He cleared his throat and dug into a pocket, then pulled out an impossibly long scroll, skimmed until finding the right portion and began.
"Chapters one through four: Jasper transferred in to DSA, scored the lead in the play and made a mortal enemy of Rock. Lisa fell in love with Jasper. Jasper also scored a crazy room mate, who was then blown up by Eric, and has since moved in with Felix.
"Meanwhile, Cal—that's me—is still obsessed with... Hey, I am not obsessed. I'm in love. Ahem. I am still in love with my ex-girlfriend, Greta. Greta is part of a pop band called LolRock. About the same time a bunch of local bands signed up for the Best In Chalice Championship, including our Band and LolRock, the mayor of Pallis was assassinated. And someone was trying to kill Lisa.
"We got to the Championship and kicked some butt, but LolRock got first place. Which is ok, because there's going to be two more rounds, and we made it to the second one anyway. But, Jasper discovered that LolRock aren't just any nymph pop band, they're being controlled by someone evil, cheated in the contest, and are responsible for the attempts on Lisa's life. They're also now trying to kill Jasper.
"All of this happened almost a month ago, because clearly our time doesn't run parallel to yours. If it did, this whole stupid story would have been finished months ago. Anyway. It's now about a week and a half before the play goes up, and after that is Round Two of the Championship. And with that I bring you...."
Felix sighed. "Save your talking until after your coffee, ok?" he asked.
"Mleh."
They waited in silence, until the coffeemaker started gurgling. Jasper flounced over to it, with as much energy as he could manage before he had his first cup of coffee, and without bothering to pour it into a mug, downed most of the pot.
Felix didn't even bat an eye. This was normal by now.
Jasper's eyes opened wide. "But what I don't get," he said more coherently, "is why we have to go the airport. This is the only day I get to sleep in." He started to pout, but decided he'd rather drink more coffee instead.
Felix shrugged, and pulled on his shoes. "Well," he said, tying them, "Eric is driving one van, and I'm driving the other."
"So why do I have to go?"
"Because you're a main character."
Jasper did pout now. "Only Cal can do that!"
"Whatever," Felix said again.
"And why can't Cal drive the other van?"
"Because Cal drives like a hippie." Felix straightened up, having finished with his shoes. Jasper poured the rest of his coffee into a travel mug.
"How does a hippie drive?"
"Passive aggressively."
"So what... He drives casual?"
Felix rolled his eyes and waited while Jasper finished getting ready to leave, then dragged him out to the parking lot, where Eric, Cal and Lisa were already waiting.
"They tried to strangle me in my sleep," Lisa greeted Felix and Jasper. She paused, then realized she'd missed a perfectly good opportunity to cling to Jasper in fright, shrugged, and jumped on him anyway.
"Errrric, get her off!" he sulked, trying to duck out of Lisa's vice-like grasp. Eric, of course, ignored them, then tossed a pair of keys to Felix.
This was the second trip to Pallis International Airport in as many days; the day before, a handful of DSA students had headed off on the International Art School Exchange, making their way to the UK. Today, the same number of students would be arriving from the UK to spend a month at DSA. It was a program the school ran every year, though usually they found someone more stable than Eric to drive the school vans.
The drive was uneventful, much to Jasper's surprise. Neither of the vans blew up, there were no road blocks or police chases, and they arrived early enough that he was able to stop at one of the vendors and get several more cups of coffee.
By the time the plane touched down, he was in a good mood, despite Lisa's frequent ambushes. "Hey, did anyone bring a sign or anything?" Felix asked.
"Eric did," Cal answered.
Eric had, indeed, brought a sign; as the plane from London emptied out, he held it up:
"Uh, Eric? I'm not so sure that's going to help," Cal sighed, though Eric didn't really care. There was vague confusion as no one came over to them, then finally it occurred to one of the teenagers exiting the plane that it was possible that the guy with the uninformative sign might be for them.
"'S over here, mates," he called, and a group of about fifteen people milled over to where the DSA students were waiting. It was a coed group, and most of the people looked distinctly British, though it was hard to put a finger on exactly what makes a person look British instead of American.
