Chapter 31 : Friends at home

“Excuse me. I need to go to my classes” mumbled Lindsey, trying to move through the thong of peoples who had gathered around BFHS’ entrance, parking and adjacent streets.

Thousands of peoples were there, shouting, screaming at each other, with vans of journalists here and there, and she knew perfectly why. Her little revelation to Jenny and the others. And with Shannon coming in the following day to get her brother in front of everyone, rumor had started to morph into certainty and now all those stupids were there. Don’t they have better things to do, she thought as she pushed some guys with handheld placards.

“Minors have no place dictating our lives!” roared one of them, a blond man with an impressive beer belly, indicating that he had some serious dedication to drinking and doing nothing much more.

“Shut your shit trap, you pig!” screamed a massive woman barely five meters away, with her own placards proclaiming how great it was to see Minors more respected in society.

“You don’t get to tell me what to do, woman! It’s not because no real man want your ugly ass and that you have to get fucked by those little shit stains that…”

Lindsey couldn’t hear much more, the screams, yells and general nuisance of the crowd drowning his voice as she made her way toward the school. She felt her breath becoming quicker and shallower as she found herself trapped among all those peoples. It was several times the entire population of Old Creek, and the pre-teen suddenly regretted ever leaving it behind. She wasn’t exactly great with crowds. Soldier on girl. If ‘Rando can endure it, so can you! Don’t show them any weakness, and you’ll be fine. If need be, clobber some moron.

“Lindsey! Hey, Lindsey, over here!” she heard over the noise.

Looking to her right, she saw Helana’s gigantic frame, easily dwarfing all the other MAJORS around, waving at her. On her wide shoulders sat both Shawna and Jenny, one on each side of her head, looking more than a little frightened. The way the crowd moved around the girls signaled the presence of Samantha, since peoples suddenly shook their head or winced in pain. Even from where she was, Lindsey could feel the Tier 3 influence, this all-powerful mind striking at the others to force a way through the throngs.

She hesitated only for a second. This was madness, with MAJORS smaller and taller than her everywhere, and she decided that banding together with the other gym rats and aces of the MMA team. It’s not weakness to admit that I won’t be able to do much in there. Being with them is only a smart move, it proves that I’m better suited to succeed, she decided. Even in such a heated situation, she was a MAJOR, and cooperation didn’t came easily to her kind. She suddenly stopped abruptly when a strong hand fell on her shoulder and yanked her backward.

“Hey! What the fuck!” she shouted without thinking.

“You think you can just push me around, little girl?” growled a white man, whose face was incredibly red, either because of anger, insolation or skin disease, she couldn’t tell.

“I’m just trying to reach my friends and go to school!” hissed Lindsey, removing his hand in a swift move of her shoulder.

“Like I give a fuck You pushed me, you say sorry, runt!”

That guy was around 3m (10f) tall. He probably weighted twice as much as herself. Still, Lindsey’s mind had gone red, and she curled her hands into a fist and struck. At a very basic level, she felt happier than most of the time. It was so damn good to let her pent up aggression free. Ever since they had moved to New Orleans, she had had to watch over Alejandro or wallow in self-pity. She hadn’t had Alaric to help her lose some steam. And that dude was just the thing she needed, she decided. It wasn’t as if anyone expected a gathering of angry or simply disagreeing MAJORS to not end in blows anyway.

The man’s abs turned out to be really hard and she hissed in pain, even as he barely twitched. A dangerous glint appeared in his eyes and Lindsey suspected that she was in for a beating.

“Poor shit! I’ll gut you!” roared the guy.

“No you won’t!” thundered Helena’s voice, attracting a lot of attention with how deep it was. “Touch her and you’re dead, little shit!”

Lindsey turned her gaze toward the gigantic teenager, as everyone near them. She couldn’t help but smile when the guy bleached visibly. He even rose his hands to show that he didn’t want to try and fight with the black colossus. Lindsey herself felt a little afraid of Helena. The Beaulac girl’s face was in mask of anger, and her bulging muscles seemed to grow bigger by the second, and she dwarfed all the other MAJORS around. Jenny and Shawna were screaming something, but the young Ferrand couldn’t hear them, their voice lacking the power of the titaness’.

“Thank you Helena” huffed Lindsey when she managed to reach the protective shadow of her friend.

“You’re welcome” replied the other teenager, just before wincing visibly. “Oww, Shawna! Don’t pull my hairs like that!”

