John looked at a man walking towards him with a suspicious gaze. He was the second most late person to roll call.
He was the man with a hamsburg chin.
The man put his small plate onto the table and sat down across from John.
"YIP!" Screamed the dragons
My sentiments exactly.
"Why are you sitting here?" Asked John.
The man with a hamsburg chin simply smiled.
"To sit somewhere else would involve giving fucks. And the less fucks I give, the more fucks I gain. It's simple economics." Said the man with an almost sadistic grin on his face.
John couldn't help but furrow his brows at him.
This man is insane. No wonder he got through the test so easily.
After all, only a crazy person would be unaffected by death.
"Could I convince you that going somewhere else would involve giving even less fucks?"
He only grinned.
"When a man who weighs more than two of you combines tells you to walk away. You would have to give a fuck to agree to do so." Said the man.
John sighed.
I'm not completely finished with my food yet.
There were still millions of crumbs to lick off the thousands of plates he had polished off. So John simply shrugged.
"Okay then."
John brought his first plate up to his face and began to lick it. He tasted grease and frosting.
Yummy.
"So….." The man looked at John with analytic eyes.
"Do you have a variant system? Is that why you eat so much?"
John paused.
Variant system? I heard the system mention something about that.
If one were to have a variant system, that would mean they would be outside the norm. Anyone can tell what's going to happen to those who aren't within the bounds of normalcy.
I should make sure that no one knows that I have a variant system. That means.
John's body tensed as he turned to look the man in the eyes.
"I have a variant system too you know."
John's body untensed.
Okay, good. Mutually assured destruction.
"I'll tell you what my system does if you tell me what yours does." Said the man.
"Bet." Said John.
The man nodded.
"Okay. My gives me insanity points for each thing I do that is super unexpected or involves not giving a fuck. I can then use those insanity points to buy skills or fulfill certain wishes. What does yours do?"
"Mine makes me stronger and tougher the more I eat." Said John.
The man grinned. There was a smug glint in his eyes.
"Cool. What's your name?" Asked the man.
"My name's John. What's yours."
The man's lips curled into his mouth, which called further attention to his borderline inbred chin. He looked like he was sucking a lemon.
"Names are a homage to the will of your parents and the history that led them to that choice. But my whole family's dead. So just call me Dude."
John nodded.
If I hadn't known that my name was chosen by my mother. I might have changed it long ago.
"Why did you decide to become a hunter?" Asked Dude
John looked into the distance for a moment. His eyes gained a starry quality as he idly pet the two small dragons below him. The blue dragons stayed on John's head. It watched the people around him like a sentry.
"Power. I want power. The power to find my mother. The power to defeat anyone who would try to hurt me. The power to be safe and invincible." Said John.
Dude nodded in respect.
"I want to become a warrior because I'm relatively well off and lived in a community that wasn't at all affected by the war. So I would have to give no fucks to become a warrior."
~The world..... It has become so twisted that bad decisions are turning into good decisions.~
"Okaa~~~y."
"YO! GIBBERING SHIT MUNCHERS! IT'S TIME FOR THE FINAL TEST! YOU'VE SLEPT IN OUR BEDS! ATE OUR FOOD! NOW YOU OWE US YOU FUCKERS! IT'S TIME TO WORK! AND FOR THE WEAK FAGGOTS AMONG YOU! IT'S TIME TO GO DIE IN A FUCKING HOLE! FUCK!"
The announcements are so vulgar.
With some anemic movements, John pulled himself from the table.
"Well, let's get going," John whispered to his Dragons.
"Yes. Let's." Responded Dude.
John looked at Dude awkwardly for a moment.
Was that Just Dude being Dude? Or was that for system points?
John couldn't tell which one was more plausible.
"Sure. Let's go." Said John with a scowl on his face.
...…
They walked back to the yard where Harry was still lounging in his lawn chair. They were late by ten minutes. John just couldn't blubber any faster than that.
John bent over onto his knees and began breathing heavily.
"You know the deal." Said Harry.
Dude nodded with a smile on his face. He bent over in front of Harry and let Harry put his feet on him.
"OH RUB YOUR FEET ON ME DADDY!" Dude yelled.
A wave of chuckles echoed through the crowd of people in front of Harry.
"SHUT UP! LAUGH AND I'LL SEND YOU ALL INTO ANOTHER ILLUSION!" Screamed Harry.
The crowd grew silent.
"Good. Now, I want all of you to get in that blood-covered murder bus over there."
Harry pointed to the bus that had brought the 'innocent' civilians here.
"That's going to take each of you to where your first missions will occur." Said Harry.
The people nodded and began to shuffle towards the bus. John moved to walk with them.
"Wait." Said Harry.
"Get on top of the bus. Or I will put you through a nasty illusion."
No one wants to risk going through a nasty illusion.
John sighed.
"Okay."
Harry reached under the bus. He grabbed a large roll of metal wires.
John tried to climb on top of the bus. But he could never pull himself up, no matter how hard he tried.
"HURRY UP! I HAVE A TIGHT SCHEDULE TO KEEP!" Yell the bus driver.
"I'M HURRYING!" Yelled Harry.
"It's too much work to tie you to the roof. Put your back against the bus."
John obliged.
Harry looped many metal wires over the top of the bus and crawled under the bus and in between John's legs a few times to loop the wires through John's legs.
Pretty soon John was tied down to the bus.
John clutched his three dragons to his metal-covered chest. He had to make sure they didn't fall away when the bus got moving.
"Okay, you can go now!"
Yelled Harry.
The bus began to speed along.