Chapter #75A Jade and Gray World by: rugal b.   Casey, from what Robert's memories can tell you, is a jerk. A grade-A psycho who loves nothing more than to torment Robert at any given opportunity. What the Molester and Kirkham are, well were, to you Casey is to your brother. Except possibly worse. With the Molester and Kirkham it's all rather simple and old fashioned: body checking you into a wall here, shoving your head hard into a locker there, a little punch in the solar plexus, some times a swirlie if they're feeling a little merciful. But Casey? Casey is one of these new fangled modern bullies. Oh sure he gets his licks in but he knows how to play people, how to mess with their heads. He knows the value of spreading things around on social media and of making someone paranoid, afraid of their own shadow. Some times you can do so much damage without ever throwing a punch.
Is that really who you want to be? Is that the type of life you want whether it's two weeks, two months or two years? You'd add a life as a miserable asshole but that's the kind of life Bob's consigned you to for the next little while. But you can mitigate that. Your brother annoys you, that's true, and you fight often enough. But it's typical sibling rivalry bullshit; deep down you know you love him. You don't want to spend any time bullying him.
So Traci Small it is. The problem is that Robert doesn't know her, he doesn't know any girls really, so getting her as him will be next to impossible. You'll have to make a jump to someone else that provides you with a route to her and who knows, along the way you might wind up somewhere that fulfills Bob's requirements.
"Yo, Eric, I need to ask you some questions." you state as you ring him up, "About some of your clientele."
"Jesus, Will, you couldn't have picked a worse time." Eric replies in an exasperated manner.
"Um, something wrong?" you ask.
"It's Cindy, dude!" he exclaims, "It was cool at first but damn, man, she just wants it all the time! A guy's only got so much he can give, you know what I mean?"
You laugh, "Don't wish on the monkey's paw, then."
"Anyway, yeah, clientele? Liiiiike...."
"Like the people who frequent your store." you reply, "Specifically, anyone of middle school age. Double specifically a girl of middle school age."
"Middle school...? Dude, that's... kinda weird." he says, "Little unsettling to be honest."
"This from the adult keeping a copy of a high school girl as a sex slave?" you ask teasingly, however there's a brief moment of silence. "I was just messing with you, dude. Anyway it's like this: Bob wants me to switch into another person, someone to act as an apprentice under his assumed identity. Said that it needed to be a middle schooler, wouldn't give me any more than that."
You hear Eric mull that over for a moment, "Yeah, Fane's got their reasoning I guess. Alright, so, middle school girls huh?" another moment of mulling, "Yeah, there's one. Comes in on Saturdays with her boyfriend in the afternoon, usually around three or so."
"That works, yeah."
"Problem is, middle of the afternoon means Howie and them will be there and probably some real customers as well." he states.
You grumble about that, "Alright, well... thank of a reason to get us in the back room. We can make the switch there."
* * * * *
It's a hassle getting Will to agree to take you out to King Kong Komics. You let him smack you around a little until he's gotten his fill, it's painful and pisses you off but you gotta do what you gotta do you figure, and then tell him you'll be out of his hair by tomorrow afternoon. That Saturday is filled with chores, mostly doing stuff in the house for your mom, as the family gets ready for Thanksgiving. You finish close to three and after a quick shower from Will, he had to actually sweat doing yard work, you're gone.
The bell rings as you walk into the store and Eric's face lights up. "Hey, seeing you guys twice in a row? My ideas to get business turned around must really be paying off!"
"What ideas?" calls out Christian derisively looking up from his game with Howie, Darrell and Hugh.
"Gonna do a few giveaways. Show people I'm a generous guy and get some word of mouth going." he shoots back with a grin, "Speaking of, I've got one going on right now. Actually I was just about to do the drawing but if you guys wanna grab some slips and write your names on them I'll throw them in the bowl and get right to it."
You do as he says and so does he and then call attention to the drawing. The roleplayers take a quick break from their game, the dozen or so other customers stop as well. "Alright everyone, time for the drawing!" he calls out, "I'll draw two names out of the bowl, those two will go with me to the back where they'll each take twenty comics out of anything I've got back there, and it's my special stock so you know it'll be good." he grins.
