Chasing Rusty Parker - 37. What Talk Of Peace?

Chapter Thirty-Seven – What Talk Of Peace?

There was something hammering against his eardrums and, at first, he thought he had to be dreaming still. No, it wasn’t some dream involving a lot of noise; the ruckus was coming from outside, and although his window faced the back of the house, there seemed to be some sort of pandemonium happening not too far away. Rusty groaned and opened his eyes. He was so not a morning person, and especially after indulging in so much action with his baby dude last night. He was in no mood to wake up on Saturday morning that early.

Matty stirred by his side, scrunching up his cute nose, annoyed as he seemed to be for the same reason Rusty had woken up. “What’s going on?” he growled sleepily. “What’s with all the noise?”

“I have no idea, but I’ll go open the window and check.” Rusty tip-toed around, although there was little chance Matty could go back to sleep now.

He opened the window wide, and the sound of some sort of cadenced shouts reached them. At first, he couldn’t make out any proper words, but then he understood. He turned toward Matty, who was up on his butt, his hair sticking out in all directions. He was staring at him with a dumbfounded look on his face. “Is that what I think it is?”

No more parties, no more booze,

Let’s have higher life values!

“Va-luze?” Matty said slowly and stared at Rusty. “O. M. G. Those are Connor’s Implacables, aren’t they?”

“I suppose so. But why the hell are they chanting like this first thing on a Saturday morning?” Rusty had no idea about the hour, but he could only assume that normal people were still enjoying a little bit of extra sleep.

“Let’s check Xpress,” Matty decided. “I mean, they’re bullshitters by definition, but they might know something about this new development.”

The noise outside was only getting louder. Rusty shrugged and left the window open but moved to sit on the bed by Matty’s side and look over his shoulder at the screen. Absentmindedly, he placed a small kiss on his bed partner’s naked shoulder. Matty started for a moment and looked at him, and only then Rusty realized the domesticity of the gesture. Was he being tamed or something? By a cat boy? Then it had to be true what they said about cats being the actual masters and not the other way around. Still, he was about to look guiltily away when Matty hurried and smooched him on the cheek. That also lasted for just a moment, because Matty turned his attention back to the screen.

What’s going on, Sunny Hill? How can you take this lying down? Ugh, and all these years we squandered for your fulfillment as a naughty species, aka college students. Connor Williams doesn’t have only Mr. Preston’s ear. We now suspect that he has his whole head! Or worse, that he replaced the aformentioned head, because we don’t otherwise understand how it was possible for our dear Dean of Students to give in so easily to such demands.

Did we mention it yet? Your college life, the one you’ve been dreaming of since you sent out your first application and waited with bated breath to be accepted within the halls of learning and debauchery of such an institution, yes, that college life, is officially OVER.

“Wow, all caps. Xpress means business,” Matty said, interrupting his reading of the latest piece of news for a bit of commentary.

“When did it all happen?” Rusty asked and nudged Matty gently to read further.

Connor Williams, you are so, so vile. We cannot help but wonder what lurks behind this veneer of respectability you’re trying to project. We are so sure there are plenty of skeletons in your closet, and we don’t mean the closet you came out of. No, no, no, we mean the one you have stashed in a musty cellar somewhere, the kind you don’t want anyone to ever see.

Maybe the students of Sunny Hill have yet to understand that you are treating them no better than sheep. But we’re awake. We know that you’re a threat. And we will take you down.

How, you might ask? Here’s a hint. We only need one champion to stand up to you and deny you the power you seek to seize through such underhanded tactics. And then, we’ll support him or her through thick and thin.

In other words, dear Connor: challenge accepted.

“That sounds like a job for a superhero,” Matty said and threw Rusty a lopsided grin.

Hmm, how much was Matty suspecting? Well, there was the matter of the refused threesome that must have given him away as Rybalt, but why be the first to deny himself the pleasure of this new game?

“Get real, Matty,” he said with pretentious superiority. “Superheroes aren’t real. Also, and I know you might start to cry, but Santa isn’t real, either.”

