“Operation Super Smart Seducer begins now!” I pushed up my glasses with a diabolical smile behind these spectacles.
“Arno, where did you find glasses—” Rono asked before I grabbed his shoulders and shook him back and forth.
“Rono!”
“YES?!”
Rono and I were hiding behind a rock while looking over at our target: a girl with a short bob hairstyle. She was on a lounge chair with the shade of her rainbow umbrella covering her entire body. She was rather petite, and wore a white two piece swimsuit. Jack and Gollie were building sandcastles in view of her. I could tell! These guys are just praying for our failure! But this is my super smart arc! I can’t possibly lose!
“Here’s the plan: You have to save her life.”
“O…kay?” Rono raised an eyebrow.
“I’m gonna go in and give her a good scare. When I do, you need to come in and beat me up. Once I’m defeated, you introduce yourself and sparks will start flying!”
It’s a classic in the Arno Achebe playbook. It’s how Ori and I met! I guess girls like being saved? Then again, I think anybody would appreciate it if you saved their life. Now that I think about it though, I saved Jack’s life technically during the whole New Dawn Festival fiasco. Is he…
My thoughts trailed off, but I was brought back to reality when seeing Rono get hyped up for this interaction. “Wait, this might actually work! You’re strong as hell, so seeing me beat someone like you up will certainly paint me in a good light right off the bat. Big bro Arno, you’re a genius!”
“Actually Rono, it’s just basic attraction.” I chuckled as I shook my head, disagreeing with him out of humility.
“Lead the charge, big bro!”
“With pleasure!” I flexed my muscles before leading the charge. I ran directly in front of the lady. And now that I’m in front of her, I just realized…what am I gonna do? I’d get in real trouble if I did anything that could even be considered harmful…so now what?
“Uh…can I help you?” The girl put her book down and was now staring at me with her eyes raised. I started to sweat profusely as I tried to think about what to do, but nothing came…I just stood there awkwardly as the lady pressed me even further. To make matters worse, I heard Rono rushing for an attack from behind me.
“I’ll save you, miss!”
My fight or flight was kicking into overclock and I spun around and punched him in the face as hard as I could. The girl let out a scream in response and several people in the area began to look onto the scene that was being made. Jack and Gollie immediately ran to clear up the misunderstanding.
“Don’t worry guys! These two just like doing pranks!” Gollie lightened the tone of the situation. “They’re part of a comedy duo! You can check out their skits over at the cafe this evening!” As Gollie was doing the talking, Jack was dragging Rono’s slumped body away. Once we all smoothly exited that situation, Jack dumped a bucket of water over Rono to wake him up. When he finally came to, he was furious with me.
“Arno…What. The hell. Was that?!”
“I got nervous…” I averted my gaze.
“Well, make sure that doesn’t happen again!”
“So you guys are gonna do this again…” Gollie sighed.
“Of course! We just gotta iron out some of the details. Arno! We just gotta figure out what you could do before I get there.”
“Right. What are you thinking?”
“Hm… maybe you just try to hit on her. But be real scummy about it.”
“What level of scummy? Gutter scummy or Hives scummy?” I asked.
Jack shook his head before leaving with his bucket and shovel. “They’re scaling the moral compass of the terrorists we fought…let’s get out of here.”
“Definitely Gutter scummy. We need that suave, but assholeish behavior. You get what I’m saying?”
Funnily enough…I did get what he was saying.
“Sure thing. I’ll get on that right away!” I wasted no time as I made a beeline for the first girl in the immediate area. She had a huge straw hat on that hid her face and a green one piece swimsuit. The plan was to get real scummy and hit on her, so Rono can come and save the day.
“Hey toots…” I started off as I pointed finger guns as her, “How about you and I blow this spot and I show you what a parasite can offer you. I’m nothing like these Holians!” I gave my most devious smile and stuck my tongue out like some twisted caricature of what a Holian assumes what a Haustorian acts like.
“No, I think I’m quite alright..” Her voice sounded familiar. When her straw hat lifted, just under the brim I saw the eyes of Therese Cistra return my gaze. I immediately broke character. “After all, you parasites are rather…barbaric.”
She really is just a worse version of how Derris used to be. I don’t think I’d ever get along with someone like her. With every look she gives me, I can tell she looks at me as no more than a dog.
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“I’ll save you, miss! Hyahhhh!” Rono ran towards me with a wooden chair and brought it down on me. I didn’t flinch as the chair immediately broke into pieces as it made contact with my head. Therese looked over to Rono and immediately pieced together what we were up to.
“Ohhhhh I see. A little diversion to make your Holian friend look nicer. That’s nice of you…I mean, that’s one of the things a parasite is good for. Being the bad guy.”
Yeah, it’s just what I figured. She’s just gonna keep on trying to bring me down. Despite what she says though, I know my worth. I parted my lips to tell her off, but Rono spoke up before I could.
“You’re wrong, you know. Arno’s saved my ass countless times. If it wasn’t for him leading the fights we've been in and Ori directing us, we probably would’ve lost at zone two and the New Dawn Festival.”
Therese’s eyes shifted over to Rono briefly and he immediately put his arms up as he went on the defensive. “W-well, you probably didn’t know any better! It’s not a big deal or anything—”
“So you think Arno is not capable of evil?”
“Well… I think there are Holians that are capable of good and evil. The same goes for Haustorians.”
