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How Not To Become Lunch: 30 - Make New Friends
“Ozzy! Look out!”
The boy froze, instantly grabbed his wand and looked frantically around his surroundings, searching for a threat.
“What is it?!” he asked urgently.
“Your shoe’s untied,” came the worried reply.
“…Zach!”
“What?!”
“You sounded like a predator was about to have me for lunch! Don’t scare me like that!”
“Sorry!” Zach replied. “It’s just, you wouldn’t believe the situations untied shoes have gotten me into…”
Ozzy couldn’t help but chuckle as he crouched down to tie a fresh knot.
“I didn’t scare you too much, did I?”
“I’ll tell you when my heart stops pounding,” Ozzy joked. “Just try not to pull that stuff around Jack, the last thing he needs is more stress.” He stood back up, motioning for them to continue down the hall.
“Why? What is this Jack kid like?” Zach asked.
“Well, you’ll find out in a minute when I introduce you, won’t you?” Ozzy teased.
“Yeah, but can’t you tell me anything? Why so cryptic?”
‘Cause if I tell you he’s a marked boy who hangs around with a hungry werewolf all day, I’m afraid you’ll have better sense than me and run for the hills, Ozzy thought. At the same time, though, he felt he should give Zach a little heads-up as to what he was walking into, it was only right.
“Well… he’s brave, that’s for sure. Very friendly; maybe even a little too friendly. And, well…”
The pair rounded a corner as Ozzy hesitated.
“He’s marked,” the boy admitted. “So a lot of times he ends up-” he stopped mid-sentence, his expression suddenly turning grim. “…sticking out of a frog’s mouth!” he finished.
“Oh… that’s too- Wait what?” Zach asked, confused.
Ozzy pointed urgently at the swelling gullet of a frog girl down the hall, in the middle of gulping down a frantically flailing human lunch. A lunch Ozzy had quickly recognized.
“That’s him! He’s about to be frog food! We have to help him!”
“Wait- really!?”
“Yes!”
*gulp*!
Ozzy looked over fearfully in the frog’s direction as another large portion of his friend’s body disappeared down her throat. When he looked back at Zach a moment later, the boy’s entire demeanor had changed. His wand was held out at the ready, and his expression was focused and stern.
“Gherden agus clungen nadir!”
Ozzy blinked and stared at Zach.
Was that a four-word spell!? And he just cast it with no preparation like it was nothing! First try and everything! What kind of spell even was that? I don’t remember what half those words mean!
“Ozzy! Go get him! That spell will keep her from hurting you, but it won’t keep her from swallowing.”
Ozzy snapped back to reality, looking back toward Jack and his assailant. The frog girl seemed to have her arms pinned to her sides and her feet stuck to the floor, Jack’s flailing body causing the only sizable movements, while also creating little wiggling bulges in her hungry gullet.
Following Zach’s command, Ozzy sprinted toward the sight. The amphibian didn’t- or rather, couldn’t- make any move to stop him as he wrapped his arms around Jack’s legs and started to pull.
“Don’t worry, Jack! I’ve got you!” he called, struggling against the power of the predator’s eager maw. He leaned back with all his weight and hauled, and then all at once he felt his friend’s body slip free and come tumbling out on top of him.
“Agh!” Ozzy yelled, suddenly sandwiched between the hard floor and a severely disoriented Jack, who was unintentionally plastering him in second-hand slime. Ozzy was busy scrambling to get out of the unfavorable position when the frog girl practically snarled.
“Oh no you don’t!” she yelled angrily.
Ozzy caught a glimpse of her face- or more accurately her mouth- as it opened wide and her flexible tongue came shooting out in his direction, just before one of Jack’s legs blocked his view.
“Gherden!” Zach cast.
When Ozzy finally got Jack off of him, he looked to see that the amphibian’s tongue was now stuck against her chest, much like her arms were stuck to her sides.
“You little-!” she seethed, though the words were hardly recognizable with her tongue the way it was. She stepped toward them angrily, now free from the floor, but she had no free appendage with which to grab them.