A few stood out in the crowd, though. Felix's Radar of Cool singled in on one guy, wearing an old band T-shirt and jeans, with thick black glasses and wild black hair. He looked like nothing so much as a grown up, slightly geekier version of Harry Potter. Walking behind him was a boy who caught Lisa's attention immediately; he had shortish blond hair and blue eyes that defied adjectives. Her jaw dropped and she let go of Jasper, who rubbed his shoulder where she'd been clutching.
There was a brief round of introductions, though no one remembered anyone else's name minutes later, and everyone was split into two vans for the trek back to school. Felix drove with Jasper bouncing in shotgun; Lisa sat sandwhiched by the two students Felix had noted.
"I'm Lisa," Lisa cooed at the blond one. "What's your name?"
The blond gave her a disgusted looked and rolled his eyes. "Demian," the other student provided. "And I'm..." he stopped.
The blond, Demian, looked amused. "Don't keep them in suspense," he said.
"Shut up, Demian."
"What is your name?" Felix asked when he didn't give it.
He sighed. "Leslie."
Demian started laughing.
"'Scuse me," Leslie said to Lisa, then reached over and smacked Demian upside the head. He turned back to Lisa. "It's British. Not a girl's name. Really."
Demian started snickering again, then glanced over at Lisa. She smiled and batted her eyelashes. "Are those your shoes?" he asked, glancing down at her feet. "They're crap. Mine are the good ones."
Felix exchanged a knowing look with Jasper, who was bouncing lightly in his seat, humming to himself. He looked over at Felix and shrugged a little.
"They're WHAT?" Lisa demanded.
"Crap," Demian said apathetically.
Lisa, who was used to dealing with Jolene and her older brother, smiled sweetly back at Demian. "Are they?" she asked, the words clipped.
"Well, yeah—" he started, but was cut off as she punched him.
Leslie collapsed against the van's window, laughing. That seemed to make Demian more angry than being hit had, and he reached past Lisa to punch Leslie, who punched back. Lisa rolled her eyes in disgust, hit them both for annoying her, crossed her arms and sulked.
"Ok. I'm bored now," she declared. "Are we almost home yet?"
"Uh, conveniently enough, we are," Felix answered, pulling in to the parking lot.
"That was a short trip," Jasper noted.
"Yeah... Let's ignore that. End scene."
"'K."
*
Jolene crossed her fingers. "The boss says that we're the most incompetent killers he's ever seen."
"I don't like killing," Greta said.
"And blood gets, like, all over my cute clothes when you try and kill Lisa," Gen objected. "And, like, you never even invented a potion to get out blood stains or anything."
"Yes, because I was too busy trying to kill people with no help from you!!!"
Greta strummed absently on her guitar. "So what did the boss tell us to do?"
"Well," Jo muttered angrily, "he says to give up on the show, because clearly the two of you are too incompetent to kill that stupid giggly brat or the coffee-guzzling twit!!"
"Yeah, well I don't see you killing them, either," Greta snapped.
Jo narrowed her eyes. "Whatever. He says we need to concentrate on getting them out of the contest, since we completely botched the musical."
"And how are we supposed to do that?"
Jolene began to cackle maniacally.
*
The exchange students had just finished a campus tour and short orientation, and were now gathered for their first meal in the DSA cafeteria. The food seemed to be some sort of brown thing, covered in gray sauce, with something resembling vegetables on the side.
Leslie poked his alleged meal hesitantly. "So this is... American?"
"Sure." Demian reached for his carton of milk, but Leslie snatched it out of his hands.
"Aaaaigh!" he yelled. "Don't you see? That's... It's milk!"
A few people were giving him odd looks now, but he didn't care. He patted the milk gently and put it down on his tray.
Demian smirked, which is to say, returned to his normal facial expression. "You know everyone else is drinking milk, right?"
