with some shit from this damn link, too," I grumbled as I returned my gaze to the grounds. "But, nope. That fucker's life just gets better and better. He's got Cameron trained to do what he wants, me looking like a wet dream to leer at, and now that weird blue bitch, Gwen. Knowing him, he's probably fucking her already." Clenching my hand into a fist, I smacked it against the roof I sat on to vent. Doug was one topic that never failed to rile me up. It wasn't even just that everything seemed to work out for him. Every time I tried to get mad at him, he made me feel like some irrational lunatic for not just being okay with all the shit that happened to me. He couldn't see any reason why I wouldn't want to be a hot girl, why I wouldn't want to fawn all over him, or why I wouldn't want to do whatever the hell he told me to, like some kind of slave. It wasn't a surprise really, him being the narcissistic ass that he was. Even if I managed to come up with a reason, he'd just find some way to make it seem silly and stupid. I hated it. The moment of rage didn't last, though, quickly returning to the more mild angst that I'd been dealing with since lunch. After all, while I wanted to hate Doug, I knew he hadn't really done anything to deserve it. He hadn't chosen to do this to me, at least not according to the doctors. It had just happened. I could hardly blame him for trying to make the most of it. That was just who he was. "I should just ditch him again. I was gonna do that anyway before that second haywire," I mused fleetingly. The idea certainly had merit. It would keep Doug from getting any ideas about us doing ... stuff together, while getting me away from Cameron's devisor bullshit. I could be all alone again. The word alone moving through my thoughts prompted a reflexive wince as darker worries started worming their way into my head. "Probably the best thing I could do for them, anyway. They wouldn't last too long around me." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 20 - Day 28 - Saturday Sunlight crept through my window as I woke to the feeling of pain. I was so used to such a feeling being indicative of an impending haywire, I immediately activated my warper abilities as I started to rise. I barely got up to a sitting position, though, before my mind roused itself enough to realize that it wasn't my head that hurt. Instead, it was a dull ache radiating through my lower abdomen and back, both of which were also complaining about my sudden rise. "What the hell?" I muttered, truly confused by the sensation. Such pain was almost completely foreign to me. The only times I'd ever experienced that kind of ache was after some kind of physical trauma, either from a fight or from ... something worse. I hadn't been in any fights, though, and it wasn't anything worse. Hissing through my teeth at the discomfort, I flopped back onto my bed. "Maybe it's some new kind of haywire come to torment me," I mumbled pessimistically. The last new kind of haywire I'd experienced had been responsible for the dramatic reshaping of my appearance, so I certainly wasn't looking forward to another new kind showing up. Whatever it was, though, I was pretty damn sure that stupid psychic link to Doug was behind it. "I swear killing both of us would have been better than putting up with all this shit," I grumbled, regretting, not for the first time, that I hadn't been more insistent about breaking the link. "But noooo ... I had to let them talk me into giving it a shot." Feeling tired and a little chilly, I tugged up my blanket and snuggled underneath it. Once covered, I squirmed around for a bit trying all sorts of different positions in an effort to find one that was comfortable. Lying on my stomach seemed to help the back pain, but it meant squishing my boobs, which were oddly sore and tender today, under me. Laying on my side made the pain even worse, so that was right out. In the end, I just rolled onto my back again, hoping that I could manage to sleep through the discomfort. I don't know when I succeeded in falling asleep, but apparently I did because I went from groaning in discomfort to my eyes snapping open to the sound of someone knocking. "Whoever the hell is out there better be ready to die," I grumbled too quietly to be heard through the door while rubbing at my head which now ached slightly. After a moment, I called out, "Who is it?" "It's Doug," came the reply from the other side. "Go away, Doug," I directed, starting to snuggle back into my blankets again. I wouldn't have wanted to see him even if I didn't feel like shit. "I know you're not busy, Erin. Open the door," Doug countered insistently. Growling in anger, I forced myself to rise, my tired aching body protesting the entire time. Rather than walk. I just teleported across the room to the door, grabbed the handle, and yanked it open. Standing on the other side was Doug, who I treated to a withering glare for disturbing my rest. "What the fuck do you want, Doug?" I demanded irritably. My anger did not get the reaction, I was hoping for. Instead of reeling back or wincing, Doug gave me a look of concern. "Are you alright?" "Just peachy," I snapped acerbically while leaning heavily against the door frame. "Now that we've got that out of the way, why don't you just fuck off and leave me the fuck alone." Doug furrowed his brow skeptically at my answer. "You don't look peachy. You look like shit." "That's just this stupid body you saddled me with," I retorted. Sighing heavily, Doug shook his head at me. "Yeah ... no it isn't. You look like you can barely stand. Are you sick?" "No. I don't get sick," I answered. "Now, can we stop talking about me? Just say whatever stupid shit you came here to say so I can slam the door in your face already." Doug chuckled at that. "If you've already decided to do that, does it really matter what I came to say?" "Good point," I agreed, pushing off the door frame to step back and try to slam the door in Doug's face. Apparently, Doug expected exactly that as he stepped forward right as I stepped back. I tried to slam the door on him anyway, figuring he deserved to get hit for trying that shit, but I barely even got the door to start moving before a stab of pain shot through my head. Releasing the door, I staggered back a step, clutching a hand to my head and hissing in pain. Between the sudden pain and everything else that was messing with me, my heel caught on the floor and I could feel myself start to fall. "Shit!" Doug cursed, lunging forward to catch me before I got far. The door slid closed with a click behind him as he grabbed me. "You alright?" Flushing in embarrassment, I shoved myself away from Doug, with a furious, "Get off me!" Once I was free and standing on my own, I stood there panting for breath, shoulders slumped, and glaring angrily at the aggravating boy who refused to leave me alone. For his part, Doug just looked worried. "Seriously, what's going on?" "I don't know, alright?" I sighed. "I just woke up feeling like crap." "So you are sick?" Doug inquired. "I don't get sick," I huffed. "Not since I manifested, anyway." My insistence got a frown from Doug. "Well maybe you should lie down or something while we talk about it. No sense in pushing yourself." "I don't want to talk about it!" I snarled, spinning away from Doug. I had to admit I did like Doug's suggestion to lie down, though, even going so far as to go flop onto my bed. It did make me feel a little better. "Yeah, I got that from your attempt to slam a door on me," Doug remarked. In spite of his acknowledgement of my disinterest in communication, he came over to sit on the edge of my bed. "So, what are some of the problems?" I narrowed my eyes at Doug, trying to glare him out of the room, but that tactic clearly wasn't going to work. There were other things I could have tried, though. Clearly the link would stop me if I tried to slam a door on him, but it wouldn't mind if I teleported him out of the room, then teleported just myself back in. I didn't have to talk to him, but this situation was pretty new to me, so I thought maybe he'd have some insight. "Fine," I finally conceded. "Lots of stuff is off. I'm tired, cold, and sore." Looking me over, Doug nodded thoughtfully as I listed off my symptoms. His inspection even went so far as to have him rest the back of his hand against my forehead which got me to promptly swat it away. Unperturbed by the strike, he mumbled, "Well you might be a little warm, but nothing too odd," before furrowing his brow. A beat later, he asked, "Where are you sore?" "I'll tell you, but no more touching," I stipulated, jabbing a warning finger at the boy. Doug held up his hands non-threateningly. "Fine." Even with the show of good faith, I spent a moment just peering at Doug suspiciously before answering. "Mostly through my lower back and stomach," I told him, rubbing a hand over the spot just below my belly button. "My ... uhm ... chest ... is kind of tender too, and now, thanks to you, I also have a headache." Doug nodded knowingly as I informed him of my various pains. "Ah, I see ...." "What?" I questioned, wondering what the psychic had figured out about my current affliction. "Roll over for me, please," Doug requested. I furrowed my brow in confusion. "What? I already tried that. It doesn't work with my bo-" "Just do it," Doug reiterated more firmly. Clenching my jaw at getting told what to do, I nevertheless rolled over as instructed. It worked about as well as it had last time, mildly helping my back, but causing some new pain from my tender breasts. Not to mention it just felt weird having all that flesh squished under me. "There. Happy?" I demanded hostilely. "Ecstatic," Doug replied dryly right before his fingers rested on my lower back. Instantly, I jerked away, partially rolling onto my side. "Hey! I said no touching!" "Just trust me," Doug told me. The absurdity of the statement got a wry chuckle out of me. "Are you serious? The last time I trusted you, you tricked me into making out with you." Doug rolled his eyes. "I didn't trick you into anything. Besides, you don't have to worry about anything like that with this. Just relax." I gave him a suspicious stare for a few moments. Finally, I conceded, flopping back over onto my chest. Once again his fingers found their way to my lower back, and I couldn't help but jerk when they touched me. "Relax," Doug repeated as his fingers started to rub my lower back. Strangely, Doug's touch didn't feel all that weird. Actually, if I was being honest It felt kind of nice. It eased some of the pain in my back and I could feel my tension and discomfort start to drift away. "Mmmm," I moaned softly. "Helping, isn't it?" Doug remarked. I nodded. "Yeah ... how'd you know to do that?" "My sister," Doug answered. "You're sister?" I inquired in confusion. "Yeah, she always liked a good back rub when she got her period," Doug answered. For a moment, the relaxing massage kept me from catching the meaning of that last word. After all, I'd only heard it used in that context a few times in my life. One of those times was quite recently, though, when Dr. Tenant had been explaining the differences between boy equipment and girl equipment ... The relaxation shattered, and I pulled away from Doug's hands again. "Oh no no no no." "What's wrong now?" Doug questioned, before realization dawned on him. "Oh ... did Dr. Tenant not warn you about that?" "No, she did, but I can't ..." I tried to argue, trying to latch onto something to explain that it had to be something else. "There's no blood! She said there'd be blood." "Well, I'm not really an expert on this, but I think I remember hearing that the PMS stuff comes before the blood," Doug noted. I wanted to come up with another argument, anything to deny it, but it made too much sense. I was never sick, so it was unlikely that this was an illness. All the problems I'd had that morning were things I'd been warned might happen, too. It all just fit. "Oh god ... this is gonna happen every month?" I asked in utter dread. "It lasts a few days too," Doug replied, implicitly answering yes to my question. "Oh god," I repeated, rolling back onto my tummy to bury my head in my pillow. Doug's hand started rubbing my back again, more sympathetic than massaging. "Sorry." "Every time I think it's over, something new comes along to fuck with me," I complained, getting a chuckle from Doug. "What are you laughing at?" "Nothing really. I was just thinking that it would probably be a lot easier on you if you weren't constantly trying to slam doors in people's faces - both figuratively and literally - when they try to help," Doug replied. I turned my head enough to glare at Doug. "Last time I let you 'help', I ended up kissing you." Doug just gave me a little shrug and returned to massaging my back for me. "Doesn't mean you shouldn't ever let me help again. I'm not doing anything bad right now am I?" "No ... I guess not ... " I muttered begrudgingly. I did feel a little better. Doug smiled. "Sometimes, it's good to have friends." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 21 - Day 29 - Sunday I stood in front of the medical building full of apprehension about going inside. While I still felt awful, tired, and achy, after having put up with it for a day it was no longer enough to confine me to my bed in misery - barely. That meant I needed to talk to the doctor, because I needed to know for sure what this meant. Steeling myself, I stepped through the door and made my way toward the nurse's station. "Uhm ... excuse me." The nurse looked up from her work to smile at me. "Hey, sweetie. What can I do for you?" "I ... uhm ... I need to speak to Dr. Tenant about ... my change," I explained evasively, rubbing at my arm with one hand out of embarrassment. The nurse nodded in understanding. "I see. She's with someone at the moment, but she should be done soon. I'll take you back to one of the exam rooms to wait." "Thanks," I answered. It wasn't long until I was seated in one of the exam rooms awaiting the doctor's arrival. I wasn't sure if I should've been eager or full of dread about it, though. The doctor would have answers, which would be nice, but I was pretty sure they were answers I didn't want to hear. Hiding from it wouldn't change them, though. I'd just have to face this like everything else, even if it was a nightmare. "Hello, Miss Kleid. Good to see you again," Dr. Tenant greeted as she came into the room, giving me a clinical appraisal. "The nurse said you needed to talk about your change, but you don't look any different this time, so what's up?" Unable to look the doctor in the face while I talked about what was going on, I kept my gaze on the floor while gripping the exam table tightly in my hands. "It's actually about the last change ... I think. Yesterday I ... uhm ... started having these ... problems: abdominal and back pain, exhaustion, stuff like that. They're still there today, and since I don't get sick, I think they might be related to my ... new equipment." "Ah ... yeah that does sound like some classic PMS," Dr. Tenant responded. "Kind of quick, though. You haven't been fully female for a month yet. These things are far from regular, though, even for people who are born girls, so we should do a quick exam. Lift up your shirt a bit." Once I had done as asked, she stepped forward, carefully pressing her hands into my abdomen. "Any blood yet or other symptoms?" "No blood, my chest is a little tender, and I've had headaches off and on," I answered. Dr. Tenant nodded as she quickly finished up the touch exam. "You can put your shirt down," she told me which I quickly did. "I don't see any kind of trauma or anything else that might obviously be the cause. I know we talked about this possibility back after your first big change, but do you need me to go over it again?" Dr. Tenant asked, getting a head shake from me. "Okay. How about supplies? You'll need some tampons or pads. They have instructions on the packaging, but I could go through it with you, if you want." I shook my head again, not sure I could handle the embarrassment of that conversation. "I don't have any, but I can figure it out on my own." Dr. Tenant nodded. "Alright. That means it's time for the unpleasant part." "Unpleasant part?" I asked, dreading the sound of that. "You remember that exam we did when you first got your new equipment?" the doctor asked, getting a slight nod from me. I remembered a very invasive exam where she'd poked around inside me to see how complete my plumbing was. "Well, we're going to have to do it again." *********************************************** *********************************************** I shifted my weight from side to side as I sat on my bed to try to ease some of my discomfort. While my PMS symptoms still hurt, they weren't the problem at that moment. The big problems now were getting over the disconcertingly invasive pelvic exam, and then being forced to deal with my anatomy immediately after to prepare for my disgusting new bodily function. Having only been a girl a few weeks, my equipment was still scary enough in its own right that I tended to avoid it as much as I could. The idea that I would soon also be bleeding out of it was downright terrifying. Terrifying or not, I was determined to be ready for it, because at least that made me feel marginally in control. Maybe I couldn't stop the bleeding, but I could control how it went. My efforts to control the situation were how I'd gotten to this new level of discomfort. I'd had a dizzying array of choices to choose from at the school store, but they'd mostly boiled down to two distinct choices. One choice was pads, tampons, or both, and the other choice was to guess how 'heavy' my 'flow' would be. Just thinking about it made me cringe. In the end, I'd just gotten the heaviest options in both styles, determined to be prepared for whatever nightmare the world decided to throw at me. The purchase was daunting enough, but that was really only where it started. After that, I had to use the damn things. Neither choice looked or felt appealing in any way. The pads were like wearing a diaper in my undies while the tampons required me to insert ... something inside of me. While getting the latter in was downright traumatizing, it was easier to deal with long term than the diaper thing, so that was what I'd gone with. It still made me feel really uncomfortable to know something was currently jammed up inside me to catch any blood that streamed out. "What a nightmare," I sighed as I buried my face in my hands. Wasn't it enough turning me into a girl? Having to also deal with all the aches and cramps and tampons and blood was just overkill. Worse, this wasn't just some one-time thing. Every damn month for the rest of my life this waited for me - well, unless I got pregnant. Somehow, that managed to sound even worse. A knock on the door tugged me from my despair. Groaning, I forced myself to stand up through the awkwardness, pain, and exhaustion and walked over to open the door. "Oh ... it's you." "What a pleasant greeting," Doug replied sarcastically. "Is it just your usual disdain for me or did the visit with the doctor go badly?" "Can't it be both?" I responded, turning to go sit back on my bed. Taking the door not being slammed in his face as an implicit invitation, Doug stepped inside and followed me over to the bed to sit beside me. "What'd she do?" "Poked around inside me to see if all my stuff was in working order," I answered. "Great news, it seems to be, so I can look forward to this shit happening next month too, and the month after that, and the month after that, and-" "I get the idea," Doug cut off my repetition. "That sounds rough." I shrugged. "Just one more thing to deal with. Half the world manages. So can I." Doug chuckled. "It's amazing how quickly you manage to go from blinding rage about how awful something is to 'I can handle this'." "Oh, I'm still furious about what you've turned me into," I assured him. "I'd love to pummel you into a pulp for it too, but thanks to the fucking link I can't even do that." "Do you really want to pummel me into a pulp?" Doug asked. That question was a difficult and confusing one for me to answer. "In the moment, when I just want this to all stop ... yeah. I realize it's not really your fault, but that doesn't mean pounding your face in wouldn't be fun." "So it's a good thing then that this link has stopped you, then," Doug noted. Shrugging uncertainly, I let my gaze fall to the floor. "I don't know. I guess not killing you is a good thing. I can't say I'm very happy with the rest of what it's done, though." "It's definitely a lot to get used to, I'll give ya that" Doug conceded. "However, much as I don't think you want to hear it, I think you're better this way than the other way." "Why? Because you want to sleep with me?" I hissed acerbically. "Well sorta yeah," Doug admitted. "I mean ... you'll have to trust me on this, but people wanting to sleep with you is a good thing." I tossed Doug a skeptical look. "Sure doesn't sound like a good thing, but whatever." Rolling his eyes, Doug just shook his head at me. "God, you're naive." My eyes narrowed immediately at the insult. "Watch it. I may not be able to punch you, but that doesn't mean I'm gonna just put up with your shit." "Sorry," Doug replied, holding up his hands in surrender. "It's just you really don't know a lot about sex stuff. Surely you've had a friend at some point who was into someone awful and you knew they were awful, but you couldn't convince your friend of that." "Nothing like that's ever happened to me before," I replied, not bothering to mention that, I'd never had any real friends, at least not that I could remember. All I'd had were a couple of martial arts buddies I'd sparred with before I came to Whateley. Everyone else in my life had been more like family, and none of them had acted like Doug described. "Well anyway, that's the kind of thing that happens when people want to sleep with you. They'll forgive your faults, do things for you, and want to spend time with you," Doug explained. "It's very useful." I nodded in understanding. "So that's why you keep coming around here even after I've told you countless times to go away." That got a laugh out of Doug. "Well, I guess it would be hard for me to say that wasn't at least part of it, but there's more to it than that. You're just ... something else." "What do you mean by that?" I asked. Doug gave me a little shrug. "You're ... I don't know ... special ... I guess ..." That was strange. Doug was almost never at a loss for words like that. He always seemed to have something to say no matter what the situation was. It made me