9:00 a.m. my alarm blared in my ears as I rummaged for my custom InWire, disguised as an old tribal necklace, in one of the shelves my headboard contained. As I found it I gave it a solid shake turning them into a pair of glasses before placing them on my heavy eyes and hitting the AR display that said stop.
Well, time to deal with today. I thought to myself as I sat up in bed. Looking out the window the snow had melted to little more than a few inches.
"Sol, what's the weather ganna be like today?"
Almost instantaneously a solid colored hologram of a teenager that looked identical to me popped out of the translucent green bridge of the disjointed AVR goggles sitting on my desk.
"Looks like it'll be another cold day to be honest. I'd suggest you wearing that hoodie, but I think you left that back at school."
"Riiiight."
"So maybe layer up with a long sleeve t-shirt under the military school uniform?"
"That could work."
I reached for a shirt out of my drawer and pulled out a green t-shirt with a sideways cross on it. The design was pretty basic but it was going under a uniform so I figured no one would see it.
Aside from that if I needed to shed the jacket to the uniform to escape from school again at least I'd have on something different that what they would identify me with. I looked at the time and hurriedly put the shirt on before grabbing the AVR gear and throwing it around my neck. As I headed for the door I remembered I hadn't put my pants on and grabbed them as I started to hop into them one foot at a time.
"Alt, bus!" I could hear my mom shout from downstairs.
"Alright! I'm coming."
As I opened the door I took a deep breath. Whatever the day had waiting for me I was about to jump head first into the unknown.
As I stepped out of the house into a burst of light that made me squint. All around me was a white that seemed to stretch out as endlessly as the sea interrupted only by the houses that seemed as distant and as personal as private islands. The people themselves like islanders that spoke different languages amongst their own individual tribes. It was a culture me and my mother had never been able to acclimate to as if we were exiles in a foreign country.
"Have a good day Alt"
I turned in time to see my mom waving at me from just outside the door with a smile on her half asleep and dreamy face.
"Bye Mom! Love you!"
I waved back.
"Love you too!"
As I stepped onto the bus I looked for a sign that Tristan was okay. First row nothing. Second row, the girls he normally hangs out with. Third row some of the gravity ball team. The further back I went the more anxiety I got that something had happened to him; it wasn't until I got to the back of the bus that I found a bruised but very much alive and very asleep Tristan. I sighed with relief.
"Tristan!" I shouted in excitement.
"Huh?" He turned over in his seat like a hibernating bear not wanting to be bothered.
"Oh you're alive?!" He had grabbed my shoulders before I knew what was happening, gripping them tightly before smiling at me. I was taken back by how bewildered he was to see me.
"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" I sat down on the seat next to him.
Tristan's jaw tightened as if he were chewing on a tough piece of jerky.
"Well, it was some time after practice that I heard about it…."
"So those bruises," I pushed on one and watched him squirm "are from practice then?"
"Yeah," he winced "After you outran the brothers only one of them followed you into the woods."
His expression turned sour again.
"So what'd you hear about?"
"Apparently there was a body found in the woods that had been mutilated by a pack of coyotes."
My stomach started to sour as I broke out into a cold sweat.
"Say that again…"
The alarm on my face must have shown because even Tristan was breaking into a cold sweat.
"Well if it wasn't you then…"
"No way…,"
my voice was hushed as all the air in my lungs left me.
"Don't say—"
"Then one of the brothers is…"
We both sat down on the bench seat of the bus sweating hard as the bus carried us closer and closer to our final destination.
"Hope you've at least slept with somebody in this lifetime."
"What's that supposed to mean?" I could tell he was trying to take my mind off of things, but it wasn't working.
"Just saying they're ganna deep six your HDA; and that's IF they don't torture you in a data prison."
"Not helping!"
Tristan grimaced.
"I know. I just thought a light joke would help."
Just then one of the other cardinals in the school stepped onto the bus looking around before taking his seat. As he looked around he saw me and grinned and then directed his attention to Tristan.
"Looks like a loyal mutt took a beating for an already dead owner."
I started to ask Tristan what he meant.
"We can always go again, right here right now!"
Tristan yelled as he stood up prompting the bus to go silent.
"What's with all you arrogant lowlys lately?" The boy scoffed as he sat down.
"Maybe we're just sick of all the shit you hand out."
"Well if you lot weren't all unintelligent apes maybe we wouldn't have to give you so many handouts, now would we?"
With that the teenage Cardinal sat down. His words implying more than just the current exchange of insults. Tristan knew it, I knew it, heck the whole bus knew it. One slip up between peers that differed in status meant a family's income and social status could be sunk to rock bottom, never mind how many floatation devices other people could throw.
Tristan's father in fact had, had the misfortune of running into one of those situations as a young adult and has been working 16 hour days since then as a result just to keep food on the table for his wife and son.
Tristan sat down, arms folded, scowling at the back of the seat.
"Take my family, take my friends, take all the things I care about. But, one day I'll be coming for your head." He mumbled.
"If we make it past today." I darkly joked
"That's a very big IF." He retorted grimacing
The bus continued to lurch forward.
"I doubt they'd let you off even with them already having a cloned body for his HDA. Heck wouldn't even surprise me if he showed up at school just to point you out." Veins were popping out of his temples as he continued to stress what kind of consequence might truly manifest itself.
We sat in silence as the bus pulled past the school gates.
"Well," I said "Here we go…"
The bus came to a screeching halt, justifying the tension between me and Tristan becoming as tight as a tightrope. We gulped before peering out of the window and outside the bus. As we surveyed the area we spotted no one that was there to ensure our fate just yet.
"You really think if we were going to get you it'd be out in the open? You two monkeys are dumber than you look."