"Aaaaaaaaaaaigh!!" Leslie yelled, leaping to his feet. He began to dash around the cafeteria, grabbing milk cartons, ripping them out of the very hands of the confused DSA students. By the time he returned, a half dozen milk cartons clutched in his arms, Demian was drinking his own milk again. "Demian!" he said accusingly.
"What?"
Leslie was on the verge of pouting as he carefully arranged the milk cartons on his tray in a smiley face. "You know my imaginary friend in grammar school was Milk. You know I can't bear to see it get drunk." He paused, debating if he'd used the past tense of the verb "drink," correctly, as he was now having visions of his imaginary friend giggling and falling over.
"Yes. I also know that that is very, very sad," Demian agreed, crushing the empty carton in his fist.
"Dems!"
Demian rolled his eyes. "You know what's odd, though? Everyone has gone back to lunch as normal. It's like..." he paused, looking around at the students, "like they're used to frequent bizarre occurrences."
Before Leslie could answer, someone in the hallway yelled, "Look out! It's going to blow!" and there was an explosion. Part of one of the walls exploded inwards; the students nearby looked up, uninterested, and began picking plaster out of their food, which, oddly, didn't look any less appealing.
"Aaaaaaaah!!!" Someone else yelled, and Jasper came running in to the cafeteria, his hair on fire. He continued to scream and run around like a chicken with its head cut off until Lisa ran in after him, clutching a bucket of water, aimed, and tossed it over Jasper's head. His curls were slightly singed but not hurt badly, and he stood, pouting, in the middle of the cafeteria.
The local students returned to their meal, while the foreigners stared a bit. "ERIC!!" Lisa yelled, and stomped back out of the cafeteria by way of the new hole in the wall. Jasper shrugged and followed her.
"Well that was..." Leslie floundered for words. "Odd," he finally finished.
"Kind of puts your milk thing in perspective," Demian agreed.
*
Leslie stared at the map in confusion. It didn't seem to have any connection to the building he was currently trying to find his way through. He was looking for his first class at DSA, but was no longer convinced he was even in the right building.
Hesitantly, he opened a door and leaned inside to look around.
Something hard smashed into his head.
"Ow!" He yelled. "What the bloody hell was that for?"
"No, no, no," demanded the teacher, who was now standing next to him, clutching a two-by-four. "You want more of a 'waaaa,' sound. Try it again. Try it. 'Waaaaaa.'"
"What the—Aaaaaaah!" he yelled as the teacher beat him over the head again.
"No, more of a 'waaaaaaaah!'"
"But I just—waaaaaaah!"
"Better," the teacher said approvingly.
Leslie rubbed his sore skull. "But I just was looking for Mr. Dylan's English class..."
"What? Oh. Sorry, it's being hit on the head lessons in here," the teacher apologized. "Mr. Dylan is a floor up. Room 301."
"Uh... Right."
Leslie fled the room, found the staircase and the room, braced himself and let himself in. He relaxed a little bit when no one tried to bash him over the head with anything, though thought it was odd that the teacher—assuming that he was a teacher—was sitting at the front of the room, playing a folk song on an acoustic guitar, while the students amused themselves by talking, throwing things, and generally ignoring the teacher.
He recognized Jasper and Felix from the van trip to school and Felix half-waved at him. Still on edge, he sat at an empty desk near the two lads. "Should I, uh, tell the teacher I'm here?" he asked.
"Why would you want to do that?" Felix asked back. "Do you want him to look for you in class?"
"Yeah, then you'd have to show up," Jasper agreed.
Leslie shrugged. "'k," he agreed. "So... um..."
"Yeah," Felix agreed. "Wanna take off? We can show you around."
"Cool," he agreed. They started to leave, but the PA system clicked to life. "I have a very important announcement," came the voice of Mr. Donnely. "Temporary Mayor Riley has just issued a proclamation—"
"What, are we in Robin Hood now?" Felix muttered.
"—of curfew for minors under the age of 18, due to the circumstances of Mayor Gordun's death. Minors found on the streets without parental supervision after nine o'clock will be brought home by the police." He paused for breath, and there was the sound of people shouting in the background. "Oh Hell, call the fire department!" he yelled and the PA clicked off.
