I was twelve going on thirteen, when I walked into a storage room, where a bunch of older kids were encircling two younger students who seemed to be from my grade. Actually, now that I was looking closer, the girl was actually from my class. I probably should have realized that sooner, but outside of my family and their closest associates, the people around me are just another thing that I acknowledged, processed, and then more or less forgot about. That was one of the problems with having too big a perceptive range.

Eventually, it became hard to sort all the relevant and irrelevant data points. Outside of certain specific social, political, and tactical circumstances and contexts, I wasn’t really great at figuring out what the cut-off line should be. My mortal origins meant that some things needed to be pushed to the back of my mind, if I wanted to be able to operate like a normal person. Otherwise, I could end up becoming the kind of nigh-omniscient, machine-like, monster that my mother, and her most trusted, imperial officers, feared that I might become.

Since these people had nothing to do with me, I figured it’d be fine for me to just get what I’d come here for, and go. The teacher had sent me here into the storage room to grab one of the old projectors that they kept here. We were apparently going to be reviewing some kind of educational slide show, which I suppose would be a good change of pace.

After using my eyes' x-ray utilities and data-analysis functions, I was able to pick out one of the few good projectors from amongst all the duds. Just as I was about to pick one up, one of the older students called to me.

“Oi! What the fuck?!” said one senior-boy. A tall red-head.

“Hm? Oh, I’m fine…Don’t mind me,” I said. By now, familiar enough with this word’s collaquilisums to realize that “what the fuck?” was more of a general invective of askance than anything else. Like a coarser version of asking how someone was doing, or so I figured. Sometimes you were actually expected to answer, most of the time, it was mostly just a thing people said as part of a situationally appropriate social script.

“Can’t you see we’re fucking busy here?!” yelled a broad-bodied female with pigtails and little too much make-up than should have been allowable according to the student code of conduct.

“Oh. No, I saw you…I’m just here getting a projector for the teacher,” I said. Figuring that logically speaking I had more right to be there than they did. This clearly wasn’t some school sanctioned activity they were taking part in, and “I” had been sent here by a teacher.

“The fuck…?” said grumbled another of the older kids.

“This little shit,” said yet another foul-mouthed youth. This time a short rotound male, with slicked back, blond hair.

I picked up the projector, because I really did need to be getting back to class. The class itself wasn’t important but drawing the teacher’s ire by looking like I was on a frolic, might ruin my chances of getting access to certain restricted sections of the library that I’d otherwise need to spend a great deal of time and energy accessing by clandestine means.

“The hell!? We ain’t done with you, kid. Have some respect!” said the red-head. Shoving me and nearly making me drop the projector.

“Hey, I recognize this kid. It’s Thad’s little brother,” said the big girl with pig-tails.

“Thad? That shit-head?!” said the short rotound blond.

“The one that always used to give Turtle’s big bro, Rory, shit?” said another of the brutish adolescents.

“Heh, is that so…I heard your brother finally graduated up for the upper-levels…Congrats, looks like you and I need to have a little cha-...” said the red-headed youth.

I ended up cutting off whatever the red-head was going to say. I am afraid I simply didn’t have the time. I really needed to be getting back to class. I wasn’t completely clueless. I was aware that the older students were getting aggressive. I was starkly aware. They weren’t enough of a threat for my tactical programming to boot-up, but they were at least worth of a minor-hazard warning from the spatial awareness heuristic. A soft-prodding in the back of mind, reacting to the youth’s aggression.

“I’m afraid I have to go,” I said.

“Oh? And what if I say I’m not letti-...” said the Red-Head.

Again I cut him off, I really didn’t have time for this. So, upon discerning that he counted as a hostile lifeform, I gave the boy a light shove. Not enough to actually hurt him, but enough to clear him from my path.

Perhaps, there was a minor miscalculation, this was my first altercation in the 12 years since rebirth, and who knows how long I’d been in the place between the worlds while I was waiting to be reborn. The young man ended up flying into another youth, and both of them ended up hitting a wall. Sending dust and old handouts flying everywhere. Yet, since the resulting impact wasn't 'that' loud, and a cursory scan of their bodies showed no serious injuries I pretended to be unphased.

I picked up the projector in one hand, and the box of associated accessories in another. I turned to the two other students, who were around my age, addressing the one that I believed was probably a classmate.

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“Well, we really should all be getting back to class. Thank you for your understanding,” I said. With a small inclination of my head.

I returned to class, trailed by the two other students. The male ended up going his own way and heading to another class after throwing a guilty and apologetic look at the female. The girl glared at the young man, and then looked away with a sniff, before continuing to follow me. It turns out I was right.

The girl was indeed one of my classmates. What’s more, she was apparently my deskmate. Sitting at the desk that was pushed next to mine. Another girl, a girl with the same face stood at her side, speaking softly, wearing a concerned expression.

