With every step I took, a shot of severe pain traveled from my legs to my butt. Walking to my room
had never been this much of a hassle. I was forced to waddle like an idiot throughout the corridors, which seemed much longer than they really were. I didn't deserve any sympathy though, because it was my own stupidity that caused me to trip over that Heartless anyway. Suddenly I heard giggles behind me, and a scruffled voice saying, "Hey, watch this..."
I knew I had become a target of a cruel joke, so I began to waddle as fast as my butt would allow me to. I could see my door only a few feet away. I could almost touch it, but I knew I would never reach it in time, so I gave up my hopeless ambition. A sudden loud smack cracked through the air as leather met leather. This was followed by a couple of manly laughs and atrocious pain cascading my butt.
"Nighty night, duckling," Xigbar said with that annoying smirk of his then kept walking down the hall without another word.
"Axel, you should walk over the Heartless, not fall over it," chuckled Xaldin as he followed his partner in crime down the hall.
The pain was so intense, I couldn't move, which was why I didn't bother to fight back. All I could do
was lean against the wall and try to prevent tears from forming in my eyes. It sounds really dumb, but man, that was painful. I stood there for a minute, then progressively hobbled to my room. I dropped my coat as I walked through the door, shutting and locking it behind me.
"Like that would even do any good," I muttered to myself, beginning to take off my gloves. "They can portal wherever they want." There was a long pause as the sudden realization dawned on me that I was an idiot. "And so can I," I sighed.
I pulled my tank top over my head and threw it on top of my coat and gloves. Then I took off my
boots, but removing my pants was the real pain in the butt...literally. Now in only my boxers, I made my way over to my bed, relaxed my whole body, and just flopped onto the mattress. Never before had any bed felt softer than mine did at that moment.
"Guess what I hate? Life," The words were muffled by the soft pillow I had my face buried in.
It felt marvelous to lay down, but that feeling was short lived. My butt pains overpowered how tired I
was, so sleep didn't seem like an option. I tossed and turned for a good hour but it was no use. So finally I just laid there in the darkness and began thinking about something I had tried my hardest to push to the back of my mind.
When Saix and I entered the Organization, I never would have guessed that things would turn
out the way they have. I was just so sure that we would be best friends forever. As Somebodies, we always had this special bond. We were the perfect friend for each other. We enjoyed all the same things, even had the same sense of humor. We were the epitome of the phrase "partners in crime." We would always help each other with fights, especially the time we stood up for that one girl in our grade who was bullied by her "friends." I can't count the number of times we fought alongside each other, and we never lost.
Not only did we help each other in fights, but when we were bored, we always found some way to cause trouble. We pulled so many pranks on people in school, even broke into the town castle and got thrown out by a big hairy guard. One of my favorite memories though, is the time we broke into our high school in the middle of the night and completely trashed the place. Man, what I'd do to relive that.
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There was a month and a half of school left. Everything was hectic with project due dates around the corner and final exams, so we thought we'd add a little flavor. I thought up the brilliant idea one day in class when our teacher mentioned how much she despised senior pranks. At lunch that same day, I brought up my plan to Isa. At first he was sort of hesitant, just being his typical self. Eventually though, I was able to persuade him.
Over the next month, we secretly collected all of our supplies. This included everything from maps of the school to cans of spray paint to aluminum baseball bats. Isa came over every weekend and brought his laptop so we could research ways to break in, as horrible as that may sound. Our parents couldn't tell a difference, since we were always together anyway. At school, we payed close attention to the locks on the doors, the cameras, the security system, all that good stuff. We made sure we had all the details engraved into our minds.
Finally, the day had come. Our plan was all set and we knew exactly how to pull it off. That night when I was sure my family was asleep, I put on a black hoodie, black jeans, and black sneakers and grabbed my sports bag full of supplies. Carefully, I crept out of my room. Even the most quiet noises seemed intensified due to the heavy silence. I made my way down the stairs and out the front door.
Isa lived just down the street from me. We planned to meet up half way between our houses, then walk to our school. I tried to stay away from the illumination of the streetlights just in case any of my neighbors were still awake. I'm sure anyone would freak out seeing someone in all black walking down the street in the middle of the night. I finally saw Isa in the distance, just standing against a light post. He had his bag on the ground next to him and his get-up was similar to mine.
"Hey, everything set?" I asked as I got closer to him.
"No, some of the cans of spray paint are still at home getting ready. They're a little nervous, but they'll be here soon."
"Oh okay. Sorry but we can't wait on them. Let's go." Sarcasm was second nature for us. We smiled at each other, he grabbed his bag, and we were off.