“Come on!” Ozzy yelled, grabbing Jack and pulling him to his feet as he himself scrambled to flee. They ran down the hall together, Ozzy half-carrying his half-conscious friend, back toward Zach and his outstretched wand, with the predator close behind them.
“Berillus!” Zach called as they passed him.
When Ozzy turned around, he saw a soft, dazzling light radiating from the tip of the other boy’s wand. The frog girl had stopped in her tracks, staring at the boy angrily, but warily.
“…Just. Go.” Zach advised her.
The hungry amphibian found that she could move freely again. She reeled in her tongue and flexed her arms testingly, all while keeping a burning glare fixed on Zach. But after a few tense moments, her expression softened just slightly. She turned around without another word, grumbling something to herself under her breath, and stormed off down the hall with her decidedly empty belly.
“That was amazing!” Ozzy exclaimed, shifting to better support Jack’s weight as the rescued boy continued to recover from his daze.
“Thanks,” Zach replied simply with a little smile.
“No, seriously! That was some of the best spell casting I’ve ever seen! A four-word spell from someone our age? Out of nowhere like that? No wonder you’re in that class! You’re incredible! And what even was that last spell!? Were you gonna zap her with lightning or something?”
“Oh, no!” he admitted putting up a hand as if to hold back the other boy’s excitement. He glanced toward where the frog girl had gone to make sure she was out of earshot “‘Berillus’ is just a light spell,” he admitted quietly.
“You stared down a predator with a bluff!?” asked Ozzy, awestruck.
“Well, sort of. I could have backed it up with something if I had to, but that’s usually all it takes to scare them off.” He spoke with a bluntness that implied quite a bit of experience.
“You. Are. Awesome,” Ozzy complimented, “Seriously.” If he’s this cool around predators, maybe hanging out with Jack won’t be a problem after all.
“Yeah, but only with magic,” Zach replied, a suppressed note of frustration in his voice. “Without this wand I can barely even- OOF!”
“Zach!”
“Ugh …I’m fine. I’m fine.”
Zach picked himself up off the floor, and both kids looked down and immediately noticed one of his shoes. It was untied.
Ozzy couldn’t help but laugh. How did he manage to trip? We weren’t even walking!?
“See what I mean?” he asked rhetorically, as he bent down to tie a new knot and hide the embarrassment on his face. Ozzy took hold of himself; the last thing he wanted to do was ridicule his new friend.
“Well, anyone who can do magic like you is still pretty cool in my book,” he said, “even if you can’t tie your shoes.”
Zach smiled. The encouragement seemed so genuine, even with the friendly teasing.
“…Ozzy?” Jack murmured, finally coming to.
“Yeah Jack, it’s me. You’re alright.”
“Ugh… How was the nurse?”
“‘Nurse’? What is he talking about?” Zach asked, standing back up.
“Almost getting eaten like that is pretty disorienting,” Ozzy explained with experience in his voice.
“…So, he’s marked, you said?” Zach asked, understanding that this seemed to be a frequent occurrence.
“Yeah…”
“… Guess he’s lucky to have a friend like you, huh? Must be hard…”
“Never gets easier…” Jack said, starting to become somewhat sequitur. “Who’s this?” he mumbled.
“Oh. Jack, this is Zach, he’s in my new advanced magic class.”
…
“Really, you should’ve seen him, Jack! He was like a master wizard!” Ozzy praised.
“Well, I was a little busy at the time,” Jack replied.
“I told you, it was no big deal,” Zach insisted.
“Well Zach, I kinda have to side with Ozzy on this one. You did literally save my life.”
“Yeah, I know, but…”
“I think the words you’re looking for,” Ozzy interjected, “are ‘You’re welcome Jack. Now you can enjoy eating your lunch instead of being a lunch’.”
They all laughed at the joke, the sound blending in quite naturally with all the other conversations of the cafeteria.
“Seriously, thanks for that,” Jack said.
