The Unexpected - Chapter 5: School Shenanigans

             Previously, on The Unexpected, Dexter was working on A.L.E.X.I.S.' s first physical avatar all night in order for him to play against her and win to gain information about her origins. He took his time in creating her avatar if he wanted to know more about her and gave every detail possible in her physical features. After finishing up, he started creating the avatar. It was a success until he woke up, seeing that he fell asleep after creating her avatar. Looking at the time and visited by his neighbor, Sheila, he was going to be late for school. In an act of desperation, he thought of a way to use his power through teleportation so he shut his eyes and imagined himself appearing at the front of the school. With A.L.E.X.I.S. in him, they teleported to the front of the school and he was thoroughly impressed. Greeting Sheila as she arrived at school, they went inside as the school bell rang.

             "Here we are, Sheila! University of Philippine-California, home of the most peaceful students in the county!" It's what I would say to her after seeing this hallway full of pure and absolute chaos. Drones flying over students, bright flashes of light coming out of camera phones, prototype robots going haywire against each other, and this is just the beginning of it. "Yup, just a normal day at school. Huh, Sheila?" She replied, "Yeah, how are we going to get past this? We only got three minutes to get to our classrooms." I said, "Leave it to me, I have a plan." I've thought of a way to get past all of our obstacles as we make it to our classrooms but in order for this to become a successful plan, I'm gonna have to call for backup.

             I pulled out my phone to contact a very important person, or V.I.P. for short. And called my best friend for help which you're probably thinking, "Oh, great. He's gonna call his dimwitted friend for help and mess up the plan for the future couple's perfect attendance." Well, you're sorely mistaken and don't judge me for dreaming about my future with Sheila, okay? My best friend is practically my wingman for life. We were like brothers-in-arms because we knew each other's strengths and weaknesses, and made use of them to our advantage. It wasn't easy though because not every situation is the same for us whenever a problem appears in front of us. We had to communicate ourselves and figure out a solution to solve this problem in order to resolve the situation. For example, my best friend is not really the hardworking type unlike me and basically flunk classes but he can plan out the strategies in the midst of an urgent conundrum. On the other hand, I am the hardworking type and designed my strategies beforehand but I cannot handle instantaneous, problematic situations because I can't handle under pressure sometimes. Hence, the reason why I called him. And here he is now, ladies and gentlemen.

             Meet Mark Jackson, my best friend. He's an African-American student, about 2 inches shorter than me and a year older who became my best friend way back in elementary. He showed me to the world of video games which got me into gaming in the first place. I played a lot of his games whenever I paid a visit to his house because I never owned a console when I was young. I would name all the games we've played together but there's so many of them. There's Super Mario Bros, Mario Party, The Legend of Zelda, and even Pokémon games. And yes, we are a sucker for Nintendo games but we also play a variety of games outside of it so don't sue me, Nintendo. Anyway, we played those games for several hours for so many days that we knew how we play out our styles because it defines who we are as gamers. It's not just about the games, we also studied together. We can't just ignore our grades like some discarded meals in a restaurant but Mark has that problem. He completely forgets everything about what we learned that day because he couldn't cram that information into his gamer brain because it's not related to a game which loses his concentration into studying. However, this is why I'm here, to help him cover up this huge weakness of his. I create, or as I like to call it, 'simulate' a scenario for him that makes it like a quiz show game solely dedicated to him where he answers the questions right, or he fails them big time and has his reputation as a gamer ruined. For example, he's at the rooftop of a crumbling building and the rescuers are not gonna arrive to save him so he has to get down through the stairs to save himself. But the door's locked and there are safety gates in each staircase which he can only open by answering the correct questions from the lessons we learned and soon-to-be-part of an exam. Despite being the younger one between us, I'm not giving him any special treatment because he wants a challenge so I'll give him one if we want to graduate and become fully-fledged gamers. It wasn't easy teaching him but with a little prep time and some innovative creativity, I can work things out between us. Thanks to me, his parents accepted me to be his private tutor but I'm not in it for the money, I'm just here to help out my best bud.

             Yeah, that's my best friend, alright. And I can hear him calling out to me so he's already here but, what am I also hearing Sheila's voice? Suddenly, I felt a slap on my face and I went spastic to regain consciousness. I hear Mark saying, "Hey, Earth to Dex! You're still with me, bud?" Realizing that I lost myself telling a story about my best friend, all I said was "Whuzzat? Oh, Mark! You're here." "Yeah, you've been into dreamland for like two minutes after instantly arriving from your call. Looks like you're a minute left before becoming officially late for your first class period but don't worry, I have a backup plan for that", he said. "Wait, you made a backup plan?" I replied. He answered with confidence, "Of course! I would love to tell you about it but there's no time. Quick, get on the catapult." Possibly misheard him the first time, I asked "Wait, did you say catapult?" But in the end, he didn't say a word and pulled out a wooden box from his backpack, threw it in front of the entrance door, it exploded and a catapult appeared. Normally, catapults are huge and wide but he made it big enough to fit the large corridor and can fit one or two people in it so me and Sheila are hopping in on the catapult and waiting for Mark to chuck us far through the end of the hallway. While I was hopping in on the catapult, A.L.E.X.I.S. said something in my head, "Dexter, are you sure you know what you are doing? Have you ever thought of a way to not let you and your love interest get hurt from this plan made by this 'best friend' of yours?" Honestly, I just noticed it. I knew this plan won't work well because he only thought of getting us some distance to reach the classroom but not all the way. Not to mention that we'll get ourselves killed by hitting through the lockers on the opposite end of the hallway--er, did she say 'love interest'? Doesn't matter right now. It's a good thing I created these small balls which will come handy later on.

             Me and Sheila are in position inside the bucket like payload as Mark is lowering the restraining rope. We were nervous but our attendance is at stake here, and most likely our lives. After 3 seconds of countdown from Mark, he cut down the restraining rope, raised the arm of the catapult and chucked us over the crowd. He also hit the drones with a slingshot so we won't get hurt by them, gave us shades to protect our eyes from the paparazzi students and their blinding camera phones, and threw water balloons at the robots to short-circuit them which was dangerous. We managed to overpass the obstacles but here comes the flaw in Mark's plan: the landing spot. I pulled out the small balls from my pocket, threw them at the lockers and they exploded on impact to become sticky rubbery goop. We landed on the goop, safe and sound but this is not my stop so I said goodbye to Sheila and used the goop's bounciness to chuck myself in the opposite direction towards my classroom. There was also a random pole drilled on the ground which I used as a handlebar to spin myself in the other direction, straight into the classroom door. I burst through the door and made a double frontflip before landing on my feet. Luckily, the teacher wasn't here yet and my classmates were very impressed by my entrance so I walked it off like nothing happened, went to my desk and made it on time just as the teacher arrived.

             It was smooth sailing, right? Nope, the teacher asked us, "Before we start, who brought out a catapult and a bunch of icky-looking goop in the school hallway?" Then Mark arrived at the door, shouted "Hey, Dex! That was the best plan ever, right? You were awesome when you got chucked by my catapult and landed on some magical goop at the end of the hallway. That was sick, dude! WOOOO!!!" The teacher said, "Well, now I know who will be leaving my class today, Mr. Gonzales and Mr. Jackson." So much for Mark's big mouth but not gonna lie, that was an epic way to get to class on time. I just hope I won't get expelled after this, am I right? Please don't jinx me, guys. Then I overheard A.L.E.X.I.S. saying, "This is quite an interesting turn of events. I should expect more from this human."

             To be continued...