I gotta admit, I was kinda paranoid, even though this was my plan from the start. What if we got
caught? What if we went to jail? I know my parents well enough that they wouldn't bail me out, not anytime soon anyway. I sucked it up because I knew I would have fun.
We approached our school, looking around for any tattle-tales, although it was midnight and nobody would have been there anyway. Deciding it would be best to break into windows rather than going through the front door, we made our way to the back where the cafeteria was. Isa pulled an aluminum baseball bat and two black beanies out of his bag, along with latex gloves to cover our fingerprints.
"I'm gonna haul you up on the count of three," I said to him, cuffing my hands together and readying myself to lift him to the windows a little ways above the door to the cafeteria.
"Alright."
"One, two, three," I grunted as I heaved him up just enough to reach the window sill. Isa kept his
balance with one hand on the wall and swung the bat, shattering the window to pieces. He slid the bat across the bottom and top, making sure there weren't any sharp remains. He pulled himself up and sat there in the window sill.
"Toss it."
"Here," I tossed his heavy bag to him, then threw him mine.
"Good boy," Isa pulled out a rope and leaped down to the inside, throwing the opposite end out to me. I proceeded to climb up the wall, then felt a loosening jerk on the other end.
"Oops, sorry honey!" I heard him laugh.
"Can you not," I said monotonously. Quickly this time, I pulled myself through the window and jumped down dangerously close to him on purpose. He shoved me away and shook his head, putting the rope back into the bag.
We scanned the area carefully for anything even slightly off, then made our way toward the office. I pulled a bobby pin out of my pocket, one I had stolen from my older sister. We had practiced unlocking doors this way in preparation for that night, so getting the door open was an easy process. I opened the door for Isa and he quickly ran over to the monitor and camera system. He got some pliers out of his bag and began cutting wires. I decided to take matters into my own hands and picked up the bat from the ground. I swung repeatedly, making bits and pieces from the monitor fly past me. As I swung back, Isa grabbed the barrel of the bat. I turned to look at him, his eyes piercing into mine.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" He shouted in a whispering voice.
"You are WAY too technical with things," I replied, snickering and waving off his question. "You know we're in a hurry."
"I was TRYING not to be reckless so MAYBE we wouldn't get caught."
"Well, we have to start somewhere, right?" We both smiled at each other, knowing that this was the beginning of the moment we've been waiting for. We hooked up the office radio to the entercom, blasting it on the type of music to get this thing going. Isa grabbed his bag and tossed me a can of spray paint, then got the other bat out of my bag and we went to work. We swung the office door open and booked it out of there.
We started running in different directions, yelling and jumping, beating the lockers and spraying paint randomly as we went. I ran upstairs to the first bathroom I saw and murdered the toilets and sinks. Water began to flood, so I retreated, grabbing rolls of toilet paper along the way. I heard Isa downstairs breaking windows in classrooms and throwing desks. I, on the other hand, shut the end of the toilet paper into the bathroom door and took off down the hallway, shutting some parts in lockers so that it hung like party streamers. With the other rolls I just ripped the paper off and threw it in all directions.
I reached a classroom and proceeded to beat the doorknob until the lock no longer worked and I pushed it open. I went over to the window smashed the glass out with my bat, readying it for my next idea. The teacher's desk was next; I rummaged through the drawers and flung the contents throughout the room, then knocked everything off the surface. The desk was pretty heavy, but I managed to scoot it to the window and flip it over the edge. There was a loud crash as it hit the pavement below. I stuck my head out the window and peered down at the wrecked piece of furniture, grinning in satisfaction.
When I went back out into the hallway, I found myself sloshing through toilet water. It was flowing out of the bathroom and flooding the hallway, coming up over my ankles. I chuckled at my success and began splashing it with my feet. There were toilet paper remains mixed in and I could tell this would be a real pain for whoever had to clean it up. I went down the hallway and opened all the classroom doors so that they could be thoroughly flooded.
I started smashing in lockers with my bat, one by one. Then I came across the locker belonging to the girl Isa had the hots for. He was always really shy about those things, so I decided to ruin his life. I went into one of the classrooms and pulled a sheet of paper out of a drawer from the teacher's desk and scribbled some words onto it quickly. It stated in my messiest handwriting: "You make the blue-haired kid's heart throb. Hey lil mama he wants to whiper in yo ear." Then I laughed hysterically because I think I'm a comical genuis, and I ran back out into the hall and shoved the note through the slits in her locker door.
I decided, then, to check on the victim of my cruelty and see how his vandilism was coming along.
