Bully (parts 7 & 8)

Seven: Flashback

IT HAD TO BE THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT WHEN I HEARD SAIL RISE. I don’t know how I ended up sharing the tent with Sail. The boys considered it a privilege, like I had become his right-hand-man. “River!” Sail hissed. “Come on.” He gestured for me to get up.

I wasn’t sure if the nightly hightide had happened already or not. The tent was built with the same orb tech that protected Nweatish buildings. The sand was cold under my feet. My head hurt from drinking too much. I could tell Sail was feeling it too as he walked a few steps from the tent kinda shakily. The bioluminescence of the coral forest made the setting seem eery. Sail stopped before a clump of seaweed that gently swayed from side to side as if it were underwater. I could see a steady stream of water arching from his waist to the bush. “Oh! Sorry.”

Sail turned, wicked smile on his face. “It’s all good bro. I had to pee. You gotta piss too?”

“Not really…”

“You ever try to take a piss with a hard-on?”

“No.”

“Come here,” Sail waved me over with his free hand. I felt uncomfortable. Something I was quickly learning was to stay away from any situation that could potentially be considered “gay.” Just a few months ago, stuff like that didn’t matter. Now, it was what could make or break you, as a boy.

“Have you ever jerked off before?” Sail asked me. I could feel that tugging in my groin. I grew even more nervous.

“No.”

“Come here. I’ll show you how to do it.” Sail brandished himself. He was done peeing, but still very erect. “You go like this.” Sail slid his hand up and down. “Try it.”

I don’t think I ever felt more uncomfortable, but I wasn’t going to deny Sail. Unless, this was some sort of test. Was he going to call me gay once I pull my dick out? Wasn’t he already gay because his was out, in the open, showing it off to me!? I was so confused that my sweaty hands fumbled with my pants’ buttons. I was already rising to the occasion when I popped out from the confines of the button-fly.

“Try it,” Sail said again, wicked smile and all. “It feels amazing!” And it did.

We stood there for a few minutes, stroking, until Sail said, “Let me try something. Give me your hand.” He snatched my hand before I could take it back and he placed it on himself. “Do it.” He commanded. I stroked him. I watched as his eyes closed. He let out a breathy sigh, a sigh of pleasure. “Don’t stop.” I was both more excited than I’d ever been, but I also wanted to throw up. There were so many emotions warring inside me. But I did my best to ignore them and focused on Sail’s hand on my penis. What he was doing there.

Until, suddenly, I felt the excitement spilling over me! I was going to cum! I felt Sail bucking underneath my grip as well. He let out a breathy grunt. I was afraid he’d wake the others! But I didn’t stop. I didn’t stop until I was finished and Sail stopped throbbing in my hand. He half-smiled and giggled. He had become overly sensitive in the end, he removed my hand from himself. “You’re pretty good,” he smiled at me.

I wiped my hand on my pants and we crawled back into the tent. We never spoke another word about it.

Eight

PLANETARY SCIENCES WAS OVER. The gym was on the other side of the school, downstairs. Gym used to be one of my favorite classes. I had it with Sail, Harp, Phish and the others, so it was just like all of us hanging out after school. Now, it was purgatory.

I walked briskly towards the gymnasium, trying to ignore every other person I walked by. I was walking so fast for two reasons. One: Was that the gym was so far and we only had a few minutes in between classes. Two: If I could get to the locker room and change before Sail got there, I would be safe. He wouldn’t have the opportunity to pick on me when I was most vulnerable. Let’s face it, we are all a little vulnerable in our underwear.

I ducked down a faculty stairwell, hoping there were no teachers in there. It was a shortcut, and it also kept me away from other students. I didn’t need anybody’s shit today. I felt like my name was on everybody’s tongue. Trench had sit with me on the bus. We had talked. Stuff like this didn’t go stagnant in school — it spread like wildfire.

The coast had been clear and I slipped into a back hallway where there were private bathrooms that most boys used to feel up the shirts of their “girlfriends.” No one was in the hallway. I walked towards the back entrance to the boys’ locker room. I let the door close behind me.

I scanned the gloom. There were benches laid out in a pattern with hallways of lockers. A few students were already there in various levels of undress. It smelled faintly of urine and dirty feet, and seaman, though I couldn’t explain that one. Someone was in the showers. No one ever showered after gym, except that Guppy kid who changed his underwear after class. No one was brave enough to get that naked and risk being called gay. Except maybe Toad.