“I’m sorry…” mumbled the poor helpless Minor. “But it’s all so terrifying! You’re so tall, and there is so much peoples and, and…”

She stopped, clearly unable to find her words, but also terribly agitated. In all honestly, Jennifer didn’t look any better, and Lindsey was willing to bet that being sit on a friend’s shoulder while hundreds of MAJORS were becoming more and more agitated around you was probably a far cry from what anyone would have deemed a good experience. And for poor little Shawna, with the traumas of her past having made her particularly prone to fear –or so assumed Lindsey- it was probably an atrocious experience.

“Want ma to clam har down a littla?” offered Sam, not turning her head away from the peoples around them, looking willing to bite.

“No, don’t worry, it’s fine, I’ll handle it” said Helena, quite calmly considering the situation. “Shawna, baby doll. You have no reason to be afraid while I’m here.”

“Yeah, very persuasive” huffed Lindsey with a smirk.

“Look and learn” replied Helena with a grin. “How are you feeling now, Shawnie cutie?”

“I’m all fine Madam Beaulac” said Shawna with a wide smile. “Because you’re here!”

Lindsey shuddered in disgust. The gigantic MAJOR had clearly bonded her cousin and used it to forcibly calm her down. It was something which was truly alien to Lindsey. She understood the cravings for the bond, of course – if she ever had a chance to secure one with Izzellah, she wouldn’t ever break it, not willingly. But using it to control a Minor’s emotions. It reeked of Mac Ferlanism, to her, and she found it useless, to boot.

Sure, being able to make sure that a young kid wouldn’t cross a busy street, or wander near the fire place, or would calm down while her parents were talking with their friends was a great power to have. But her Mama and Papa had told her that it was her duty to use it responsibly on older Minors. Once they were able to understand the basic rules of their safety, thus when they entered puberty and not earlier as the Ferrand had so bitterly learnt, a MAJOR shouldn’t have used the bond in such a way. It was disrespectful to both partners.

“Do you really need to go that far to calm her?” she simply asked, however, not wanting to insult the one who had avoided her a potentially terrible beating.

“Yeah. Honestly, it makes me feel so powerful, you’ll see when you’ll get the chance to do it. Plus it trains me for when my little Carlena will be born.”

“She’s fine?”

“Surprisingly, yes” intervened Jenny, huffing from her perch. “But I don’t think we will be much longer. I see several fight breaking up here and there…”

“It could ba a good idea to move than!” growled Samantha.

“To go where?” asked Jenny. “There is like hundreds of peoples between us and the school!”

“I’m pretty sure Sam and me can open a way to the school” declared Helena. “The problem is more the journalists than anything else. You two can’t see them” she explained to the two MAJOR girls on the ground, “but there is at least six news vans on the car park, and several others who are filming in the crowd.”

“I don’t saa why it would ba a bad thing” said Sam. “Thay won’t hurt us!”

“They’ll want to interview us” explained Helena, as if it was obvious. “They’re bound to recognize me, and then Shawna. We’re kind of public figures. I mean, she is, what with helping our uncle Douglas in his bid to keep the town hall, and everyone know I’m Shannon’s cousin so…”

“So you think they’ll try and get information out of you?” asked Lindsey.

“Pretty much yeah. And quite frankly, I don’t want to be made into a fool for running my mouth, and those guys are really great at making you do just that…”

“So what? We remain stuck here, hoping that everything calms down? We’ve got classes girls!” huffed Jennifer.

“If you want to go to school that badly, I can drop you and see how you fare” offered Helena with a wicked smile.

“I’ll pass! But seriously, we can’t just skip a whole day of class. My parents would kill me!”

“Mine too” affirmed Samantha’s somberly. “Mom’s a cop. I would navar haar the and of it!”

Lindsey sighed in frustration. It wasn’t what she had expected for the day. Because of her little slip up, things had gone crazy. And she couldn’t act too openly, because Izzellah was coming the very next day and she highly doubted that the Minor would like to be embroiled in such a madness. That whole circus had to be avoided if she could. But on the other hand, she had to go to classes, to learn, so she could help Alejandro at home and attain her goals, to become a great scientist.

“Attention everyone!” suddenly blared a voice in a megaphone. “This is Headmaster Gordon. Due to this uncalled for demonstrations at our doors, school will be closed today! Those students close enough to reach us are encouraged to do so, we will warn your families to make them known you’re safe. As for the other, I highly advise about going home and to call the school to make her know you’re safe. As for the thousands of peoples who thought that it was a great idea to prevent students to attend their school because of what two peoples feel about each others, you should be ashamed of yourselves!”

“That’s it?” asked Lindsey, bewildered. “Can’t he threaten them to call the police or something, to make them go away.”

