"Kline! Speak to me!" Bell cried, her voice drowned out by the crashing chairs and screaming.
Thud! Crash! CRaaAShhHhhHhh! Thud! Crash!
"Mindy, calm down!"
"Get out of my way; Kline needs help!" Mindy cried dramatically, picking up another chair.
While throwing chairs, she didn't look angry, just irrationally panicked and desperate. It seemed like the world had disappeared from her eyes.
"Wait! We're worried too, but—"
Thud! Crash! CRaaAShhHhhH!
"AgghHHhhHHhhhHhhH!"
More women screamed in panic as the woman rampaged through the fallen chairs like Achilles, slicing through Trojans when Hector killed his best friend, Patroclus, during the Trojan War.
"UGHhhHhhhh." Kline groaned, grabbing the top of his head, and—
CRraaaaACK!
—casually snapped his spine back into place.
It was so natural and unceremonious that everyone watching was horrified, including Mindy, who snapped out of her daze momentarily.
The hazy virgin opened his eyes in confusion. When he saw a familiar sight, Bell's light green eyes, he panicked and squirmed slightly, making her wince.
'Play it cool, virgin!' He yelled at himself mentally, 'An actual injury is eight layers of cringe deeper than just tripping! So you have to play this off somehow….
Self-deprecation humor? Yeah, that'll be charming, and then I can pull the pity card. Let's do this!'
"Oh hey, Catalina." Kline laughed awkwardly, making her eyes tremble, "I was just coming to talk to you. How'd you like my entrance? I'm accepting feedback for improvement."
'Nailed it!' He thought passionately, giving himself a mental fist pump. However, he frowned when he saw the abstractly disconcerted look on her face.
'It's because I broke my neck, isn't it?' He sighed internally, 'Yeah, it's because I broke my neck.'
"Kline…." Bell whispered strangely.
"Yeah… about me breaking my neck." Kline sighed, "I just cracked the spinous process of my C5 vertebrae. I'm sure it sounded awful, but it didn't break the intravertebral disc."
Mindy and Mira stopped moving when he casually explained what had happened to him. The only way he'd know something so detailed—was if he had gone through it!
"So don't worry; it'll only take a minute to get back to normal." He continued soberly, "Otherwise, I'd be in a hospital bed for six hours, and those… floozies would be hawking or whatever."
The brunette's strange gaze flashed with murder, making him panic.
"B-But I'd be limp-dick-Lenny, because, you know, broken spinal cord hah… haha… hahaha." He laughed awkwardly, his facial muscles randomly twitching from nervous system misfire.
Bell opened and closed her mouth a few times. "I see… well, I'm glad you're doing okay."
"Yuuuuup! Doing-okay-man, that's me!" Kline replied with a cringe-worthy chuckle.
The brunette stood up and turned between Mindy and Mira. "I'm sure one of you can lead Kline's care without assaulting him, right?"
They both looked at her strangely.
"Where are you going?" Mira asked suspiciously.
"I'm looking for the buttercunt who lacked the dexterity to stay on her feet yet managed to curve-ball her Hitler memoir into Kline's shin." Bell replied in a dry yet damning voice.
While her tone and eyes lacked intensity, there was something indescribably distinctive about the look in her eyes. It felt like whatever action she planned wasn't a crime of passion—it was routine, regular, and mundane.
It chilled most people to the bone, but Mindy, Mira, and one other didn't seem disturbed. The last one proved that casually.
"Hey, Kline…." Violet said nervously, approaching from behind Mira, "I'm sorry my book caused you trouble."
The three women staring at Kline's eyes snapped open in astonishment and simultaneously turned to the petite brunette.
"You caused him trouble?" Mindy asked, cold-toned and trembling, "You call [this] causing him trouble?"
"Yeah….?" Violet blinked twice in confusion, "I don't think he wanted this to happen—"
The redhead's mouth slowly lowered as the petite woman spoke, feeling like she was hallucinating the words she was hearing.
"—that'd make this trouble, right? Plus, when you add in cleaning up the chairs and—"
"Did you just bring up the chairs?" Bell asked with blank eyes.
"Why are you both questioning the obvious?" The brunette asked in befuddlement.
"That's what I want to know." Mindy trembled with slightly teary eyes, "After you intentionally hurt my… friend Kline… [again]... you're gonna laugh it off as [trouble]?"
Kline's eyes lit up. Getting in the friend zone is a hard plus when you're not already friends with someone! So long as you don't get the [you're my best friend] right before you confess, you're in a golden zone! Redhead hangouts, here I come!
"What do you mean?" Violet asked in calm annoyance, "He's fine; just look at him. Why are you acting like this grade of [accident] is worth noting?"