“You’re welcome,” Zach replied, taking Ozzy’s advice (though he left out the last bit).
There was a brief pause as they each took another bite of their respective meals.
“So, advanced magic class, huh?” Jack asked. “I guess that explains why I didn’t see you in our old class, but I kinda wish you’d told me earlier.”
“I tried, but I couldn’t find you. You don’t exactly spend a lot of time hanging around the halls.”
He did have a point. Jack often rushed to the safety of his next desk.
“Speaking of, what were you doing out in the halls by yourself anyway?” Ozzy asked.
“Looking for you,” Jack answered.
“Oh… sorry dude,” Ozzy replied guiltily.
“It’s not your fault, I was just worried. Besides, it was my idea to walk right up to that frog girl.”
“You did what?” Zach asked. “Why? You do know that most frogs will swallow you in a single gulp, right?”
“Really?” Ozzy asked. “Geeze, I guess you were lucky today. Don’t think I would’ve noticed you if you were already stuffed inside.”
“Sure didn’t feel lucky.” Jack replied. “She took her time cause she was-” he shuttered, “tasting me.”
“Oh…” Ozzy replied with a hint of disgust.
“Yeah, this mark doesn’t usually go out of its way to give me the opportunity to be rescued…” he said. “…Or meet cute girls, but I guess there’s an exception for everything,” he added as an afterthought.
“Oh?” Ozzy asked suggestively.
“Oh- um-” Jack immediately regretted opening his mouth. “I went to this place over the weekend with a bunch of other marked kids. There was just this girl there, that’s all.”
“A ‘cute’ girl?” Ozzy repeated.
“Yeah- I guess- I mean, Ruby was-”
“‘Ruby’?”
“Come on Ozzy, stop teasing him,” Zach butted in.
“Oh, fine!” Ozzy replied in an exaggerated humph.
“Saved my life again,” Jack joked, leading to another group chuckle.
“So wait, why did you walk right up to that frog?”
“Oh, I thought she was-”
“HEY!” came a feminine voice, cutting through the chatter of the lunchroom.
“…Lily,” Jack finished, as all three of them turned to see none other than the girl herself.
Luckily, the angry-sounding amphibian wasn’t talking to any of them, but she was pointing rather conspicuously at a pair of boys a couple tables away. And that wasn’t the only conspicuous thing about her.
“There you are, you little twerp! Spill a drink on my dress!? You think you’re gonna get away with that!?” There was, in fact, a rather large stain across her chest.
“No! Lily- please, it was an accident!” one of the boys pleaded. He’d jumped out of his seat, but found himself pinned by her eyes, afraid that if he ran she would only chase him down. He was probably right, not that it mattered.
“Well, you’re gonna start paying me back by saving me lunch money!” she yelled furiously, and then out shot her tongue, flying like a sticky bullet.
“No- Mpf!”
The tongue struck him right in the face and molded itself around his head, grabbing a tight hold. But just as it started to reel him in, the other boy- presumably his friend- jumped up and grabbed hold of his waist.
Lily was fuming, putting both hands around her lasso of a tongue and pulling, but being the petite little predator she was, she was having a bit of trouble overpowering two humans her own age. She yelled incomprehensible, garbled insults around her outstretched appendage, rage in her eyes.
“Don’t worry babe, I’ll help you with that little fly,” came a much gruffer voice. Of course, Lily was never too far from her boyfriend when she could help it.
A series of rapid thuds signaled the large bear’s arrival on the scene; not that he hadn’t been there the whole time, but the angry girl had been putting on such a spectacle that somehow even a huge kid like Grizz had managed to blend into the background. Now, however, he was charging toward the two terrified boys like a furry brick wall on a mission.
The boy in the grasp of Lily’s tongue never saw it coming, but the other screamed as Grizz arrived and lifted them both off the ground, one in each hand, and casually removed the troublesome one from his girlfriend’s designated lunch.