“Oh, no,” Matty said and closed his eyes in theatrical pain. “That can’t be true! I won’t accept it! I hate you!”

“Okay, okay, I lied, don’t hate me,” Rusty said in a plaintive voice and rubbed his head against Matty’s shoulder.

Matty wrapped one arm around him and kissed him on the head. Since when were the roles reversed? It didn’t matter. Rusty actually enjoyed being the one pampered, for a change.

“It looks like Connor has managed to convince the Dean of Students to put a ban on booze at parties, with no exceptions, and there’s even a curfew now. All parties need to end before midnight, and you must also submit a special request that should include the number of party guests and other stuff,” Matty said as he skimmed through the campus news feed quickly. “Damn, Xpress is not wrong. This thing is big, and Connor might have just made a few enemies. I mean, I’m the kind who prefers a different type of party, but for most people, I guess, it’s going to get pretty dull.”

“What kind of party do you prefer, Matty?” Rusty questioned.

“This kind,” Matty said promptly. “A party of two.”

“Sounds good to me,” Rusty approved. “So, this curfew, what does it mean, besides the party-related stuff?”

“Basically, there should be no more roaming at night,” Matty said with a sigh. “Unless you have an emergency or other similar reason, and that’s also something that needs to be documented and shown to security on campus--”

“Okay, this is starting to get nuts. Connor just went from douche to evil mastermind in the span of a few weeks.”

“I agree with you. I mean, he’s obviously up for ruining things for everyone on campus, and I don’t see why, save for his acolytes, anyone would go along with him.”

“I believe that Xpress put it quite well for a change. At this point, people seem to be taking everything lying down,” Rusty said and nodded thoughtfully. “I mean, if no one stands against Connor and his weird ideas, who knows how far he’s willing to go?”

Matty shuddered for show. “I fear even thinking about it. It was already a bit scary to see how easily he managed to brainwash a not so easy to ignore number of students, but this? He basically has the Dean of Students in his pocket, or so Xpress makes it sound. And, above all else, why are his people the ones protesting in the street right now? I mean, they’re the ones behind the change. What more do they want?”

Rusty pondered over the issue for a moment. “They want validation.”

“Are you sure?” Matty wondered out loud. It didn’t appear that the question was aimed at him.

“They’re bullies,” Rusty continued his line of reasoning. “They’ve won battle after battle, and that without any opposition. Now they want to go even beyond that. Yeah, they want to bully everyone into being on their side because that’s what happens with all tyrants. They’re never happy with power. They want absolute power.”

“That’s pretty insightful, Rusty. I’m afraid you’re right.”

Rusty took in Matty’s expression. “Hey, let’s not make it so serious. It’s only college, right? Although Connor might grow up to be a nasty dictator of sorts, for now, I don’t think he can do much.”

“Well, I hope that’s the case. But, frankly, by what I hear happening outside, that should be a wakeup call for everyone that Connor is going too far. You’re right that he’s basically in a race with no opponent. That makes it sound all the more like he’s looking for one.”

“Exactly,” Rusty said and grinned, as an idea began to form in his head. “He’s itching for a fight for real, only no one has given him that satisfaction.”

“Are you going to be the one to do that? No one more fitting than the king of Sunny Hill, right?”

“What king? Ever since this shit with Connor started, and I really mean the pun this time around, not many see me as that anymore. Not that I care about it, anyway,” Rusty said with a shrug.

Matty gave him a slanted look, seemingly deep in thought about something. “You know you’ll always be the king for me.”

For a moment, they stared at each other without saying a word, then burst into laughter at the same time. “You almost got me right there,” Rusty said and shook his head. “Anyway, I’m not much of a king these days, so it would be nice to see someone else stepping up. I wonder who that guy will be.”

“Or gal,” Matty reminded him. “I mean, it could be anyone at this point. Connor and his people are protesting against an empty chair, which means that it’s a free for all.”

“This time, I’m just going to be a spectator,” Rusty said and crossed his arms. “I mean, why should I play into Xpress’s game or Connor’s? I’m not that easy.”