We turned to the Cardinal menace at the front of the bus who somehow had managed to be one of the last people to walk off.
I started to respond, but then realized what kind of trouble I was already in.
"Good boy, it seems you understand what your place is now. Maybe there's hope for you yet."
Tristan started to lurch forward to start something, just as I had grabbed him holding him in place.
"Calm man, calm. He's just trying to get a rise out of us."
Following my words the big guy calmed down a bit.
"Or I could just be stalling you two for the real show."
He smiled at us before walking off the bus into what had become a sea of red and black uniforms.I started to cuss worse than a sailor.
"Fee-fi-fo-fum"
"I smell a dead man under our thumb"
"He's under our thumb, brother?"
"Well when we get done with him he'll be under our bum"
One familiar and one unexpected voice could be heard from the crowd gathering outside.
Great, I thought that one problem I thought I'd at least be free of until the end of the day.
"Alt, I know you're on this bus," Bane glared at me from outside the tinted windows of the bus. "Why don't you make it easy on your friend there and come out alone."
It was at that point I remembered I was still holding Tristan in place, but he was no longer running to get off the bus. His rash impulsive behavior had been replaced with a solemn look and a tightening jaw. I slowly started to release my grip as I scooted around him to face the growing army of cardinals outside.
"It'll be okay." I said in a low voice
I started to walk to the front of the bus where Dan, the bus driver, looked irritated.
"Sorry I can't do anything for ya Alt." he said as he pulled his baseball cap down further over his eyes.
"Eh, it's alright Dan. I knew something like this was bound to happen."
"You're a good kid, you know that?"
"Thanks." I took a deep breath as the blinding sunlight outside shone like a spotlight on the endlessly black stage.
"Glad you made it," Bane looked at me "I owe you quite a bit for being chewed apart."
He leered at me before tossing a lacerated head at my feet. When it landed just a few feet from the last step on the bus I recognized it as Bane's own face. My stomach began to feel nauseated as I stared at the disembodied head that I kept seeing fully attached to Bane's current shoulders.
"Be glad," Bane sneered "You're one of the handful of people who can say they've deep sixed at least one Cardinal in their lifetime."
"Brother can we kill him now?" Brutus chimed.
"Kill?!" I looked at Brutus wide eyed
"Well Duh," Brutus sounded surprised to hear my question "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, and a body for a body."
Brutus flicked his finger at me and before I could even react I felt a strong grip drag me back up the steps of the bus and into a seat directly behind me. As the bus skidded about 100 meters I could see Tristan standing in the middle of the pack where the bus had been. As teachers and students alike started to pour out from the buildings the atmosphere became more like a colosseum. Powerless teachers begging these powerful young men and women to end this without bloodshed, and students either wanting to join in or antagonize the tasteless public execution.
"Seems we have an audience now." Brutus smiled.
"Seems as though we'll have a quite the public example then." Bane responded.
Tristan without hesitation took up a boxer's stance before swinging with his left hand at Brutus. As he swung the space between him and Brutus appeared to become like that of a hurricane wind. As it neared Brutus he opened his left hand and held it out.
"Not bad." Brutus skidded back into the crowd of black uniforms.
"Shame though," Brutus thought aloud "I was "just" thinking you'd be my new bodyguard."
Brutus raised his right hand palm up toward the sky.
"I suppose I don't have to kill you though."
Pressure, like a 10 ton mallet struck the earth around Tristan as he was pressed into the dirt faster than my eyes could keep up with. Even from where I was sitting on the bus I could hear bones break and muffled screams erupt from his mouth. My eyes widened in horror as I jumped off out of the bus and broke into a dead sprint toward my suffering friend.
"Do you suppose he knows how to protect himself from the majority of the pressure I'm putting on him?" Brutus asked
"If he doesn't he'll just be another casualty I guess," Bane sighed ��But do try to control your strength, we don't want another body bag on campus okay?"
"I don't see why I should, we asked for Alty and we got Tristan. By that logic I think he shares in his friend's fate."
I ran at Brutus with all my strength, as I approached him he smiled and started to thrust his left hand at me. Surprisingly to him I launched into the air full force delivering a drop kick right to his chest.
"Little brother are you alright?" Bane the older twin ran to him.
"I'm fine, but something is unusual about Alty here." he shook his head as he regained his composure.
As I recovered my stance off the ground I turned to Tristan who had about a 2 foot imprint in the ground.
"Tristan!" I yelled as I approached his lifeless body.
I got no response…
"Hey man, you're alright right?" I dug up one side of him and flipped him over.
"Hey man c'mon your alright."
I smiled hysterically, shaking his still body as if to wake him up from a deep slumber.
"Tristan!" I started to cry.
He's deader than a doorknob. My mind started to speak to itself. They'll probably put him on ice like everyone else, no round trips for you one way riders. Panic and rage started to take precedence as the inside of my head got louder.
"You killed him." I mumbled
"Brother I told you to hold back." Bane clicked his tongue at his brother.
"Sorry. I thought he could handle it." Brutus disdainfully laughed as he stuck his tongue out.
I gently put Tristan's head down on the crumbled ground around him before taking a deep breath. As the realization set in that this was real I started to let the angry emotions set in.
"He could have just stayed on the bus," Bane said distastefully, "We warned him, to stay on the bus. And now look at him, brother. He's bodybag number twenty-six dad now has to cover us for again."
"I said I was sor----." Brutus started to apologize to his brother but was abruptly stopped as my fist drove itself straight across his face before delivering a swift kick to Bane's head.
"You'll be paying for all this." I said feeling more energy surge through my body than I'd ever felt in my lifetime.
I didn't know it yet, but it would be at this exact moment that I would never be able to go back to any semblance of my old life.