by Bryan Young
Tye: Oh hey! Yeah it was pretty dope! Maybe next time I’ll take you there
Gemma: Ik you guys made it out ok but I don’t think I’ll be going anytime soon lol. Especially with what happened on the news
Tye: What happened on the news?
Gemma: You didn’t hear? There was like a million calls to the police by people that lived near the hills. Everyone claimed they saw some crazy stuff.
Gemma: You were there so I was worried something happened. What did you see??
The message caught Tye off guard. Though he had fully expected people to ask him about the hills, he hadn’t quite decided what his response should be, given the nature of the events that had taken place. Should he be truthful? Would people believe the truth? If they did believe it, how far would word spread? If word spread, would that in turn put him, his friends, and his family in danger?
Tye: Nothing. We weren’t there all that late. What did you hear people saw?
Gemma: Well, apparently there were a lot of calls about a bright blue light and a crazy loud buzzing sound
Gemma: That and people claimed to see five lights shoot up into the sky. They said one of them was way bigger than the others. Idk.
Tye looked at his phone perplexed. Excluding the one that had attacked him, he was certain he had only seen four pods leave the crater as he scrambled to escape the hills. He did a quick search online and found that the local residents had indeed reported five bright lights in the sky. A cold sweat ran down his brow. He bit his lip in fear of what that fifth larger object could be. He hoped he had miscounted the smaller pods or that the last object was simply there to hold the pods together, but he feared that it somehow had a much more sinister purpose.
Tye thanked Gemma for the info and told her he’d call her soon. As he made his way downtown and towards the basketball courts, he received another frantic text from Brodie, urging him to hurry. Tye rolled his eyes, reasoning that whatever was making Brodie so desperate to play basketball could wait. He took a familiar shortcut through some neighboring houses and casually walked to the basketball courts listening to Phony Ppl and singing softly to himself.
On the courts, he noticed Brodie waving his arms and yelling at Jax, Nathan, and Tony. “I’m telling you, bro! I can dunk!” he shouted as Tye casually approached the group. Brodie turned to Tye and continued, “Tye! Tell these dudes wassup! I can dunk, right?!”
Tye raised an eyebrow and scoffed, “You can dunk? Since when? I didn’t even know you could grab the rim with your baby hands.”
“Bro!” Brodie shot back. “See! Y’all playin’ wit me too much!”
Brodie turned around to grab the basketball lying idly beside him and proposed that they play a game so he could show off his athletic “talents.”
“Was this your emergency, Brodie? Whether or not you could dunk?” Tye asked, unamused.
“Nah, man. I said ‘SOS’ because I didn’t want to wait for you to show up at half past 5. We all know you prolly woulda slept till then if it were up to you.”
“I think he was also worried about you waking up at all.” Tony commented. “For all we knew, you could’ve turned into a pile of goop from that thing yesterday. You feeling alright man? Grow any extra limbs?”
Tye chuckled. “Like I said yesterday, I’m fine. I don’t really wanna talk about it. Since I’m here though, if you’re tryna play some ball then let’s get it. What are we playing to?”
“First to 7?” Brodie suggested.
“Sounds good. But when you lose, no bitching for the rest of the week,” Tye replied with a smile.
Due to the fact that he had always declined the invitation to play, Brodie turned towards Tony and gestured for him to get off the court so that they could have an even two-on-two game with Jax and him on one team against Tye and Nathan. He set up himself at the top of the key and checked up the ball with Tye. The game officially began and Brodie spotted Jax posting up the smaller Nathan. He threw a crisp bounce pass from between Tye’s legs to Jax in the key, where he threw an awkward layup that bounced around a few times in the hoop before going in.
“That’s wassup boy!” Brodie shouted, throwing his hands up before walking over to Jax and giving him a high five. “Aye! Winners! We take the ball back up the top!”
Tye looked at Nathan who, not the athletic type to begin with, shrugged. Tye groaned and shifted his attention to Brodie once again. He checked up the ball again and Brodie threw another clean pass to Jax and took off towards the corner, where he received a pass back and shot a three over the recovering Tye with conviction, swishing the ball and holding a pose afterwards.