Considering the potential for social faux pas, and the very small amount of danger that this could have presented if I were dealing with something more serious than children, I decided that from then on, I would change my active-memory allocation priorities for entities that were routinely in my surroundings.

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“Here,” I said. Upon returning home, a day further down the week. Placing a small cardboard carton with a microwaveable pot pie from a brand that my brother liked, on my brother’s desk.

“Huh?” said Thad looking up from the comic that sat atop the textbook he was actually supposed to be reading.

“It’s for you…I happened to buy one for myself on the way home and thought I’d buy you one as well,” I said.

“Oh, uh, Than-…Shit! What the hell happened to you?!” said Thad. Sounding alarmed as turned from what he was doing at his desk, and finally took a good look at me. I suspected that it looked like I’d been rolling down the road, instead of walking on it.

I fell down the stairs today. It wasn’t a long fall, thankfully. I wasn’t holding anything spillable or fragile, and I was currently too sturdy for something as small as fall down the stairs to cause me serious injury, but it was still a long line of annoying incidents that had been taking place as of late. Since our unfortunate first meeting, Sheldon “Turtle” Romero and his friends were still peeved with me for whatever reason.

I had attempted seeking aid from the teachers and school administrators, but they had all expressed either disinterest, disbelief, or extreme reluctance to get involved. So it seemed I was on my own. I didn’t wish to bother my parents either. Our family was currently going through one of those transitional lean periods caused by the seasons, politics, the economy, and similar external factors, and I had no desire to add to their stress.

Upon analyzing the situation at length, I’ve decided it might have had something to do with my stumbling on them while they were busy assaulting those other two students. However, I couldn’t fathom why that would result in this kind of long-term vendetta. Maybe I was just unlucky, and they’d turned their attention to me, on their own. They ‘were’ a particularly vicious group of youths.

“I had a small accident…” I said. Lightly tossing my shoulders.

“An accident? Or an ‘accident’? Is someone picking on you? Because if so, even though it might not be cool if I mix it up with kids in your section anymore, I still have some friends that I can ask to look out for you and get the punks off your back,” said Thad. Anxiously looking me over in the same mother-hennish way, our mother Reina might have done so. I refrained from mentioning it, because I’d learned that my brother seemed to take such comments badly.

I found myself feeling a faint sense of warmth at my older brother’s readiness to come to my defense, but I shook my head all the same. I couldn’t help wondering if we’d still be having this same conversation if any of my original siblings had been so ready to stand up for me and come to my defense.

“That won’t be necessary. I already have measures underway to handle the situation…Though, I still appreciate the sentiment and I have a newfound appreciation for any role you might have played in keeping similar situations from arising up until now,” I said.

“Ah, well, uh…Don’t mention it…Like seriously, I’d have to deny it if you do because ma will tan my hide if she hears that I’ve been fighting…” said Thad. Looking awkward. Face flushing abashedly.

“Understood… Well, good look studying…You got number three wrong by the way,” I said. Nodding and quickly exiting my brother’s room.

“I did? Shit...I'm so gonna fucking fail next week's test,” said Thad. Looking alarmed, and then sighing dejectedly

“Hey, language!” called our mother, Thad’s birth mother, Reina. Who just happened to be passing by Thad’s room at that moment in time.

“Sorry, ma!” called Thad. Rolling his eyes with a helpless “see, what I mean?” sort of expression.

I left my brother’s room and retreated to my own room, to change out of my clothes, and finish what little homework I’d failed to complete during the emptier moments in class. Besides school work, I also had some plotting to work out in my head. Turtle and his little gang had progressed past the point of being an irrelevant annoyance, to being a proper irritant.

My first instinct was to remove them in the permanent sense, but I quickly realize that this might be a tad too extreme a reaction. The other party was still made up out of children after all, and even though I was also a child, I was a child with the consciousness of an adult, and Turtle and his fellow ne’er-do-wells, had failed to cross any of the lines that would allow me to take measures that were overly heavily.

That being said, I “did” have a plan, and those children would have to endure just a bit of pain for making a nuisance of themselves as they had. Unfortunately, for all of us, in this particular culture and time, the adults generally allowed the children to self-manage. I wasn’t joking when I said socially and technologically the culture was about par for what you’d expect for a time somewhere between the 1500s and 1980s. And now more than ever, the grown-ups seemed to feel that outside of emergencies the children should be able to look after themselves for the most part. Even in school, the teachers and professors only expected to have to lecture. Only handing down punishments when student behavior was disruptive to their classes, or skirted some established standard of conduct.

Which meant, we kids were essentially on our own when it came to dealing with all the pint-sized would-be tyrants. Which in turn meant, I was forced to resolve this issue myself. I was tired of Turtle and his friend’s games, and I intended to take steps to make sure that they learned to leave me alone. The tricky part would be doing so without leaving any deep scars and severe injuries.