MSP Academy

Chapter 2: A Bus Ride to Pluto

John ran outside and welcomed the warm sun rising up just he had done earlier. A lone figure waited at the end of road, as if waiting for John to arrive.

“Hey Jade.” John greeted as he walked up to the figure. Jade had been John’s friend for years and he could always make out her long black hair, glasses, and her captivating green eyes. Today she was wearing a long sleeve shirt with what looked like an atom on it. Jade was always interested in science and stuff like that. She also wore a white skirt that went down to her ankles.

“Hey John.” Jade smiled. “Ready for another year of studying?”

“Not really,” he replied. “I am however ready for another year of pranking some teachers.” Jade laughed. They had spent years pulling pranks and sharing jokes together.

“Just don’t go overboard like you did last year.” Jade said waving a finger at John. As an end of the year prank, John had simultaneously set off three perfect pranks. The first was drawing on the math teacher’s face as he slept through a test with a permanent marker. Then there was the meatball bombs John had planted in some cheerleader’s pasta, the janitors weren’t that happy either when they had to clean it up. Lastly, John had placed a whoopie cushion and smoke pellets under his least favorite teacher’s seat. The teacher being a man known only to the students as ‘Mr. Noir’ or sometimes the nickname ‘Mr. Black’. Although the nickname sounded more racist than what it was. As the teacher sat down there was a loud fart and a lot of smoke. Suffice to say, it was a job well done, until he got caught that is. Since no one was injured, just humiliated, John was let off the hook with only a warning. They probably called ahead to the high school just to warn them about his mad pranking skills.

“You know Mr. Noir had that coming to him.” John protested.

“I’m just saying to be careful. You don’t want to get suspended or anything.” Jade snapped back. John nodded. She had a good point. Their discussion on the matter ended as their bus stopped near them and they board the yellow chariot to school.

“Yo John over here!” John heard a voice call out. John looked down the aisle and saw blonde hair and shades. He made his way towards his friend and sat down on the seat next to him. The cool kid wore a broken record shirt with a pair of jeans.

“Hey Dave, how was your summer?” John asked.

“It was okay,” he replied. “Most of it was spent with Bro and Dirk. You remember Dirk right?” John nodded. He had meet Dirk years ago at one of Dave’s parties. Dirk had struck John as a cool kind of guy, but he was definitely a lot different from Dave. “So John did you hear about our gym teacher?”

“Mr. Tanner? No, what?”

“Apparently, he was injured in an accident over summer and he won’t be able to teach for a while.”

“So?”

“So,” Dave emphasised. “The school brought in a ‘specialist’. Which happens to be my big bro.”

“No way!” John gasped. “Your bro is our gym teacher?”

“Yep, which means gym is going to be fun.”

“What do you mean? Won’t your bro take it easy on us?” Dave started to laugh uncontrollably. “What’s so funny?” John asked.

“Dude there is no way my bro is going to ‘take it easy on us’.” Dave made air quotes. “If anything he is going to make it more brutal on you and me just for the fact that he knows us. Also we won’t be having the normal class of stretches that or running that make guys like us stare at girls like those.” Dave gestured towards the seat next to them. John followed Dave’s line of sight and saw Jade and Rose chatting. Rose was wearing a dark dress with a pink longsleeve underneath. The moment he saw Rose in the dress John couldn’t stop but remember the dream he had the other night. The outfit she wore was exactly like the one from the dream. Reality started to drift as he focused on Rose, but not his Rose. The Rose that had been consumed in darkness, that couldn’t speak a single word of English as she use her powers against the unbeatable boss.

“John,” He heard her voice. “John, are you okay?” He wanted to reply, but it was if he was drifting off into nowhere. “JOHN!” Suddenly there was a light. John was back in his world. Rose and Jade showed worried looks. Dave’s hand was on his shoulder.

“John you okay man?” John could see Dave was worried, even behind his calm demeanor and shades. “You were spacing out of orbit. I was just about to call some of my mad scientist friends to use their super telescope to spot you on pluto.”

“Why not a planet full of hot aliens?” John joked.

“Whoa there Speedy Gonzales,” Dave mocked shockingly. “We don’t have the resources to pull you away from that kind of planet.” They both laughed. John had fun joking with Dave and his irony even if he didn’t quite get the sense of it. John felt a hand tap his other shoulder. He turned as saw Rose.

“You okay?” She asked.

“Yeah I’m fine. I guess I didn’t eat enough this morning.” He replied. Rose gave him a suspicious look before returning to her conversation with Jade.  John turned back to Dave as they spent the rest of the ride talking about summer activities.