“WOOOOO DON’T TOUCH ME, I’M HOT. CALL ME STEPH. CALL ME KLAY. CALL ME RAY. JUST WHATEVER YOU SAY?! KNOW THAT YOU NOT GETTIN’ IN MY WAY.” Brodie laughed and strutted back to the top of the three-point arch. Annoyed with his friend’s gloating, Tye checked up the ball hard into Brodie’s chest. Knowing he was getting to his friend, Brodie leaned in close to Tye and began talking trash. He then proceeded to cross him up and hit him with another contested three. “Five to zero. You let me hit another one of those and it’s OVAAAAAA!” Brodie screamed, prancing around and shooting pretend arrows into the sky. “It’s raining from deep and you can call me Poseidon!”
Irritated, Tye called for a timeout and got into a two-man huddle with Nathan. “Alright, I’m sick of this dude. You and I switch places. I’ma bait him into dunking and then I’m blocking his ass at the rim,” Tye said with determination, punching his fist into his hand.
“Okay, sure. But uh… for the record, I suck at basketball, so once we actually have to score—”
“Oh, I know you suck, man. I got us,” Tye said, cutting off Nathan.
They broke from the huddle and as planned, Nathan stepped up to guard Brodie with Tye wrestling with Jax down low.
“Aye Brodie!” Tye called. “Bet yo ugly ass won’t jam it on me!”
“You talking mad shit now when you down 5-0? Aight,” Brodie replied calmly.
Brimming with confidence, he drove right past Nathan and jumped up to dunk but Tye’s hand blocked the ball with the force of a brick wall, which sent Brodie flying into the concrete with the ball careening across the other side of the court.
Getting up slowly, Brodie saw Tye standing over him. “Guess you really can’t dunk,” he said with a smile, extending a hand to pick Brodie up from the ground.
“I can’t when an immovable object is in my way. Hell of a block,” Brodie admitted quietly. “Your ball.”
Tye set up at the top of the three-point arch and checked the ball up to Brodie with Tony posting up down low. He tried to drive past him but was stopped at the rim by Jax who stood tall with his arms lifted. He threw a quick pass to Nathan on the wing who dribbled it and shot the ball at the hoop, where it smacked the backboard and flew right back into Tye’s hands. He reset the offense and backed up to the three-point line and shot up a wide open three, which bounced off the rim and back into Nathan’s hands. “Don’t shoot. Give it back up here!” Tye yelled, prompting Nathan to throw the ball back to him.
“Let’s see you do it then!” Brodie yelled from under the hoop.
“The hell are you talking about?” Tye yelled back.
“Dunk!”
“Dunk?”
“Yeah! You blocked me, so I get to knock yo shit out too! You know what? If you can do it? You get the game!”
Tye considered it for a moment, knowing that until now, the most he had managed to do was grab the rim. However, running on pure adrenaline and competitive fervor, he focused, hearing only his heartbeat and the muscles twitching inside him. He took off towards the rim, took three mighty gallops, and launched from a good amount outside the key, flying towards the rim. He soared into the air while Brodie, Nathan, and Jax looked on in slow motion. They could nearly see the sweat drip off him as he stuck his tongue out. In one fluid motion, he cocked his arm back and flushed the ball through the hoop, his head clear above the rim.
The other four boys looked on in awe as Tye came down and fist pumped, hooting and dancing around to celebrate his win and first-ever dunk.
Jax was the first to break the silence. “Uh. Since when can you dunk?”
“Never,” Tye replied casually.
Brodie and Jax looked at each other with concern. “Dude,” Brodie began. “How normal is it to go from not being able to dunk at all to dunking from the top of the key?”
“I don’t see the big deal,” Nathan cut in. “He dunked the ball. Does it matter from where?”
Brodie glared at him, annoyed by Nathan’s sports ignorance. “Dude. The key is 19 feet long. And he was jumping from a like five or six feet behind that. Even Michael Jordan could only dunk from the free throw line. And that’s 15 feet. You mean to tell me a guy who couldn’t dunk doing something that even the greatest basketball player of all time couldn’t accomplish is normal?”
Nathan scratched the back of his head. “Hm. I see your point.”
“Then again,” Brodie said reflecting back. “Tye did get some crazy superhuman hops yesterday so I’m not too surprised.”
