Mantid #1: Origins

Monday

It was Monday, and Blaze got herself ready for school, ate breakfast, and then grabbed the recording of Allie on the radio station and shoved it in her backpack. She went into the garage, disconnected her bike from its trailer, and rode to the high school.

She didn't like school that much, except for the fact that she got to solve math problems in the trigonometry class. She didn't really hate any of her classes except for English class, because the teacher - Mr. Maddox - made her read aloud all the time. He also made everyone memorise all 40 of the most used prepositions in the English language and then recite them in front of the whole class, and she did not by any means have a good memory.

Now on the other hand, Japanese class was fun... Most of the time. There was this one new girl who moved to her area last semester - Luna Soong - Who perpetually was the first to raise her hand for every question. Her accent was perfect too - A little too perfect. She won all the memory games they would play in class. And on top of all that, she always got perfect scores or better on every. single. assignment. (In all of her classes, of course).

Blaze loathed her perfection. She was her assigned partner in class, and Luna always outshined her; eternally making her second best in that class.

Blaze remembered how Luna would always correct her if she said something wrong in Japanese, or any other language for that matter.

She sighed, "She's not worth getting angry over, Blaze."

She saw that the traffic light turned red for her, and put the brakes on and waited for the light to turn green again. Blaze checked her watch, then looked up when she heard a "ding," signaling that it was safe to cross.

She started pedaling again, Is there anything that she isn't good at?

Then she racked her brain to think of any flaws she might have... Upon further investigation, she could think of no faults; she was a whiz at math, she could sing like a Disney princess, she was polite, she was the best on the school chess team, and rumor has it she skipped three grades in her old school.

Oh come on. Everyone has something they're bad at...

Blaze was outside the school now. She rode around to the bike rack and chained her cruiser there, locking it. Then she jogged over to where her friends were standing.

"Hi!" She greeted.

Jackson, Sydney, Max, and Brenton, her best friends replied, "Hi!"

"So," Jack, her most trusted friend asked, referring to her pincers (but everyone else in the school thought it was finding Luna's flaws), "How's your 'project' going so far?"

"Not bad," She replied.

"I bet you haven't found one weakness with her yet," Sydney said, slightly taunting her.

"Nope," Blaze admitted.

"And you never will," Brenton commented.

"Nobody can be completely perfect," Blaze responded, "It's impossible."

"Apparently not anymore," Max said as the bell rang for the students to go to class.

She went through her first three hours, then the lunch bell rang. Blaze had A lunch during second semester, which was the earliest of the three lunches.

Blaze sat down at the blue, circular table she usually sat at with her friends. Brenton and Jack sat down across from her, waiting for their row to be called.

Brenton asked Blaze, "What are we doing in history?"

"We're making a timeline of stuff that happened during World War II."

"Ugh," Brenton reacted, "I hate timelines."

"Oh," Blaze remembered, "And you have to draw and color pictures."

"Oh joy. Yay," He replied in a monotone voice.

Jack, who had the same teacher as the two of them said, "Please tell me it's not due by the end of the hour."

Blaze pursed her lips, guilty of what she would say next, "It is, sadly."

The lunch monitor announced, "Row 4 can go get their lunch!"

The three stood up, and walked over to the line for "food."

Blaze looked at the signs with the names of what they were serving today. The choices were: Beefy tacos with refried beans (or refried poop, as she called it), pepperoni pizza, and grilled cheese sandwiches.

Once she got to order, she chose the lesser of three evils, "I'd like the pepperoni pizza."

The lunch lady put a piece of pizza (basically very salty cardboard soaked in grease, and fried in even more grease) on a styrofoam tray, and handed it to her.

"Thanks," Blaze said, trying to sound grateful for a future case of diarrhea.

She went over to the pay counter, and gave the man there 3 dollars to buy her "lunch."

Blaze walked over to the side, and picked up some white milk (which came with the "food"), a fork, and three napkins.

She went back to her table, and sat down, putting her tray in front of her, internally cringing at what she was about to eat.

Brenton, holding his tray, was talking with Luna, and invited her to sit at their table. She agreed, and scooted over next to Blaze.

"Hi," She greeted.

"Hi," Blaze said quietly back.

She glared across the table at Brenton for a few seconds.

He shrugged, smiling back at her briefly.

Jack seated himself, holding the taco far out in front of him, trying to escape the smell, "I swear, we need to wear hazmat suits around this stuff."

Blaze chuckled while hopelessly trying to dry up some of the grease with her napkins, "No kidding."

Brenton bit into his grilled cheese sandwich, and chewed.

Blaze, Jack, and Luna watched him intently to see what would happen, since none of them ever tried the grilled cheese sandwich before.

He looked up and tilted his head to the side, now chewing more slowly. Then he gagged. Blaze handed him one of her napkins, and he spit the "sandwich" into it, and then he folded it, picked up his tray, and walked over to the trashcan to throw his "lunch" away.

Jack asked, "Hey guys, I wonder if this'll bounce?"

Luna looked down at her "sandwich," and pushed it to Jack, not wanting any part of it.

Jack ripped a piece of cheese off, rolled it into a ball, and dropped it on the table; and lo and behold, it bounced!

"And they expect us to eat this?!" Blaze exclaimed, "I wouldn't feed this to my cousin's pet goat!"

After soaking out as much grease as she could, she reluctantly took a bite of the pizza, "Not as bad as it was last time."

"I'm glad yours is good," Brenton commented, still a little green around the gills.

"What exactly do they make the food with, anyway?" Blaze asked.

"I don't know," Luna answered, "But whatever it is should be disposed of the same way they get rid of radioactive waste."

All of them nodded in agreement.

After lunch, Blaze went through her last three hours, and then exited the school and walked home.