When I reached the bottom floor I saw books and papers strewn throughout the hallway, all torn and abused. The locker doors had been beaten in, some off of the hinges. The walls were covered in spray paint and I saw the words "I HATE YOU" sprayed on the door of the teacher Isa despised most. I suddenly heard glass shatter around a corner, so I followed the noise and found Isa with shards of glass at his feet. He had his bat in his hand and the window on the door in front of him was completely destroyed.
"Ahem," Isa jumped at the sound I made and spun around, nearly hitting me with his bat.
"Don't do that!" He swung his bat over and over, pretending to beat me with it.
"You've done a pretty good job down here," I said, scanning the area.
"I know. What have you done?"
"Oh ya know, just smashed the toilets and flooded the upper floor." I grinned proudly at the statement.
"Hm...pretty impressive. Wanna head back to the cafeteria?"
"Yeah, it's getting pretty late. We should leave soon."
So we gathered all of our crap and walked back to the cafeteria, and as we opened the doors an idea struck me. I dropped my sports bag and chuckled, then I ran to the door leading to the kitchen. Isa followed and approached me just as I was beginning to pick the lock with my sister's stolen bobby pin.
"What are you doing now?" He asked exasperatedly.
"I'm just grooming my pet giraffe."
"Oh that's cool." And with that, I had the door open.
I lead the way as we walked into the kitchen and began examining everything around us. We had been many places we weren't supposed to be, but the school kitchen wasn't one of them. It was surprisingly clean, much cleaner than I had expected. Isa chuckled and I looked over and saw that he had dropped his sports bag, had his hair in a net, and was holding a pair of tongs. Grinning, I followed suit, looking for some food we could mess with.
I found my way to the bags of frozen chicken in the freezer. While Isa was messing around with the stove, I pelted him with the biggest piece of chicken in the bag. He shot me a death glare, then shoved me aside to get to the freezer. Isa yanked out a bag of his own chicken and whipped it around into my head, then ran across the room before I regained my balance. We knew, right then and there, it was all out war.
Frozen poultry hurled across the kitchen at the speed of light, every now and then colliding with various body parts. I aimed a bit too high, and my chicken knocked over a bucket of left over grease, spilling it all over the floor and stove.
"Ah, look what you did!" I said, hurdling my last piece of chicken at Isa's stomach.
"ME?!" He quickly stomped towards me, slipping every few steps. I couldn't help but laugh as I threw wet crumbs at his face, attempting to slow him down from murdering me. Suddenly everything stopped. My eyes widened as I looked past him, orange light exposing my fearful expression. Isa back up next to me when he caught sight of the steadily rising flames.
"What did you do?!" I shoved Isa as hard as I could, knocking him back against the freezer.
"Me?! You're the POOP STAIN that spilled the grease!" He came back at me full force, nearly knocking me to the ground.
"The fire wouldn't have been caused if a certain BOOTY FLAKE hadn't been messing with the stove knobs!"
I interrupted Isa's retalliation and said "NOPE, don't care, help me put the fire out!" and with that, I darted to the sink, ripped a bowl off a nearby shelf and filled it with water. As I ran back to the growing flames, I could hear Isa yelling something, but I shrugged it off. I wanted to be the hero.
I slung the water out of the bowl and into the inferno. Suddenly I felt a hand grabbing my collar and yanking me back. I fell to the ground and saw flames comsume the place where I had been standing just moments earlier. The fire was growing rapidly; flames licked the air and the smoke was becoming so thick we could barely see. Then it dawned on me. Water only intensifies grease fires.
When I stood, Isa smacked my arm then pointed above and I saw the flames beginning to eat away at the ceiling. We said in unison, "The toilet water!" and started for the door in a panicked rush, but realized soon after that our path had already been blocked.
The fire burned an entrance in the ceiling for the water to seep through, worsening our delimma with each passing second. The heavy smoke was causing our eyes to sting and we had both crouched over in coughing fits, on the verge of vomiting.
'This is it. This is how we're gonna die. Not only has my stupid senior prank backfired on me, but it'll
kill my best friend too.'
Those thoughts swarmed my mind as I tried to prepare myself for death; not just my
death. I was preparing to watch Isa die alongside me, and it was all my fault. I fell to my knees in defeat by my own stupidity. Before I could stop them, tears were streaming down my face, mixing with the soot and perspiration already caking it.
I mustered up the strength to raise my face and speak my last words to my best friend. "Look man, this is all my fault. If you get outta here alive, make sure you run away. Isa I'm so so-"
"Get on!"
I paused my emotional breakdown and looked up in confusion. I could barely see due to the smoke so I just felt around until my hands touched a metal surface. I figured out it was a catering cart and climbed on.
"Here! Block the fire with these!" Two large rectangular pans were thrust my way and I took one in each hand and held them up on either side of me.
