Chapter 18
Meeting the Pack
(Amoni Jacobs)
“Ohh, hey girl.”
The voices and annoying cheers of boys and girls alike echoed in the hallways. Hearing them was easy for Amoni with her enhanced hearing. If she had tried, she almost felt that she could taste the different pheromones that males and females were giving off.
“Uh, who is that?”
The girls talking sounded both jealous and annoyed by the person they were seeing. Hearing the commotion, it was clear that they were talking to or about someone new.
While this was interesting, especially for a small school like theirs, Amoni felt that there was no way she would run into this person. As this was the Advanced Placement, or AP, Physics C: Mechanics. Of all the people in the new generation of her pack, she was the only one able to keep up with the rigors and requirements of being in AP Physics. In fact, the standards for this class were so high, that unless you were in the AP prep courses in your Junior year, there was no way you would be recommended to join this class.
Which was why Amoni figured she would hear about this new girl once class was over. The fact that there was a new girl was nothing new, and in fact had quickly made the rounds of the school before the day even started.
From everything she heard, the new girl was tall, red-headed, and muscular.
That description alone was enough for Amoni to think about the indoctrination process with her, but only if she was cool. After the last few yahoos were added to the pack by her cousin, Jerome, it was noted that Amoni would be in charge of choosing who would be added to the pack.
This was no small task, for being pack meant you were part of the family for life. There were obligations that came from being invited to the pack. Obligations that meant that even if the newest pack member grew overly arrogant from joining and began picking a fight with everyone, it was the pack’s obligation to back up said moron. Even when a victory in such a case would just be a pyrrhic victory.
Again, lessons were learned, and Amoni showed Jerome why she was better at piecing together intel. At this rate, she was clearly setting herself up to be the next pack shaman. While she had always wanted to be the leader, being recognized as a shaman was no small feat, as it would grant her minor abilities to commune with the earth and spirits.
At least that is what she was taught by her father, as her father was the current pack shaman, meaning that if she was accepted by the spirits, she could gain a lot of interesting abilities to help the pack. Until she got to the point where she could protect the pack, she felt it was her job to ensure that everyone who joined the pack from here on out were vetted. With seven of them in this school alone, she felt she was already at her pack’s maximum.
Well really this was Jerome’s maximum as he would invariably need to be the one who kept everyone else in line. Still as the guild’s recruiter, she knew she would at least have to have a list of reasons why the new girl didn’t meet their new standards.
These were the thoughts that were going through her mind, before she saw her.
The girl was tall and powerful, that much she had already known thanks to the rumor mill. What the rumor mill had failed to mention, or what Amoni had failed to fully grasp was why everyone spoke so highly of her. She was beautiful, as she all but radiated a form of indomitable power.
Seeing the girl, Amoni wanted to use this moment to help her, as she was clearly lost. Likely coming in to ask for directions to her actual teacher. Fortunately for Amoni she sat further back and was unable to respond to her entry before she handed over a piece of paper to the teacher, Dr. Cahill. Yes, this school managed to hire a person with a Doctorate in Mathematics, which was why the courses were so tough.
Dr. Cahill was also why there was a matriculation process for those students who wanted to take AP courses through the local community college. Right now, through all her AP courses, Amoni was looking at nine credits already completed, and was hoping to complete another twelve credits by the end of this year, putting her at twenty-one credits, or roughly over a third of the way to her associate degree. The goal was to spend one more year saving money by attending the local community college, and then heading off to state.
Of course, that was if she didn’t make the girls’ basketball team and get recruited by a nationally recognized organization.
Never put all your eggs in one basket as it were, at least that is what Amoni was planning by joining. Sure, it was cheating by being part of the pack, as her first evolution made it so she was finally tall enough to join the team. Before her recent evolution to the first Tier, she had been an undersized 5’6. Now that she had achieved her first evolution, and the growth spurt associated with such an achievement she was 5’10. With her next tier evolution, she hoped to be over the six-foot threshold. That was where she expected to stay unless she somehow managed to get another evolution while in college.
Though it was hard to tell what allowed some to evolve faster than others. All that was known for certain was that the last personal evolution seemed to end when your natural growth cycle also ended, meaning that right now Amoni was under the gun to get these last two evolutions.
Unfortunately, no one really knew what people needed for an evolution.
These thoughts seemed odd, to Amoni, as she didn’t quite know why they came to her. Then looking at the towering girl before her, her sudden apprehension became apparent, as her mind was clearly sizing up the competition. Her mind saw the girl before her and instantly saw her as a threat, not only to her pack, but to her own position on the team, but why?
The girl while tall and apparently muscular, due to the way her muscles bulged out from under her clothes did note a stronger build, but there was more.
Something about the way she moved, gracefully sliding in. Maybe she was one of those dancers with the pink leotards? They were muscular and often graceful, right?