Leslie kind of stared. "Um... I've been wondering since I got here," he commented, "but... What exactly is wrong with this place?"
"Many, many things," Felix said, then, "Wait, did he say 'curfew?' Damn it!"
"The Mayor's mad with power," Mr. Dylan sang as he strummed his guitar. "Someone ought to stop him." He continued playing random chords. "Felix go talk to Eric..."
"What was that last part?"
"What?" Mr. Dylan asked innocently, looking up from his guitar. "I didn't say anything. I'm just singing Give Peace a Chance. You know. John Lennon."
"You weren't singing that."
"Yes I was," Mr. Dylan said guiltily.
"Ok," Felix agreed, "but.. Is this going to come back later in the story?"
Jasper stomped his foot and pouted. "That is, like, three times this story! Cal hasn't even—grrr."
Felix ignored him. "Uh, yeah. Let's go... Practice room. Right."
"Go talk to Eric," Mr. Dylan sang. "Stop the Mayor."
"What?!"
"All I am saying, is give peace a chance..."
"Aren't the lyrics, 'all we are saying?'" Leslie asked.
Felix gave Mr. Dylan an odd look, shrugged and headed out of the room.
Felix, Jasper and Leslie caught up with Eric and Cal in their room. "Hey, shouldn't you be in class?" Cal asked.
"Shouldn't you?" Felix responded. "Did you hear the announcement?"
"About the Mayor? Yeah. Idiot republicans."
Felix crashed on a couch, Jasper perched in an overstuffed armchair, and Leslie hung back in the doorway, not really sure what was going on. "So what do we do about it?" Felix asked. "Mr. Dylan... Uh... Seemed to think you might have some ideas."
"Well," Eric started, but Leslie interrupted him.
"Why... Why would you do anything? I mean..."
Everyone else exchanged looks. "Well," Cal started, then trailed off. "Because we're..." he tried to think of a rational reason why they should, realized there was none, and went with his fallback excuse. "Because we're the heroes."
"The what?"
"It's probably best not to ask," Cal said, shrugging. "So what's the plan, Eric?"
"You sure you want to know? It means you'll be aiding and abetting."
"We're used to that by now," Felix pointed out.
"Hmmm. All right." Eric glanced at them over the top of his sunglasses, then commented, "Isn't there another new character somewhere? Someone who should be here?"
Everyone turned to Leslie, who shrugged. "Dems?" he asked. "Are you sure you want him involved? He's a little... Uh... Well, obnoxious, really."
"But we haven't seen him in pages," Cal pointed out. "Do you think he's in wacky trouble somewhere or something?"
"Nah, he just got here," Leslie said, then stopped and thought about it. "Wait a minute, what day is it?"
"Uh, Monday?"
Leslie shrugged. "Oh, not trouble then. Just having his twice-weekly breakup with his girlfriend." He rolled his eyes.
The phone rang. "I'm not getting it! I don't care!" Demian yelled at it, not really caring that the phone would keep ringing, regardless. He counted the rings until it feel silent, then collapsed onto his bed. "Ha. I didn't answer it."
He rolled over, then rolled back to face the phone. "I'm not going to call and see if that was her. I'm not. Not."
He reached out towards the phone. "Just calling home. Telling them it's weird here. Yeah." He sat up and began to dial. "I'm not calling her, I'm not," he repeated, as his mantra, though it was a lie. "Dammit," he muttered as the phone began to ring.
On another continent, a very angry girl picked it up. "Demian Abnormal, rot in hell!" she snarled.
Demian burst in to tears and hung the phone up. She sighed and called the number he'd given her again.
Demian answered. "That was mean," he sniffled.
"You're mean! I know you're cheating on me!"
"With whom?" he demanded, indignant.
"Linda. Heather. Theresa!!!"
Demian sat in guilty silence. She started to cry. "I'm sorry," Demian said quickly, "I didn't mean any of that, they were just because I was so lonely from missing you. I'm always travelling for school, or your parents are dragging you off to Greece on holiday, and I'm so lonely..."