I went to my locker, desperately trying to get the combination into the lock as fast as I could. If I could get changed before Sail got here and out into the gym I was safe. Sail wouldn’t try anything in front of the gym teacher. But here, alone, with nothing but other silent spectators. I was in trouble. No one would defend me and risk the wrath of Sail and his henchfish.

I glanced across the gloom. It was dangerous to have wondering eyes in the boys’ locker room. It was “guy code” to keep your eyes on your own junk. Comparing sizes and whipping each other with wet towels all while naked was something that only happened in movies. There were two other students hastily changing. Pulling up their shorts over their underwear. They were probably just as nervous as I was. Sail was an equal opportunity predator. The only people safe were his friends. And even they would probably suffer a jib or two.

It was then that I realized that Trench Gripe was in my gym class. I honestly hadn’t noticed that he was there! Maybe he slipped out with the other people that hated gym and went to the aerobics room. His long silver hair hung like curtains over his naked chest. He was spindly with very little muscle definition — though the promise that if he worked out he could be pretty buff was there. When Trench almost met my eyes, I snapped my attention back to myself.

I had my shirt off and my fishscale trousers almost to my ankles when I heard, “Hey River! I got something for ya.” I made the mistake of looking. It was instinctual. Sail stood there with a skimpy set of underwear on, kind of like the ones Toad liked to wear. He was swinging his hips so that his junk moved from side to side. “Want a taste — faggot?”

I knew I was doomed because I had looked. I was petrified.

Before the summer, if Sail was talking to me like this I would have assumed that he was joking and it was just some prologue to a play-wrestling interlude that released some of our adolescent aggression. I mean, our bodies were starting to make us feel things, telling us to feel things that didn’t make any sense to our child-self. Just like that night camping. The night that ruined it all.

Now — looking into the true fury in his eyes, I knew he was waiting for an answer or he was going to hit me! “N—no,” I stammered. How quickly my exbestfriend was able to cow me.

With my peripherals I was desperately trying to find someone, anyone, that I thought might save me. The locker room wasn’t exactly populated. It never was when Sail and his henchfish were about. Where had Trench gone? Guppy? I didn’t hear the shower anymore. Calling for the gym teacher would only offer me physical abuse faster than if I bared through the fear and tried to talk my way out of it.

“What do you mean faggot, I see you looking! Would you like a taste?”

“No I‘m not — looking,” I squealed.

“So you wanna see it?” Sail sneered. He pressed his hips out, accentuating his package. “Here, get a close up.” Sail laughed. I pulled my pants up. Sail must have given Phish and Toad some sort of gesture because they advanced on me. I really didn’t think they were going to touch me. They’d get in trouble. We were in school! The gym teacher was just on the other side of the wall. But they did touch me. They grabbed me and I hardly put up a fight. This was really happening. This wasn’t play fighting. “Take a look,” Sail’s shit-eating grin was from ear to ear.

I didn’t want to say out loud that I’d already seen it. …And perhaps that’s the reason that I was here — in Phish’s headlock with Sail’s junk too close to my face! “I think he wants to see it,” Sail said to Phish. “Turn around dweebs!” He snapped at his henchfish. I could hear and see dirty bare feet shuffle as they all turned around. I imagine that Phish closed his eyes.

And to my horrified surprise, Sail pulled himself out from the cover of the thin fabric of his underwear! I didn’t know what to do other than cry an unintelligible, “No!”

“You like that?” Sail asked me. It was swinging too close to my face. “Make it hard.”

“Dude! What are you doing?” Phish asked unsurely. His face nearly buried in my arm, but he never loosened his grip.

“Shut up dweeb! Just hold him. I’m going to give little River what he’s always wanted.” Sail smiled that smile he always got when he was about to do something truly outrageous. Like that time he teased a shark while we were all riding around on squidback. We all told him not to do it. The shark woke and chased after them, it ate Sail’s squid, but he was able to get away unscathed.

He was fully hard now.

“Sail…No,” I said weakly. He pressed the tip along my lips. I could feel myself want to throw up or thrash Phish’s arms off of me.

“Sail,” Phish said again.

“I said hold him!” Sail pressed his tip against my lips harder. I was crying now. He parted my lips. I was going to bite him. It’d be the last thing I’d ever do — but I was going to bite him!

“Sail, you’re not serious,” Harpoon said.

“Sail,” Phish said again. I could feel his grip on my head loosen. Phish didn’t agree with what Sail was doing. It wasn’t often that anyone stood up against Sail.