Therese simply stared at Rono with a surprised expression. As each second passed, Rono’s eyes darted around everywhere except towards Therese. Therese then sighed and said “Looks like you submitted to the parasite. It makes sense. After all, you’ve been in multiple combat situations with him. You’re basically on the same level. It’s a good thing the rest of the country doesn’t think like you. The average stranger may act like they’re comfortable with you around, but really they’re just waiting for you to do something stupid. Oh, I have an idea! I’ll prove it!”
She rose from her seat and began to walk towards me. In almost an instant, she changed her entire demeanor from her usual relaxed attitude to a stern, commanding one.
“Hey, asshole! Give me back my purse!”
Everyone once again began to look over at the scene that was being made. I looked around for Gollie or Jack but it seemed like they weren’t anywhere to be found. More people started to surround us and Rono tried to calm down the impending crowd, but they were beginning to get more aggressive. Before long, a police officer came onto the scene. He was tall and had disturbingly huge muscles.
“What seems to be the problem here, ma’am?” He said in a deep voice.
“This parasite stole my purse! His Holian friend here was flirting with me and then all of a sudden, I noticed it was taken straight out of my bag!”
“Wait, we didn’t even touch her bag!” Rono said.
“Yeah, check her bag! It’s probably still in there—” I pointed over to her and she was dumping the contents of her bag onto the sand. Things like makeup, hand sanitizer, lip balm and more fell out as she emptied her bag.
“I’m noticing a lack of purse here, gentlemen. Do you have something to say for yourselves?”
I immediately noticed her pursing her lips in an attempt to hold back her laughter. How the hell is she actually missing her purse?! Did she legitimately lose it? If so, she’s a cunning person for putting an excuse like that together so quickly.
“How would we be able to hide it?! All we have on are our swimming trunks and they don’t even have any pockets!” Rono patted where his pockets would be and I followed suit to prove my innocence.
“There is one place he could hide it…” Therese said as she scanned my body with a mischievous grin. I don’t get it! There’s nowhere for me to hide her stuff. I’m only wearing my swimsuit!
Oh wait…
“I have an idea,” she clasps her hands together as if she just came to an answer. “Why don’t we get the parasite that stole my stuff to display himself completely? That way, we’ll know for certain whether or not he has my stuff.”
“That’s not fair at all! He has to embarrass himself in front of all these people just to prove his innocence?!”
“Okay,” I said flatly as I put my hands on the brim of my pants. Everyone immediately shielded their eyes or turned away. Therese was holding back her laughter as she shielded her eyes, but left a small slit open to see more of the chaos unfold. Can’t be helped though. I have to prove my innocence in some way. I won’t give her the satisfaction of feeling like she embarrassed me in some way either.
“What in the hell is going on here?!” A voice came from the very edges of the crowd and as the crowd parted, Instructor Matthews revealed himself along with Ori and Derris. Derris wore a white t shirt and red shorts and Ori was wearing a black bikini with purple flower prints all over with a matching cover up sarong skirt.
“W-woah! You’re the Twisted General!” The police officer’s eyes widened as he turned to see Instructor Matthews. He wasted no time getting into a bowing position to pay his respects. “I’ve been meaning to see you, sir. You saved my daughter’s life once from kidnappers! I’m eternally grateful.”
“In that case, I’ll have you know…whatever mischief you think my student is up to, he didn’t do it.”
“But…” the officer stole a quick glance at me and the instructor spoke up again to attract his attention. “Or do I have to put my title as a CT on the line for you to believe me?”
“That won’t be necessary, sir!” He immediately lifted his head.
“But what about my purse?!” Therese interjected, but Matthews rebutted “Perhaps you left it at home? It’s very easy to forget things like that. After all, there’s no way my student would do something like that. None.”
Having someone stick up for me like this seriously warmed my heart. It showed that Instructor Matthews had faith in who I was as a person. I’ll try my best to live up to those expectations.
Therese sighed with an apathetic look on her face before finally switching gears to another smile “Now that I think about it, I think I did forget my purse at home! Sorry everyone!” She sheepishly looked to the floor and the surrounding crowd muttered before coming to the collective conclusion of my innocence and dispersing.
“Now then, Gollie, Jack, and Anna built a pretty impressive sand castle a bit ways from here. Let’s go see how tall it is guys.” Matthews began walking off and the rest of us followed. While we were walking, Ori asked me how exactly I came across our cross zone finals rival.
“The guys think I’m stupid, Ori!”
“And?”
“And…I’m scared they might be right!”
“Arno,” Ori stepped in front of me and turned around with a smile. “That’s my job, silly. You just focus on hitting things. I’ll focus on who you’re hitting and why. I’m the brain to your brawn, remember?”
“Oh yeah…”
I have to be reminded every while, but Ori and I are a team. We cover for the other’s faults or weaknesses. We’ve made it this far because of our cooperative mentality, and we’ll go even further because of it.
When we all went to the part of the beach where Jack, Gollie, and Anna were building their sand castle, we noticed how huge it was. The Instructor wasn’t joking. That castle is huge. As I stood there admiring that castle, Ori grabbed my hand and started to drag me somewhere. “Instructor Matthews told me about a snow cone stand over there! Let’s go try some!”
“S-sure…” I was getting dragged to this snow cone stand, but was immediately halted by a force from the opposite way. When I looked over, I saw Jack grabbing onto my other hand. He had a rather serious expression on his face.
“Do you mind if I talk to you guys for a second?”