"Well, I'm lonely too! You bastard."
"Right, and you've never done anything about that I suppose? Like Steven? Alex? James?" "Shut up! It's still your fault!"
"It was my fault last time! It's your turn to be at fault!"
She hung up. He stared at the phone in angry silence for a long moment. The phone rang again.
"You don't get to be angry, it's my turn to be angry!" she yelled. "And last time was not your fault. It was mine—it was your fault! It's always your fault!"
He hung up the phone. He stared at the phone for a long minute. He picked up and dialed again. "I am sorry," Demian said softly. "I guess it is my fault this time. A little." There was snuffling on the other end of the line.
"I'm sorry, too."
"I miss you."
"I miss you."
"I love you."
"I love you." She snuffled and hung up the phone. Feeling lonely and depressed, he flounced back on to the bed. A minute later there was a knock on the door.
He answered it, and found one of DSA's senior girls standing in the hallway. "Hi," she said. "I... Just wanted to drop by and welcome you to our school."
"Awfully nice of you," he said, opening the door further to let her in.
"That accent is just dreamy," she giggled.
"Well, y'know..." Demian shrugged, and shut the door behind them. "So do you, uh, welcome a lot?" "Only you." She winked.
He smirked.
"So, Eric, what's the plan?"
"It's pretty simple, really. Sneak in to the Mayor's office. Plant bomb. Whole thing goes kablooey. No more Mayor... No more curfew."
"K," Felix agreed. "But is there a way in which we don't kill people?"
"Why wouldn't we want to do that?"
"Well, we are the heroes," Cal pointed out. "I'm pretty sure we're contractually obligated not to kill. It's the goodguy creed."
"Like Batman," Felix put in.
"Ok. So if we don't kill or bomb, what do we do?" Cal asked.
"Well, we break in."
"Like Batman," Felix pointed out.
"Uh, yeah," Cal said. "Grapling hooks, rope... Eric has that stuff. Didn't you have a belt with it somewhere?"
"A homemade Batbelt?" Felix asked hopefully.
"Well, sort of, but..." Cal trailed off. "So what do we do once we get in?"
"We could intimidate henchmen. That's always fun," Eric pointed out. "Highlight of my day, usually."
"Like when Batman needs to know something about a mob boss, so he finds the henchman and drags him to the top of a giant tower and hangs them over the edge and threatens to drop them until they freak out and tell him everything. Can we do that, Eric?"
"Ok, Felix, what the hell is wrong with you?"
"What?" he asked. "I like Batman."
"Ok, well, Eric and Batman don't have anything in common, so could we move on?"
"Sure." Felix sat back and tapped his fingers against the arm of the couch. Cal opened his mouth but Felix cut him off. "Except that Eric is, well, nuts, and Batman is kind of nuts too. Like, y'know, the shrinks in Gotham are always trying to blame Batman for all of the crimes that happen, like, in The Dark Knight Returns, when Harvey Dent goes nuts again, and then the Joker starts working for the first time in years, and everyone says it's because Batman showed up again. But when you get down to it, Batman does feed their psychoses, because they work to kill him, and they couldn't if there was no Batman. But if there was no Batman, then they could get away with murder, and—
"FELIX!!"
"What?" he asked innocently.
"Raving fanboy," Cal muttered. "So where were we?"
"So... We drive in. I break in while Cal stands guard. Felix and Jasper... Do something. And then we're back out," Eric said.
"Yeah, just curious, but..." Leslie interrupted again. "Well, what are you going to do if you aren't planting a bomb?"
There was a long silence. "Well, uh..." Cal said. "We'll see, won't we? I'm sure something will turn up."
"Oh, I see. Do you do this often?"
"Only on weekends," Felix sighed.
"You're asking an awful lot of questions," Eric muttered, narrowing his eyes. "You don't work for the CIA, do you?"
"Uh... No."
"Good then."
Leslie kind of blinked and stared.
