Chapter 12: Chapter 11

Even after an hour or so of exercise, I didn’t feel that tired- actually quite the opposite. As the session continued, I felt more energized. I don’t think this was another Ability- for some reason two felt like the correct number when I thought about how many I had. It is possible I’m also stronger than I was yesterday, but I didn’t have a reference from before I awakened.

 

After we properly finished, I was verbally dragged along by Charlotte being conversational into the showers- much to my discomfort. I don’t think my nervousness was too painfully obvious, but it did feel like she was trying to be more conservative for me. I was socially savvy enough to pick up on her playful smiles, and prayed that she didn’t misinterpret my shyness to something else- although now that I think about it, there's no way she could have known the real reason.

 

Taking up her offer, we went to a nearby cafe for brunch. We got to know each other a bit better- although my necessarily vague answers about my life made the conversation a bit one sided. That's not to say her answers weren’t vague as well, leading me still undecided on if she was from this world or not. What I did learn confirmed my initial assessment of her: she was a very genuine and kind girl, had always enjoyed the thought of learning how to fight as more of a sport, and liked learning. The food was nice but made me realize I needed to feed my other body as well.

 

Promises to come to the next day’s session were exchanged, and I was off to find a market to get food to bring back. In my wandering I got profoundly lost and decided to sit on a bench and rest while getting food with the body that actually needed it. As that was happening, I realized tracking where I was in my other body made me feel even more lost. 

 

At any point I could have asked someone for directions, but as I sat there I started to feel more and more people looking at me. Some would turn to their people and say something, some would linger for just too long- and all of it was making me steadily more uncomfortable as minutes passed. I could’ve sworn I wasn’t as noticed before getting my tail- something I actually tried to encourage by looking as uniform as possible. I tried to distract myself by attempting to hide my tail, but that only made me more aware of the people passing by.

 

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After successfully getting my other body back home without getting lost, I felt I had to go somewhere else. Like before I simply wandered, trying in vain to find a landmark I recognized. Every time I contemplated going to ask for help, I could feel a wave of adrenaline start to build up- stealing my resolve to get out of this mess on my own. With nothing better to do, I had my other body start to draw a map on some scrap paper so I wouldn’t wander in circles. After what felt like hours, I realized that the map was not helping, I had no experience with cartography and streets came out not to scale, some street names were repeated- it was a mess.

 

However, it was all good. I was starting to calm down from my earlier freak out. On a side note, I couldn't remember ever being that adverse to crowds before. Yes, there were times I’d get overwhelmed or tired of social stuff, but never borderline panicked. It had also come on out of nowhere after I had already been sitting there for at least a dozen minutes. Taking all this into account, my mind jumped to someone with an Ability trying to make me panic and get more lost for whatever reason.

 

Realizing this possibility, I tried to systematically choose routes that looped back on themself to see if anyone was following- but I think those only got me more lost. It was getting dark as I realized I should look for somewhere to stay instead of trying to get home- but I looked like I had ended up in the alleys of a lower-end residential area. After taking a look around, it almost seemed as if the area had been built specifically to be as confusing as possible. 

 

The Academy tried very hard to prevent the formation of slums through subsidized housing, help relocating out of the city, and a program to seek asylum from debt traps. While there were no obvious slums, I had heard that parts of the city had been influenced by the few gangs that did operate within it. In all likelihood I was in one of those areas- and if so, it was likely the confusing layout was to prevent the police and other outsiders from being able to effectively make their way through.

 

Just as I realized this, I ran into a cliche: a dead end and the sound of heavy footsteps coming into the ally behind me.

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