“Ain’t no police got time for that” affirmed Samantha. “Mom got har hands full with far dire problams, raally.”

“It’s crazy! Back in Old Creek, nothing like that would happen!”

“But back in Old Creek, there is like, two hundred peoples top” laughed Jenny from her perch. “I mean, Wikipedia talks about a thousand of so peoples, but surely, it’s overestimating things right?”

“Not it’s not! We aren’t that numerous, sure, but at least it means that no one can be prevented to go to school, unlike here, apparently!” fumed Lindsey, feeling the need to defend her hometown.

“Sorry, I didn’t want to make you angry Lind” hastily said Jennifer, raising her hands to demonstrate her good will and almost tumbling down Helena when their friend shifted a little. “Hey, watch out!”

“If you think it’s a good idea to not hold onto anything when on far taller MAJOR, it’s not my fault. Plus, we got to move. There is no way we can reach the doors, so we have to go and catch a ride to our houses. Damn, it’ll take hours!”

“You could crash at mine” offered Lindsey on the spur. “It nearby, like, a ten minutes’ walk top, usually.”

“Really? You’re inviting me to your room? Naughty girl!” cackled Jenny, now holding tightly Helena’s neck.

“What!? No! I’m just saying that…”

“Don’t pay attantion to har” sighed Sam. “Sha’s in rut, and want you. Naxt yaar, it’ll ba some other naw girl!”

“You say it like it’s a bad thing! It’s my duty to help future champion unlock all their potential! Plus, you didn’t complained about it two y…”

“Moving out!” barked Samantha, her face darkening under her blond hair. “Show us the way!”

---------------------------------

“Well that’s… quite a house” simply said Jennifer, as she gawked at Lindsey’s not so humble abode.

“It’s not my fault” defended the youngest girl. “It’s Shannon, who hijacked our plans. We had a perfectly humble apartment set, my parents and me, but she decided that it would be better for Alejandro to be closer to our school.”

“I’m surprised that she didn’t enroll you into a school closer to her home” huffed Helena. “But to me, it’s seems to be a great house, so I don’t know why you’re complaining.”

“I’m not really complaining… I mean, we got a pool, and a cook, or we would have if ‘Rando let me call him here…”

“How can he prevent you for doing so?” blurted Shawna. “You’re a MAJOR!”

“And he is my older brother” explained Lindsey, calmly. “I get that you think that us MAJORS have to regulate your very lives, but my family believe that you Minors must have a say in family matters, at the very least.”

“But…”

“Shawna, please. When in Rome, do as the Romans. And when in the Ferrand’s house, respect their mores” sighed Helena.

“Thanks… But I would like you to not use the bond so… liberally, please Helena” asked Lindsey, when the Minor’s eyes became bleary and a strange smile spread on her face.

“Oh… Sorry, I didn’t know it made you uneasy… I’m just really used of seeing my cutie here being bonded to my Mom, and well, Mom likes to use the bond, a lot.”

“Don’t worry, it’s no big deal… But it’s just that back at home, I never had anyone doing this. I mean, Mama and Papa probably did so when Alejandro was younger, by I wasn’t born, or too young to remember it. And then, after the Incident well… Nobody wanted to bond with him, and I don’t think we could have.”

“Why? I gat that it was some tarrible avant and all, but come on! Bonding couldn’t have halpad?”

“No. Up until last year, the very idea of bonding was insufferable to him. He has closed his mind for ten years and even today… I don’t think he would like it. We had to hide from him that he would have to bond me to take the plane, otherwise he wouldn’t have moved to New Orleans.”

“Wow, I didn’t know” said Samantha. “I maan, ha’s got a kind of aloof vibe, sure, but baing so against it? Avaryone knows that minors are pulling tha “bond rape” card all the time as soon as thay are unhappy with a MAJOR but…”

“Here, I can tell you that it wasn’t faked… He spent months in the hospital, and he was utterly terrified of every MAJOR save our brother Alaric for at least two years. It was… horrible.”

“My God… I hadn’t realized how terrible it was… Suddenly, I’m really afraid for my Carlena…” said Helena, caressing her muscular belly.

“I can get that, I feel the same now” sighed Jenny. “And I can’t tell I care very much about minor’s right and the like. But speaking of your future baby, how is she?”

“Yas, please, tall us girly!”

“Well, if you want to know… I won’t be speaking of that outside!” laughed Helena? “Won’t you take us inside?”

“Sorry, sorry! I just was so confused, with everything at the school and all!”