Of course, it wouldn’t be him taking on the challenge, but Rybalt, and that meant, as far as most people knew, someone else. Yeah, it really helped to have a secondary character he could slip in and out of without any problem. He stared for a few moments at Matty, trying to read his mind but came up empty. It looked like Matty wasn’t particularly bothered by who would pick up the thrown glove. Unless he was the one reading minds right now.

A loud knock on the door made them both turn their heads. Rusty threw a cursory glance at Matty to see if he was decent enough for visitors and then sauntered to get the door. He wasn’t very surprised to see Maddox and Jonathan there.

“Have you guys heard what’s going on outside?” Maddox asked.

Rusty opened the door wide and gestured for them to come in. It looked like neither his bestie, nor his better half seemed surprised to see Matty still in his bed. After all, they knew almost everything about what was going on.

“Yeah, it was pretty difficult to sleep through all that,” Rusty pointed out. “And we so wanted to sleep in.”

Maddox walked over to the window to listen some more, but the sounds were now fading into the distance. On his way there, he nodded at Matty and got a slight wave as reply. “What are you going to do about this, Rusty?”

“Why does everyone think I should do anything?” Rusty asked with a shrug.

“Because you’re the king, or did you abandon your throne without our knowledge?” Maddox asked and crossed his arms.

“It’s more like my people forsook me,” Rusty replied and stared pedantically at his fingernails while quirking an eyebrow.

“You also have that other--” Jonathan stopped mid-sentence and stole a glance at Matty, who appeared to be completely oblivious to what was being talked about. That was one poker face he wanted to borrow on his way to the casino.

“You’re the only guy who actually cares,” Maddox said quickly and saved his fiancé from spilling the beans. “If you don’t, who, then?”

Rusty sat on a chair and shifted his weight back and forth for a bit. “Eh, aren’t we supposed to have one foot out in the real world already? We’re seniors.”

“Yeah, and there’s also such a thing as a legacy. You don’t care about that?” Maddox insisted with a sly smile.

Ah, that only meant that they were really suspecting him of already being on the job, as the king of Sunny Hill or Rybalt. They were here to test the waters. Too bad Rusty wasn’t good at sharing his plans. “I don’t have to jump at any opportunity to prove myself. After all, I’m busy,” Rusty said and shrugged.

“Busy with what?” Maddox asked with a sly smile.

“Studying,” Rusty said brightly and pointed at Matty. “Just ask him.”

“Rusty has been applying himself something fierce,” Matty explained right away. “He is busy.”

Now that was a partner if he’d ever seen one. He winked at Matty, who smiled back.

“Hey, we tried, right?” Jonathan said in a tone so fake that it wouldn’t sell a ticket if his life depended on it. That also meant that he and Maddox had been sent there by the others to test him. Rusty suspected Kane, who was always too curious for his own good. It didn’t matter; they would all find out about his awesome plans once they were put into motion.

“What was that all about?” Matty asked, always the astute one, once Jonathan and Maddox were out of the room.

“My besties always suspect me of wanting to get in on the action whenever there’s any,” Rusty said lightly. “And they always have a ton of advice they want to dish out to me, which I don’t really need. The best way for me to make them shut up is to pretend I’m actually not interested at all.”

“You do act like you’re not interested at all,” Matty said slowly and watched him with his eyes at half-mast.

“I might be, or I might not,” Rusty replied, opting for a mysterious tone. “I mean, I’m not the only star of campus lately. There’s also--”

“Rybalt,” Matty completed his phrase with a sly smile.

“Yeah, that guy,” Rusty admitted. “We also have a cat boy, right? What do you think? Would he be up for shaking up Connor’s new reign?”

Matty shrugged. “I have no idea. But maybe just one person is not enough.”

“Two are better,” Rusty agreed and leaned over Matty, making him lean back.

“Or three,” Matty challenged him and blinked slowly, just like a cat.

“Or four. But let’s not count to one hundred, okay?”

There was no reply because what followed was a kiss. And Matty seemed no longer in the mood to argue beyond that magic number four.