As soon as he let go, Lily’s tongue did its thing, hauling the unfortunate kid through the air directly into her gaping mouth. He flew straight inside with a wet splat and a slurp, her amphibian maw stretching to comedic proportions- or at least it might have been comedic if not for the muffled cries of the human inside, and the frantic struggling that showed clearly through her stuffed cheeks.
*GULP*!
She swallowed rather emphatically, even for a frog. And just as Zach had mentioned a moment ago, a single, enormous bulge sunk quickly down her neck, stretching out her stained clothes, and came to settle firmly in her waiting belly.
“There! Now be a good lunch and digest! Then maybe I’ll accept your apology,” she said, giving her wriggling belly a firm slap. “Maybe you’ll distract people from the stain you made while you’re at it,” she added more quietly.
“With a belly like that, you’ll look hot no matter what you’re wearing,” Grizz said as he walked back over to her, still holding the other boy in one hand.
“Aw, thanks honey bear,” she replied. Predators were always nicer with full bellies. “And you know, it was nice of him to be my lunch and bring a spare. And, well, what kind of a girlfriend would I be if I didn’t offer to share with my boo.”
“Hehe, don’t mind if I do,” Grizz said.
The boy in his grasp began to flail harder and tried to plead, but there wasn’t much he could do against a predator Grizz’s size. As usual, the bear reached over and grabbed hold of the child’s pants.
“No no no!”
*rrrrip*
A tiny chorus of laughter sounded from the onlookers. But, of course, they didn’t have much to look at for long. Grizz quickly shoved the boy’s head into his toothy maw and began to swallow with the casual speed that one might gulp down any old lunch.
*GULP* *GULP* *GULP* *GULP* … *UURPP*!
“Ah… that hit the spot. Thanks babe.”
“My pleasure~” she reached out and put a hand gently on his now bulging, wriggling belly, and at the same time, she took one of his hands and gently placed it on hers. *guuurgle* went the two happy stomachs in unison, as both set about digesting their new meals.
As they walked off to find some empty seats, the clatter and chatter of the lunchroom gradually returned to normal levels.
“…Man, looks like you’re lucky you didn’t run into Lily,” Ozzy said.
“Um, isn’t it sort of a bad idea for you to go looking for frog girls around lunch time?” Zach asked. “Especially one with a giant, angry, brutish bear boyfriend who can eat two kids in a sitting?”
“Oh, Grizz isn’t that bad once you get to know him- Wait, ‘giant, angry, brutish bear’?... Major Ursa!?”
“Huh?” Ozzy asked, looking from Jack to Zach, who suddenly seemed rather embarrassed.
“Oh, um… yeah,” Zach admitted.
“What?” went Ozzy.
“‘Giant, angry, brutish bear’,” Jack repeated. “It’s how they always describe Major Ursa in the Hu-Man comic. You like comics too, Zach?” Jack was clearly very excited.
“Oh, well, sort of. It’s just that one, really.”
“Wait-wait-wait,” Ozzy interjected, “First off: Jack, you figured out he likes a comic just from that one line?! And second: what exactly is a ‘human comic’?”
“Well, yeah, I mean who uses the word ‘brutish’? And it’s not ‘a human comic’, it’s ‘Hu-Man’, ‘Hu-Man, The Super-Powered Human’. By day, he’s Hubert Mansley, just an ordinary guy, but by night he’s the super-powered, predator-defying Hu-Man!”
…Ozzy burst out laughing.
“Hey, come on!” Jack scolded, “You’re embarrassing him!”
“I think you did that for him!” Ozzy hooted.
“It’s not like I don’t know it’s cheesy!” Zach defended. “It’s just, inspiring, okay?”
“Sorry! Sorry!” Ozzy replied, trying to get a hold of himself again.
“Well, I get what you mean,” Jack said. “I think I actually have the latest issue of that one back at my place. I could bring it if you don’t already have one.”
“Oh-” Zach paused to steel himself against Ozzy’s stifled chuckles. “Yeah, that would be nice, thanks.”
“It’s the least I could do after you saved me!” Jack replied. “I guess I just have to be careful getting it here. The last time I brought a comic somewhere my best friend-…’s dog, ate it.”