wonder what it was about me that could possibly cause that. There didn't seem to be anything all that special about me, well other than the fact that I knew I was attractive to him. He'd said that wasn't it, though. Flushing slightly, I shifted nervously on the bed and tugged at my shirt. "Well, whatever your reason for hanging around, it's super annoying," I huffed, feeling kind of warm. Strange after feeling cold for most of the last two days. "You didn't seem to find that back rub yesterday so annoying," Doug countered. "That was sorta okay ... I guess ... " I conceded reluctantly. "If you're still sore today, I could give you another one," Doug offered. The offer was quite tempting. The cramps and pain and exhaustion were all still there, and I could really use some help relaxing after the whole tampon thing. "Well I guess I wouldn't mind ... if you really want." Even that much of an admission had me blushing and looking away. Doug nodded and shifted position to allow me to lie down before tapping the bed. "Alright, lie down." I did as he asked, lying on my tummy to let him rub my lower back. It did feel nice. *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 22 - Day 30 - Monday "Fucking disgusting," I spat as I held the blood-stained tampon I'd just removed out at arm's length. Quickly, I dropped it back into the little wrapper it had come in and then set it aside, so I could get to work on inserting a fresh one. Once all that horrible stuff was out of the way, I quickly yanked my underwear back up, left the stall, and tossed my trash in the bin. Not even wanting to be in the same building as what I'd just had to deal with, I activated my powers, picked my favorite spot on Hawthorne's roof, and teleported away. The roof replaced the bathroom in an instant, leaving me with the vista of Whateley bathed in the midday sun. It would have been a nice day if not for my first period. For the first few changes of my tampons, there had been no blood, giving me the terrible false hope that maybe the doctor had been wrong about what was coming. That hope was now buried in the trash can along with the waste that had ruined it and my appetite to eat, not just this lunch period, but ever again. People just shouldn't bleed when they aren't hurt. Of course, it was hard to claim that I wasn't hurt. I certainly did hurt at the very least. Bleeding did not alleviate any of my PMS symptoms, but it did imply hope that they'd go away, at least if anything I'd read about it could be believed. However, reading about such a revolting bodily function had been nearly as bad as having it. "I should find some empath power, just so I can make Doug feel just as miserable as I do," I mumbled vindictively as I sat down in my favorite spot. "After all, he did want me to copy a power." While it was an amusing thought, I'd never actually follow through on it. Not even Doug deserved this torture. Leaning back, I looked up at the sky to watch the few clouds there move lazily along. I always loved to just look up at the sky. It wasn't because of the majesty, or out of some hope of a higher meaning, or any of the other usual things. I liked looking up at the sky because it reassured me to know that it was still up there - that no one had taken it away when I wasn't looking. Nothing makes a person appreciate the sky as much as having someone steal it from them. "At least one thing is still right in my life," I murmured softly. There was a pretty good chance it was the only thing that was, but one thing was better than nothing. Sighing, I let my gaze fall back to campus, looking off into the distance at the cafeteria where undoubtedly Doug and Cameron would be having lunch. A couple of days ago, I would have considered them problems, nuisances that just kept shoving their way back into my life for some reason. I was less certain of that now. Cameron really wasn't all that bad - for a devisor anyway - and Doug had been ... persistent. "More like stubborn," I harrumphed grumpily. No matter how many times I told him to get lost, it never seemed to phase him. I didn't even know why he bothered. He had to have easier options he could pursue for friends - like that stupid Gwen girl he found so fascinating. He kept putting up with me though, for no other reason than because I was somehow ... special. Coughing to clear my throat, I adjusted the collar of my blouse and shifted my shoulders a little. I'd been thinking about his little declaration quite a lot since he'd said it, but the reasoning hadn't become any clearer. It could certainly have been a lie, some scheme to endear himself to me, but it had seemed so ... sincere. Exasperated, I rested my head in my hands and rubbed vigorously at my hair. "This is so frustrating!" I growled. "I should just read his damn mind." Almost as soon as the words left my mouth, I sighed, letting my shoulders slump. My mom had been very clear when she'd let me copy her power that I was only to use my telepathy with permission or to prevent harm. This would do neither. Even if Doug was scheming, I doubted it was out of any desire to harm me. That wouldn't benefit him any. Reading his mind would just be to satisfy my selfish curiosity. I couldn't abuse her power like that, and asking him would give him plenty of warning to mask his scheme, if that was what it was. "Guess I could always just try to cut them out of my life again," I proposed. For some reason, the idea didn't sit quite as well with me as it had before. That was probably just the PMS, though. *********************************************** *********************************************** Dr. Bellows waiting area appeared around me as my teleport finished. Knowing I was a few minutes early, I took a seat in one of the chairs to wait. As I did, I constantly shifted and squirmed, trying to find the position that made PMS suck the least. Right on time, the psychiatrist stepped out of his office - a habit he'd been in for every session since the first. "Hello ... " he started to greet in his usual pleasant tones, but that lasted only until he saw me, then even he couldn't quite hide his surprise at my appearance. "Ahem ... Erin." "Hey, Doc," I greeted neutrally before flipping my vision to inside the psychiatrist's office and teleporting inside. Dr. Bellows walked in a moment later, letting the door swing closed as he took his seat. "I remember you having to cancel last week for an incident. I presume your ... new look had something to do with it?" I clenched my jaw at the question, really not wanting to have to talk about it, especially with the psychiatrist - not that I ever wanted to talk with him about anything. "Yeah. I had another haywire like I had the time I was in here. When it was over, I looked like this, and ... stuff happened." "What kind of 'stuff'?" Dr. Bellows interrogated. Humming thoughtfully, I tilted my head from side to side. "Well, I guess I got a little ... upset about it and then I snatched Doug from his class and tried to punch my fist through his face." That revelation, unlike my appearance, was not enough to surprise Dr. Bellow. It figured really. He'd probably read the security report about it. "You were already female at the time and adapting to it reasonably well. Why react to this particular change so much more violently." "Well actually, I tried to do the same thing when I learned there was some kind of psychic link between him and me that was responsible for turning me into a girl," I pointed out. "So it was just as violent." Dr. Bellows nodded at the new information. "Still, surely you didn't find this change as extreme as the one which swapped your gender, especially since it was not unexpected that you would keep changing. Right?" "I guess," I admitted. "But that doesn't mean I didn't still want to punch his face in. I thought he was trying to turn me into some kind of perverted fantasy of his." "Why would you think that?" Dr. Bellows inquired. I shrugged. "I was linked to him, and he'd said that I'd be his type if I had nicer hair and uhm ... bigger ... boobs. Next day, I changed and got those things, so I figured he was behind it." "And was he?" Dr. Bellows asked. I shrugged again. "Sorta? I mean ... they think it is likely that this link thing is trying to make me more ... attractive to him. Apparently, it's subconscious or something, though, because stuff changed besides just what he'd said." "I see," Dr. Bellows replied, making a quick note about me. "And how do you feel about how you look?" "Hate it," I answered curtly, earning a gesture from the psychiatrist to elaborate. I considered just adding 'a lot' in a snarky sarcastic way, but I knew he'd just ignore it. It would waste a few seconds of time, though, so it was tempting to do regardless. "Fine. It's a lot more awkward than I was before. Yeah, I was a girl, but my boobs were manageable, and my body still pretty much felt the same if I wasn't thinking about what was between my legs. Now I've got these bouncing nuisances," I gestured at my chest for emphasis, which obligingly jiggled a bit from the gesture. "And my hips feel weird, and my hair keeps getting in my eyes, and now I've got my period to deal with and-" I stopped abruptly, immediately regretting what I'd just said. Dr. Bellows's reaction to my mention of my period was just a slight raise of an eyebrow, but I knew that meant we were going to talk about it and I didn't even want to think about the gross things going on down there, much less talk about it. "That must be difficult for you." "It is," I answered stiffly, narrowing my eyes at the doctor ready to cut him off if he so much as tried to pry into it. "Well let's start with the easiest problem you mentioned. Have you considered cutting your hair, or even just tying it back to keep it out of your eyes?" Dr. Bellows suggested. The avoidance of the period topic had me so surprised that I missed a beat before I could even think about the actual question. ".... Uhm ... no ... " I answered uncertainly, wondering why I hadn't thought of just hacking the extra hair off. It certainly would be a lot more convenient, but I supposed it probably wouldn't look as good. I had sorta gotten used to it like it was, anyway. It was only really a nuisance when I practiced fighting, and tying it back sounded like an easy enough solution to that. "Well, something to consider anyway," Dr. Bellows noted. "The last problem you mentioned probably would have happened regardless, so it would seem your only major issue with your most recent change is your ... shape." "Yeah ... I guess," I answered, willing to concede the other two, especially now that I'd been told about tying my hair back. Dr. Bellows nodded. "You know, a lot of girls would rather look like you do now than you did before. In fact, a lot of them would just like to look like you do now, period. I know that doesn't necessarily make you like it any better, of course. I'm just saying that there might be upsides to your current appearance that you haven't considered." "What like having guys leer at me all the time?" I remarked sarcastically. "Sorry, but that's just creepy." Dr. Bellows shrugged. "I know from our talks that you've never experienced this before but, trust me. Someday, you might find that you actually want to get attention like that from a boy." The very idea of it made me scrunch up my face in disgust. "Not a chance," I spat, getting an amused chuckle from Dr. Bellows. "What's so funny?" Dr. Bellows bellows shook his head. "Nothing really. Your reaction there just reminded me of a little girl being told they might grow up to be interested in a boy. They almost always react that way, but most of them will one day grow up and be interested in boys." "Yeah well I'm not and never have been a little girl, so it's never gonna happen," I stated defiantly. Even as I did, though, my mind taunted me with memories of kissing Doug and not exactly being repulsed by how it had felt. *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 23 - Day 31 - Tuesday "This is what I get for bothering with those two idiots," I grumbled as I sat there, staring at the door into the cafeteria. A good quarter of lunch period had already passed while I'd waited with no sign of either Cameron or Doug entering. If there was one thing I hated, it was waiting. While I certainly was furious, another part of me, an insignificantly small part, was a little worried about the two boys. It wasn't just that neither had sat down with me. Neither had even shown up at all. Cameron at the very least had a tendency toward mishaps that could certainly make him late, and if Doug had been with him during one of those mishaps, it could explain why they hadn't arrived yet. It only took remembering what had almost happened on the bus ride to school to get me thinking that such a mishap could be very dangerous. "They'd better be fucking dying," I growled as I flipped on my clairvoyance and started searching around campus for them. They weren't in any of the obvious places, such as their last classes, their rooms, or with security, and there would be all sorts of things wrong with me peeking in on people in Doyle, so I had to just sort of look around, hoping to catch sight of them. It took me a little while, but I finally found the people I was looking for. Cameron was seated under a tree, holding a hand to his nose and looking quite a bit worse for wear with an eye that looked mostly swollen shut and a generally battered appearance. Doug and that girl, Gwen, were nearby, the former kneeling next to Cameron to talk to him, and the latter standing back a bit impassively with her arms folded across her chest. Huffing in exasperation, I stood up and teleported, appearing at the scene in a puff of black smoke. "What happened? One of your shitty inventions finally piss someone off?" Of the group, only Gwen was startled by my sudden appearance, and even she only jerked slightly in surprise. Doug didn't even look up from Cameron, whose face he was carefully inspecting. However, the devisor did look up at me, still clutching at his nose. "No," Cameron insisted in a voice that was very nasally before wincing in pain. "None of my stuff has gotten out." I snorted in amusement at the claim. "Maybe not today, but it's only half over." "He hasn't had anything malfunction since last week," Doug spoke up. "I'm pretty sure that's not the reason he got attacked." "Why else would anyone care about a scrawny little nerd like him?" I questioned incredulously. Doug shrugged. "Apparently the guys that got him were Mal and Andy, so my guess is to get back at you, Erin." "Get back at me? Why would they beat up Cam for that?" I inquired. "Because he's your friend, and after you embarrassed them in the cafeteria they know better than to try to go after you directly," Gwen interjected, before tilting her head toward Cameron. "He, on the other hand, is easy to go after." I rolled my eyes at the other girl's claims. "That's ridiculous. He and I are not friends." "Well, everyone thinks you are," Gwen countered. "Well, we're not!" I insisted angrily, before looking at Doug. "What the hell is she doing here anyway? She's even less Cam's friend than I am." "She and I were just walking to lunch when we saw Cam like this and stopped," Doug responded. My jaw clenched slightly at the answer. "Whatever. Where's security? Shouldn't they have rounded up Cam and his attackers by now?" Doug shrugged. "I was wondering about that myself. I'm guessing Mal's behind that somehow. We can worry about that later, though. For now, teleport Cam to Doyle. I think his nose is broken." "Fine. Whatever. Let's go, dork," I sighed, stepping forward to rest my hand on Cameron's shoulder. The next moment, I activated my power, and we were gone. An instant later, we appeared in Doyle amidst a puff of black smoke. "Holy sh-!" one of the nurses started to exclaim before catching herself in front of us 'kids'. "Hello," I greeted in a faux chipper tone. "My fellow student here seems to have tried to intercept a brick's fist with his nose. Do you think you could help with that? Maybe give him a brain transplant while you're at it, so he won't do anything that stupid again?" "Hey! I wasn't trying to get in its way!" Cameron protested, causing him to wince in pain again for his efforts. "Oh dear," the nurse replied, rising from her seat to rush around to Cameron. Seeing Cameron taken care of, I gave him a quick wave as I prepared to teleport. "Good luck, Cam," I said, right before I vanished to reappear next to Gwen and Doug, causing the former to jump slightly again. The startled reaction got an amused smirk from me. "That idiot's taken care of, Doug. Time for me to take care of the other two, since they didn't learn their lesson last time," I announced, quickly searching the cafeteria with my vision to find the brothers and get ready to teleport. "Erin stop!" Doug called out before I could vanish. Jerking my vision back to my surroundings, I gave Doug an exasperated look. "What now?" "You can't just beat those two up," Doug answered. "Are you kidding? You saw what they did to Cameron," I responded. "They're gonna regret that." "I thought he wasn't your friend," Gwen remarked obnoxiously. That comment earned the blue girl a glare from me. "Well, as you so kindly pointed out before, people think he is, and that means I need to show them what happens to people who try to hurt my friends." "I'm all for getting back at those guys, Erin, but you still can't just go beat them up," Doug stated. "Who knows what kind of trouble you'd get in for an unprovoked attack like that, especially with the kind of damage you can do." "Unprovoked?!" I exclaimed. "This is very fucking provoked!" Doug shook his head. "It's not gonna look that way. Security clearly doesn't know about what they did to Cameron. They're just gonna see you show up out of nowhere and attack two students who are minding their own business. You're still in trouble for snatching me from class, and you didn't even hurt me. Imagine how much trouble you'll get in for hospitalizing those two." Clenching my hands into fists at my side, I leveled a hard stare at Doug. "So what? You want me to stand here and do nothing? Just let them get away with it?" "You're wasting your time trying to explain things to a thug like her, Doug - all muscle and no brain," Gwen spoke up. "Just let her go get in trouble." "Don't think I won't beat the shit out of you just before you're a girl," I warned, tired of the blue girl's smug attitude even after only talking to her for a few minutes. "See?" Gwen snarked. "She only thinks with her fists." I probably would have planted my fist in Gwen's face if not for Doug immediately yelling, "Stop it, both of you!" Even as my entire body tensed, I forced myself to not lash out like I wanted to. Instead, I just glared at the shorter girl with my fury barely contained. "Fine. You and the blue bitch handle it," I spat before shifting my vision to my room and teleporting away. *********************************************** *********************************************** The small rock sailed through the air in a high, graceful arch. Carefully, I traced its path with my eyes gauging its speed and trajectory. I didn't really need to watch where it was going, but it helped me stay focused on the task rather than think about that jerk Doug and his arrogant blue bi- Clenching my jaw, I jerked my vision downward and activated my teleportation. Instantly the world vanished in a puff of black smoke. When it returned, everything was reversed with me looking toward Hawthorne instead of away. I was also a few dozen feet from my previous spot. Keeping my vision down and focused, I waited. A moment later, I snapped my hand up, snatching the rock out of the air perfectly. Once I had it, I gave it a quick bounce to settle it properly in my grasp then launched it high up into the air. One more, the rock sailed through the air, and I lifted my gaze up to track it. Like the last time, the arch was perfect - the product of many many hours of me using this little exercise to practice my strength and teleportation control. It would land in the exact same spot I'd been standing at before. I just had to teleport and wait. Black smoke reversed my world once more, and I focused on listening for the rock to react. That was also part of the training, using it to hone my hearing, so that I didn't have to rely on seeing things to react to them. It wasn't that important when it came to little rocks, but there were far more dangerous things that mutants could throw. Catching the rock, I bounced it and prepared to throw it again when I caught something else on the edge of my awareness that made me frown. "Are you playing catch with yourself?" Doug asked a moment later, confirming my suspicions of who had found me. "Yep," I replied disinterestedly before tossing the rock up again. This time, I chucked it with far more force, making sure that it would go very high up. As it left my hand, I flipped on another power and gave the rock a moment to get up there. Once the rock was high enough, my other hand thrust forward, unleashing a roaring ball of orange flame that shot upward like a rocket. It easily caught the stone, crashing in with blinding speed. The next instant, the rock vanished in a massive burst of fire that sent little flecks of molten rock shooting out like sparks from a firework. "Holy shit!" Doug gasped in surprise. I turned back to him and chuckled wryly at his stunned expression. "Why so shocked? You know one of my powers is pyrokinesis." "Yeah ... but I've never seen you use it before," Doug replied, shaking out of his stupor to look at me. "From what Cam told me of the one time he saw it, I didn't expect it to be very impressive." "Everything I do is impressive, Doug," I assured him coolly. Pausing for a moment, I rested a hand on my hip and just peered at the teen before saying more. "So ... am I gonna have to get a restraining order on you, so you quit finding me when I don't want to be found?" Doug smirked in response. "If you didn't want to be found by me, you'd just go somewhere I couldn't follow." That logic brought a frown to my face. Why hadn't I just gone further away? There were plenty of fields and woodland around and all of it was just a teleport or two away. Doug certainly wouldn't trek miles off campus to find me. "The last time I left campus, I got in trouble for it," I countered. That wasn't exactly true. I'd mostly gotten trouble for ditching my shrink session that time. The faculty hadn't been too happy with the mess I'd made either. Still, they probably wouldn't be too happy with me constantly teleporting off campus without permission. "Ah ... I see ... " Doug replied in that way people do when they don't believe what's being told to them, but don't want to argue with it. "Anyway, I just came by to let you know that I've figured out what to do about revenge for Cam and to say it was nice to see you were willing to stick up for him." I shrugged. "Can't have people thinking they can get away with messing with me, even if I don't really care about what they're doing." Doug chuckled. "Yeah ... sure. Anyway ... see ya tomorrow?" I shrugged again. "Maybe." