Scut: Chapter 2

In between paying attention and taking notes in his morning classes the next day at school, Scut silently pondered about how he felt about Leniad. Before the human boy saved him from Krant the previous day, Scut and Leniad had only ever seen each other passing in the halls at school and in some of their classes. And even then, they never said a word to each other. Yet, whenever Scut saw Leniad, he noticed that the human boy looked at him in a peculiar way; Scut wasn't sure how to describe it, and it wasn't from a lack of understanding human facial features. Given how closely similar humans and Yuuzhan Vong were to each other physically, Scut didn't even need to be raised by a human family to know when a human was happy, sad, angry, or anything like that.

However, every time Leniad looked at him, Scut felt as if the human wanted something from him.

Scut guessed it must have been his friendship. Well, he thought, I guess he's going to get it.

The more Scut thought about Leniad, however, the Yuuzhan Vong knew that there was some kind of connection between him and the human than simple friendship. He didn't know what it was, but he sure would like to find out. After all, it was something he himself felt for the human since they first saw each other in the halls of the school on the first day of this school year.

When lunch came about at midday, Scut and Leniad met each other at one of the tables in the school cafeteria and they sat, ate, and chatted pleasantly as they talked about themselves, getting to know each other better, how they were each doing in school in general so far, etc. Yet, as the conversation kept on going, Scut still couldn't put his finger on what he felt for Leniad, or how Leniad felt about him beyond simple friendship.

However, whenever he looked into Leniad's eyes, he had this gut feeling that the human knew just how he felt about his disguised Yuuzhan Vong accomplice.

During their conversation, as Scut continued to wonder what he felt about Leniad with thoughts whirling and circling around in his head while still keeping his end of the conversation going, he lost focus on the human when he saw Krant come from the lunch lady's counter over to his own table. As the Bothan walked to a table full of members of his kind about his age, he gave an angry glare to the disguised Yuuzhan Vong.

When Leniad noticed that Scut was no longer paying attention to him, and was instead looking over his shoulder, the human looked behind him and saw Krant sitting down with his fellow Bothans, his back to him. He then turned back to Scut.

"Sorry," Scut said with a feeling of embarrassment for losing notice of Leniad.

"No, no, it's fine," Leniad waved away. "Gave you a dirty look, didn't he?"

"It made Hutt slime look clean," Scut quipped.

Leniad laughed at that. "Well, somehow, I doubt he's going to let what happened yesterday stay like that. And I think he may bring along some of his True Victory friends back there for payback, if you know what I mean, 'cause all those Bothans over there are just really fanatical about their hatred for the Vong."

"Oh, I understand," Scut nodded. "I think I should cancel my after-school session with Mr. Qwade today; we may have to leave with the rest of the crowd for our safety. Say, do your parents have a car?"

"My mom's an aircab pilot," Leniad answered. "Maybe she'll help us."

"Oh, okay," Scut nodded.

"But I say maybe 'cause it's no guarantee," Leniad said. "He may have some customers around that time, so we maybe out of luck. You think you can call either of your parents?"

"My dad's busy," Scut answered. "And my mom doesn't have a car."

"Well, maybe we can take a different cab together if my mom can't help us," Leniad said. "Hopefully, they'll pick us up on time before Krant and his cronies do."

"Yeah. Hopefully." He looked back at the Bothans, who were quiet and sombre as they ate their lunches.

~o~

By the end of the school day, Scut and Leniad left with the crowd of students, and luckily, they didn't run into Krant or any of his Bothan buddies. And since Leniad was able to comm his mom, who promised to pick him and Scut up at the end of school, the middle-aged human made good on her word, Scut realized as he and Leniad entered the backseat of the cab.

"Thanks for picking us up, Mom," Leniad said.

"No problem, son," the woman said, not looking back from the traffic lane before her. "Business has been kind of slow-going today, believe it or not, so my boss didn't mind me picking you up. You're lucky 'cause you get a free ride. You owe me one, you know."

"I'll keep that in mind," Leniad replied sardonically.

"By the way, it's nice to meet you, Viull," the woman continued as she snuck a peek in her rearview mirrpanel to catch a sight of Scut. "Leniad's told me about you, and how you met my son yesterday."

"Yeah, I sure owe him one," Scut said as he looked to his friend before looking back forward. "As well as you, Mrs...?"

"Oh, I'm no Missus, Viull," the woman said. "I'm Miss Lukra."

"Oh, well, thanks for the ride, Miss Lukra," Scut said.

"Like I said, it's no problem," Miss Lukra said.

Scut turned back to Leniad. "That's funny, I didn't think you had a last name."

"I don't, my parents are allowing me to choose for myself when I'm older," Leniad said.

"So your parents aren't married?" Scut asked.

"No, they are. They just don't want to take each other's names, is all."

"Oh, okay," Scut said with a nod.

"Viull, I just remembered that I forgot to ask you," Miss Lukra said, "where do you live?"

Scut told her where he lived, and Miss Lukra then veered her aircab to the direction of his apartment.