The entire time Dr. Cahill was interacting with her, he was writing things down in his notebook.
Then it clicked, he wasn’t trying to give her instructions on where her class was. He was marking her down as being a student enrolled in AP Physics.
“There you are. All set.” Dr. Cahill said, tearing off a tab from the bottom of her sheet. Then standing up from behind his desk, he looked around and said, “try to find a seat wherever.”
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Nod.
The girl just nodded and quickly scanned the room.
Shiver.
Emerald green eyes locked gazes with Amoni for a second, and in that second it felt like she was the prey. From the day Amoni was born she was pack, until the day she died, she would be pack. At least, that is what she was told. She would always be stronger, faster, and tougher than any human.
Yet, seeing that girl lock gazes with her, something primal within her screamed. No, scream would imply they had control over their emotional state, even to a minor extent. Screaming implied that there was strength enough to at least appear to be fierce and fight back.
No, when her eyes locked on with the new girl’s it was like the proud wolf that had always been there barely restrained was cowed.
Then her heart stopped, as the white girl began walking forward, right towards her.
Badump, badump.
“Amoni, right?” The girl asked.
Fear.
Hearing the girl call her name, Amoni wanted to lash out, “how do you know my name?”
“Coach Green gave it to me. She said you would be in most of my classes.” The girl said, her hands neutrally held at her sides, her left hand holding onto a stack of papers. This left her right hand, the hand closest to Amoni, open and able to strike out or defend. Amoni realized all of this, and then disregarded the thought.
“Coach Green?” Amoni asked, the words sounding somewhat hollow on her lips as she tried to place the familiar name. Then suddenly it came to her, that was the high school basketball coach, well for the women’s basketball team.
“Yes, you are Amoni Jacobs, right?” The new girl asked, but it was clear that she had somehow known who Amoni was.
“Yes.”
“Nice to meet you, I’m Misha Tulley, I’ll be the new point guard.” Misha said, not offering a hand and just sitting down in the open seat next to Amoni.
Amoni looked at the girl, who didn’t offer her hand, didn’t make any threats. Just spoke in a calm matter of fact tone that only caused heightened tension to form within Amoni. Then after hearing the words, Amoni realized something was off.
“Wait, I am the point guard.” Amoni stated.
“You were the point guard. I think coach plans to move you to the shooting guard position.” This new girl, this Misha, said.
Instantly, the wolf inside Amoni began to grumble and howl at the indignity. Turning to face the girl, Amoni found two cold emerald eyes staring back at her. These were the eyes of a predator, of one who had seen a lot and likely dealt with a lot. For a moment, Amoni looked into those eyes and saw the true focus of someone who would stop at nothing to remove obstacles from her path.
In that one gaze, Amoni realized a few things. Many were primal, things that couldn’t be placed into words. She had the eyes of a killer, at least that is what her instincts told her. Those were the cold and calculating eyes of someone who had committed the ultimate act, and probably done so callously.
The other major thing Amoni learned was that for the first time in a long time, her wolf, her inner fire could feel fear.
Amoni wanted to be strong, she wanted to challenge this girl right here and now to a fight, but somehow she knew that the girl was ready for such a provocation. That if given the sign to fight, the girl would lash out with her now closer left hand and there would be nothing Amoni could do to stop it. That was the sensation of fear that she had while looking at this white girl.
Finally, realizing that she had been staring for too long, Amoni decided to say something to see if she could recover some face, “we’ll see about that.”
With that Amoni turned to face Dr. Cahill who was already beginning to go over today’s lesson. Then just as Amoni thought the situation was over, she heard the girl speak.
“We will.”
Shiver.
Out of the corner of her eye, Amoni could see the cold piercing gaze of the girl staring her down and all but calling her unworthy. Sadly, Amoni couldn’t do anything other than stare forward and try to regain some of her dwindling self-respect.
This had been a nightmare, but she was now certain of one thing, this girl should be in the pack, but only if Jerome could somehow tame her. Otherwise, she would wreak havoc with their pack structure. Though she would be able to reign in some of the more unruly pack members that Jerome let in.
These thoughts and more seeped into her mind.
Then out of the corner of her eyes, she looked to see the girl staring forward with a laser focus. However, her predatory instincts were too high as she immediately looked over once Amoni did, causing their eyes to lock for a second, before Amoni turned away quickly.
This was not going to be as good of a year as Amoni had hoped. Fortunately, this was only one class, and then practice, Amoni could and would get through this. At least that is what she told herself.
***
(James Rider)
The entire day James had heard people talking about the new girl this and the new girl that. Honestly the whole thing seemed a bit too cliché to him, as he was so over a pretty face getting all the guys’ attention. This was even more reason why James decided that whatever happened, he would not give into temptation and would not even look at the girl.
