Challenge #00035: Not My Fault!

Jean discovers a reason why Duncan should be dumped and Todd shows her why Scott might be a better choice, all while they hang upside down from a tree. By accident.

“It'snotmyfault, IsweartoGod, pleasedon'tkillme!”

Jean was still getting her bearings. A tough thing to do when gravity wanted all her blood to settle into her head because the ground was directly above it.

She let open her ‘walls’ a crack to scan for any other intelligent life besides… Toady Todd Tolenski.

Urgh.

Well, on the plus side, she was upwind of him. On the minus side, she was upside down, in a tree, and apparently miles from anywhere.

“How’d we get here?”

“Not my fault, I swear.”

“Yeah. I think you established that in the first picosecond of consciousness.”

“Yo, don’t try to move 'less ya know what’s there,” Todd advised. “One wrong move an’ -tchk!- broken neck.”

Something warm was sliding slowly up her spine. It felt sticky. An entirely different tendril of malevolently bright and viscous blue drooled towards the ground in front of her.

She tried to pull herself upright. Alas, that meant getting further into the slowly oozing bright blue dribbles.

And there was lots of it on her clothes.

“What the hell is this blue stuff?”

“Not my fault! I didn’t do it. I was inna hall!” Toad tentatively touched his tongue to the vibrant blue goo. It must not have tasted good, because Todd winced and reeled his prehensile tongue back in. “You musta seen it. I walked right by you an’ Dunc’ and he kinda casually knocked me into a locker.”

“I didn’t notice that bit…”

“Yeah, like anybody does.” His voice switched to a mocking falsetto. “O Duncan, yo’ so manly wit’ yo’ big muscles and Aryan good looks. Who cares what the rest of the world is doing? Tee hee…”

“Maybe if you washed more often…” Jean decided she’d had enough of being inverted, blue goo or no blue goo, and struggled to right herself and untangle herself at the same time.

Todd had similar ideas and a harder time. “Yeah, well not ev'ryone gets to be perfect,” he said as he awkwardly got at least upright. “You say 'wash more often’, I have t’ distill the freaking water wit’ no power an’ try finding some kinda soap that don’t make me sick to mah stomach.”

She stared at him. “What?”

“You did an article 'bout it, right? Why there ain’t that many amphibians 'round here no mo’?”

“Oh yeah. The chemical water treatments and soap is polluting the waterways and… making… frogs sick…” Another I-can’t-believe-it stare. “You’re serious? Bathing makes you ill?”

“Like an animal shelter’s worth o’ dogs, yo.” He had found a stick free of goo and was using it to scrape as much of the goo off himself as he could. “And whatever this shit is, it’s damn toxic. Hazmat toxic. I’m'a be barfin’, bath or not. Ugh.”

Jean reached out with her mind, finding the 'feel’ of the goo, and the 'feel’ of Todd, and then taking the goo away from him.

“Thanks.” He picked his way around the tree as if the goo was lava. “We should get outta here.”

Jean de-gooed herself and floated them clear of the mess. “If you want me to talk to Duncan about the locker…”

“Nope. Nuh-uh. Negativo. No. Way. Just means I get it worse behind yo’ back.”

“Duncan is not that mean.”

“Uh. Yes he is. You can -i'unno- pick his brain t’ see what he’s been up to? You’d see if yo’ did.”

“That,” sniffed Jean, “would be unethical.”

“As unethical as distractin’ you from lookin’ inna chem lab while one of his buddies builds that goo-bomb?”

Jean rewound her memories and looked at them anew. Duncan was actiing nervous and edgy. And kind of desperate to stop her on her way to Trig.

…because he knew she’d report him.

“Uh,” she said.

“Or as unethical as chattin’ up cheerleaders when you ain’t lookin’?”

“Wait. What?”

“Or as unethical as beatin’ up geeks to do his homework for him?”

“Now that’s not fair!”

“For who?” asked Todd. “He’s lyin’ to yo’. He been lyin’ to you since th’ start of it. An’ he goin’ keep lyin’ 'till you catch him an’ put yo’ foot down. An’ then he’s goin do it mo’ when he thinks he’s safe.”

“Like anyone else wouldn’t be a liar. Lying is natural in any relationship. People want to make themselves look good.”

“Mebbe, but Dunc only wants to look good. Y'awsayin’? Meanwhile, yo got a guy right there fo’ yo’ alla time, tells yo everythin’ but one truth an’ respec’s yo’. An all he is to you is chopped liver.”

Jean made a face, trying to orient herself in a world turned blue and drippy. “Who could that be?”

“Shades, over there.”

She followed Todd’s gesture to find Scott, messy with blue goop, running to her. All anxiety and worry and - to be honest - abandonment issues.

“Jean, are you okay? Did Toad–?” He made a fist, got halfway into a fighting stance.

“We’re fine. Todd has been helping me out.”

Todd made a show of his empty hands and a sick, please-don’t-hurt-me grin. “That’s me. Knight in rusty armor.”

Jean did something she promised herself she’d never do. She dipped into her friend’s mind. She hadn’t known such relief in anyone since… Since her telepathy had turned on and she’d tried to run away from the voices and her mom had found her and swept her up in a hug and cried…

So relieved that a loved one was still okay.

Duncan, some vast meters distant, was only worried about whether or not he or his idiot buddy was going to get caught.

Someone was headed for dumpsville. Population: Dunc.

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