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 24 - Day 32 - Wednesday "Stupid fucking hair!" I cursed as I glared at the mirror. Reflected there was the usual girl me, except at the moment my hair was tied back - mostly. That mostly part was the source of my current consternation. Frustratingly, the hair at the very front of my head was not quite long enough to reach back to the ponytail - at least not long enough to actually stay in it. That meant that two stray locks were left loose to frame my face, and also whip into it whenever I moved around quickly. It was certainly an improvement over all of it being loose, but in that moment I didn't care. I was furious. "I should just shave it all off! That'll teach it!" I growled, sorely tempted to do exactly that even if it would look utterly terrible. It wasn't like I wanted to look good. In fact, being less attractive would probably be a perk. Plus, the fucking hair would be out of my eyes. My fury played itself out quickly, leading to a defeated shoulder slump. "Stupid link will probably just make it grow again or some other shit," I grumbled, staring at my reflection. That was the reason it had gotten that long in the first place, after all, because Doug prefered it that way. That realization seemed to just suck the energy out of me, so that even though the day was just starting, I felt exhausted and heavy. The stupid link had made it so I couldn't even choose how to cut my own hair. It was just so fucking pathetic. "Maybe I can at least convince Doug to let me grow it out enough to tie it up," I sighed as I turned from the mirror to go over and flop onto my bed. Lying there, I just looked up and stared at the ceiling, feeling powerless. After several minutes, I finally forced myself to sit up, my gaze dropping to my body. As usual, a good chunk of my downward vision was blocked by the large breasts that filled out the blouse I wore. Below that, the uniform skirt flared out around my hips, and then there were the smooth, slender legs. The final touch of the feminine image was the loose strands of hair that were just visible on the edge of my vision, and those were just the things not covered by my clothes. However, whether I liked it or not, I was stuck with it. I supposed there were worse bodies to have. "If I ever really want to change my hair, I guess I'll just have to risk killing Doug and me for it," I joked morbidly. A part of me was legitimately tempted by the idea, because I wanted the link gone that badly. It wasn't worth killing someone over, though. Sighing heavily, I reached up to redo my hair in the short little ponytail. It was sort of a cute look, I supposed, and I did prefer it like that to having all that hair just hanging there. Once that was done, I flipped on my powers, shifted my vision to my first class, and vanished from my room. *********************************************** *********************************************** "Hey, Cam. How's the nose?" I greeted as the younger teen sat down for lunch. Scrunching his face up, Cameron reached up to wiggle his nose a little with one hand. "Seems good, but I swear I can smell more now," Cameron answered, frowning slightly. "I'm not sure that's a good thing." "Probably not around here," I commented. "There are at least a couple of kids that unleash some pretty potent BO." "No kidding," Cameron agreed. "I think I walked past one of them earlier. Nearly dumped my breakfast all over the ground." I chuckled at the mental image. "Well ... I'm glad you're okay. I'd hate for you to get hurt on my account. You do enough on your own to get yourself hurt." Cameron gave a self-deprecating laugh in response. "Yeah ... that I do. Had an invention go haywire last night too. Nearly got my eyes poked out by a toothpick dispenser." "A toothpick dispenser?" I inquired. "Why would you even make a devise to do that?" "Well I thought it would be nice if no one ever had to get up to get a toothpick at like a restaurant or in the cafeteria here, so I made this little pneumatic gun to shoot -" Cameron explained. As soon as the word shoot left Cameron's mouth I held up a hand to stop him, using the other to rub at the bridge of my nose. "God, you're an idiot ..." "Sometimes ... yeah ..." Cameron admitted, rubbing the back of his head self-consciously. "Anyway ... I guess getting my nose broke basically just makes us even for you stopping Andy from doing it for what happened on the bus." "I did what now?" I questioned, pretending to not remember the incident just like I had the last time the devisor and I had talked about it. Cameron blinked a couple of times in disbelief. "Wait ... you really don't remember that I was there?" "Where?" I asked. "At the fight you had with Andy where you broke his ribs," Cameron clarified. Resting my chin in my hand, I adopted a far off look as if struggling to remember back to that day. "Are you sure you were there when I thrashed that blockhead?" "Yes!" Cameron exclaimed. I peered at him for a moment, seeming deep in thought and trying hard not to giggle and ruin it. Finally, I shook my head and waved a hand at him dismissively. "No, you weren't." "Yes, I was!" Cameron insisted. "The fight was because of him picking on me!" "If you say so," I replied in a tone that made it more than obvious that I didn't believe him. Cameron just stared at me in disbelief. "But Doug said ..." "What did Doug say?" I asked. "That you were ... uhm .. just teasing me by pretending to not remember," Cameron answered. "Really? Hmm ... " I remarked, nodding thoughtfully. "I wonder why he'd lie to you like that?" "Who lied?" Doug asked as he sat down at the table. Cameron pointed a finger at me. "She said you did about her just teasing me about not remembering that she fought Andy for me." Rolling his eyes, Doug leveled an exasperated look my way. "The boy got his nose broke because of you. The least you could do in return is admit you rescued him that day." "Fine," I sighed. "Doug's right, Cam. I did get involved to stop Andy from beating the crap out of you, though at the time, I really just wanted someone to take out my frustration on and that jackass seemed like a good opportunity." "I knew it!" Cameron exclaimed smugly. "There's no way an exemplar like you could possibly have just forgotten like that!" "That was what was bothering you?" I asked. Cameron nodded happily. "It didn't make any damn sense! I hate it when things don't make sense!" Chuckling, I shook my head at the silly reason for the devisor's irritation. "Well, now, you know the truth." "Oh? Did you finally admit that you consider Cameron a friend?" Gwen asked as she too sat down. She took the spot right next to Doug, scooting in close to him. Suddenly annoyed and a little angry, I leveled a glare at the other girl. "Why are you here?" "Doug invited me," Gwen answered simply. That information had my glare whipping over to settle on the boy in question as I hissed, "You did what?" "I invited her to sit with us for lunch," Doug confirmed, giving me a confused look. "Is there something wrong with that?" "Whatever," I muttered. Rising from my seat, I shifted my vision and vanished in a puff of black smoke. After quickly dropping off my tray, I teleported back to my room where I flopped onto my bed still full of anger at the psychic for inviting that annoying girl to sit with us. "Stupid fucking Doug." Lying there, I couldn't even figure out what Doug saw in Gwen. Sure, she was kind of cute, but nothing special by Whateley standards. Hell, I was a boy a month ago, and I was prettier than she was. She was such a pompous know-it-all too. Even I could tell that, and I'd only shared like five sentences with her. For several minutes I stewed in my anger right up until someone started banging on the door to my room. "Erin! Open up!" Doug called from outside. Glaring over that way, I shoved myself out of bed, stomped over to the door, and yanked it open. "I thought I told you to stop finding me when I don't want to be found." "Yeah, well I don't fucking care!" Doug spat, clearly quite angry. "What the hell is your problem, Erin?! I bring a friend to have lunch with us and get to know you guys, and you act like a bitch then fucking bail without a word?! You were a bitch to her yesterday too, even though, she was trying to help with Cam!" "So I don't like your stupid, arrogant bitch of a friend! What the fuck do you care?!" I shot back. "Because I can't exactly have one of my friends biting the other friend's head off every time they see each other!" Doug argued. I shrugged. "Fine. If you care so damned much about her, we can just not be friends anymore - not that we ever were." Glaring at me, Doug clenched his fists at his sides in anger. It didn't last long, though, as he quickly regained his composure and let out a weary sigh. "Jesus, Erin ... I'm not picking one or the other of you to be friends with. You need to stop it with this whole us not being friends thing, too. We clearly are." "Whatever," I muttered, shrugging indifferently. "Argh!" Doug growled in frustration. "It's not 'whatever', Erin! You've gotta actually talk to me. I can't help otherwise." "There's nothing to help with," I stated. "If you wanna help someone so badly, go help your bitchy, blue friend instead." "What the hell is even your problem with Gwen, anyway?" Doug demanded. "You don't know anything about her. You've been around each other for like two minutes, tops." I shrugged, not interested in talking about it. It's not like I could change Doug's mind about Gwen. Clearly, he'd just do what he always did and make me feel like I was being the unreasonable one. For a moment, Doug just peered at me, annoyed by my refusal to answer his question. Suddenly, though, something clicked, and his eyes widened slightly, followed by a slight smirk. "Well if you're not gonna talk about it, I guess I'll just go back to the cafeteria to hang out with Gwen. I was thinking about asking her out, after all." The very idea of Doug dating that pompous blueberry had my jaw clenching and my blood boiling. "You can't do that!" "Why not?" Doug asked. I didn't know how to answer that question. I didn't even know why I'd said what I did. It wasn't like it mattered to me if Doug dated some bitch. If he did, he'd probably stop trying so hard to be around me. I could finally just get him out of my life, and be alone. For some reason, though, thinking about Doug with someone else while I was all alone made my chest hurt. "Because ..." I muttered, not knowing what else to even say. Doug gave me a dubious look. "That's not much of a reason, but alright. Who do you think I should ask out instead?" I furrowed my brow in confusion. "What?" "I want to date someone. If it's not gonna be Gwen, I need someone else to ask," Doug explained. "Oh ..." I mumbled in understanding. It made perfect sense really. Doug wasn't a bad looking guy, people liked him, and he'd apparently dated quite a bit before coming here. Honestly, now that I thought about it, it was more of a surprise that he wasn't already dating someone. If it wasn't going to be Gwen, then it would just be someone else. "Any ideas on who that someone should be?" Doug pressed. "Preferably someone I already know who's at least as attractive and interesting as Gwen." My mind tried to find an answer to that question, but I could only think of a few girls that I even knew, and none of them felt any more palatable to me than Gwen. If I didn't answer with someone, though, Doug would date that blue bitch, and I couldn't let that happen. What other girls did I know? My mind supplied only one. "What about ... ?" I started to say but stopped, feeling hot and flustered. "What about who?" Doug asked. Every muscle in my body felt tense, and I could feel my heart thumping rapidly in my chest. "What about ... me?" "You?" Doug questioned incredulously. "I thought you weren't a fan of the whole kissing a boy thing. Couples kiss y'know." "I know that!" I huffed in annoyance. "It's not like I want to kiss you or even date you. I just don't want you dating that bitchy know-it-all is all." Doug gave me a skeptical look. "Why would I want to date someone who's only dating me out of spite, instead of someone who actually likes me?" Feeling self-conscious, nervous, and stupid, I looked away from Doug and rubbed at my arm. "Well ... it's not just outta spite." A moment later, Doug's hand grabbed my chin, turning my gaze back to him. He had an obnoxiously smug grin on his face. "I knew you liked me." "Shut up!" I growled, tugging my chin free of his grip and twisting my head down and to the side. I could feel my face heat up with embarrassment. "Asshole." "Sorry," Doug apologized. "You should b-" I began as I turned to face him again. However, Doug's lips interrupted my ranting by pressing in against my own. I didn't resist it. *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 25 - Day 32 - Wednesday The moment Doug's lips met mine, my anger faded away while my whole body felt hot and tense. There was no thought of pulling away as Doug pressed up against me, driving me back against the door frame, nor as his tongue moved against my lips to make them part before it. I drowned in that moment, needing air, needing space, but not wanting either. Doug seemed to share my wants because he didn't break the kiss off, just let our tongues continue their playful dance. When we finally broke for air, I leaned heavily against the door frame I was pressed against, my knees feeling like they were ready to buckle. I gasped for air, suddenly in desperate need of it or anything else that might quell the rush in ears or the rapid beat of my heart. As I did, I looked down at the floor, unwilling to meet Doug's gaze. For his part, Doug was no less out of breath than I was. I could hear his ragged breathing as he sucked air in. At the same time, though, I could practically feel his gaze on me, making my cheeks flush with renewed heat. I wondered what he was thinking while hoping he would say something, anything, to break the awkward moment. Instead of words, Doug leaned in again, tilting my head up so that our lips could lock once more. Uncertainty and trepidation gripped me right up until our lips touched again, then they were gone, burned away in the heat. Everything seemed so fuzzy, my mind unable to form full thoughts, my body sluggish and weak. Through the haze, heat, and sensation of the kiss, I felt Doug's hands move. One, the one which had tilted my head up, trailed backward, running along my neck to cup my head and pull me more fully into the kiss. The other trailed downward, gliding down along my neck and over my collarbone to the heaving softness of my chest. Jerking away from that touch, I broke free of the lip lock. "No," I breathed, bringing a hand up to push him away. There was no strength behind it, though, leaving my fingers to do little more than just rest on his chest. Despite the lightness of my touch, Doug yielded to it anyway, releasing me from his grasp and stepping back. "Too fast?" Wrapping my arms protectively around myself, I looked down again, not wanting Doug to see how red my face had to be at that moment. I needed to calm down, to regain control. My body didn't seem to like that idea, though. It was so hot and jittery. I could even feel goosebumps on my arms and a strange ... gooeyness from between my legs. It all felt so weird and out-of-hand. My lack of an answer brought a frown to Doug's face. He rested his hands on my shoulders and looked down at me. The action made me feel so small compared to him, even though, I would actually be an inch taller if we both stood up straight. "Are you alright?" Dough questioned in concern. "I-I'm fine!" I insisted in a quavering voice. "Really? Because you look like someone just violated you," Doug remarked. "Not exactly good for a guy's self esteem." "I'm fine," I repeated, this time lifting my gaze to look him in the eye and managing to keep my voice steady and calm. Doug gave me a skeptical look. "You don't need to force yourself." "I'm not," I assured him. Reaching down, I grabbed his hand and guided it up to cup one of my breasts. There I held it, trying my best to stay calm. It didn't do much good, though. My heart was thumping as loudly as a drum and my chest was so hot that it felt like it was on fire. "See, I'm fine." Not buying the charade for an instant, Doug pulled his hand away. "It's alright. It's not like I need to grope your boobs right now, amazing as they might be. We can go a little slower so that it's not so weird for you." He paused to give me a chance to respond, but I just stood there silently, feeling too embarrassed to say anything. "How was the kissing, at least? You didn't seem to have a problem with that." I shrugged noncommittally. "I don't know ... good ... I guess." Doug chuckled at my answer. "Wow. That's glowing praise coming from you." Shrugging again, I gave an annoyed little huff, followed by, "Don't let it go to your head." "I'll try not to," Doug replied. "Anyway ... I think that's the end of the mood and it's about time for class, so walk with me?" he asked, offering his hand to me. "You want to walk?" I asked, voice full of disdain. In spite of that, I reached out and took the offered hand. "Sounds awful, but I guess I can suffer through it." "Well I appreciate it," Doug responded sarcastically. Closing and locking the door, I let Doug lead the way. His hand felt warm and strong in mine, easing the tension I'd felt. It was actually pretty nice - for walking. *********************************************** *********************************************** Slumping down lower in my seat, I rested my head in my hand as I watched the teacher write on the board. I was starting to wonder if teachers intentionally made classes more boring as the semester progressed. It was starting to get to the point where it felt like torture listening to them drone on at their plodding pace. Unfortunately, I wasn't tired enough to just nap through the class. In fact, I wasn't tired at all. I was ... antsy. Shifting around, I crossed my legs, trying to find a relaxing position. It helped a little, maybe, but not much. Probably just excess energy or something. Sitting around in some boring classroom wasn't exactly a great way to burn stuff like that off, after all. Resigning myself to mild discomfort, I let out a little sigh. The teacher's babbling drifted into the background as my mind wandered. Memories of heat and the feel of someone else flitted into my thoughts, making my lips tingle at the memory. I still couldn't believe that I'd actually let Doug kiss me again. I hadn't fought it at all, even asked him to consider me instead of Gwen as someone to date. What had I even been thinking? I didn't want to date him, did I? Would he kiss me again? Would he go further - touch me again like he had before I'd stopped him? Suddenly, the room felt very hot, causing me to squirm a little in my seat and fan myself with my blouse. What the hell was I even thinking about? I didn't want him to kiss me, and I certainly didn't want him to touch me. Hell, I didn't even want to have the parts he wanted to touch! Glancing down at my chest, I eyed the sizable mounds the link had saddled me with. Doug had said they were amazing. Looking around the class, I noted that they did seem to be larger than most of the other girls. I'd heard guys say that big was good before, but I'd never really understood it. Even now that I had them, I didn't quite get the appeal. They had a reasonably pleasing shape, I supposed, but they were kind of awkward and annoying with their size and incessant bouncing. Maybe they were more fun to play with than I thought, though. Doug had certainly seemed into them before I'd stopped him, and it wasn't like I'd done much with them since I'd gotten them. I'd mostly been trying to forget they were even there. After another moment of staring at my chest, I huffed in annoyance and forced my gaze back up to the board. Not looking didn't do much to help with not thinking, though. It wasn't like they just vanished when I couldn't see them, after all. I could still feel their size, their weight, the way they filled out my blouse, the way they occasionally brushed against my arms. As such, my thoughts remained locked on wanting to experiment just to see what the fuss was about. "Stupid Doug," I grumbled. He was always the source of so much trouble literally since the day we'd met. He was the one I'd linked to, the one my appearance changed for, the one who constantly got me involved with people I didn't like, the one who'd kissed me and made things even more complicated. Now, he was even the one making me want to play with my own stupid boobs. What a pain in the ass. *********************************************** *********************************************** Wanting to burn off some energy, I stomped out of the room once my classes were over rather than just teleport across campus. Walking wouldn't use up much energy, especially not for me, but just moving around was still an improvement. At least, I wasn't squirming like I had been all afternoon. As I walked, I very pointedly took an out of the way path, one that would keep me from bumping into Doug. The last thing I wanted to do right now was deal with him. He'd probably insist on walking together, hand-in-hand, just like after lunch. Maybe he'd even expect more than that from me. After all, I had, foolishly, agreed to go out with him, so he'd probably want me to act like an actual girlfriend. It was a sickening thought to say the least. "I'll just put up with it for a couple days until the whole Gwen thing is over then dump him," I mumbled to myself. I could probably pretend to not hate Doug's guts that long. "Well well, if it isn't the gray-haired bitch," a male voice remarked antagonistically. "How's the dork doing? I hear he got his nose busted," a second male voice added. Anger flaring within me, I looked up to see Mal and Andy, the twin idiots that were currently trying to seek some ill-advised vengeance on me for embarrassing them. I was sorely tempted to just flip on some powers, teleport over there, and beat the crap out of both of them, but I