***

There was no time to lose. Matty was gone, busy doing other things, and that gave Rusty the window of opportunity he was looking for. It was dangerous to do it all without careful planning, and also like that, in broad daylight, but the newsfeed kept going and going. Eventually, Connor’s shitheads with their leader included had decided to make a pit stop at the quad, where speeches of doubtful quality were being made for an audience that was starting to gather.

Okay, so, since he didn’t have the benefit of low light conditions to hide his true identity, he needed to be extra careful. He put on the wig and made sure that the mask was properly in place before donning his cape. The fact that Connor was basically gathering up the whole population of Sunny Hill to listen to the decrees of his reign of terror worked to his advantage. No one would see him jumping from building to building and be able to guess where he was coming from.

***

Was Zoey with the bunch of crapheads? Matty suspected she was in the middle of it all and that meant that while he had told Rusty that he had some important matters to tend to… he had basically not lied. He could only hope that Zoey was careful not to give herself away in front of that frenzied crowd by saying something blunt and truthful, as was her usual MO.

That brought him to the quad, which was the direction everyone was headed in. Even if they disagreed with Connor, the entire population on campus seemed interested in hearing him out. At least, that seemed to be the case, he gathered from what he could hear other students saying among themselves. Now, where was campus security, he wondered? Things like debates on campus grounds didn’t have a reason to turn violent, per se, but it definitely seemed like Connor was looking for a reason to get into a real fight.

He stopped at a fair distance since it appeared that Connor’s team had come well prepared. Connor stood high on a box or something like that from which he could observe the crowd at his leisure. The musty suit was gone; instead, Connor looked like a politician on tour, his sleeves rolled up, his hair slightly messy, but fashionably so, while still in dress pants and a dress shirt. He also had a mike into which he was shouting his calls to action, which helped the people in the back hear him.

“I’m glad to see you here in such great numbers,” the politician in the making bleated into his microphone. “I’m glad to see that the true college life spirit isn’t dead.” Connor’s acolytes applauded energetically to make up for the lack of reaction by most spectators. That only encouraged their leader to continue. “As you may have heard by now, we earned a well-deserved victory after taking matters into our own hands and bringing them forward to the powers that be.”

Oh, no, he was such an underdog, Matty thought wryly.

“The academic environment has gone through unfathomable changes over the years, turning institutions such as ours, meant to educate and enlighten, into nothing but a year-long summer camp and something even worse than that.” Connor cut through the air with his arm to make a point. “I won’t insist on rehearsing the bad things. I’m here,” he paused for effect, “we’re here,” he resumed while gesturing to the people around him, “to focus on the positive. And we want to help you,” he pointed at no one in particular, but very decisively nonetheless, “to do the same.”

“Why on earth did you get Mr. Preston to ban parties?” someone shouted from the non-Connor crowd.

Connor shifted his weight from one foot to another. From the distance he was from the speaker, Matty couldn’t see and read his face. But something told him that yeah, Rusty was pretty much right, and the asshole was itching for a fight. He must have waited for that question, for any reaction, no matter how small, from the many students gathered there.

“Where are you getting your information from? Xpress?” Connor asked and laughed. His crowd followed on cue. “We didn’t ban parties.” Hmm, ‘we’, not the Dean of Students, Matty noted. “We,” Connor insisted, “allow parties, as long as they’re well planned events that will not lead to any unpleasant or even worse consequences. We care about you.” He gestured widely with his arm again, to show his magnanimity.

“Like hell,” someone from the crowd protested. “You shouldn’t have taken away the booze, man! We’ll riot!”

“You’ll riot for booze?” Connor expressed his disbelief. “What have we come to? There’s no other aim, no purpose in this life, but… booze?!” Well, if a career in politics wasn’t in the cards for him, Connor could always try his hand at acting. In horror movies. “You won’t riot to save the environment, or the starving children of the world, but you’ll riot for booze?!”

Yeah, what was booze compared to kids dying of starvation? Matty shook his head. Connor knew exactly what he was doing. He did very well with such opponents who, compared to him, seemed nothing but a bunch of petulant spoiled brats who only cared about their next fix, their next entertainment, and nothing else.