Lindsey started fidgeting with her keys, trying to find the right ones. Usually, it was quite easy, but somehow, she felt very nervous. For the first time in her life, she bought peoples she hadn’t grown up with into her house. Sure, it was technically her brother’s, but she was the one spending most of the time here, and it made her the lady of the house. And she would be judged accordingly by her peers, and even little Shawna. Somehow, she didn’t want the Minor to have a bad opinion of her, it would affect her relation with ‘Rando, and Minors had to be kind and happy being together, she had decided.

“Well, Cousin Shannon sure didn’t hesitate on spending some money here!” whistled Helena as she took in the marbled entry-hall.

“Sure, sure, but let’s not try to wiggle our way out of the questions we want to know more about! How. Is. Your BABY!” yelled Jenny, jumping high enough to touch the bottom of Helena’s perky breasts.

“Dam it girl, contain yourself! My tatas aren’t for you, only Shawna cutie and a Minor who would fall in love with me and would like to play with them all the time, and help my Carlena grow up in a good way!”

“Wait, wait, wait!” interrupted Lindsey. “Your breasts are for Shawna? She’s your cousin!”

“That’s why I can have access to them” intervened the Minor, her voice meek and shy. “Otherwise, Madam Beaulac wouldn’t let me touch them.”

“But that’s…”

“Fuckad up, yeah. But don’t bothar too much about it. Tha Beaulac are crazy when it comes to Minors, avaryone knows that” sighed Samantha. “I mean, I falt how your Momma falt about Shawna, Halana, and clearly, you took aftar har!”

“Sam, you little bitch!” roared Helena, even as Shawna let out a squeal and ran away, her already dark skin becoming even darker.

“What! You got to learn to leave with it! You’re fuckad up, make it your strangth!”

“Yeah? Well what about you, who refuses to speak English well just so she could get her daddy’s back!” spat Helena.

Samantha bleached, and Lindsey felt her hairs rising, as if a lightning bolt had entered the house. Suddenly, Helena took a step back, holding her head, before gritting her teeth and in one swift movement, she kicked toward Sam’s head. Lindsey didn’t thought, she jumped and caught the powerful limb, while shoving Samantha to the ground. Jenny screamed and rushed toward the tangle of muscular girls, agitating her hands in despair.

“Stop that, the two of you!” roared Lindsey, hoping to make use of the stupor her action had created.

“She insulted my whole…” started Helena, her already powerful voice gaining some deeper quality as her anger rose with her words.

“I don’t fucking care!” shrieked Lindsey. “I won’t let you destroy this house, and I won’t let you bash each other, not when one of you is pregnant with a Minor, and another is the first MAJOR friend my older brother ever had!”

“So I shouldn’t make her pay for what she said!?” screamed Sammy, tears rolling on her cheeks. “She knows fucking well why I’m still doing my best to speak like I did when I was three years old! She knows perfectly what it means to me, and she, she…”

“It doesn’t mean that you’re allowed to level my house, not when my crush is coming over tomorrow!” shouted Lindsey. “I won’t be able to convince her to stay here if you ravage the house. And you’ve both hurt and frightened Shawna! Think about her, will you!?”

“How did I hurt her! I wasn’t the one who said that what we did together was fucked up!” complained Helena, who seemed to be cooling down, if only a little. “I have a special relationship with her, but that’s because she is a minor and I’m not! It’s natural, every MAJOR does that when you have one of those guys and gals in your family!”

“Would you do that to your daughter!?” spat Samantha, looking disgusted.

“Of course not! It’s not the same thing! Shawna is… she’s under a lot of pressure, okay? It helps her! I help her deal with it! Not every minor want to have to deal with those expectations that Shannon is putting on them! Some of them don’t want to have to endure the stress of what we call normal life, okay!?”

“I... That’s bullshit!” countered Lindsey. “There is no way that Minors could prefer to remain…”

“Remain what? Stupid? Illiterate? Idiotic!? Is that what you think normal minors are!?” hissed Helena.

“What!? No! It’s just that I can’t grasp how anyone, especially Minors could want to not learn more! They can become so much more than glorified pet this way!”

Lindsey felt her own anger rising. She didn’t like how Helena was implying that her brother wasn’t normal. But she did her best to keep her head cool. She had to make friends at school, and most of the time, both the Paolini and the Beaulac girl had been sympathetic and supportive. And Jenny really wanted to get into her pants. We all have to calm down, and talk… even if it runs against anything I am!

“So, hum, I see there is a lot of tension in the air and a lot of secrets coming out! How about some hot cocoa?” asked Jenny.