Jax nodded in agreement. “At least we know that what happened yesterday definitely wasn’t a one-off.” He turned to Tye, placed his hands on his hips and asked, “Tye, did you happen to wake up today feeling a lot different or?”
Tye shook his head and said, “Nah, man. I’m just...” He paused and then did a small spin in the air, pointing at his friends when he faced them again. “Naturally gifted!”
“Right...” Jax said, unconvinced. “Listen, we’ll chalk that one up to adrenaline, luck, and our eyes playing tricks on us... For now. But seriously, man. If you’re feeling... different. Just tell us, alright?”
“I’m alright, man. Honestly? I’m worried about your bum ass still being on my court. Get outta here, my boy!” Tye replied, taking the opportunity to poke fun at the losing team. “Speaking of getting out of here though, I am incredibly hungry. You guys down to pretend like we’re really tall middle schoolers and get discounted pizza from Freddy’s?”
“You mean that kids place with those creepy animatronics?” Jax asked skeptically. “Uh. Nah. How about Mario’s?”
“Yes!” Tony shouted, jumping up. “I need food and to be frank, I’m pretty sick of you guys talking about how far you can jump. Think we can smoke afterwards?”
“Why do you always have to smoke when we hang out?” Tye asked.
“Hey man! I’m just trying to chillax my brain, my guy.”
“‘Chillax your..?’ Please never say that again. So can we go or what?”
Jax offered to drive and within the next five minutes, they had all grabbed their things and hopped into Jax’s car.
Pulling up to Mario’s, they saw a crowd gathered in the parking lot of the breakfast chain.
“Oh snap!” Brodie said jumping out of the car. “The hell is going on?”
Tye looked on curiously. “This place isn’t usually nearly this busy. I feel like it’s not the pancakes.”
Brodie rubbed his hands and chuckled maniacally. “Oh right! I totally forgot there was supposed to be a fight today!”.
Tye snorted and raised an eyebrow. “A fight? People fight in upscale towns like this? Like... with their fists? Kinda just thought people settled things by whoever has the richest parents or most culturally insensitive posts online.”
“I’m telling you bro! It’s a fight!”
“I dunno, man. I’ve lived here all my life and I only remember seeing a couple fights in middle school.”
Nathan cut in, siding with Brodie. “Oh yeah. I heard there was gonna be a fight too. Didn’t know it’d happen at Mario’s though.” He then pointed to a rotund acne-ridden kid with dark hair, a black hoodie, and a serious expression on his face. His hoodie was up and his eyes were on the ground. “I think that’s Rakesh Chakladar? Word around school was he called out a kid that had been bullying him.” Raising his hands to make air quotes, Nathan continued, “Rakesh said he was going to ‘kick his ass’ and that ‘everyone should come and see.’ Pretty crazy shit if you ask me.”
“And who is this bully?” Tye asked.
“Thad Wilson. Rich kid. Preppy and low-key a total douche but could steal your girl in two seconds. You know the type.”
Tye raised an eyebrow in disbelief. “And instead of preventing two kids from beating the hell out of each other, we just gonna sit and watch?”
Brodie patted him on the back and said with a smile, “Yup. Isn’t it beautiful? Great way to spend a weekend.”
Tye shrugged. “I dunno, man. It’s entertaining, I guess? But um, when has fighting ever actually solved an issue? Shouldn’t Thad be getting shit for bullying a kid so hard that he wants to fight him? Why isn’t the fact that he’s a shitty person the main focus here?”
“Who knows, bro? I’m just here to see a fight and get a ton of views online when I’m the first to post the video.”
Tye rolled his eyes. As he resigned himself to the spectacle of the fight, he remembered what Gemma had told him earlier. “Oh crap! Guys, Gemma told me something pretty imp...”
Before he could finish, a wave of excitement hit the crowd as Thad drove up in his new car. The boy stood 5’11”, with short curly blonde hair and a defined chin. He wore a short-sleeve button-down with an expensive pair of jeans and a golden wristwatch. As he strolled towards the crowd with two of his friends who looked more like bodyguards than high schoolers, he chatted with some of the people he knew in the crowd, refusing to even look in Rakesh’s direction.