“Just hold him fucker!” Sail put his hands on the back of my head. This was it!

“Let. Him. Go!” In the momentary distraction, Phish dropped his grip. Only Sail and his henchfish were in the locker room now. …And Trench.

“What did you say punk?” Sail snapped.

“I said leave him alone.” Trench said again. His voice didn’t waver like mine would have. He was defiant. Tears were streaming down my cheeks, but I wasn’t openly sobbing. Boys don’t sob. I was thankful for Trench — again. The moment seemed to hang in the air like a thousand years.

“What you gonna do about it, Stench?” Sail asked, using Trench’s unoriginal derogatory nickname. He’d already placed himself safely back in his underwear. What an awkward fight that would have been. Phish and the rest were standing at Sail’s flanks. They were ready for a fight.

“You don’t want to do this. Just leave.” Trench said. He spoke so evenly.

Sail laughed, “Twerp, I’ll kick your ass with one hand over my crotch.” As he said it, he cupped his balls with his left hand. He shook it a little in my direction. “I guess you want a piece of this too, huh Trench. I guess I can’t blame you. You going to get jealous River, if I give him a taste too? Or can you share?” It happened so fast. It was so unexpected! Sail slapped me. It was open handed and fast and hard!

Trench moved like a blur. I swear I couldn’t even see him move! The only way I knew where he was in the locker room was by the chalky paleness of his skin in the dim locker room lighting. I wiped dried tears from my eyes. Sail was on his back screaming. Trench was straddling him. I was staring at his bare back — and there were muscles, impossible muscles, writhing and moving there. His spine was so close to the surface, he was so thin. Running down the upper-half of his back, along the spine, was a red fin-like appendage that seemed to rip through the seam of his back. Slowly, each squirming muscle breeched Trench’s flesh and coiled around his body, each poised towards Sail. They were tentacles.

<Trench is a finly!?>

“What the fuck!” Phish gasped.

The henchfish stepped back in horror! Some yelled. I didn’t know why, until my brain caught up with what I was seeing. Black-violet tentacles writhed in and out of view from the sides of Trench’s back. He had arms like the Abyss! The tentacles coiled and writhed, each sporting a ling of suction cups and hooks glinting in the gloom of the boys’ locker room.

“He’s eating him!”

Trench’s tentacles were wrapped around Sail’s neck and some curled underneath and around his shoulders and armpits. “Damn water-breather!” Sail hissed. He gulped and it sounded like he was trying to breathe through blood clotting in his throat.

“Trench, let him go!” I shouted. He was going to kill him!

“Sail!” The henchfish were screaming.

“Go get coach!”

Toad tried to escape, but a tentacle shot out, clearly coming from somewhere on Trench’s person! It wrapped around Toad’s ankle. It easily yanked Toad back, keeping him in the locker room. Toad was screaming like a little girl now.

Sail smiled. “So this is meant to be our showdown?” Sail’s back bucked like he was being exorcized! There was a deafening popping sound, like bones snapping. I was petrified. Harpoon had his hands on my shoulder. He was partially trying to drag me out of the locker room.

There was a sound similar to paper ripping — but it was skin. Sail’s chest unzipped open like it were a vest he was taking off. A long red slimy tongue shot out and wound left and right, almost similar to Trench’s tentacles. A wyrm, the size of Sail’s body, emerged from his chest cavity. What was left of Sail was bloody, limp, and deflated. I watched in horror.

The wyrm was pale white, almost translucent. Its face was beaked and its neck armored. It opened its mouth like a five-petaled flower and hissed at Trench. Trench was unfazed by what had just occurred. I was sure that if I screamed, I wouldn’t stop screaming until my voice was hoarse. Trench just stood, brandishing his many tentacles that came from his back and his stomach. He had a particularly thick tentacle that ended in a blade of sorts that grew from the end of his spine like a tail.

Trench used this tail to slice through one of the sink’s tubing. Water sprayed directly on the wyrm, which writhed and screamed in pain. Quickly, the white grub-like monster dove into the floor, as if it were incorporeal. The sink was flooding the floor. Sail’s blood was mixing with it all, his body looking like a popped balloon with his rib cage sticking up.

I heard the door to the gym open and close. Trench looked back at me. His eyes were definitely glowing! “What’s going on in here!?” The gym teacher asked before he came around the corner. He stepped in water. Shock crossed his face. Harpoon and I scrambled out of the boys’ locker room like our lives depended on it.

Trench was nowhere to be found.