"Jack, Scarlet this is Milton. That's Eddie, and last is Kimberly." We went
down
the row as we shook hands and smiled. As I shook Kimberly's hand she
said.
"But you can call me Kim."
Jack's P.O.V.
"Alright then Kim." I said trying the nickname out.
"So new kids, where are you guys from?" said the one who I thought was to
be called Eddie. I looked at Scarlet and then back to Eddie, we couldn't
afford to give away too much information.
"New York City." I said vaguely. They all looked excited when it was
announced.
"Woah! Way cool. You never mentioned that man!" exasperated Jerry. I
shrugged my shoulders.
"You never asked." He only nodded as the one told to be referred to as Kim
spoke up.
"So tell us what you guys do there? Any hotspots or tourist attractions?" I
looked at Scarlet, signaling that it was her turn to answer.
"Well there's the Empire State Building which is located in Manhattan
which is a hotspot in itself. All the buildings there are humongous and reach
the clouds in the sky, there are the Hamptons. Then there's the biggest
attraction of all, Times Square. I mean it beautiful at night." When she
ended, I realized that she didn't answer Kim's first question, it would have
given too much away. I wasn't surprised that she covered us up with all that
extra information, we were trained to protect ourselves; verbally and
physically. Before anyone else could ask any more questions, I decided to
ask them some questions of my own. If Scarlet and I are going to be hanging
around them while we're here, I might as well know all the information I can
get out of them.
"So, what do you guys do here?" The scrawny kid Milton was the first to
answer the question.
"Well we all have our different hobbies. I, for one, have speed chess
tournaments, Kim's head cheerleader, Eddie collects… scented car
fresheners," he said looked a bit ashamed and embarrassed of his friend's
pastime. "And Jerry, well he just goes to a lot of parties and tries to meet a
lot of girls." Milton said finishing off but no less than a few minutes Jerry
came busting in, seeming to be finishing off Milton's thought.
"Yeah, but the one thing we all have in common is that we take karate at
Bobby Wasabi's dojo." While registering all this information, the tiny detail
about karate came at me in full force, I took a quick look at Scarlet to find
out that her eyes were also bulging out of her head daring to fall out of their
sockets. She was the first to speak.
"Karate? Are you serious? You guys?"
"Yeah, right at the dojo in the Maine Mall." answered Eddie. They all
nodded enthusiastically except for Kim, who seemed to notice the disbelief
in Scarlet's voice, as did I.
"Why so surprised? You guys take karate too?" Kimberly said crossing her
arms across her chest, noticing this reminded me remarkably of how she
reflected the personality of Scarlet well. Both the instigator type I see, ready
to fight, aggressive. But I could never picture Scarlet as head of a
cheerleading squad. Seeing Scar tense up was an automatic detection for me
and Kim didn't know what kind of boundary lines she was crossing. I
quickly step to the aid of the other. Just this once. I chose to answer before
Scarlet had her chance, she knows and I know this isn't what we came here
for.
"Sure." It was always a good answer if you didn't want to answer with a
definite yes, or refuse to explain yourself any further.
"Oh well that's cool," Eddie said this time, butting in front of Kim. "You
two should come by the dojo later after school and try out."
"Will do." I said giving him a thumbs up.
The school bell finally rung, signaling the second half of the school is
beginning. A chorus of "See you later." and "Goodbyes" echoed the halls as
the group walked away. I turned to Scarlet as we walked to our next class
which was Math.
"Really Scar?" I said a little frustrated.
"What?"
"You need to gain control of that quick anger of yours." She let a small
laugh, and I was glad to see that she was back to normal.
"You sound like Master Sensei." I laughed at the thought of my voice
representing an old man but I knew what she meant.
"I know, but you seriously need to chill for a while. We need to get to know
these kids to see if they know anything useful and important that we can
bring back to HQ."
"Anderson their just kids, what could they possibly know about a wanted
criminal that we're hunting down?" I shrugged my shoulders and let out a
long breath as we approached the classroom where Math would be held.
"You never know Shay, you never know."