He reaches a hand into the bowl and swirls it around eventually pulling up a slip of paper. "Alright first up we got... Robert Prescott! Congrats, dude!" he exclaims while shooting you a smirk. "And second... Jade Johnson!" You look around eventually seeing a girl, the only one in the store really, with long dark hair and dark clothes. That has to be who he mentioned last night; Robert's definitely seen her around school. "Now if you two'll come with me..."
You suddenly stop remembering that you're going to have to get your mask off of the real Robert. "Hey," you say right before you reach the back, "if I go halfsies on my share can Will come back here as well? He did drive me out here and all." Eric looks at you for a moment before nodding, "Hey Will! You call out, "Eric said you get half of my take for driving me out here so he wants you in the back too!"
Will looks at you skeptically before coming. Once inside Eric gives a quick "clear" before using the disabler. You catch the girl, Jade, and lower her to the ground while Eric does the same for Will.
"You think you'll be good back here?" You ask, "You're not worried about anybody stealing anything?"
"All the people in here are regulars. They're not gonna do anything." He lets out a sigh, "Even if they do comics aren't worth the paper they're printed on nowadays, anyway. Definitely not gonna put your kid through college with 'em like people thought back in the nineties."
You nod and then put a blank mask onto Jade then strip her and Will of their clothing before taking your own off, Eric averts his eyes this time. Eric has to flash the destabilizer a few more times before the mask emerges, you then take the Will mask off of Robert and place it onto Jade. Some more destabilizing action takes place while you get Jade's mask on and regain consciousness, dress, and then put Robert in his clothes.
An overall complicated procedure but one that goes off without a hitch.
* * * * *
"Get anything good?" asks Derek Forney, Jade's boyfriend. A self-styled nihilist and a freshman at Eastman who Jade considers her "soul-mate". The two of you are standing outside the store by your bikes, the both of you living close enough that biking there isn't a problem.
"Crap." you reply in a low, bored voice. "Nothing but crap. I think he was using us to unload some of his old stock." The comics are a small reminder of who Jade was, before she
"That's what guys like that do, babe." replies Derek, "They don't have scruples. They only love money. Their love for anything isn't real, not like our love."
With that he kisses your neck and you giggle a little before letting out a content sigh. Oh Derek... thinks Jade's mind, he's taught me so much. "Thanks for always coming out with me." you say in a voice akin to that of a lovestruck puppy as you turn, wrap your arms around his neck, and give him a quick kiss, "Maybe when we're back at my place I could give you a little gift."
She hasn't gone all the way with him but he's gotten her to do other actions.
This Derek, you can already tell you don't like him, not one bit. Jade, however, sees him as a shining light or a splash of color in an otherwise gray world. Jade has a rather pessimistic outlook on life. It all started in the spring when her boyfriend at the time broke up with her leaving her devastated. Then one of her friends started hanging with a shitty crowd.
That's when she ran into Derek at the mall. He took a shine to her, told her about how nothing matters. People are crap, the systems that rule the world are crap, religion is crap, this is crap, that is crap, everything is crap. She's since turned into a mopey girl who dresses in dark colors, her narrow face framed by long dark hair, a permanent scowl etched on said face, and a vegetarian with a sense of self-righteousness as well.
She's not ideal, you definitely don't want to hang around Derek, but she seems like the type of person that Bob was looking for. Someone who treats people, and the world really, as if they're all worthless. Or as Jade would say: crap.
But there's that friend... ex-friend really. That ex-friend who just so happens to be none other than Traci Small. They don't hate each other, they just started hanging with different crowds over the last few months and haven't had much contact. Even still, as Jade you have a direct route to Traci. She was your original pick and she might offer a less angsty, whiny home with far less douchebag high school guys preying on their emotions.
But Jade would definitely work well enough for what Bob wanted. It might be a bit hard, it'd probably take around forty-five minutes by bike to get from the Johnson residence to Blackwell's villa by bike, but maybe you should just stay where you are. | Members who added to this interactive story also contributed to these: |
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
More by this author