Besides, this was his dominion, the computer lab was practically his haven where he set up shop; fixing tablets or phones, writing papers, and generally finishing all the assignments that the other classes gave to him.
James told himself that he wasn’t lazy, as lazy would imply he didn’t do his work at all. Instead, he was economical, as he used as much of his forced time in the school to take care of school related activities.
His time after class was just that, his.
He was about to start his final paper due in the morning, when a bouncing ball of energy came barreling through the science lab door.
“She’s here, she’s here.” Darcy said, all but squealing with delight.
Looking at her, James realized he had never seen her this excited since she got a pet bunny for easter.
“Who?” James asked, though he already had a fairly good guess.
Ms. Phillips just looked at the two and shook her head. That was the thing about Ms. Phillips, she liked it quiet, but she tolerated some noise before the class began.
Then just as Darcy had all but predicted, a few seconds later a new student came into the classroom. As soon as he saw her, James instantly thought that she was a new girl come in.
She was tall, curvy and a natural red head, not one of those fire in a bottle types. At least that is what he assumed by looking at her.
Then to his surprise she went over to Ms. Philips and handed her a schedule of some kind.
“Yes, you must be the new girl I have heard so much about.” Ms. Philips began, already going into her harsh no-nonsense demeanor. Hearing her talk like this, James wondered what exactly caused Ms. Philips to be like this. Then as she spoke, things became clearer.
“Ms. Green has already informed me of your situation and the fact that you intend to be on her basketball team. While I am all for student athletes, I want you to know that this is a serious class. I don’t expect to see you coming in here and being disruptive, or taking naps, or otherwise interrupting my classroom.” Ms. Philips began, and as soon as she spoke, James realized the trouble. This girl was apparently on the sports team, and she didn’t want her to come in here and think it was a free ride.
“Okay.” Was the one-word response that the new girl gave.
Hearing her response caused an unexpected snort to come from James, as he watched arguably his favorite teacher look momentarily lost for words as she opened and closed her mouth for a moment.
Ms. Philips was quick to recover as she then asked, “so you are going to withdraw?”
“No, I will follow your instructions,” the girl replied.
“Well, okay then, find a seat,” Ms. Philips stated, and seemed momentarily quelled by the response, before adding, “you do know this is an AP course, right?”
***
(Misha)
The entire day had been slow and grueling, which was what she had expected and had even mentally prepared herself for. Yet, it had been worth it to see how school life really was.
From what she had seen, werewolves tended to stick to most of the sports related programs. Also, the term werewolf was a bit of a misnomer as it appeared that at first the changes in Lykanthropy were minor. Most of which could be attributed to subtle shifts in diets, momentary growth spurts and the like. Honestly though, the one thing she did not expect was to see a vampire in the computer lab, though honestly that too was something that should have been obvious, if she had been trying to find places where vampires would use to hide in plain sight.
The teacher was on the third tier of her evolution, while the fledgling kids were only on the first or second tier.
Also, it was clear that vampires could easily walk out into sunlight, but that they appeared to prefer to be in the shade. These were all good data points, and ones that Misha herself fully intended to delve deeper into.
For now, she wanted to see how a first-tier werewolf would react when their position on the team was challenged. Also, if she was being completely honest with herself, she wanted to see how her current Attributes stacked up against evolved beings. Particularly as she was still far away from reaching the values needed for her first evolutionary change.
In her mind she mentally accessed her organo-tech interface.
Advanced Life Growth Model Accessed.
Physical Characteristics:
Strength: 14.9 / 20
Dexterity: 14.9 / 20
Agility: 14.9 / 20
Stamina: 14.9 /20
That was the maximum her Attributes could rise to. With ten being the average, she was clearly well above average for the typical human. Yet, she could tell that there was something, a bottleneck of some kind that had been seemingly imposed upon her by the system. Though she couldn’t quite explain why.
Mentally her backdoor access told her she was missing required growth hormones, but the hormones’ descriptions were lacking from the incomplete template she had found. Honestly, she was beginning to think that her class was just meant to somehow cull the weak from the evolutionary process. Yet, the more she saw, the more she realized that even the tier ones of this place were lacking. Especially as none of the noted Attributes were above the 15-point threshold, which she mentally noted as some form of threshold.
While the tier three vampire did seem like she would be a formidable opponent, even during the daylight hours.
For now, Misha had her own goals to set. Namely taking on a team with three Werewolves and seeing how well she could run an offense against them.
“Today we will be doing a five-on-five scrimmage. Everyone give it everything you’ve got.” Coach green said, then with that everyone lined up in their perspective positions.
“You ready?” The girl Amoni asked, a slight hitch in her voice as she attempted to stare down Misha and failed.
“Are you?” Misha shot back, as she walked to her starting position.
Once everyone was in position, Coach Green nodded, then threw up the ball, and quickly retreated before chaos erupted on the court.
“Begin!” Coach