Everyone else kind of looked around the room.
"So..." Cal said finally. "Jenny Washington is coming on. Let's watch that, shall we?"
"Watch what?"
"The best talk show ever. Watch. Learn."
"What? Oh... They can't come?" Jasper asked in to the phone. "Ok, well... That's not a big deal. I didn't really expect... What?... You mean you're coming? ... You're both coming? What? Oh, no, that's... No, it's great, Sam. No, of course I'm happy. I'm... No, it'll be great! Too bad you won't have time to see any sights—oh, you will? ...Four days? No, that's great.... Well, I could sound less enthusiastic if I tried, but... Of course I'm kidding! Yeah, I'll see you Wednesday. Tell Mom and Dad and Chad hi.... 'K. Yeah.... 'K. Bye, Sam."
Jasper hung up the phone and flounced down on to his bed. Felix looked up from a comic book. Jasper wasn't talking, which was odd, and he wasn't bouncing. He was, clearly, pouting, but it was less his usual "pay attention to meeee!" pout and more a genuine "I can't believe this is happening," pout.
"What's up?" Felix asked, when Jasper didn't offer.
"My parents can't make it for the show."
"That sucks."
"No, it's fine. It's just... My brothers are coming."
"Cool." Felix paused.
"Yeah, I guess."
"Well, that's enthusiastic."
"You're perceptive."
"Like Batman?"
"No, like a running gag that won't die because the author is an obsessive freak."
"Running gags are perceptive?"
"Sure. They can be. Um... I guess."
There was a pause.
"What were we talking about?" Felix asked.
"My brothers," Jasper sighed. "Sam and Chad... They're older."
"Really?"
"Yeah, they're really great guys. Sam lives in DC, he's a lobbyist. Graduated number one from his class undergrad and in law school. Lives in a condo. Owns an environmentally sound sports car. Great guy." Jasper sighed. "Chad dropped out of college, got a job doing tech in a Broadway theater, and is now theater manager. Great guy. Writes scathing editorials about the New York music scene in his spare time, and is a tour manager for three bands during the summer. Starting a production company next year. Mom and Dad couldn't be happier for him. Yeah. Great older brothers. Really."
"Ok... Well... I'm guessing by the number of times you described them as 'great, I'm gonna guess you're... Not so thrilled with them?"
"No, no, nothing like that. They're great! Really. Cool guys. Love them."
"Ok." There was a pause. "But if they're so great, then why the pouting?"
"I'm not pouting. I'm just undercaffienated."
"Oh. 'Cause you sounded pretty upset about your brothers visiting."
"Nope... Just... Need coffee." He sighed. "That's all. Coffee will fix everything."
Silence.
"Uh, J? Were you gonna get up and make coffee?"
"No, I figured I'd just... Lie here... Hang out. You know." He sighed.
"Ok. Well. You do that, I'm gonna go—"
"It's just that they're so perfect!! They can't do anything wrong and do you know how obnoxious that is when you're their little brother? Ugh." He crossed his arms and collapsed backwards, until he was staring up at the ceiling.
"Well—"
"And they're gonna come here and everyone will meet them and they'll tell embarrassing stories about me and everyone will think they're great because everyone always thinks they're great. Do you know how many times I've had friends come up to me and say, 'Man, J, you're brothers are great,' and then I have to smile and laugh about it, and my friends always like them more than they like me, and it's not like that's unusual because God knows my parents like them more than they like me. Always have, always will, and do you know how hard it is to compete when one brother graduated with a higher GPA that you've ever had in your life, and the other brother dropped out and your parents still think it's the best thing anyone could ever do? I can't be good enough or bad enough! Aaaaaaugh!"
Felix blinked. "Oh. Is that all?"
"Well, no, but if I keep going, I sound like a freak with youngest sibling issues."
"Oh, 'cause goodness knows you didn't already sound like that. So they get in Wednesday?"
"Yeah." Jasper made himself sit up and turn on the coffee maker. "Stupid brothers."
"Should be an interesting week."