“Man, this guy just gives off the whole douchey vibe, doesn’t he? I can see why Rakesh wants to punch him in the face,” Tye said to his friends, who nodded in unison.
Thad made his way into the center of the screaming crowd, many of whom were pro-Thad, and walked directly up to Rakesh. As the boys faced each other, Thad smiled and backed up a bit, raising his arms in a taunting manner. “So what the hell are you gonna do, you pussy?!” he yelled. “You know if you touch me, I’ll beat the living shit out of you!”
Rakesh’s demeanor remained unchanged. His head was pointed down, but his gaze was locked onto Thad. As he continued to fiddle with his fingers, his lip began to quiver, and a tear ran down his cheek.
“What’s wrong Rakesh? You scared to get your ass kicked? If you want we could make this a regular thing. I promise you, you’ll be used to it by the end of the week!” Thad taunted.
“Shut up!” screamed Rakesh suddenly at the top of his lungs. The crowd went silent. Tears now poured down his face and he stopped fiddling with his hands. He charged at the bully, fists raised and yelling.
He attempted a quick right but missed as the quicker Thad deflected with deft head movement. Thad retaliated with a swift punch to the stomach that sent Rakesh down to his knees. The crowd oohed and aahed at the spectacle, giving them some space. Rakesh slowly got to his knees and charged at Thad once more, grabbing him around the waist. But was met with repeated knees to the ribs before being thrown onto the concrete. Thad walked over and began to kick the defenseless boy, leaving his face bloody and his hoodie with brown shoe prints.
Tye looked around in disgust at the crowd cheering on this barbaric display of violence. He bit his lip and turned away every few seconds, not wanting to see the beatdown occurring before him. Finally, Thad picked Rakesh up from the ground, put him on his feet, and took a step back. His arms raised, he tried to get the crowd to cheer for him, screaming, “What are you gonna do now, bitch?! Aren’t you gonna at least hit me? Do something!”
Despite being bloody and bruised, Rakesh stood with confidence and fire in his heart. He raised his fists, coughed up mucus, then spat a thick green slime directly in Thad’s face. As the cold spit slowly slid down his face, Thad’s smile slowly turned into a frown as he wiped the mucus with his hand. He turned red with anger and embarrassment, raising his fist once more and shooting it towards the smaller boy.
He looked around at the crowd and saw
their thirst for blood, even spotting his friends cheering on the clearly one-sided fight. Deep inside, he knew this wasn’t right. Tye refused to be a bystander while this kid was bullied and beaten. He knew the only reason Rakesh was fighting was that he didn’t have someone to stand up for him. And he knew that no one in this crowd would do so. Time slowed to a near standstill. He followed Thad’s fist moving towards the scared high-schooler. With inhuman speed, Tye dashed forward. Wading through the crowd, he skidded to a halt in front of Rakesh and extended his palm to block the oncoming fist mere inches away from making contact Rakesh’s face.
Murmurs of confusion and awe spread through the watching crowd, stunned to see Tye seemingly materialize between the two fighters.
“Hey! That’s enough!” Tye addressed Thad with confidence. “Can we find some other way to resolve this instead of nearly killing each other?”
Thad pulled his hand away from Tye’s loose grip and took a step back. “How the hell did you get here?” he said, his eyes wide. “Why are you protecting this prick? This shit isn’t your responsibility, he called me out! If he didn’t want to fight, he shouldn’t have been running his mouth!”
Tye looked back down at Rakesh who had blood and tears streaming down his face, then looked back at the bully. “He called you out because you were picking on him. He felt he didn’t have a way to defend himself! You think he’s doing this for fun? Can’t we just walk away and let this be?”
“The little bitch was talking shit!” Thad shot back. “I’m not gonna let anyone talk crap about me!”
Trying to de-escalate the situation, Tye spoke in a soft and even-keeled tone, motioning for Thad to relax. “Look, I get it. You don’t like each other. That’s fine. Wouldn’t it be better to just not talk to each other then? If you don’t like him, just stay away from him, man. It’s really simple. You guys don’t have to ever be near each other.”
Thad scoffed and took a threatening step towards Tye. “Look, if you don’t move, I’m going to kick your ass too.”