Jack caught himself at the end of that sentence, having a similar thought to Ozzy’s from a few minutes earlier.
Maybe my first mention of Fiona shouldn’t be the fact that she had my arm down her throat and digested my comic, he thought. But I guess I should say something. I don’t want him to freak out when she comes to sit with us again.
“By the way, there’s probably something I should tell you about- or, I guess, someone.”
“Oh? Who?”
“We’ve been friends for a really long time,” Jack stressed. “Ever since we were little.”
“That’s nice- oh, I think Ozzy mentioned something about her, she helps keep you safe from predators, right?”
“Yeah, I’d be long gone if she wasn’t around.”
“Sounds like she must be a nice person, if she’s willing to risk getting eaten for you all the time.”
“Well, she is nice, and she definitely does a lot for me, but it’s not really much of a risk…”
“Is she that good a mage?”
“No, she’s… a werewolf.”
Zach looked instantly surprised and confused. He glanced at Ozzy, thinking for a moment that this might be some sort of joke and he’d be on the verge of laughter, but Ozzy looked quite serious, even nodding to reinforce the statement.
“You said she’s a werewolf?”
Jack nodded.
“And you hang out with her a lot?”
Jack nodded.
“And she actually keeps you from being eaten?”
“She’s pulled me out of more mouths at this point than I can count,” Jack said, half as an awkward admission and half as a firm testimonial.
Zach stared at him in silence for a few moments.
Well, I can’t blame him if he decides I’m too dangerous to hang out with…
“…That’s actually pretty cool,” Zach remarked. “And she doesn’t try to eat you even though you’re marked?”
“Nope, we’ve had sleepovers and everything.”
“Huh. Well, where is she?”
“Wait,” Ozzy interjected, “you want to meet her? You’re not- erm, I don’t know… scared or anything?” He realized halfway through the sentence that he was quite obviously doing a bit of self-projecting, and slumped down rather embarrassed in his seat.
“Well, most predators don’t cause me too much trouble,” Zach said a bit bashfully, trying to refer to his magical skill in the least boastful way possible. “And Fiona sounds really nice for a pred. I mean, if she was like some big bad wolf- like Conri from advanced predator class or something- then maybe I’d be a bit worried.”
Zach looked back to Jack, whose relieved face had suddenly gotten a bit more tense.
“What?”
“Um, well, that’s her.” Jack pointed across the lunchroom to the table where sat a collection of students from the advanced predator class, among which were Fiona and, sitting right next to her, Arthur Conri.
Now it was Zach’s turn to get a bit tense.
“Your friend is in the advanced pred class?” he asked rather uncomfortably.
“Yeah…” Jack admitted, “she just got in last week.”
“You, um, you know most of them specialize in hunting humans, right? Especially mages.”
“Uh, I guess…”
“And the reason there was a free spot for Ozzy to take in advanced magic, is because Conri managed to catch one of the old students during A.P.E.”
That last statement made Ozzy particularly nervous, and Zach wasn’t looking too relaxed either. He definitely didn’t look in the mood to walk over to the advanced pred table and introduce himself, and besides, Fiona did look rather busy chatting with everyone…
“Well…” Jack said, “you shouldn’t have to worry about her, at least. I’ll tell her about you the next time we hang out. She says my friends aren’t part of her diet, and saving my life means you definitely qualify. So that’s one less advanced pred you have to worry about, right?”
“Really?”
“Of course! Just look at Ozzy, he’s been sitting with us for days and she hasn’t touched him.”
Ozzy did still look a bit uncomfortable, but he nodded positively. The werewolf did, admittedly, scare him a bit, but she hadn’t ever actually done anything to him. She hadn’t even joked about eating him, something he’d probably be prone to do in her shoes- er- paws.
“Thanks,” Zach said, letting out his breath.
“Don’t mention it,” Jack replied with a smile, “Now, I have a very important question for you: what’s your favorite Hu-Man issue?”