The previously-heavily-wounded virgin's eyes deadened when the woman played off his broken neck because he was technically alright. Everyone woman had the same thought.
Mira turned to her with closed eyes and a sickly sweet smile. "I think what Mindy's trying to say is that you broke Kline's neck, and you're treating it like a minor fall."
"It was a minor fall." Violent replied, pointing at Kline, "Look, he doesn't even have a scrape.
For Mr. Smiles, any injury that can heal in less than a minute is as mundane as tripping. There is no difference."
Kline's eyes widened in shock. She hit the nail on the head! He had developed mental leprosy for normal pain after [a doctor] removed his kneecap and left the room to see if it'd grow back on its own. He wouldn't notice cutting his finger while cooking unless he cut it off. (1)
However, he couldn't understand why [she] would know how he felt. While he wasn't certain they hadn't met before, he was confident he wouldn't disclose that fact!
He didn't know much about women, but he was confident they wouldn't find such a morbid anecdote charming. And if they did, he was dead certain he didn't want to get into a *relationship with them!
*Willingness to engage in sexy-time contingent upon the situation and up for negotiation. Terms and conditions may apply.
"Don't be silly." Mira smiled sweetly, "Sure, he's fine. However, minor scrapes and a broken neck are the difference between social ostracization and late-night torture."
Violet moved her gaze from the blonde's sinister smile to Mindy, gritting her teeth, before landing on Bell, who gazed at her like a police officer ready to detain her.
"Is no one else confused about how we jumped from minor falls to torture?" She asked in confusion.
"She's talking about you, Violet." Bell clarified straightly, "Punishment for hurting him."
Kline's eyes widened in panic. He did not like where things were going!
"W-Wait up!" He cried, "Can we drop the torture-punishment talk? There's no reason to make this a big deal."
"This woman slit your throat and purposely gave you a should-be-paralyzing injury." The brunette commented sarcastically, "And you're saying it isn't a [big deal]?"
The panicked virgin smiled wryly, understanding her point. He knew the book was purposely thrown at him. However, that wasn't the issue!
"Okay, maybe [big deal] is justified." Kline dry-swallowed, "I'm just asking if we can drop the [torture] talk. I don't want to be an accessory to a crime."
"Don't worry, no one's actually talking about torture." Bell clarified, "There are much more effective and devastating forms of punishment."
"Oh, thank god, I was worried about—wait, what!?" He cried.
"Be at ease, Kline." Mira explained reassuringly, "She's saying no one will commit a crime to punish this woman. For example, blackmail is legal if you threaten to expose a crime and don't extort the person. It's perfectly legitimate and beneficial for society."
"Oh, that's a great point. I forgot how beneficial blackmail is—wait, what!?" Kline pondered aloud before panicking again.
Kline turned to Violet, standing around with a face severely lacking anxiety. "Violet, why are you doing this? At least make an excuse."
"I was trying to prevent you from running into this woman." She replied softly, "I thought you'd appreciate that. I didn't mean for it to cause you trouble."
"Wait what!?" Mindy cried, "You're telling me you assaulted Kline at full strength to prevent him from running into crazy here?"
Bell's eyes widened in aggressive shock, and she turned to the redhead. "First, fuck you, you chair-tossing gutter slut."
Mindy's face flushed with anger, staring down the brunette viciously, ignoring the culprit and turning to Violet.
"And you, book-tossing death wish, why the hell did you assault Kline at full force to prevent him from running into me?" Bell asked viciously.
"He was trying to apologize to you, so running into you would've mortifed him." Violet explained, "So I used the minimum force necessary to prevent the collision."
Everyone's anger turned to perplexion. After recovering from their confusion, they tried to protest. However, the virgin stepped forward.
"I'm oddly thankful." Kline replied hesitantly, capturing everyone's attention, "You answered my prayer. So I'll forgive you.
However, I want to know why you know so much about my healing. My life has been classified for the last month."
Surprisingly, Mindy and Mira's eyes shot open as wide as Bell's, each looking at the brunette with crazed expressions that seemed to convey an [oh, right!] expression. Then their eyes became predatory as if to ask [yeah, why the fuck [do] you know that!?].
"Oh, that's right, I never told you!" Violet exclaimed brightly, "I'm prisoner 86, Kline."
Kline looked at her strangely. "I'm sorry… prisoner? Like in… prison?"
"No, silly." She replied softly, "From the Skulls Program. We used to talk for hours during the extended [training] sessions, remember?"
Vague memories flooded his mind when she revealed her identity. She was a significant part of his training, so he already remembered her like he remembered there being a doctor. He couldn't remember the conversations, but he remembered having them.
"Wait, Ms. 86? That's really…." He muttered in a daze, staring at the beautiful brunette as if he had only noticed her for the first time, "... you?"