I felt the cart being pulled back away from the flames then all at once it was hurdling towards them, Isa pushing it. I held the pans up, bracing myself, then I heard a thump as Isa jumped onto the platform above me. I closed my eyes tightly, hoping for the best as I felt the heat intensify around me and heard the flames roaring in my ears. It seemed like the world was in slow motion, but jolted back to reality when we hit a cafeteria table with a loud crash.
My body began to feel heavy. I released the grip on the pans and let my arms fall to my side. My eyes were trying to close, and my head was starting to droop down. I caught a fuzzy glimpse of Isa's feet landing on the tile floor beside me, but I saw nothing but black after that.
"C'mon we gotta go!" Isa's voice rang into my ears, making my head pound with every word.
I felt his hands pulling me off of the bottom platform of the cart, attempting to get me on my feet. I
took a few weak steps but collapsed back onto the floor and began to feel my consciousness ebbing away.
"You have GOT to be kidding me!" Suddenly, I was being picked up and hoisted onto Isa's back. My
chin rested on his shoulder as he tried to get a good grip on my legs. Our combined weight made him lose his balance many times.
"What does your mother feed you, fatty?!" Isa began to walk towards the door, having to readjust me on his back every few steps.
He ran as fast as he was able to the cafeteria doors where I had left my sports bag earlier. I was slowly returning to reality and I noticed Isa sticking his foot through the loop of the srap and dragging it towards the exit of the school. I knew I was slowing him down, and our chances of survival were slim with me in the state that I was, but I just couldn't gather the necessary strength. In what seemingly took hours, Isa made it to the front exit.
"Alright kid, stand up." Isa loosened his grip on me slowly until I was standing on my own two feet. My legs were still weak, and I had to crouch over, but at least I wasn't weighing him down anymore.
He pulled a bat out of my bag and without warning, began to swing relentlessly at the glass on the
bottom half of the door before us. He broke all of the glass out and slid the bat around the edges to get all the sharp remains off then he started trying to shove me through the small exit. Just as I was getting ready to go through, we heard an explosion from back in the kitchen. I figured the ceiling had been completely burned away, allowing water to flow into the burning room.
"Go!" Isa yelled and pushed me through the gap. I fell out onto the pavement and rolled over the glass shards, out of Isa's way. He pushed the bag out first, ordering me to start running, but I stood and waited for him instead.
Isa crawled out of the hole, snatched the bag, and shoved me into a run. My head was pounding and my dizziness was making me lose my balance, so I was a considerable distance behind him. He kept looking back and shouting things at me, but I was more concentrated on trying to run without falling over. Everything was a blur as our feet carried us away from the catastrophe. Our street was fairly close to the school but it seemed like an eternity before we finally reached a resting point.
Isa pointed to the woods behind a neighbor's house and I followed him there. Our running slowed to a
walk and eventually we were dragging our feet until we were completely out of sight. Isa threw the bag down and we both fell to the ground and layed there in the dead leaves. For a long while we just breathed heavily without talking, thinking of what to do next. My thoughts steered back into the direction they had been in when I had that emotional breakdown, and I began blaming myself again.
"Yo," my arm flopped over onto Isa's face, "sorry it ended up like this. It's all my fault."
"It is all your fault," Isa grumbled deeply. "I didn't get to finish my vandalism."
"Wanna go back?" I smirked and closed my eyes, replaying the memories of our senior prank. My
friend stood up and turned his back to me.
"You can, loser. I'm heading home," he said, as he proceeded to walk out of the woods, his silhouette shrinking with each step.
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"Heh." A smile began to form on my face as I thought of how dumb we were back then. I sighed in exhaustion when I realized how late in the night it was. Sitting up as slowly as possible, I felt that my butt pain had died away quite a bit. Though I did have a limp, I was able to make it to my bathroom to brush my teeth. My reflection gazed back at me when I stepped in front of the mirror. Being in just boxers after a while made me shiver. I was doing my brushing business when I saw a visitor in my bathroom doorway. After spitting into the sink, I turned to face my co-worker.
"What homie," I said as I flung the remaining junk from my toothbrush on his face. Saix shot me a piercing glare, and wiped my toothpaste suds away with the back of his hand.
"Here." He gave me a stapled packet of report topics. "The due dates are on the back sheet."
I flipped through each page, skimming over the topics, then finally rolling my eyes, I tossed the packet on the back of the toilet. I brought out my shaving cream along with a brand new razor, getting ready to shave the scruffles that were beginning to form on my face.
"Thanks booty flake," I called out to him, but still looking at my reflection as I smeared shaving cream along my jawline.
Saix turned to walk away, but I heard a faint "You're welcome, poop stain," before he stepped out of the room.