reined it in. Doug had said he would handle it, so that I wouldn't get into trouble. Trouble was seeming worth it right now, though. "Yeah someone cowardly and weak was too afraid to face me directly, so they took it out on someone who couldn't defend themselves," I responded smoothly. "Pathetic really." Andy visibly tensed at my comment, clearly angry, but Mal held up a hand to keep him in check, smiling all the while. "What's pathetic is you letting your friend get beat up and not even doing anything about it," Mal retorted. "I feel sorry for the poor dork, stuck being friends with a self-centered bitch like you." I forced a cold smile onto my face. "Who says I wasn't doing anything about it? Don't tell me you haven't noticed it yet? I mean I knew you two were dumb, but not that dumb." A flicker of doubt passed over Mal's face, and I could see him thinking hard. I was tempted to turn on my psychic powers and see what was going on in there, but it seemed too petty. Besides, it would just be a bunch of paranoid bullshit anyway. "Well, don't worry. It won't be long now until it'll be obvious to everyone, even you two lugheads," I remarked, throwing a little more fuel on the fire. Grinning maliciously, I raised a hand to wave at the two boys while flipping on my clairvoyance and teleportation. "Ta ta," I added teasingly before vanishing in a puff of black smoke. *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 26 - Day 33 - Thursday I sat there peering at the cards in Christa's hands, trying to find some way to guess which was the joker. She only had two, so it was either left or right, but no matter which I started toward, the older girl would grin wickedly, making me think I'd guessed wrong. Every time, I'd pull my hand back, rethinking my decision . It had to be one or the other, but I just couldn't figure out which. "Alpha, report to the examination room," a stern, male voice directed echoing out through the room from the intercom. The voice belonged to the man who'd brought me to this terrible place. I'd never even seen him - he never personally entered any of the rooms that the other kids and I were allowed into - but the sound of his voice was enough to instill an overwhelming fear into me. I knew that it meant pain and torment. Christa could see me freeze in panic, and her wicked grin instantly turned to a look of sympathy and concern. A moment later, she started fanning herself with her cards, doing so in an exaggerated manner that revealed to me which one was the joker. As she did, she snapped the fingers on her other hand to get my attention. "Hey, twerp. Pick a card already." Briefly distracted from my impending torture session, I caught sight of the revealed cards. With a wan smile on my face, I reached out and took the card, before setting it down on the floor with my other one, proving to no one, but myself that I didn't have the joker. "Ha, now you've gotta do the dishes." Christa nodded, not at all concerned with having to undertake the menial task. "Yep, I sure do," she agreed, giving my hair a little tousle. "You'd better get moving, kiddo. You know how angry he gets when he has to repeat himself." With an incredible amount of trepidation, I pushed myself up from the floor and started toward the door that led to the rooms the evil man used for his 'science'. I walked slowly, trying to prolong the time I had before the torment became a reality, but that was the extent of what I could do. There was no way to escape. The others and I had tried, and not even the combination of my strength and Christa's fire was enough to so much as scratch the walls of our prison. Trying to resist was futile, too. He wouldn't just hurt me then, but all of us, and it would be a lot worse than whatever this most recent test would do to me. All I could do was trudge along to my fate. The door to the examination room slid open as I approached, allowing me to step inside. It was a cold sterile room, full of glistening metal. Various devices filled the space, each its own form of torture. Some of them I hadn't even experienced yet, so my mind could do nothing but supply horrible fantasies of what terrors awaited me whenever they were chosen. Behind me, the doors slid closed, locking me in the torture chamber. "Sit in the chair, Alpha," the voice directed evenly. Apparently, I hadn't taken long enough to upset him. Next time, I would have to remember to try to walk a little slower. The command prompted a wince from me as I turned to the gleaming metallic chair. I hated the chair more than any of the other devices I'd ever been in. It was a nightmarish test that lasted hours, and left me so weak and pained that, for the next few days, I would be unable to even get up on my own. There was nothing I could do, though. There was no way to resist. The voice always got its way in the end. Slowly, I moved forward, dreading every step, wanting to fight it, to flee, to rail against it, but that would only bring more pain. I sat in the chair, leaned back, and felt the restraints snap into place - a necessity to keep me still through the ordeal. After that, there was a hiss of pneumatics and hydraulics followed by the agonizing pain of dozens of needles jabbing deep into my flesh and even my bones. I screamed the first of many screams. The scream in my dream carried into the waking world as I bolted upright in my bed. It was followed by several desperate gasps for breaths as I tried to fight away the icy fear that gripped me, sending shudders down my spine and aching pains through my chest. Around me the room was dark and empty, devoid of the excruciating needles and that terrible haunting voice. "Just a dream," I told myself, but even with the evidence of my surroundings I didn't fully believe it. Even after years, part of me believed that this world was the dream, and that someday, I would wake up from it and be right back in that hell - bound to the whims of a mad man - powerless and broken. Slowly, the terror of the dream faded, leaving me sitting there on my bed feeling empty, tired, and lost. I flopped back, resting my head on my pillow and an arm on my forehead. From there, I just stared up at the ceiling, trying to think about anything but the past. As is often the case, desire did not meet reality. All the remainder of the night drifted away with me unable to do anything else but think about that terrible place and the nightmares I'd witnessed and endured. The only thing that eventually brought an end to my dark musings was the sound of my alarm telling me that I needed to go to class. *********************************************** *********************************************** With my head resting on one hand, I poked absently at my lunch, moving french fries around with my finger. All the while, I stared out into space, thinking about the faces of the kids who I'd considered siblings. The faces that came to mind weren't happy or smiling or laughing. They were twisted horribly, mangled, and in pain. They were the last faces each had made. "Wow, not finished already?" Cameron remarked as he sat down at the table across from me. "Huh?" I mumbled, coming out of my daze. Looking down, I noticed that half of my food was still sitting on my tray. "Oh ... just not hungry today." Cameron gave me a look of concern. "You have one of your haywires or something." I shook my head. "No, I haven't ... not in a while actually ..." I told him, surprised by my own answer. When had my last haywire been? It had been days, far longer than I'd ever gone without one. I supposed I hadn't noticed since I'd been thinking of my period as a haywire. No more haywires would be something positive about this whole link thing, at least. "What's the problem then?" Cameron asked. "It's none of your damned business is what it is," I growled, not wanting to talk about my past. Cameron visibly reeled back from the harsh tone of my voice. "Sorry. Just curious." "Yeah, well, one of these days you're gonna get in more trouble than you can handle for being 'just curious'," I warned him. Cameron chuckled. "Heh, you're probably right about that. Like just last night I was-" "Don't want to hear it," I cut in before Cameron could start off on another tale about his misadventures in devising. "Aw, let him tell the story," Doug remarked as he plopped into a seat next to me. "They're always hilarious." "I don't care if - " I started to protest as I looked up from my food to the new arrival. However, my words came to an abrupt halt when I saw who was standing right behind him - Gwen. "What's she doing here?" Doug held up a hand as if that would calm me down. "Look Erin, I know you two got off to a rocky start, but I was hoping you could start over." I leveled a withering look at Doug. "Excuse us, you two," I said before reaching out to grab Doug's shoulder and flipping on my warper power. The next instant, cafeteria chairs had been swapped out for the bed in my room. I didn't stay seated, though, shoving myself up and spinning around to glare at Doug. "What the hell are you thinking?! I didn't agree to go out with you, so that I'd have to put up with that damn, blue bitch!" My anger left Doug completely unphased. "She's still my friend, Erin, and besides, I thought you didn't agree to that just because you hated Gwen." "I didn't," I hissed through clenched teeth. "That doesn't mean I don't also hate her." "You don't even know her," Doug pointed out. "I'm not saying you have to like her, but if we're going to be together, I can't have you just dismissing my friends out of hand. You need to give her an actual chance." Clenching my fists tightly at my side, I did my best to resist the urge to punch Doug in the face. "Fine. I'll give her a chance." "That's all I ask," Doug replied. "Well, that and for you to teleport us back to the lunchroom so I can eat." With speed born of fury, my hand lashed out to grab Doug's shoulder. The next instant, we reappeared in the cafeteria, this time with me standing just behind my seat and Doug sitting on nothing but air. His arms windmilled as he tried to catch himself on nothing right before he crashed to the floor. Smirking at my revenge, I moved around the table to plop into the seat to the right of Gwen, giving her a slide nod of greeting. "Hey." Amidst the laughter of several onlookers, Doug let out an exasperated huff before shoving himself off the ground and back into his seat. "Well, that went surprisingly well." "You call getting dumped on your ass in front of everyone 'surprisingly well'?" Gwen commented with a smug grin on her face. I hated that grin. "Yeah. Usually she tries to punch me," Doug explained. That got a burst of obnoxious sounding giggles from Gwen. "You have strange tastes in women." "I prefer to think of it as better tastes," Doug remarked, his eyes turning to me. Feeling uncomfortable, I looked away, reaching out to grab my tray and drag it to my new seat in the process. Once I had it, I grabbed a fry to nibble on, feeling a little hungry again after the energy expenditure of the teleports. Besides, there was no point in wasting it. After I finished a few fries, I glanced up again only to find Doug's gaze still locked onto me. Our eyes didn't meet, though. He was looking lower than that. As I watched, his gaze swept to my left then back to me a couple of times. The whole time he had this obnoxious little smirk on his face. Wondering what he could possibly be looking at, I activated my clairvoyance and shifted my perspective so that it matched the angle and position of Doug's eyes. My view of Doug's smirk vanished, replaced with one of a linen blouse pushed out by two round orbs. I recognized those orbs. The pervert was staring at my boobs. Sighing in annoyance, I hunched forward and folded my arms on the table. It wasn't the most comfortable position to sit in, but it blocked my chest from Doug's view. Satisfied with that, I flipped off my clairvoyance, and looked at Doug again. The loss of his view had stolen the smirk from Doug's face replacing it with a slight frown. Served him right for staring. *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 27 - Day 34 - Friday Disinterestedly, I sat in my seat, idly tapping my fingers on my desk as the teacher lectured. It wasn't one of the worst classes I'd had. The teacher was actually talking about something I didn't know and didn't necessarily mind learning. I just had other things on my mind. Throughout lunch the day before, I kept catching Doug looking at me. Leering was probably a better word for it. He was hardly the first guy to do so since my last change, but it seemed to get to me a lot more than the others. I didn't know why. It just did. Whatever the reason, I knew it bothered me, and I didn't know what to do about it. Things would be so much easier if I could just gouge Doug's eyes out if he did it again, but that just wasn't going to happen. The best option I could think of was to just ditch lunch. That would mean he would eat with Gwen, though. Why'd he have to go and invite her to eat with us anyway? It was so frustrating. That was when class decided to end, leaving me still undecided on what to do as my classmates started to get up to leave. "Screw it," I growled under my breath as I flipped on my powers to teleport to the cafeteria. There, I rushed through the lines, grabbing only a light lunch, and polished it off as quickly as I could before teleporting to my room. There, I just flopped onto my bed and looked up at the ceiling for several minutes. "At least, you don't stare at my boobs," I finally told the ceiling, before letting out an exasperated sigh. "Who knows, maybe you do." Tilting my head up, I looked down at my breasts. Lying down like this, they looked smaller than usual, the soft flesh sort of pooling on my chest rather than thrusting out. It was too bad that it was just an illusion. Once I sat up, they'd look just as big as usual. Sighing, I let my head fall back to my pillow. Staring at my chest wasn't going to help anything. It was just going to leave me stuck with one more person staring, and I definitely didn't need any more of those. A knock on the door pulled me from my thoughts. I didn't even need to bother with my clairvoyance to see who it was. There was only one person who ever came looking for me when I didn't want to be found. "I'm not here, Doug!" I called out. "Just open the door, Erin!" Doug called back. With an irritated huff, I shoved myself off my bed and trudged over to the door. After unlocking it, I pulled it open to reveal the exact person I'd come here to avoid. "What do you want, Doug?" Doug held up a wrapped-up sandwich he had in his hands. "I thought we'd have lunch together, since apparently, you've decided not to give Gwen a chance like you said you would." "That's not it, though, she is an arrogant snob just like I thought," I explained. "Well, then why did I have to trek across campus to come find you?" Doug asked. Rolling my eyes, I just turned away to go sit on my bed. "You ever think that maybe, you're the person I'm trying to get away from?" "Sure, but I try not to take it personally," Doug joked as he followed me inside, closed the door, and sat on the bed with me. "So, if it wasn't Gwen, what horrible thing did I do to you?" I should have been expecting that question, but I wasn't. Looking away, I tried to think of what I could say to him and not about how hot my cheeks felt at that moment. If I told him the truth, he might stop, but it was embarrassing to even talk about. "You ... stared ... at my ..." I gestured toward my chest with one hand. "... you knows." Doug burst out laughing. "That's why you're holed up in your room?" "What?! I don't like you staring at me, alright!" I growled defensively. "Oh, no I totally get that. I was just expecting something less ... well girly," Doug explained. Tossing a glare at Doug, I growled out an annoyed, "Whatever. It bothers me, alright?" "Well, I'd promise I wasn't gonna do it anymore, but honestly, I'm gonna do it more," Doug replied. "Besides, it would be kinda silly to expect me not to look at my girlfriend." "G-Girlfriend?" I gasped. Doug nodded. "Yeah, you know, as in the girl I'm going out with. You do remember agreeing to that don't you?" "Well ... yeah ... it's just ..." I stammered out. I never did manage to finish the sentence as Doug's amused smirk at my embarrassment caused me to snap my mouth shut, turn away, and blush. "Speaking of that, it's our first weekend together. You wanna do something with me tonight?" Doug asked. "I can kick my roommate out, so we can watch a movie or something." Getting asked out on a date only made me blush more, especially as Doug mentioned a movie. The last time I'd let him invite me to a movie in his room, we'd ended up making out until his roommate got back. No way was I gonna let that happen again. "I'm not really up for a movie," I refused. "Hmm ... alright," Doug hummed thoughtfully. "It's probably too late to get permission to go off campus or you could teleport us into town, so how about we find a nice spot on campus and have dinner?" "Uhm ... sure ... I guess," I mumbled, not seeing how dinner would be a problem - as long as we stayed somewhere public anyway. "Great," Doug declared. "I'll come by to get you around six?" "You don't need to-" I started to protest. Doug held up a hand to silence me. "I insist." Sighing, I rolled my eyes at the silliness of it. "Fine. Whatever." *********************************************** *********************************************** I rubbed my hands along my skirt a few times as I stood in front of the mirror. Nothing in the mirror looked out of place. My hair was tied up as best as it ever was, leaving the hairs in front framing my face. My uniform was a little sloppy, the blouse untucked and with the top couple buttons undone like I usually wore it. I hadn't bothered with the stupid knee socks either, since I wasn't going to class, but otherwise it was fine. Turning, I glanced over at my clock to see the time. The little digital numbers burned in my vision. There was just five minutes left until Doug was supposed to be there, if he wasn't late anyway. I kind of hoped that he was, then I'd have an excuse to call the whole thing off. "What was I thinking agreeing to this in the first place?" I chastised myself. Sure, I'd told him that I'd go out with him, but that was just to get rid of Gwen. The blue bitch was still around, though. In fact, she spent time with Doug quite often. Apparently, she wasn't the kind to be scared off by a guy being taken. A knock on the door caused me to jump in surprise. Rubbing at my face, I hurried over to the door and opened it. Standing there was Doug, holding a small cooler in one hand and dressed in an untucked white dress shirt and a pair of jeans. It was a good look for him. "Hey," Doug greeted, giving me a quick once over. "Still need a few minutes to get ready?" "What?" I gasped. "No, I'm ready." "Oh ... okay " Doug replied before offering me his free hand. "Shall we?" Not taking the hand, I looked down at myself to double-check that I hadn't somehow missed something obviously wrong with my clothes. Everything looked as normal as it had in the mirror, though. Confused, I looked back up to peer at Doug suspiciously. "Why did you think I wasn't ready?" I questioned. "It's nothing. Don't worry about," Doug assured me, shaking his head. "No. I wanna know, and you'd better not lie about it," I told him, pointing a threatening finger at the boy. Rolling his eyes, Doug let out a little sigh. "Fine, I'm just surprised to see you wearing your school uniform on a date is all." "Oh ... " I mumbled, looking down at my clothes again self-consciously. It did seem a little weird now that Doug had pointed it, especially since Doug was dressed in casual clothes. "It's fine, though. It's not like it looks bad or something," Doug offered reassuringly. "I was just a little surprised, because I kinda thought you didn't like the girls uniform." "I don't, it's just ..." I began before pausing for a moment. "... they're the only clothes I own that fit." For a moment, all the psychic could do was blink in surprise at my explanation, before he finally just started laughing. "What so funny?!" Doug rubbed a hand across face and he tried to get his laughter under control. "It's just the idea of a girl owning nothing but her school uniform is too ridiculous to not laugh." "I own other clothes, you ass. They just don't fit because someone decided I needed to have two balloons attached to my chest all the time," I growled angrily. My anger did not stop the boy from continuing to chuckle at the situation, grinning all the while. God, I wanted to just beat that grin of his face. "Well since that's my fault, allow me to rectify it for you. Dinner will keep for a little bit while we go buy you a new outfit," Doug offered. I scrunched my face up skeptically at the idea. "I don't know ... " "Aw, come on. You need to have something you can wear beside your uniform. Besides, here's your chance to get something you actually like wearing," Doug pointed out. Letting out a defeated sigh, I nodded. "Fine." "Great!" Doug exclaimed as he reached out to grab my hand. "Let's go." *********************************************** *********************************************** "How the hell did they manage to mess up t-shirts?" I grumbled as I stood in front of the dressing room mirror tugging at my outfit. While looking for clothes, I'd tried to go with something as simple and comfortable as I could think of, a t-shirt and jeans, but somehow I'd failed. Instead of the loose baggy fit I was used to from such an outfit, the garments were actually quite snug. The shirt was 'fitted', which apparently meant it was designed to cling to me, stretching to accommodate my curves rather than hanging on me. The jeans weren't any better, designed to cling onto my hips, butt, and thighs. At first, I'd attributed the fit of the clothes to just being too small, even though, I'd picked out the same sizes as my uniform. Unfortunately, that hadn't been the case. Trying to go to larger sizes just created different problems, like my t-shirt no longer fitting on my shoulders, and my jeans hanging so low on my hips that I was worried they'd slide right off. After that, I'd swapped back to the correct sizes, but they hadn't improved since the first time I tried them on. "Maybe I could try boy's stuff?" I mused, discarding the idea almost immediately. I'd tried to wear some of my old boy clothes before, since I was still the same height and general size, but it hadn't worked. They just weren't designed to handle the curvy bits I'd been cursed with, resulting in a fit that was both uncomfortable and bad looking. "You know, if you're having trouble deciding, I could take a look and give you some suggestions," Doug called from outside the room. The very idea of having Doug 'take a look' agitated me. He'd probably just leer at me like he'd done with my chest the day before. Still, it was possible, if unlikely, that he might have some idea of what I should do. I certainly didn't, and I didn't want to take too long on this whole shopping nonsense anyway. "Fine!" I huffed in response. Turning from the mirror, I yanked open the door and stepped out to where Doug was waiting. There, I stopped and gestured at the snug outfit I was in. There was no immediate response, though, as the boy just stared at me for a long moment. "Well? "Well what?" Doug asked, still staring at me. Clenching my jaw, I glared angrily at the pervert. "You said you'd give me some suggestions." "Oh right," Doug responded, snapping out of his stare finally. "I think they look great. You should get them." "What are you talking about?" I growled angrily. "Look at how they fit!" "Don't worry, I'm looking," Doug assured me, his gaze dipping downward again. "And they fit fine, better than fine actually." "No, they don't!" I exclaimed. "They're way too tight!" Doug furrowed his brow. "They are? Isn't that just the norm for girls' clothes?" "It is?" I questioned uncertainly. I'd never really paid much attention to girls' clothes. "My uniform doesn't fit like this." Well, my blouses were a little snug in the chest, but nothing like the t-shirt I was wearing. "Well, yeah, but that's because the school designed it," Doug explained. "They don't exactly want girls to look good. It'd be a distraction." I frowned slightly at the explanation. It did sorta make sense. Having guys constantly staring at girls certainly would be a distraction - not that that didn't happen to me even in my uniform. Maybe tight clothes would make that worse, though. That definitely wasn't a point in my current outfit's favor. "Let's look at it this way. Does it feel uncomfortable?" Doug inquired. I shook my head. "It feels a little weird, but not really uncomfortable." "Alright, so it's not uncomfortable, and you look good in it, so what's the problem?" Doug asked. "I don't like how it ... shows things off," I explained, a little embarrassed. "You're not gonna find anything that's gonna make you not look like a girl, Erin," Doug pointed out. "Not even your uniform is conservative enough to do that." Sighing, I looked down at the outfit again. I supposed it wasn't so bad. Doug seemed to like it at least. Besides, I was sick of clothes shopping. "Fine. I'll get this." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 28 - Day 34 - Friday "How about right here?" Doug asked, gesturing toward the base of a random tree on campus. "Here?" I questioned, looking at the tree. It didn't seem to be anything special, and there wasn't a particularly great view around it either. "Why here?" Doug grinned as he stepped over to pat the tree with one hand. "This is the tree you were sitting at when you let me touch your leg." Instantly, my eyes narrowed to a withering glare. "So this is where I should bury your body after I tear it into itty bitty pieces then?" "It might work for that too, but for today, I was thinking it would serve as a nice back rest while we eat," Doug replied, holding up the cooler he'd been lugging around since coming to my room. Shrugging disinterestedly, I just walked over and plopped down to lean against the tree. "Works for me." "Great," Doug stated as he sat down so close to me that our hips were nearly touching. "I tried to guess at what you like from your lunch choices, so hopefully I've got something here you'll enjoy," he said, setting the cooler down in front of me. Snapping my gaze from the tiny gap between us to the cooler, I reached out and grabbed it. "Food's food." Opening the cooler, I found a wide assortment of sandwiches, salads, fruit, and all sorts of other cold foods. There were several different types of soda in there as well, creating a rather impressive selection. "You made all this?" "God no. I had a girl who owes me a favor make it all," Doug answered. "I probably couldn't even make a PB and J." "Anyone can make a PB and J," I told him. "I wouldn't count on it. I'd probably put, like, a whole jar of peanut butter on it, covering both sides of the bread, then do a little dollop of jelly on the top," Doug countered. That got a giggle from me. "It's not a layered cake, you idiot." Doug shrugged. "Might as well be for all I know." "Well, then, I'm glad you got someone else to make dinner," I replied, still laughing. "And I'm glad you actually came out with me," Doug responded. No longer laughing, I looked down at the sandwich in my lap. "Yeah ... " "Well well, if it isn't the gray-haired bitch," a male voice remarked antagonistically. "And look, she's got a boy with her," added a second male voice. "Think they're on a date?" "Not a chance," the first voice answered. "No one would ever go out with a cunt like her." Anger flaring, I looked up to see Mal and Andy a short way down one of the paths. They were just standing there laughing with stupid grins on their faces. I was getting sick and tired of these two idiots thinking that they could get away with talking shit around me. I started to rise from my seat, when suddenly I felt Doug's hand on my shoulder. Glancing his way, I saw him shake his head at me. "It's alright. I'll handle them." "Fine," I hissed through clenched teeth. Forcing myself to relax, I leaned back against the tree before angrily unwrapping my sandwich and biting into it. While I chewed, I watched as Doug got up and walked over to confront the two boys who were still laughing like idiots. "Gentleman as you can see we are kind of in the middle of something here, so I'd appreciate it if you could just move along." Inwardly, I fumed as I heard Doug's words. What the hell was he thinking, politely asking them to leave like that? No way were they going to listen to shit like that. "You hear that?! He would appreciate it if we moved along!" Andy exclaimed, roaring with laughter. "It seems her boyfriend is as much of a cowardly bitch as she is," Mal commented. "Sure seems that way," Andy agreed. "I'm surprised he's got the guts to not just run away from her." With the brotherly aside finished, Mal turned to address Doug. "I don't care what you'd appreciate, so why don't you just turn around and slink back to your dyke girlfriend with your tail between your legs." Doug didn't so much as flinch at the two boy's remarks. "Why don't you two just leave before someone gets hurt?" In response, Andy's fist lashed out to crash into Doug's face, knocking the blonde boy to the ground. "Like y-" Andy began to taunt. However, my fist slamming into his gut put an end to that as the air whooshed out of his lungs. Even as Andy started to crumple around my hand, I spun, yanking my hand back as I thrust a leg out. My foot came around high in a reverse spin kick, to crash into the side of Mal's head, sending him tumbling to the ground. My spin didn't stop there either as I came all the way back around to face Andy who was trying to recover from my gut punch and throw a punch of his own. My right hand snapped out, easily halting Andy's fist in midair. My left hand was already coming around, palm open to slam into his elbow. A loud crack reverberated through the air as Andy's arm folded the wrong way at the elbow, shattered bones slicing through skin. The next moment, there was a shriek of pain from the brick as his mind caught up with the injury that had just been inflicted on him. Overcome with pain, his other hand flew to his injured arm, and he tried to pull away from me. I was far from finished, though. Releasing Andy's fist from my grasp, my right hand darted out, grabbing ahold of his throat to keep him from escaping. Reorienting my vision, I teleported both of us so that we appeared right next to the tree. As soon as we came out of the teleport, I slammed Andy against the trunk, getting a dull thunk as the brick's head bounced off the bark. Gagging, Andy reached his good arm up to claw at the hand that held his throat. His fingers just scraped off my PK shell, though not able to even get through that barrier much less hurt me. There was nothing he could do. Cocking my other hand back, I slammed it up into Andy's chest. More cracking sounds filled the air as ribs broke, followed by strangled gasps of pain. Before he even had time to fully experience the pain of that first blow, I did it again, and again. "That's enough! Put him down!" an unfamiliar male voice shouted. Holding off on another punch, I reoriented my clairvoyance so that I could see the new arrival. It was a tall, well-muscled boy, and from his age, I guessed he was a student. There was a slim girl standing next to him as well, similar in age, and both had grim looks on their faces. I didn't recognize either of them, but they were trying to protect Andy, which meant they were enemies. I needed to deal with them. Reorienting my vision again, I set it up in the sky looking down, so I could see the whole area around me at once. Once that was done, I tossed Andy aside, leaving him to flop onto the ground a couple of feet away. The next moment, I vanished in a puff of smoke. To the new guy's credit, he actually started to react before my fist slammed into his lower back. Rather than feeling my hand crush into his kidney, though, it felt like I'd just punched a wall. Apparently, I was going to have to use a little more force to take this one down. The guy and girl tried to turn and orient on me, but I was already teleporting again. Once more, I appeared directly behind the guy, using his efforts to retaliate against him. Moving with the remaining momentum from my punch, I brought my leg up and around. My foot and shin caught the guy in the side of his stomach, this time with enough force to cleave through whatever defense had protected him from my first strike. The wind flew from his lungs as the kick propelled him through the air for a couple of feet before he crashed into the ground. Seeing her ally go flying, the girl tried to raise a hand to aim at me, but she just wasn't fast enough. Lunging through the gap left by the guy, I snatched her hand and twisted. Her wrist was not up to the force and snapped like a twig, causing her to shriek in pain. Not stopping there, I lashed out with my other hand, slamming a fist into the girl's chest to put her on the ground. After taking a quick breath, I turned back toward where Andy was lying, and started stomping toward him. He didn't even notice, just lay there writhing in pain as blood from his broken arm stained his clothes. There would be a lot more blood when I was through with him. "Erin stop!" Doug shouted, finally recovered from getting decked. Too angry to listen, I took another step forward. However, as soon as my foot hit the ground, blinding pain stabbed through my head. Instantly, my legs crumpled underneath me, dropping me to my knees. Wailing, I clutched at my head as wave after wave of pounding agony cut through my thoughts. After several horrible seconds, the pain finally subsided and I fell forward onto my hands gasping for breath. "Jesus Erin, are you alright?" Doug asked, kneeling down next to me to rest a hand on my shoulder. "I'm obviously fucking not, you fuck!" I spat, head still aching from the residual pain. "Sorry," Doug apologized with seeming sincerity. "What the hell even happened, Erin?" I shook my head weakly. "I ... I don't know." What had happened? I'd just been eating my sandwich while watching Doug make an idiot of himself trying to get the two brothers to leave. Then, Andy had punched Doug in the face, and I ... Forcing my gaze up, I looked around at the scene of the fight where all four of my opponents still lay on the ground groaning in pain. "Shit. Here comes security," Doug hissed, releasing me to rise and step a short distance away from me. His words barely registered with me. My thoughts were still locked on the carnage around me, unable to believe what I saw there. It had all taken less than a minute. I was still staring when security grabbed me and hauled me away. *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 29 - Day 34 - Friday Dazedly, I sat in a chair in some security office. My hands were cuffed behind my back. I wasn't sure the handcuffs were actually capable of holding me, but I didn't try to break them. Honestly, I really didn't even notice them. I just sat there, head hung in shame, as the events of the fight replayed in my head. Behind me, I heard the door open, followed by footsteps, then someone sitting down in the chair behind the desk. "Well, Ms. Kleid, I've reviewed the tapes of the fight," Chief Delarose began. "So now why don't you tell me what happened." "I don't know," I answered quietly. "You put four kids in the hospital with broken bones, one of which is still in critical condition. That's an awful lot for I don't know," Chief Delarose remarked. "I was just eating dinner with Doug. Mal and Andy came and started harassing us. Doug went to deal with them. They punched him. Then ... I don't know," I elaborated. Furrowing his brow, the security chief leaned forward to peer at me. "You mean you don't remember?" "I remember ... I was just... so angry ... " I mumbled before looking up at the security chief. "Why was I so angry?" "You've never had any incidents like this before, have you?" Chief Delarose asked. I shook my head. "No." "What about the boy who was punched, Mr. Clemens? What's your relationship with him?" Chief Delarose continued. I blushed slightly at the question. "He's my ... uhm ... boyfriend ... I guess." Chief Delarose raised an eyebrow at that. "You guess?" "It's complicated," I replied. "Could he have something to do with it?" Chief Delarose questioned. "His getting hit seems to be the instigating factor, he's a psychic, and witnesses say that after he told you to stop, you had some kind of ... episode." "I don't know," I answered quietly. For a few moments, there was silence as Chief Delarose just looked at me. "Alright," he finally said. "I think that's all I need from you. Given the nature of what happened, you'll be detained here while this is sorted out." "I understand," I replied neutrally. After what had happened, I couldn't really argue with the precaution. I did wonder if it was a real precaution, though. Did they have some way to stop me from teleporting away, if something like this happened again? I hoped so. *********************************************** *********************************************** "It's probably Doug's fault," I grumbled. Him getting his stupid self hit was what had started the whole mess. If he'd just let me handle it, then the whole fight probably would've never happened. "But no, he had to stick his nose into it." Fuming, I pulled my knees up to my chest and rested my hands on them while I stared at the wall. That was really all there was to do in the little cell I was being detained in. It was that and replay the events in my head getting angrier and more frustrated by my actions with each repetition. Anger did little to alleviate my guilt over the affair. It was my job to keep control, my job to make sure I didn't hurt people. I'd lost control, though, badly hurting several people. I was lucky that I hadn't killed someone. The sound of the door opening interrupted my cycle of anger and guilt. Glancing up, I saw Dr. Bellows enter the cell, and offer me a professional smile. " Hello, Erin." "Great, a shrink," I muttered, before turning away from him. "I didn't realize that torture was legal in this country." As per his usual, Dr. Bellows just ignored the hostile comment. Instead, he got a stool from the guard and walked over to set it down next to the small bed I was sitting on. "What happened earlier, Erin?" "I don't know," I answered truthfully. "I was eating dinner with Doug, some jerks showed up, they hit Doug, then suddenly I was beating people to a pulp." "How did you feel?" Dr. Bellows asked. "Angry ... really angry ..." I responded hollowly. Dr. Bellows nodded in understanding. "Do you know why?" I shook my head. "No." "Have you ever been that angry before?" Dr. Bellows asked. "Yes," I answered. "When?" Dr. Bellows questioned. A sense of emptiness gripped me. "When I found out my parents had been killed." "That's a pretty different situation from this," Dr. Bellows noted. I shrugged. "You asked. I answered." "Doug is the boy you are linked to, is he not?" Dr. Bellows continued unfazed, getting a nod from me. "Are you two close beside that?" "Not really," I told him. Dr. Bellows raised an eyebrow at that. "Really? You were having dinner with him, and in your report with security you described him as your 'boyfriend'." Being reminded of my relationship caused my cheeks to heat up in embarrassment. "It's complicated." "I imagine so," Dr. Bellows remarked. "Want to talk about it?" "No," I stated firmly. I didn't want to be in the relationship, much less talk about it with some stupid shrink. For a moment, Dr. Bellows just peered at me as if wondering if he should try to pry into that more. "Do you think he could have influenced you in some way to force you to defend him in such a manner?" I shrugged. "I don't know. Can't you guys look for that sort of thing?" "With someone else, maybe, but from what I understand, your link creates too much psychic interaction between you two to tell," Dr. Bellows explained. "Like trying to find a specific set of footprints on a well traveled path." Sighing, I flopped back onto the bed. What that basically meant was that they couldn't tell if Doug influenced me because he was always influencing me. Were any choices I made my own anymore or was I just some puppet dancing on the psychic's strings? "The prevailing opinion is that this wasn't some kind of intentional coercion at all, but rather a defensive reaction prompted by someone attacking the person you are linked to," Dr. Bellows tried to reassure me. "Great, so anytime that idiot gets himself in trouble I go on a rampage. Yet another perk of this stupid fucking link." I grumbled morosely. "Well, now that we are aware of it, we can-" Dr. Bellows began. "We can what?!" I spat angrily, shoving myself to my feet. "Make sure no one ever gets mad enough to punch Doug?! Good fucking luck with that! What about if it's an accident? What if next time, it's worse?! Tell me what you're going to do to stop this from happening!!!" For once, the doctor actually reacted, stiffening at my outburst. "Given that you've already demonstrated restraint by holding back your strength to keep your attacks non-lethal and not using any of your more dangerous powers during this incident. I'm sure that with counseling, you'll learn to cope with the anger response and keep control." "Great! Because I just love our talks!" I retorted sarcastically, before flopping back on the bed. "So do I get a fancy new armband now?" "Armband?" Dr. Bellows questioned. "For being a rager," I explained. "Several of the other thornies have them." Dr. Bellows let out a weary sigh. "A single problem with a single specific situation does not make you a rager, Erin. You're hardly the only person who would get angry if someone punched their date. Besides, such an armband would be all but pointless. They are meant as a warning to other students to not antagonize the wearer, but the only thing you've ever had a problem with was when something happened to Doug, not to you." "Whatever," I muttered dismissively, turning away from the doctor. "Are we done then?" "Yes, though, you do have another visitor, assuming you want to see him," Dr. Bellows replied. There was only one person that would visit me while I was being held, but I asked anyway. "Who?" "Doug," Dr. Bellows confirmed my suspicion. Of course it would be Doug. He always came and found me when I didn't want to be found, when I just wanted to be left alone. I could tell him no, but it would be like swatting at a gnat. He'd just be back in a minute to annoy me again. "Fine," I agreed in defeat. Nodding, Dr. Bellows rose from his stool, taking it with him as he went. There was the sound of the door opening and closing, and then, I was alone again. For several minutes, I just lay there curled up on the bed with my back to the room and my eyes on my hands resting in front of my face. Finally, the door opened again and I heard someone else enter. This time, I didn't even bother to look up, didn't acknowledge that anyone was there. That didn't stop the person from walking over and sitting on the edge of the bed next to me. "How are you doing?" Doug asked. "Absolutely wonderful. Can't you tell?" I answered sarcastically. Doug chuckled softly. "Good to see you haven't lost any of your snark, at least. I hear it's a bitch to get that back." Sighing wearily, I rolled over enough to look at the boy. His eye was black and swollen shut, but otherwise he looked like the same smug asshole I remembered. "Why are you here, Doug?" "Checking on you," the psychic replied. "You are only in here because you were defending me, after all." "Well, don't worry. I learned my lesson. Next time, I'll just let them beat you to a pulp while I cheer them on from the sidelines," I assured him. Doug grinned. "You better not. I need you to protect my pretty face." "You think that's pretty?" I teased. "Well, maybe not as pretty as yours, but yeah," Doug replied. Cheeks suddenly hot, I let my gaze drop to the bed beneath me. "If you say so ..." "Thanks for coming to my rescue, by the way," Doug told me. "I was not expecting the two of them to actually be dumb enough to start a fight." I gave him a little shrug. "Well, I can't have people thinking they can get away with punching my boyfriend right in front of me, can I?" "I suppose not, and after the thrashing you gave Andy for it, I dare say that's never going to happen on this campus again," Doug replied. "Which I for one am certainly happy about, because I hate getting punched. It hurts! A lot!" That remark got a brief chuckle out of me, but it ended quickly, leaving me staring off into space. We were laughing and stuff now, but from what I'd been told, I'd literally beat Andy to within an inch of his life. If I'd gone just a little bit further ... Suddenly I felt Doug's hand was on my shoulder. I stiffened briefly at the touch, but its warm, steady grasp seemed to just suck tension out of me. Relaxing again, I slumped down against the bed. "I'm ... sorry I ruined our date," I whispered in apology. "It was those two morons' fault, not yours," Doug responded reassuringly. "Besides, we can always just go out on another date." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 30 - Day 37 - Monday "Ugh ... no ..." I groaned as my alarm pulled me from my sleep. Squinting up at my clock, I prayed that I'd just set the time wrong, that I didn't have to get up yet, that I could go back to sleep. I wasn't so lucky. "It's not fair." Continuing to groan, I forced myself upright and just sat there for several long moments as I tried to fully wake up. Normally, mornings were easy for me. I didn't really need that much sleep, and woke quickly and easily. Of course, normally, I wouldn't have spent my weekend serving my punishment for the fight that I'd gotten into. While the school had come to the consensus that the fight wasn't really my fault, that didn't mean I'd escaped punishment entirely. The one I'd been given was a mix of house arrest and community service. During the day, I was handed over to various staff to perform whatever task they needed handled, from teleporting around supplies, to cleaning labs, and all sorts of other things. No individual task was all that exhausting, but two days straight of near constant power use and physical labor had done a thorough job of wearing me out. For once, I actually wanted to sleep in, which naturally meant I wasn't going to be able to. I was sure that they'd considered this as part of the punishment. Finally starting to wake up, I forced myself up to my feet and set about getting ready for my day. A quick teleport snagged me a shower where I tried very hard to not fall asleep in the warmth of the water. Another teleport brought me right back to my room to towel off while I fished out clothes to wear for the day. "Hmm," I hummed thoughtfully as I finished putting on my bra. Looking down, I gave an experimental tug on the straps then fidgeted a little with the cups. Nothing looked amiss, but it didn't feel quite right today - not that it ever really felt right. Shrugging off the odd feeling, I finished getting dressed before pulling my hair back in a ponytail. After that, I gave my reflection a quick check in the mirror to make sure everything was in order. It was right as I finished the check that I heard a knock on my door. Confused, I flipped on my clairvoyance to see who could possibly be looking for me this early in the morning. The sight of what waited on the other side, elicited yet another groan in my already groan-filled morning. Figuring it would be pointless to try to ignore him, I walked over to the door and yanked it open. "What do you want, Doug?" I demanded. "And good morning to you, too," the psychic replied with a chipper grin. "What. do. you. want. Doug?" I repeated, glaring at the blonde boy. Doug's grin never wavered. "I thought that, since our date and the rest of the weekend was lost, we could walk to class together." "You know I don't walk to class, Doug," I reminded him. "You walked with me before," the psychic pointed out. "That was a one time thing," I corrected. Doug raised an eyebrow at that. "Really? Because, we did it the day we got together and that day you had the haywire that blinded you." "Okay, a two time thing then!" I growled angrily. "I still don't walk to class!" Doug grin was joined by a smug chuckle at my frustration. "Come on. It won't be so bad. Plus, it'll give us a chance to spend some time together just the two of us." Flush with anger and frustration, I looked away from Doug and sighed, "Fine, we can walk to class together. Happy?" "Extremely," Doug replied triumphantly. "Are you ready to go?" "Yeah ..." I mumbled, stepping out into the hall to close and lock the door. "I guess I'm ready ..." "Great," Doug replied, before reaching out to take my hand. "Let's go." Not seeing much point in resisting, I just let Doug lead the way through the morning bustle. Several of my floormates stopped what they were doing to watch us as we walked, making hushed comments between themselves. Unlike most of campus which had never actually been quite certain of my gender, my floormates all knew I was a guy, or at least had been, so I could just imagine the kind of snickering and rumor- mongering they were doing. Face burning, I looked down at the ground, cursing my stupidity for letting Doug hold my hand while we walked. Even if people weren't around, I shouldn't have done it. It only served to encourage him, which was the last thing I wanted. He'd probably just say it was normal for couples to hold hands, but so what? It's not like the two of us were normal. As we made it outside, I glanced down at Doug's and my hands, wondering if I should just tug mine free. It wasn't like Doug could actually hold me if I didn't want to be held. He was far weaker than I was. He certainly didn't look it, though. His hand was bigger than mine, leaving my own looking rather delicate in comparison. It was warm too, leaving me feeling faintly flushed and overheated like it was an unusually warm day. "Did you decide to try giving me the silent treatment or something?" Doug asked. "Huh?" I mumbled, snapping my eyes up to meet his. "Oh ... uhm ... no ... just ..." "Embarrassed to be seen with me?" Doug offered. Eager to latch onto an explanation, I nodded. "Of course I am," I responded, which just prompted him to laugh. "What?" "I just think it's funny that you'll gladly punch a guy out for me, but you're embarrassed to be seen holding hands with me," Doug replied. "It's cute." Blushing, I leveled a glare at him. "I am not 'cute'." "Are too," Doug shot back childishly. "How about I teleport you to the middle of the ocean and drop you? We'll see how cute you think I am then," I retorted. Doug just grinned. "It's cute when you threaten me, too." "Argh! Fuck you!" I growled in frustration before yanking my hand free of his and folding my arms over my chest. "So in protest of being called cute, you're going to pout, possibly the cutest thing a girl can do?" Doug teased. Instantly, I dropped my arms back to my side and leveled another glare at Doug. "See if I ever walk to class with you again!" I spat angrily before flipping on my powers and teleporting away. *********************************************** *********************************************** I tapped my foot impatiently as I waited outside Dr. Bellows office for my session. It wasn't that I wanted to talk to the man, far from it, but I wanted to get it over with. In order for it to end, it had to start which I was anxious for it to do. Unfortunately, I still had a little bit to wait. "Can't wait to not need to come to these stupid things anymore," I muttered, not that I had much hope of that day coming any time soon - especially after what had happened Friday. I was probably stuck with these weekly sessions for at least the semester if not the year. I'd just have to work quickly to overcome this newest hurdle. Hearing the knob to the office door turning, I immediately flipped on my powers, checked to make sure there wasn't another student inside, then teleported directly into the room. "In a hurry today?" Dr. Bellows remarked as he released the doorknob and walked back to his chair. "I'm always in a hurry to get out of these sessions," I responded smartly. "Of course," Dr. Bellows replied. "Well then, given what happened Friday, there is a topic I would like to discuss this session, if you don't mind." I shrugged, figuring he probably wanted to talk about the fight. It wasn't a topic I particularly liked, but it would probably help get me through these sessions quicker, so I figured why not. "Sure, whatever gets this moving." Dr. Bellows nodded. "Good. I'd like to talk about your boyfriend. I'm rather curious how you two got together given that the last time we spoke, you said there was no chance you'd ever be interested in a boy. Going from that to having a boyfriend is a pretty big turnaround for just a week." My jaw clenched tightly at the mention of Doug. "It's complicated." "We have a whole hour," Dr. Bellows replied. "Explain it to me." My fists joined my jaw in clenching tightly. "I don't want to talk about him." Dr. Bellows raised an eyebrow at that. "Why not?" "I just don't!" I hissed angrily. Falling silent, Dr. Bellows just looked at me for a moment. I returned his attention with a hate-filled glare. I didn't want to talk about Doug. I didn't want to even think about that asshole - especially not after that morning. Suddenly, Dr. Bellows's look turned to concern. "Did he do something to you?" I blushed bright red as memories of my most recent kiss with Doug burned through my thoughts. "No!" "Erin if he's doing something against your will, you need to tell me," Dr. Bellows instructed. "He's ... I mean ... it's ... not ..." I stammered, averting my eyes. "It's not what?" Dr. Bellows questioned. A shudder ran through me, causing me to clutch tightly to the couch beneath me. "It's not ... against my will." "Then why are you so angry right now?" Dr. Bellows inquired. I shrugged. "I don't know ... it's complicated." Dr. Bellows paused in thought for a moment before continuing. "Do you like him?" My blush was getting hot enough that I thought my face might actually burst into flames from the heat. Why did we have to talk about this? It was just so embarrassing. "I don't know ..." I admitted. "Sometimes we have fun ... I guess ... it's ... complicated." As I stumbled along through my answer, Dr. Bellows just nodded. "I take it you're embarrassed by how you feel?" "Of course!" I exclaimed. "He's a boy!"" "And you're a girl," Dr. Bellows pointed out. "But I don't want to be!" I shot back. "I don't want to have boobs and and go through... that every month and have guys telling me I'm cute and argh!" I smacked a hand against the couch, before letting out a sigh. " ... I don't like how being around Doug makes me feel either." "And how is that?" Dr. Bellows asked. I shrugged. "Angry, flustered, hot, annoyed, anxious, confused ... helpless." "Helpless?" Dr. Bellows repeated that final word as a question. I nodded. "I can't hit him, I can't hide from him, I can't choose how I look, I can't choose how I feel," tears started to well up in my eyes, "I can't do anything." The look Dr. Bellows gave me then was some mix of sympathy and concern. "If you don't want to be with him, you don't have to be." It was true. I could just break up Doug. I could ask the school to keep him away from me. I'd never have to see his stupid smug grin or deal with his obnoxious taunts ever again. It was such a simple solution. There was just one problem with it. "That's the worst part, doctor," I replied. "I do want to be with him." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 31 - Day 38 - Tuesday "You really made a girl anorexic by having her constantly have nightmares about her gaining weight?!" Cameron gasped. "That's horrible!" Grinning wickedly, Gwen nodded. "I know! Why do you think I did it? Arrogant bitch thought she was so hot. Not so hot now that she's all skin and bones." Mouth flapping, Cameron just stared at Gwen in disbelief for several moments. "That's horrible ..." "Like you've never done anything horrible with one of your little inventions," Gwen retorted. "Not on purpose!" Cameron declared adamantly. Gwen shrugged. "Maybe not or maybe you just aren't aware that it's on purpose. After all, you keep creating things even though you know they could be dangerous." "That's ... that's not ..." Cameron stumbled. "Now Gwen, don't break him. He's the only devisor I've got," Doug cut in to defend Cameron. The wicked grin returned to Gwen's face. "But what if he wants to be broken?" she asked, peering at Cameron like he was a tasty morsel. "Have you ever been whipped before?" Blanching at the prospect, Cameron shook his head emphatically. "N-N- No." "Really? You should try it sometime. It can feel soooo good," Gwen purred, causing the red of a blush to compete with the white of fear on Cameron's face. "Gwen!" Doug cut in again, his tone making it clear that the blue girl needed to stop immediately. Sighing, Gwen held her hands up in capitulation. "Alright, alright, I'll stop. We can talk about boring stuff instead like how stupid classes are going or whatever." "I like my classes," Cameron announced. "Of course you do, sweetie," Gwen replied with a falsely sweet smile. "You're a nerd." Peace restored, Doug let the other two talk. Turning to his left to where I sat next to him, he poked me gently with his elbow and asked, "You're awfully quiet today." Having been staring off into space, I started in surprise at the touch and jerked away. "What are you doing?!" Looking surprised and a little worried, Doug held his hands up non- threateningly. "Is something wrong?" "Huh? No," I mumbled, shaking my head. "Just thinking." "About what?" Doug asked. "About none of your damned business," I spat angrily. Doug smirked. "Well, now I have to know." "Well, you're never gonna, so back off," I shot back. "I bet it's about me," Doug commented teasingly. Heat flared in my cheeks as my anger quickly turned to fury. "I said back off!" "Ugh enough," Gwen groaned. "If you two want to flirt, get a room." "I'm not flirting," I grumbled defensively, blushing and turning away. "Well I was," Doug remarked. Blush deepening, I just shoved myself from my seat and grabbed my tray. With an angry huff, I vanished in a puff of black smoke. A few moments later, I was in my room curled up on my bed. *********************************************** *********************************************** As my last class of the day drew to a close, I stared at the board with my chin resting in one hand. There was stuff on the board, the teacher was even writing more at that very moment, but I didn't see any of it. Nor did I hear what they were saying. I hadn't noticed anything for most of the class, in fact. My mind was on other things - one thing. Ever since talking to Dr. Bellows, I'd felt so lost. I wanted to be with Doug. I'd admitted it, but I didn't understand it. I hated him. All he did was tease me and torment me and butt his stupid nose into every little thing, because I couldn't stop him. Except, I could have. All I'd had to do was say so to the shrink, and it would have been over, but I hadn't. I couldn't find a reason why I hadn't just told the doctor that I didn't want Doug around. It didn't make any sense to me. Even just thinking about his stupid smug face made me feel all anxious and angry. Something bumping my shoulder broke me from my thoughts. Somewhere along the line, class had ended. All around me, kids were filing out of the room, including the one who had just bumped into me. I hadn't even noticed. Sighing wearily, I just teleported right from my seat, appearing on my bed in my room. As soon as I was there, I flopped backward, to stare up at the ceiling. Almost instantly, I was focused on my situation again - on Doug. Soon, I was lost in thought once more. Time drifted by meaninglessly as I lay there. I wasn't even sure if I was awake or asleep as the same thoughts and images danced through my head. If only it was all a dream, then I could just wake up. "Erin?!" Doug's voice called my name. "Let me in!" Snapping back to reality, I was greeted by a loud insistent banging on my door. Groaning softly, I shoved myself up to my feet as I flipped on powers. A puff of black smoke brought me out to the hall where I grabbed Doug's shoulder. Another puff brought us back inside my room, where I released him and plopped back onto the bed, curling up with my back to him. "Whoa!" Doug gasped as he wobbled dizzily from the teleportation. "I suppose that's one way to let me in." Wrapping my arms tightly around myself, I let out a little sigh. "What do you want, Doug?" "I ... uhm ... I actually came to apologize about what happened at lunch. I wasn't trying to upset you," Doug apologized. "You didn't upset me, so just leave," I told him. Doug snorted dubiously at my claim. "Well, that's clearly not true. Want to tell me what's actually bothering you now?" Those words made me wince. He never listened to me. "No." "Okay ..." Doug responded uncertainly, before trailing off. For several moments, there was just silence, and I didn't even need my clairvoyance to tell that he was just staring at me without making any moves to leave like I'd told him to. That was no surprise, though. After all, he never left me alone. When I finally did hear movement, it was the sound of footsteps on the ceramic floor followed by the bed beneath me creaking slightly as Doug sat down. I could feel his proximity now, close enough that parts of him brushed against my back. All I could do was curl up a little tighter. "Seriously, what's wrong?" Doug inquired, leaning over me to look at my face. "I've never seen you like this. You're starting to worry me." "Good," I mumbled bitterly, rolling my shoulder forward to try to hide from him. "Now, go away." "Erin-" Doug began. That was the last straw for me. I shoved myself up on my arms, twisting around to glare at the boy. "Argh! I hate you! Why won't you just get out of my life?!" Eyes wide in surprise, Doug reeled back slightly from the outburst. His jaw dropped as if to start forming words, but they didn't come. For several long moments he just looked at me while I glared at him with tears filling my eyes. "I thought ... I mean ... " Doug's mouth finally started making words but not full thoughts. "...is that ... is that really what you want?" Trying to cling to my anger, I fought to hold true to what I'd said. My convictions were already crumbling, though, falling away. My anger faded with them, leaving nothing but a dull aching pain somewhere in my chest. "No," I whispered, hanging my head as tears started to trickle down my cheeks. The next thing I knew, Doug's arms were around me, startling me. Before I could pull away, he brought me in close, so that my head was against his chest, while his hands rubbed gently at my back. Enveloped in warmth, thoughts of resistance faded, and I just slumped against him, resting my head and hands against his chest. "I just ... I don't ..." I tried to begin, tried to explain. Doug hushed me softly. "Sh, it's alright. You don't need to explain. I told you that you didn't need to force yourself. If you don't want this right now, it's fine." From within Doug's arms, I tilted my head up to look at him. He gave me a little reassuring smile that seemed just a bit uncertain. I couldn't remember him ever seeming uncertain before. Reaching up with one hand, I slid it around behind Doug's head and pulled it down toward me. A moment later, my lips met his in a gentle, tentative kiss. The warmth I found there trickled into me, driving away my angst. While the first kiss was tentative, the second was less so, and the third not at all. They were less gentle too as each drove the need for the next, leaving hardly any time between to gasp for breath. Mentally, I cursed the need to breathe at all. Doug was tentative at first as well, but by the second kiss that was gone. He pressed his lips against mine eagerly, every bit as into it as I was. By the time we got to tongue, he was pressing me down toward the bed, forcing me onto my back. As he did, he shifted his own position, climbing on top of the bed first and then me after that, so that his weight pressed into me with every kiss. Caught in the moment, I barely registered Doug's hand drifting downward past my collarbone. When it reached my chest, it squeezed and I flinched. Instantly, Doug jerked it away pulling back from the kiss. "Sorry, I didn't ..." Doug gasped. "Don't be," I breathed before pulling his lips back down to mine. I didn't care what he touched. I just wanted to stay like this. Doug started to just go with it, reaching once more for my chest, but he stopped and pulled back again. "Are you sure?" Frustrated by Doug's reluctance, I grabbed his hand and dragged it to one of my breasts and held it there. "Yes. I only have the stupid things because of you, so you might as well enjoy them." No more encouragement was needed to get Doug to act. Grinning a smug little grin, he dipped back down to kiss me. As he did, his hand went to work, eagerly kneading the soft flesh it held. In spite of my reassurances, I was tense for the first few moments, unsure of how to handle the sensation of being fondled or the heat that burned within my chest as a result. It didn't take long for that heat to burn my doubts away, though, and enjoy the feel of Doug's hands on me - really enjoy it. Arching my back, I pressed up against him, thrust my breast fully into his hand and my hips up against his. Right as I was really getting into it, Doug suddenly released me, pulling back and panting for breath. Left in the lurch, I sat up, pulled my legs under me, and peered at him in confusion. "Is something wrong?" "No!" Doug blurted far too quickly. "You're just ... uhh ... a little more ... eager than I was ... uhm ... ready for." Feeling stupid and embarrassed, I wrapped my arms around myself and look down. "Oh ... sorry ... " "No no. It's not a bad thing," Doug quickly reassured me. "I liked it ... a lot ... that's sort of the problem." Confused once more, I lifted my gaze and furrowed my brow. "What do you mean?" For once, it was Doug that was blushing. "It's ... a guy thing. I just need a minute." "Oh, okay," I answered uncertainly. Now that I was out of the moment, I felt fidgety, tense, and nervous. Shuddering slightly, I rubbed at my arm anxiously, trying to calm down. It wasn't easy with Doug right next to me, looking at me, reminding me of what I'd just been doing. "I, uhm ... have ... homework ... to do ... yeah," I stammered out, scooting my way off the bed. "So, uhm ... I should probably ... do that ... now." "Oh. Alright," Doug accepted. "I'll, uh ... let you get to that. See you tomorrow at lunch?" I nodded. "Yeah, tomorrow." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 32 - Day 39 - Wednesday I bounced my leg anxiously as I sat at my usual table in the cafeteria. Even though most kids were still just arriving, I was already finished eating. I was actually thinking of trying to go back for seconds, even though, firsts had already been more than I usually ate for lunch. If I wanted to get more now, though, I'd have to wait through the line, and I definitely didn't want to do that. Forced to go without seconds, I stayed where I was, with my eyes focused on the table in front of me. I was rarely actually looking there, though. Frequently, I would glance up toward the door or search the crowd. Several attempts passed before I finally spotted Doug entering the cafeteria with Gwen beside him. The sight of him cranked my nervousness up another notch. He obviously wasn't going to miss lunch now. I'd have to see him, talk to him, look at him, all while remembering what had happened the day before. I knew that I should have just teleported back to my room. Unfortunately, before I could vanish from the room, Doug saw me. Adding to the misfortune was the fact that I was looking at him at the same time, causing our eyes to meet as he gave me a little wave. All I could do was jerk my gaze back down to the table, and curse the fact that I couldn't just leave now. "Hey, Erin," Cameron greeted pleasantly, first of my friends to arrive at the table as usual. "How's your day been?" "Fine," I replied disinterestedly, focused mostly on trying to not shake or bounce now that he was there to watch me. "You?" "Great! I put the finishing touches on my new disassembler. It's twice as big as the last one and four times as snuggly!" Cameron declared happily. "It also didn't go crazy and run all over campus, so that's good, too." I nodded absently to that. "Good for you." "Thanks!" Cameron chirped. "Now, if I could just figure out where to put a diamond edged ring saw on it, it would be perfect." Mention of dangerous cutting blades going on a tooldybear finally got my undivided attention. "You want to put what on it?" "A diamond edged ring saw," Cameron answered, apparently quite unaware of how ludicrous that sounded. "Listen to me very carefully, Cameron. You are not to put any kind of saw or drill or anything else that cuts or shreds on that thing. Do you understand me?" I chastised, talking slowly like one does to a child. Realization finally dawned on Cameron. "Oh ... yeah ... that could be bad, couldn't it?" "Ya think?" I remarked sarcastically, gearing up to lambast Cameron for his idiocy. I never got the chance. The next thing I knew, I suddenly felt something pressed against my cheek. Jerking away from it and spinning around, I saw Doug getting ready to sit down next to me and making some kind of smoochy face. "What the hell are you doing?!" "Giving you a kiss on the cheek to say hi," Doug answered. "I figured after last night that-" "That what?! You could do whatever you want?! We're in the middle of the cafeteria!" I retorted, cutting him off as my cheeks pinkened in embarrassment. "Ooo, what happened last night?" Gwen purred with intrigued delight. "It sounds ... juicy." If the kiss on the cheek wasn't embarrassing enough, that question certainly was. Instantly bright red, I jerk around to not look at either Doug or Gwen. "Nothing." "Yeah right ..." Gwen muttered sarcastically. "Come on, Doug. Tell me what happened." The psychic shrugged helplessly. "Sorry Gwen. I'd rather Erin didn't teleport me into the middle of the Atlantic." Pouting, the blue girl let out an annoyed sigh. "Well, that's no fun. Now, I know it has to be something delicious." "If you keep talking about it, you're going to find out if my fist is delicious," I growled angrily. Shaking her head, Gwen clicked her tongue at me. "Tsk tsk, such a temper." Before I could even clench my hands into fists and start to rise, Doug's hand was already on my shoulder. "No, Erin." "But she-" I started to protest, but the psychic just shook his head at me. Angry and frustrated, I let out an annoyed huff and folded my arms across my chest. "And Gwen, next time you intentionally antagonize my girlfriend, I'm going to reveal that dirty little secret of yours," Doug added. For once, Gwen actually looked intimidated. "You wouldn't." Doug shrugged nonchalantly. "Try me." "Whatever," Gwen replied with a dismissive shrug. "Pissing off the brute isn't worth it." "That's what I thought," Doug remarked smugly, before nudging me with his elbow. "Sorry about the kiss, too. Still trying to figure out your boundaries here." "It's fine," I muttered. "Just don't do it again." With his apology accepted, Doug smiled and leaned in a little closer to whisper, "By the way, can I stop by your room after class?" The blush that had only just started fading returned in full force. "L- Last night ... was just a one time thing because ... I was feeling ... out of sorts ... I ..." Doug held up a hand to stop me. "I'm not expecting a repeat. Just wanna hang out." "Oh ... then ... I guess that's fine," I mumbled. *********************************************** *********************************************** Tapping my pencil's eraser against my notebook, I tried to focus on the assignment in front of me. That was unfortunately proving difficult to do. As much as I wanted my homework to serve as a distraction, my brain was locked on the fact that Doug would arrive soon. Still, I struggled to do the assignment, because having a poor distraction was still better than having no distraction at all. If I did nothing, the seconds would seem to take forever. "I should have just grabbed him after class and teleported him here," I muttered, further proving my lack of focus on my assignment. It would have been so much faster, but the last thing I wanted Doug to think was that I was eager to spend time with him. He'd start getting ideas in his head then. Finally, there was a knock on the door. Instantly, I was on my feet and teleporting over the grab the handle. There I stopped, forcing myself to take several deep breaths and count out the time it should have taken me to get up and walk to the door. Only then did I open it up. "Hey," Doug greeted me with a pleasant smile. "Hey," I returned, trying to sound disinterested and calm even as I felt my heart pounding in my chest. For a moment, Doug and I just looked at each other before I realized I need to move out of his way and stepped aside. "Uhm ... come in." "Thanks," Doug told me as he stepped inside. Another moment passed where the two of us just stood there, silently. I had no idea what I was supposed to say or do. Doug had never come over to just hang out. He always showed up to bother me about something or another. There was always a purpose to it. "So ... uhm ... this is my room," I said, nervously, wanting things to stop being so quiet already. "There's ... uh ... not really much to do." "That's okay," Doug assured me, walking over to take a seat on my bed. "There's actually something I wanted to talk about." Inwardly, I sighed in relief at the news. "Oh? What?" "Well, it's really more something I'd like you to do," Doug corrected. "I want you to turn on your healing ability." I furrowed my brow in confusion. "What? Why? Are you hurt?" Doug shook his head. "I'm not hurt. As for why, that's the power that haywired whenever you ... changed significantly, right?" "Right ... so?" I answered uneasily. "So I want to see if you're still changing," Doug explained. My eyes narrowed. "Why would I be? I thought you said that it was probably over, that I looked ... amazing." That last word was said at barely more than a whisper. "You do," Doug reassured me quickly. "It's just ... promise not to get mad until I finish explaining?" Anger flared within me, causing me to clench my fists and jaw. No one ever said that unless they were about to say something anger inducing. "I'm already mad, Doug, so you might want to start explaining before I find out if this link can stop me before I incinerate you." The psychic raised his hands in surrender. "Alright alright, just hear me out." My response to that was to flip on a power, then use it to wreathe my fists in flame. "Start explaining, Doug." "Look, I was being honest back then, I really thought you'd be done," Doug tried to mollify my anger. "I was just thinking on a different scale back then." "Get to the point," I growled, already sick of this. Doug nodded. "I am just ... be patient. I really noticed it the other day when you sat next to Gwen at lunch." "Noticed what?" I asked, not at all pleased to hear the blue bitch's name come up during this conversation. "Well ... honestly ... that you're boobs really aren't that big," Doug answered. "What are you talking about?!" I gasped in disbelief, the distraction extinguishing the fire around my hands. "They fucking huge!" Shrugging a little, Doug tilted his head from side to side. "I'm sure they feel that way and I'm not saying they're small, but you're only a little bigger than Gwen, and she's barely average size for this school. Back then, I was thinking about you like some baseline girl from back home, not in comparison to the preternatural level of beauty around here." "Get out!" I hissed through clenched teeth. There was a moment of silence as Doug just sat there looking at me. "Kicking me out won't solve anything, Erin. I was just trying to be honest. I could have just said nothing and if you ended up changing just let you think I had no idea what was going on." I winced at those words. Doug was right after all. There'd been no imperative for him to tell me. It was really all downside for him. Maybe he'd gotten impatient, wanting to see his fantasy in real life? It really didn't matter, though. If I was still changing, it was going to happen unless I had them find a way to break the link. Did I want to risk that? "If I do this, you have to promise me that I'll never have to change again," I told him. "I don't think that's h-" Doug started to argue. "Promise me!" I interjected. "Promise me or I go make the staff break this link right now, so I never have to go through this ever again, no matter what it does to us." Doug nodded. "Alright. I promise that you'll never have to change again after this." Nodding, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath to steady myself. I couldn't believe I was actually considering this. There was no way of knowing what kind of perversion Doug's subconscious might turn me into. I still wasn't even used to the body I already had and it was relatively normal, at least for a girl at Whatley. In spite of all of my misgivings, I flipped on my psychic abilities and focused them on healing myself. Warmth flooded me as the power took effect, making me feel flush and light-headed. With that heat, came the considerable strain of maintaining the healing effect. The power guzzled energy faster than any other power I had, even when it wasn't going haywire, quickly leaving me feeling tired and worn out. I kept at it, though, determined to get this done with in a single effort. Several moments ticked by without my feeling anything that indicated I was changing. Maybe, the rapid change had only been because of the haywire. Maybe, Doug had been wrong, and I wouldn't change at all. The hope of that possibility being true died almost as soon as it came to life. The first tell was a pervasive tightness in my clothes, specifically around my chest and hips. My underwear, already snug at the start, was now digging into me, a sensation which grew more uncomfortable with every second. I could feel other, less obvious shifts in my skirt and blouse as well. Fear knotted my stomach as I forced myself to persevere. I'd chosen to go through with this, so I had to see it through. All I could do was pray that the changes would stop soon, that it wouldn't be that big of a difference. Finally, I couldn't feel the tightening getting worse, a signal that the changes were likely at their end. Flipping my psychic ability back off, I slumped in relief as the strain of maintaining the effect vanished. As I tried to catch my breath, I could feel the difference in my body, especially because each deep breath caused my bra to dig in painfully. After a moment to recover, I finally opened my eyes, making sure not to look down at the results. Instead, I focused my gaze on Doug, who sat on my bed staring at me with wide eyes. I didn't know what to take away from that. "H-How ... do I look?" I asked apprehensively. "Stunning ..." Doug breathed, clearly meaning that word. The compliment made me feel a little relieved, but only a little. Just because Doug liked it didn't mean I would. The only way to know for sure was to see for myself. Mustering my courage, I turned and stepped over to my mirror to do exactly like. The first thing I noticed in my reflection was my chest. It was hard not to notice it first given the way it seemed to be practically bursting out at me. A couple of my blouse buttons had been popped open by my growth, revealing flesh puffing out from all sides of my bra. Squashed into the ill-fitting undergarment, it was hard to tell exactly how much bigger I was, but it looked even more significant than my last growth spurt. Once I got past the boobs, it was clear that there were several other changes as well. For one, my face looked different, more defined and older. The girl in the mirror looked more like nineteen than fifteen - especially when combined with her figure. My hips and butt had both clearly expanded, though, not to the same extent as my chest. My arms and legs seemed a little fuller too, with slightly more tone. Less obvious was the fact that I seemed to be taller, the mirror situated slightly lower than it should have been compared to me. Taking a shuddering breath, I tried to assess it all calmly. I wasn't happy with the bigger breasts, but I'd expected them after Doug's earlier remarks. The rest seemed ... tolerable. Being taller might actually be pretty nice. It would take some work to get used to it all, but it didn't feel impossible to handle. Tugging my blouse as closed as it would go to cover my chest, I crossed my arms over it to hold it in place and provide additional coverage. Nervous and embarrassed, I turned back to Doug to find him still just staring at me. Was it really such a big difference to warrant a look like that? "I ... uhm ... think I need to get some new clothes that fit," I said to break the silence. Doug nodded dazedly. "Yeah." "I mean now," I added, wanting to find something to cover myself properly as quickly as I could. That finally snapped Doug from his staring. "Oh. I'll come with you." I shook my head immediately. "No. I ... need some time ... to myself." "See ya tomorrow then?" Doug asked, clearly unsure how'd I'd answer that question. I nodded. "Yeah, tomorrow." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 33 - Day 40 - Thursday "Why'd he have to make them so big?" I grumbled as I worked to cram my melon-like assets into my new bra. It was several sizes bigger than my old bra, a necessity to properly encase my expanded chest. Once it was on, though, my whole upper body just seemed to be two big, round, white cups filled to the brim with flesh. "Why does he even like this?" I continued to complain while looking at my reflection. It didn't make any sense to me at all. My newly enlarged assets just looked like bloated, oversized marshmallows - not that my previous size hadn't looked that way as well. It was more pronounced now that they were twice as big, making me feel faintly embarrassed even alone in my room. Not knowing what else to do, I just sighed at the sight. They looked weird and they got in the way a little more, but other than that, they were, surprisingly, not really all that difficult to get used to. They didn't really bounce any more or less than they did before, which meant they still bounced way too much, and the weight, while significant, was mostly irrelevant to me with my strength. In the end, it was far less significant of a change than it looked, certainly less so than either of my previous developments in that area. There was one other problem with my new dimensions that was readily apparent as I continued to dress. Finding a button up top to wear with them was a nightmare. I'd managed to do it, but it wasn't a great fit. The blouse was quite loose around my waist and shoulders then pulled tight around my chest, the buttons puckering from the strain. It did little to hide the change, like I would have preferred, but at least my bra wasn't visible. Outside of my chest, the changes made less of a difference, but annoyingly still a big enough one to force me to buy new clothes. Now five-ten and noticeably thicker through my hips and butt, I'd needed all new skirts to meet the knee length requirement. Outside of that, they looked and felt about the same. Once I was dressed, I gave my reflection a quick once over to make sure nothing was about to burst out or anything. Everything seemed fine, at least for the moment. Who knew how well it would hold out during the day, though. "It's just like last time," I stated, looking myself in the eye. It didn't feel like I was looking at myself, though. Thinking about it, I tried to picture what I'd looked like before all this had happened. I could remember my old reflection, I rarely forget anything, but it seemed as unfamiliar as my current one, someone long gone even though I had cared about him a great deal. It was a feeling I was quite used to. Not wanting to dwell on such things and lose my nerve, I squared my shoulders and refocused on the day ahead. I had classes to get through and other students to face. If I started doubting myself now, I'd never make it, and I had to make it. There was no going back, no running from the girl in the mirror. With grim determination, I grabbed my things and teleported to class. Initially, my arrival drew only the usual amount of attention - quick glances and slight jumps as people reacted to the burst of black smoke. Such attention was normally fleeting, with maybe the gaze of a boy or two lingering a bit on me. That was not the case that day, though. Several jaws dropped as they saw me, a not insignificant number of them belonging to girls. Even those with a little bit more control stared openly. Within moments, the whispers and rumors began, all focused on my new ... look. In spite of my best efforts, I felt my cheeks heat up some under the attention and where it was directed. There was nothing to be done about it, though. I'd already learned from the last time that people were going to stare, no matter how I felt about it. It hadn't been quite so many back then, though. Stiffly, I slid down into my chair and tried to just ignore the people around me. At the front of the room, the teacher was gearing up to start the class, so that was my focus. As far as I was concerned there was no one else in the room, certainly not dozens of other kids staring at me, wondering, whispering. Folding my arms, I hunched forward, preparing to endure what I knew would be a very long day. *********************************************** *********************************************** Focusing carefully, I fought to keep myself perfectly still. It wasn't easy. My limbs wanted to shake with exhaustion, and my body demanded that I shut my powers off. I refused to give into either, though. I'd never get better if I didn't push my boundaries. The source of my exhaustion was the fact that not only did I have all five of my powers activated at once, but I was continually using four of them. I floated a foot above the ground, wreathed in flame and sparks. My clairvoyance was set to the inside of the closet back in my room, someplace dark so that it wouldn't be distracting while keeping the power constantly active. The only power I didn't use was my teleportation because it required vision of my destination to work. Having four powers in continuous use at once while the other was active but unneeded was more than enough to strain me anyway. While the training was good for improving my endurance, it served another purpose. Out there behind Hawthorne, alone, and focused on a task, there was no one around to stare at me. I couldn't even afford to waste thought on such a matter lest I break my concentration and lose control. As the seconds ticked by, my hands, one clenched inside the other in front of me, started to shake. The twitch spread quickly, invading every part of my body until I was quaking as I floated there, still struggling to keep my powers up. I pushed just a little further before finally, I flipped all my powers off. Fire and lightning winked out as I suddenly dropped to the ground. I staggered as my feet hit, knees threatening to buckle under my weight. Somehow, I managed to catch myself, stumbling forward dizzily a couple of steps before finally coming to a halt. There I folded over to rest my hands on my knees and gasp for breath. "That looked hard," Doug's voice remarked. "Majestic too." Still trying to catch my breath, I barely managed to turn my head enough to see Doug standing a little ways away. "How long ... have you ... been there?" "A minute or two," Doug answered, causing me to silently curse my choice of activity. "I thought we were going to have lunch together, so when you weren't there, I came looking. I expected to find you punching something, not floating here surrounded by flames and lightning." "I would've punched something, but I forgot to buy a new sports bra and I didn't want to go back to the store," I explained, before letting my gaze drop back to the ground. "I'm ... sorry ... about lunch. I just ... needed a break from ... people." Doug shook his head. "I'm the one who should be apologizing." "Yeah, you should be," I spat, thrusting myself upright. "It's all your damned fault after all." "You're right. Sorry," Doug replied. The apology caught me a little off guard, leaving me unsure of how to respond. After a moment, I just shrugged dismissively. "Whatever." Another moment passed awkwardly silent, before Doug spoke up. "You know, I've been wondering about something. The other day, you seemed pretty dead set on not copying anyone's powers, but then how did you get the powers you have now?" "I copied them, obviously," I answered snarkily. "Well, yeah, but why these particular ones?" Doug asked. I tensed at the sore subject. "Why do you want to know? Hoping to find some way to get me to copy other ones?" "Well, that's part of it, but given how you reacted, I imagine it's probably pretty important to you," Doug admitted. "I also just hate not knowing secrets." "Let's just say you're not going to convince me," I answered. "The only reason I ever copy powers anymore is when it's required for a test or the like. I always immediately release the power I copy after I'm finished, too." Doug sighed in disappointment.. "Great, so I don't get to convince you or learn the secret. What a drag." I chuckled at the boy's whining. "I don't see why you're so interested in this anyway. It's not like the ones I have aren't powerful and diverse. What do you even want me to be able to do that I can't already?" Doug shrugged. "I don't know. There are lots of cool powers. You could become a shifter and look however you want, and wizards seem really powerful, and there's probably other weird effects like warping time that would be really cool." "Frustratingly, most of what you just suggested doesn't really work," I informed him. "I can't copy stuff that changes my body, so no shifter, and while I can copy wizard traits it just gives me more power to cast spells not the knowledge to do so. I've only learned a few really simple ones so far, so it's kinda underwhelming. As for warping time, I've never met anyone that could really do much with it that I can't do by just being fast." Doug frowned. "What about, like, Gwen's power, though? That's pretty cool." "Why would I want to give people nightmares?" I asked incredulously. "I don't know. Gwen seems to be pretty creative with it," Doug answered. I rolled my eyes at that. "Yeah, creative at being horrible. No thanks. And before you suggest Cameron, I'm never going to copy a devisor's power. Those guys are fucking nuts." Doug laughed. "Well, I can't really argue with that after seeing some of Cameron's creations." "Yeah. He can be such a doof," I muttered, smirking at some of the memories. "At least, he's a mostly harmless doof," Doug remarked. "He almost blew us all up the first day we met," I pointed out. Doug shrugged. "I said mostly." For a moment, I laughed at that, but it quickly faded away. Uncertainly, I looked down, unable to ignore my recent changes, how they'd come about, and what the psychic and I had just been talking about. "Doug ... am I good enough ... like this ... this body ... these powers or ... or do I need to ... change again?" Taken aback, Doug just stared at me for a moment. Feeling my face go hot, I forced my gaze even further away from him while wrapping my arms around myself. There was no hiding from his eyes, from his judgement. All I could do was dread his answer. "You're way more than just good enough, Erin," Doug finally told me. "You don't need to change anymore. I promised, remember?" Smiling faintly, I nodded. "Yeah ... I remember." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 34 - Day 41 - Friday The moment my last class before lunch ended, I stood and a puff of black smoke whisked me away. I didn't appear in the cafeteria, though, as was my usual. Instead I appeared in front of the campus store, only to freeze there and stare at the doors for a couple of seconds. "You can do this," I muttered to myself. Determined not to let my embarrassment and discomfort stop me, I forced myself to take a step forward. Another step followed that until I was inside the store and on the way to the clothing section. Once at the clothing section, I stopped, searching around for someone to help me. I was definitely going to need it, because I had no idea how to pick out what I was looking for. The woman that had helped me the day before was there, so I hurried over to her. "Back again?" the woman remarked as she saw me, before quickly looking me over. It was vaguely embarrassing, but at least this woman wasn't doing it out of perversion. Every time she'd seen me it had been after one of my changes, so she probably just assumed that I must have changed again. "Did you forget something?" "Uhm ... no ... well yes, a sports bra, but that's not my ... main reason for the trip," I explained. "I ... uhm ... I'm looking for a ... dress." That last word was whispered like it was something embarrassing and dirty. The woman nodded. "I see. I see. What kind of dress?" "There are different kinds?" I asked uncertainly. The woman snorted out a laugh at my confusion. "Oh my ... where to even start with that one. Yes, there are different kinds - lots in fact. Most of them are for different kinds of events, such as an evening gown for formal parties or a sundress for a warm summer day in the park etc." "Oh ..." I mumbled, realizing that I'd clearly undertaken a far more challenging task than I'd first imagined. "It's for a, uhm ... date." The woman waved her hand in a gesture for more information. "What kind of date?" "A ... picnic ... I guess ..." I answered hesitantly. The woman nodded. "Okay, so nothing too fancy, and you'll want something kinda loose so that it's easy to sit on the ground in it. Of course, you'll want to show off at least a little, too, so not too long and maybe a little low on the neckline." I just blinked a couple of times as the woman rattled off criteria. It all sounded reasonable enough. I did want to look nice, and I would have to be able to sit in it. "Okay." "Do you have shoes, a purse, or anything else it will need to match?" the woman inquired. That question got more blinks. "I uhm ... don't own a purse and," I glanced down at my feet in a pair of black sneakers, "these are my only shoes besides the ones from my uniform." "Oh my ... you poor thing," the woman muttered, shaking her head in sympathy. "Do you want to look for a whole new package or do you want to try to find something that will look good with the shoes you have?" While I didn't see anything wrong with just wearing what I owned, the way the woman was talking made it clear that it wouldn't be normal or nice looking. "I guess ... the whole thing?" "Good choice," the woman answered, confirming my suspicions. After that, the woman started off, dragging me around the section to try on various things. The experience was far worse than just shopping for uniform clothes or even searching for jeans and a t-shirt like the week before with Doug. There were all sorts of different styles and colors and options which the woman insisted were all incredibly important. She was constantly nitpicking how something fit or how the color didn't go with my hair and all sorts of other little things. Not knowing anything, I just nodded along and tried on what was asked, always hoping that the next thing I tried would be the last. It took a long time, but eventually, I was released from the torment of shopping. Bag with dress, shoes, sports bra, and purse in hand, I quickly teleported back to my room. Dropping my purchases off, I activated my clairvoyance to see if Doug was still in the cafeteria or had come searching for me. To my surprise, he was actually still in the cafeteria, chatting with Gwen and Doug. That would make the next part harder. Vanishing from my room, I appeared in the cafeteria behind Doug's seat in a puff of black smoke. "Uhm ... Doug." Hearing his name, Doug turned around to look at me. "Erin! Hey!" "Doug ... there's, uhm ... something ... I want to ask you," I began nervously, unable to look the blonde boy in the eye while I talked. Doug tilted his head curiously to the side. "Okay ..." "I was wondering ... because of what happened ... if you wanted to ... maybe ... try that ... date again ... tonight?" I managed to ask, my cheeks turning red just from hearing it outloud and growing even redder while I waited for a response. Doug blinked in surprise. "Yeah, that sounds great. Six at your room again?" I nodded quickly. "Yeah." "Alright, I'll be there," Doug replied. "Me too ... I mean good ... I mean okay ..." I stammered nervously. "Anyway ... uhm ... I still need to eat ... so ..." I pointed toward the lines and then just vanished in another teleport. *********************************************** *********************************************** "I guess this looks right?" I commented as I fiddled with my clothes in front of the mirror, wishing I was more certain of that fact. If I was going to do this whole dating thing, I wanted to do it right, not have Doug think I wasn't even ready to go like last time. The problem was, I really had no idea what doing it right entailed. As far as I could tell, I had my clothes on the same way they'd been in the store when the saleslady had been helping me. The short-sleeved, light blue dress seemed to flow around me with every little movement. The hem was a little shorter than my school uniform but not much, just a couple inches above my knee. There was a black belt around my waist which I'd been told was very important for gathering the dress in at my waist. It certainly did that, pulling the dress up against my curves rather than having it billow out. The biggest and most embarrassing difference, though, came from the neckline. Unlike the normal necklines that I was used to from dress shirts and boys t-shirts, this dress looked like someone had hacked a V out of the front of it, leaving a decent portion of my chest bare, enough so that the upper swell of my breasts were peeking out into view. "I suppose he does like looking at them," I mused as I glanced down at my chest. Was him staring there a good thing? Should I show more? It was already embarrassing enough as it was, though. The rest of the outfit wasn't so bad, at least. Having no idea how to wear heels, I'd ended up getting shoes that didn't have them. They were kind of like slippers but supposedly designed for normal wear, which I guessed was alright. The little, black purse was more confusing. It was sort of like a pocket, except it was less convenient. I didn't even have anything to actually put in it, which made it even more confusing. It was supposedly an important accessory, though, so I slung over one shoulder. It all at least seemed to look right. Any confidence I had in my attire vanished the moment I heard a knock on my door. My cheeks instantly pinkened, as I inwardly cursed myself for thinking I could actually handle wearing a dress. There was no way I could let Doug see me in this. A second knock reminded me that Doug was waiting outside. I didn't have time to change, and I didn't have anything to change into anyway. Unless I called the whole thing off, he was going to see me like this. Trying to keep myself from shaking, I hurried over to the door and gripped the handle. For a moment, I was just frozen there as I tried to build up the nerve to actually pull the door open. It took a couple of seconds, but I finally did. The door opened to Doug, who had one hand raised to attempt a third knock. At first, he looked surprised by the door's sudden opening, but that quickly turned to a smile. Then, it went right back to surprise a moment later when he looked down at my outfit and his jaw dropped. Nervously, I crossed one arm in front of me to grip the other. "H-Hi." "You're wearing a dress," Doug stated in a dazed tone. I nodded. "Yeah ... " "You're wearing a dress," Doug repeated, his tone growing more incredulous. Heat flushing my face, I nodded again. "I look stupid in it, don't I?" Doug shook his head. "No, you don't. You look ..." He just trailed off, never finishing the thought. Instead he just stared at me. Self-conscious, I fidgeted a little. "Uhm ... could you ... not stare at me?" "Oh ... sorry," Doug apologized, shaking his head to snap himself out of it. "You just look so ... amazing." "Thanks," I replied self-consciously. "Do you mind if we try a different spot today?" Doug his head. "Not at all. Where would you like?" "I'll show you, just be careful when you come out of the teleport," I instructed before reaching out to tap him on the shoulder while I closed the door behind me. A moment later, Doug and I stood atop Hawthorne, near the edge of the roof. The whole campus spread out before us, lit by the sun hanging low in the sky. It was like we could see our whole world from up there. The mixture of the teleport and the view hit Doug with a harsh wave of vertigo. Dizzily, he tried to stumble away, but I just gripped his shoulder firmly and yanked him to a stop. There was no way I was going to let my date fall off a building. "I told you to be careful," I scolded once he seemed to be recovering. "How did you ever get used to your world just jerking around like that?" Doug asked, shaking his head to clear his vertigo. I shrugged. "Practice. Same way I learned to fly, to fight, to not break things I don't want broken, etc." "Sounds like a lot of work," Doug noted. "I guess ..." I replied distantly as I looked out at the campus. For a moment, Doug just looked at me before turning to follow my gaze out to the scene before us. "So, what made you pick this spot?" "It's one of my favorite spots to come and just sit and think," I answered. "It's also very unlikely anyone is going to walk by and ruin our date again." "Ah, smart, and I do like the view," Doug remarked. A slight smile curled my lips. "Glad you like it." "Of course, it's nothing compared to the view of you in that dress," Doug added. Instantly, heat flushed my face. "I, uh ... it's just ... I mean ..." "You're welcome," Doug said. Ramblings ended by those words, I nodded. "Thank you." *********************************************** *********************************************** Chapter 35 - Day 41 - Friday "When I was like four or five or so, I got it into my head that I could fly just like the superheroes I'd seen on TV. My friend, Tommy, he didn't believe me, so I told him I'd prove it to him," Doug began. "Absolutely certain of myself, I climbed to the top of my brother's and my bunk bed and leapt off it." I snickered at the stupidity of children. "How'd that work out for you?" "I broke my wrist," Doug answered. "The funny part was, that apparently, when the doctor asked if I'd been worried that I might get hurt, I said yes. I was worried I'd take off too fast and smash my face into the ceiling." Snickers turned into a full blown giggle fit strong enough to force me to curl up. "God, you were dumb." "We're all dumb when we're kids," Doug replied. "I'm sure even you did something stupid when you were little." Looking down sadly, I shrugged. "I wouldn't know. I don't remember anything from back then." "Nothing?" Doug asked. I shook my head. "My memories don't start until a little after I turned ten." "What happened?" Doug questioned. "I ... don't really know," I answered. "Back then, I was ... part of some experiments related to my power. They think one of them might have done it, but no one knows for sure." Doug looked confused. "People experimented on you? When you were ten?" Looking away, I nodded. "A devisor kidnapped me shortly after I manifested. He believed that my power held the key to creating a way to give anyone any power. My earliest memories are of the experiments he performed on me to try to unlock the secrets of my ability." "That explains why you hate devisors and using your power," Doug remarked. "Yep," I confirmed. "My power brought that man into my life, it trapped me as a child, it caused me to suffer through haywires every couple days, and when I'd finally managed to adjust to all of that, it changed me into this." I gestured down at myself. "It's been nothing but trouble since the day I manifested." For several moments, silence hung between the two of us which was fine with me. I just leaned forward and looked out at the sky pensively. As I did, memories of my past danced through my thoughts. Suddenly, I felt an arm slip around my shoulder along with a faint pressure, pulling me to the side. I let myself be pulled until I came to rest against Doug. He didn't say anything, just rubbed my shoulder with his hand and held me. Relaxing in the embrace, I rested my head on his shoulder and continued to watch the sky. "What horrible thing do you think it'll do to me next?" I finally asked quietly. "I don't know. Maybe this time you'll finally get to be happy," Doug postulated. I shook my head. "No, I won't." "Are you happy now?" Doug inquired. That question proved to be a tricky one for me. Was I happy? I'd been forced to have someone in my life I didn't want there and have my body changed into some perverted fantasy for him. Had Doug really been so bad, though? He'd been there for me throughout all of the changes. He was there for me at that moment too. Was being attractive to him really so bad, either? It was certainly embarrassing, and yet ... "Yes," I finally answered softly. "Then we just have to make sure to not let anything ruin that," Doug replied. "I've always thought I could stand up to it in the past, and I've never been able to," I pointed out. "The power always wins." Doug smiled confidently. "Ah, but in the past you didn't have me, and I never let go of something I want no matter what." I smirked. "So I'm 'something you want'?" "More than anything else," Doug assured me. Shifting in the boy's embrace, I turned so I could press my lips against his. I relished the feel of them, so warm and caring. I could get lost in that feeling. I wanted to get lost in that feeling. Flipping on my powers, I envisioned my room and a puff of smoke later Doug and I were seated on my bed. I shifted further, rising up so that I had to tilt my head down to maintain the kiss. As I did, I brought my hands up as well and used them to press my counterpart down to the bed beneath me. "What are you-?" Doug tried to ask between kisses, but my lips cut him off. Heat built within me, and with it, a burning need for something more than just kissing, but I didn't know what that something was. Breaking free from the kiss, I peered plaintively down into Doug's eyes, gasping for breath. "Please ... I feel ... need ... I don't know ..." "Maybe I should take the lead," Doug remarked before moving to sit himself back up. Once he was upright, Doug reached up to grab my shoulders, his fingers tickling my skin. His hands felt nice, but didn't fill the need I felt. In fact, it only made me need whatever it was even more. Thankfully, Doug didn't stop with that. Instead, his hands slipped the dress off my shoulders before he quickly tugged it down, baring my bra as the dress fell to bunch around my waist. Blushing in embarrassment, I started to ask, "What are you-?" It was my turn to be cut off, this time by Doug's finger on my lips. "Shh, just trust me," he hushed, before his finger vanished. I felt his hands on my skin once more, this time trailing over my back. There, they found the hooks of my bra and a moment later, the tight support of the garment vanished as it snapped open. Feeling my bra start to slip, my arms darted up to clutch the cups to my breasts. "Trust me," Doug repeated, gently pulling my hands away. A moment later, my bra slipped from my shoulders, baring the mammoth chest I'd been saddled with. Embarrassment and shame battled with my desperate need, trying to get me to abandon my path. They weren't enough to get me to resist, but I did look away, unable to bear meeting Doug's gaze in such a state. Meanwhile, the boy's hands went to my unprotected breasts, cupping the huge mounds as best as they could. There was too much flesh there, though, overflowing his fingers and palms as he tried. That didn't stop him from giving them a gentle squeeze. A jolt ran through me, eliciting a gasp from my lips. The sensation continued as Doug kneaded my chest, filling my thoughts. Still, it wasn't enough. Not stopping, Doug's hands shifted again, this time so that they could push me down onto the bed. Once I was, they drifted down from my chest to grab my dress again. I felt my belt get undone. Then, there was a yank, and all I had on was a pair of panties. Those didn't last long either, quickly grabbed and worked off my hips, leaving me naked and shuddering. "This might hurt a little at first, but you just need to push past that," Doug warned me, as I heard the sound of a zipper. Having come this far, there was no will left in me to stop the boy, even if I'd wanted to. I was his to do with as he pleased. He was right, it did hurt at first, but that initial pain was soon forgotten in what came after. When I finally gasped out that euphoric climax, I knew that it was exactly what I'd needed. *********************************************** *********************************************** "I can't believe I did that," I muttered as I flopped onto the bed. Even as I said that, though, the memory of it made my whole body tingle, making me wish that Doug was still around to make me feel that way all over again. Fortunately, the boy was not around to allow me to cave into my feelings once more. He'd left a while ago, forced out by approaching curfew after we'd exhausted ourselves exploring our passions and each other. Never in my life had I felt anything like what he'd made me feel. Even through my embarrassment and inexperience, it had been utterly amazing. Of course, not everything about the experience had been wonderful. Once it had ended, embarrassment and shame had come crashing back down on me. Under its weight, I was just sweaty, sticky, and exhausted and Doug's comforting arms weren't enough to make me feel anything less than dirty because of what I'd just done. A shower and time had helped alleviate the grime and weariness, but it hadn't been able to solve everything. The space between my legs still ached slightly, a reminder that not that long ago, I'd had a boy's ... thing jammed inside me. It was enough to make me shudder in disgust. For once, it had been my choice what had happened. Doug had done nothing that I hadn't asked of him. He'd given me plenty of chances to turn away, if that had been what I'd wanted to do. I didn't know if that made it better or worse. That I had succumbed to some unknown desire which I'd never felt before was absolutely terrifying. Could it have been the link? Could it have just been because I was finally physically mature enough to feel that way? Doug had certainly seemed to have the same desire I did, but he was linked as well. I was no more capable of knowing how it might have affected him than I was of knowing how it had affected me. "Argh! Why does this have to be so complicated?!" I growled, clutching my hands to my head in frustration. Nothing with Doug was ever simple. It wasn't even just because of the link. Even if the feelings were all mine, I had no idea what they meant. Did I hate him? Like him? Love him? I was sure I'd felt at least a couple of those things, along with dozens of others, when I was around him. It wasn't like emotions were clearly labeled, so I'd know exactly what I was feeling and when. Hate and like especially were so hard to tell apart. I hated how he was always there, but at the same time, I liked that he was there for me when I needed someone. I hated how arrogant he was, but at the same time, I liked that he had the confidence to take the lead when I didn't know what to do. When he'd stripped me down, I'd been so embarrassed that I'd wanted to teleport away and never come back, and yet I'd still wanted to go further with him. How could all of those contradictory things be true at once? "It doesn't make any sense," I sighed. It was all just a giant pile of nonsense that there was no way to possibly sort out. I'd have to stick with the few things I did know, and ignore the rest of the mess. I had enjoyed the date, I had enjoyed what had followed, and I did want to see Doug again. That was what mattered - all that mattered. The End Author's Note: Hey all. Hope you enjoyed the story. Remember that I just released my first book on Amazon, The Demon King of Gen'ric, about a fearsome ancient evil turned cute, demon girl. It's only $2.99 and available right here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08MV9YFN7