Silence followed. Some of the brighter students were probably busy thinking up arguments to contradict Connor, but the leader of crapheads had the element of surprise on his side. He must have polished that speech for quite a while before this Saturday morning.

“It’s not like we can do something about all that,” the heckler insisted after a while, but doubt was creeping into his voice, weakening his message.

“So you think,” Connor said and nothing spelled his triumph better than his puffed out chest. “We know because we were the same,” he added with an extra layer of piety illustrated by his hands tightening on the mike. He was now playing the empathy card. “We thought that we couldn’t do anything, either.”

More silence from the crowd. Matty couldn’t believe it, but it wasn’t like he was getting out there and telling Connor a couple of things to his face, either, right? Then, he understood. Connor was playing them and forcing them to accept his point of view. Determined to be at least a voice of reason in that sea of lunacy that was threatening to turn its waves into a tsunami, he began pushing his way through the crowd to get to the front and speak.

He was barely there and ready to open his mouth to speak when Connor flinched and brought one hand to his head. He looked around and it looked like something had hit him. All those present began searching with their eyes for whatever the source of that attack was.

“Hey, look over there,” a girl shouted. “It’s him!”

Matty couldn’t keep in a smile as he saw the tall figure balancing his weight on the edge of a nearby roof. Rusty wouldn’t stay away; of course he wouldn’t. And he looked even more dashing in broad daylight in his cape and overall disguise.

“Rybalt!” a few more cried out.

“What’s he doing here?” some whispered.

“I think he’s crashing this party,” another student offered his point of view.

Rybalt reached into his breast pocket and took something out. Then, he moved his arm back and threw that small object at Connor’s head. Matty was close enough to see what it was when the thing dropped to the floor. It was candy. Not exactly the first thought that came to mind, that, because the candy had an unbecoming brown color, but it made total sense. It looked like Rybalt wanted to fight the king of crapheads with his own weapons, so to speak.

“Hey, you hooligan, stop what you’re doing right now!” Connor shouted.

Instead of offering a reply, Rybalt reached for more ammunition and this time rained a series of projectiles over the heads of those around Connor. One boy grabbed one piece that hadn’t yet touched the ground and tried to put it into his mouth. Unfortunately for him, his leader noticed and slapped his hand, making the candy drop. With a forlorn look, the guy followed the dropped candy with his eyes and only after a moment realized that his leader was still staring at him and pedaled back to being an exemplary craphead.

“Get down from there,” Connor continued, addressing the intruder now. “Let’s see how brave you are when you have to face me man to man!”

“You mean, man to octopus?” Rybalt asked and laughed, putting his hands on his hips. “Sorry, man, I’m not into tentacles.”

“I don’t even know what you mean by that! You make absolutely no sense,” Connor stated and held his chin high, still clutching the mike with all his strength.

Rybalt laughed and aimed another projectile at Connor’s head. The other had only two options: to duck and look ridiculous, or to take it like a man and look ridiculous. Being the proud idiot that he was, he endured a candy hitting smack in the middle of his forehead. That made a few laugh. Apparently, it only took a little bit of showing how naked the emperor was for the audience to realize that they weren’t supposed to feel like they were under assault.

“You!” Connor hissed. “You vampire!”

Matty shook his head in mirth. That guy really needed to brush up on his vocabulary because that wasn’t anywhere near an insult. If anything, Rybalt looked every bit like a sexy vampire, someone meant to seduce and turn everyone’s heads, and that was the complete opposite of the image Connor was projecting at the moment. Or at any other moment, Matty considered. Finally, the leader of that organization had found an opponent, but maybe it wasn’t the kind of opponent he expected.

Rybalt laughed loudly, while everyone looked up, hands shielding their eyes to see him better. It appeared that everything Connor did played right into his plans, because he took a few steps on the ledge, executing a little elegant dance while at it, and making the audience gasp in surprise and terror. Then, he broke into a song that sounded very much like an aria no one had ever heard before.

You call me a creature of the night

But you don’t rise from sunlight, either

These people, they deserve a knight;

In turn, you’re nothing but a mouth-breather

It was quite possible that Rybalt had come up with that little song on the spot, and Matty, knowing the guy pretty well, wasn’t surprised. The other students present, however, thought nothing of it and were just enjoying it. The insult caught right away, and the earlier chants performed by the crapheads now faded into obscurity as the other side of the barricade began to chant.

Mouth-breather! Mouth-breather!

Connor was livid, clutching at his mike and throwing nervous looks around. One of his acolytes moved to his side and began whispering something in his ear. Matty observed as the expression on Connor’s face turned to one of perverse glee. The S.H.I.T leader nodded briefly at whatever his subordinate suggested, and the other guy took out his phone.

Of course, they’d pull a black card seeing how they were losing the crowd. Matty shook his head in disgust. Someone had to warn Rybalt that the assholes were, most probably, calling security to complain that their little brainwashing party was getting crashed by someone with more moral fiber in his little toe than in all of them combined.

Except for one person. Matty searched for Zoey in that mass of uniformed bastards – today, they were all dressed in light colors, to reflect the color palette their leader had opted for, white shirts, light cream pants – and didn’t manage to spot her.

On the roof, Rybalt continued to give his performance, probably oblivious to the further underhanded tactics of the assholes below. Matty had to applaud the new star of Sunny Hill for not stooping to Connor’s level and allowing himself to be dragged into an endless debate. Instead, he offered the students an alternative, the real joy of being young and free.

It looked like, from his vantage point, Rybalt could easily spot any movement and the arrival of a couple of campus security guards immediately prompted him to act. “This party appears to be over, my lieblings,” he said and took a bow, while most of the students applauded. “I will see you, as scheduled. Stay true, don’t step in shit.”

And, with that, Rybalt executed his signature move of draping his cape over one arm and making himself disappear like a real magician. Matty felt proud. Now that was a good way to fight the haters. And those around were probably, in pretty large number, the same people who no longer thought that Rusty was still the king of Sunny Hill. How wrong they were. How surprised would they be to learn the truth?

The security people pushed their way through the crowd to Connor, and the guy covered the microphone while he talked to them. They seemed dumbfounded at having been called there, and it appeared that at least one of them was chastising the leader of crapheads about it. Connor had his most suave face on and was even acting, as it appeared from where Matty stood, like a veritable victim.

He shook his head and began walking away. Now, where was Zoey? He took out his phone to message her. She was probably laughing her ass off right now, but only internally. While he was no superhero like Rybalt, he could at least save his bestie and get her to go to lunch with him.

***

“I wasn’t there,” Zoey moaned and pressed her head into the table.

“Were you sleeping late?” Matty asked and patted her gently on the hair.

“Well, yeah, but that’s not the point. They simply didn’t tell me.”

“How come? Haven’t you passed the brainwashed test? I’m afraid that must be it.”

Zoey gave him an annoyed look from below, with just one eye. She would definitely make a fine pirate. “It’s weird. Your roommate wasn’t there, either, by the way.”

“For real? Now that is weird, indeed. I’m pretty sure John would never miss the opportunity to lick Connor’s ass for the world. Is he sick or something?”

“I don’t know. But you should. He’s your roommate,” Zoey pointed out. “Didn’t you see him this morning?”

“I didn’t sleep in my bed, let’s put it that way,” Matty said with a smile.

Zoey grinned. “Right. I forgot that you’re going steady with Rusty now. By the way, what does he think of all this crazy stuff?”

Matty hesitated. Even if Zoey was his bestie, Rusty had his reasons for keeping his alter-ego a secret. “He says he doesn’t care and doesn’t want to get involved.”

Zoey didn’t appear to notice his hesitation. “Well, then it’s good that there’s this Rybalt dude flinging candy at Connor and his shitheads. We still need a hero, right?”

Matty nodded, without adding a word. Rusty definitely wanted the cat boy to join Rybalt in his illicit life of fighting Connor and his team. That meant he needed to do some planning.

TBC