Guns and clothes

I was too early for the shops to open in the mall, so I opted for entering a bar for a drink. I found a beautiful little cosy student-study-bar. This bar was wonderful. Tables were separated by plants, open bookcases, and other decoration. The colour scheme was cream-white, beige, and dark red accents. The chairs were very soft and comfortable to sit and felt like designer chairs. The tables had an optical illusion making them appear extremely thin. In the corner, a cleanly organised counter could be seen with a rack filled with all sorts of board games aside of it. In short, a place where you could spend days. I ordered myself an oolong tea.

It didn’t take long before a batch of students dropped in. Two guys and a girl laughing and chatting made their way to a table next to mine. They sat down and branched their laptops. Some study books and pencils were dropped next to it. The girl was glancing at me while interacting with the boys. The two boys were less subtle. They were taking turns in openly staring at me, as did the barrister from behind the counter.

Reality check, I was Marie, crazily attractive and a massive unwanted attention magnet. I was tempted to go ask for a napkin to wipe away the drool.

“Hey! Are you also going to the uni? Or are you still going to college?” the girl suddenly interrupted my increasingly rude thoughts.

“Me?” I asked dumbly.

“Yes, you! I’m Steffi, by the way. And this is Jonathan and Geoff.”

“Nice to meet you. I’m Marie. I’m not in college anymore. I’m continuing my studies in a private institute. Today is a day off. I’m filling it with shopping.” I responded. I suddenly realised that I did look rather young.

The two boys were now staring in stereo. I felt their gazes travel all over my body. I instinctively sat a tiny bit more upright, secretly double checked my clothes for malfunctions and crossed my legs firmly.

Crossing my legs, that is something I can’t do as Julian, but comes very natural as Marie. I guess the wider hips, the legs a bit more apart, overall thinner built and the increased flexibility counts for something.

“Yep, still as uncomfortable as ever.” I thought sighing as their eyes continued undressing me.

“I need some nice clothes and need to pick up some clothes for my boyfriend.” I stated. Hopefully this would blow them off. “Nope, they are still processing… Wait for it… Wait for it…” I thought.

There it was, Geoff was the first getting a confused, frustrated look in his eyes. He glanced at Jonathan who still had a brain on leering holiday and poked him. “She has a boyfriend.” Geoff said.

“Figures.” Jonathan replied after an excruciating effort to reboot his thinking processes. He looked disappointed at me. I just shrugged.

“What are you studying?” Steffi asked. It appears she was just a friendly gal who liked people and talking in general. I had no idea what to answer on that question. What would I even respond? That I enlisted in a secret government organisation? That I was going to get training to not get killed?

“I’m learning IT. I want to help people with their computer material.” I said, sticking to the familiar territory of my Julian life. “And you guys?” Time to turn the attention away from me.

“Wow. That’s great. I always seem to break my laptop. I’m studying criminology. As do those two goofballs. We want to get into law enforcement.” Her soft and joking nature suddenly turned serious. “We are not searching excitement but want to help to make our society a safer place.”

“That’s noble of you.” I replied.

“Tsss, how naive,” I thought. “They clearly have no knowledge about organisations who just operate above the law without problems.”

“You seem like a nice girl. We are going to a shooting range close by, if you want, we can let you have an initiation. You can never be safe enough,” Geoff suddenly blurted out. “A session only takes an hour and a half.” I guess he already forgot the whole concept of ‘boyfriend’ I posted to them earlier.

“Can we do that?” Steffi asked him.

“Sure, I did it for Frank two months ago!”

“A shooting initiation. I guess I’ll get the pro lessons soon. Still, it’ll be a good chance to find out what I can do without giving away too much to those government creepies. Besides, I have enough time and they seem like a fun group if those boys could stop staring.” I reasoned with myself.

“I never touched a firearm before. But I’m curious and I’ll still have enough time left for shopping.” I answered to Geoff.

“Yes!” Geoff let out an arm pumping victory movement like he just passed a difficult exam. “You don’t need any experience. You’ll get the rookie program which teaches you and let’s you try different types of guns.”

I mentally rolled my eyes at his enthusiasm.

The group ended up hardly doing any studying and just assembled their stuff again. The boys were just too restless. We took a bus towards the range. I left my car near the bar. This was not a moment to show off.

Inside the shooting club, I gave my newly minted id-card and the group vouched for me. They only knew me for two hours and they were taking responsibility for my actions. I really hoped my children wouldn’t do such stupid actions when they grew up.

Anyways! What a difference from the past! I never had people around me who would do such a thing for me.

A mentor from the range joined our group. He was responsible for baby-sitting me since I didn’t have a license. He started with a shooting demonstration and a rather extended explication about rules and arms. He had me exercise the practical parts: how to load, how to arm your gun, how to hold it, how to stand, how to aim and finally how to shoot. He shot a few rounds in the target. He explained how you can get your target close by to see how you did and how to change it into a fresh one. After a warning about the recoil, he let me try.

I took the gun and put a new clip in it like I was shown. I was careful not to miss any steps. I took the pistol and aimed.

“One second.” The mentor interrupted. He stood behind me and reached over me and took my hands and corrected my aim. “There, that should at least hit the target. Now look at the nozzle and see at what spot it points. You’ll see that it’s not entirely in the centre, you need to correct a bit down. This is because you are not 100% aligning the barrel with your viewpoint. Squeeze gently and shoot!” he instructed me.

I squeezed gently and the shot went off. And the gun almost flew out of my hands. Luckily it didn’t hit my face.

I looked at the card and saw I hit in the left upper corner.

“Fantastic! You hit the target card on your first try! That is better than most.” He cheered on.

“Nice job, Marie!” Jonathan chimed in. They were all cheering for me. I looked back and they were all standing around me and watching me. I obliged and blushed like a good girl under praise.

I turned back and tried again. This was the start of a half an hour of serious aiming and loud bangs.

Steffi and her companions each took a stall and started training themselves. I stopped a few times to peek how they were doing and to steal their technique with my eyes. Geoff had the steadiest results for as far as I could see. Always hitting the target around the same zone. A pity it wasn’t in the bullseye. Steffi varied the most. I guess that had something to do with not able to properly control the recoil. But she was the only one with a shot almost in the bullseye. I had no idea what Jonathan was doing but his target card had a completely random speckle pattern.

When I got back at my stall, I took the gun and looked around me to be sure nobody was watching. I started to hyper focus. I felt my body and rooted it in place. I mentally glued the gun to my hands, and I envisioned a clear dot on the target painted by the nozzle.

I fired. I saw the bullet travel and hit a point a bit above and to the left of the bullseye. I adjusted my metal dot, and the next shot was millimetres beside the mark. I adjust again for the last millimetres and fired through the bullseye. Perfect hit. I continued shooting until my clip was empty. Every shot perfectly followed the previous one through the centre. I quickly retrieved the card and put up a new one. I put the freakishly perfect one in my pocket and I started exercising with various distances. Always determining where I was going to hit and hitting my mark time after time. My body had absorbed the right technique. I created more or less random patterns to hide my impossible skill.

Jonathan appeared at my side. He was done shooting and was looking at me strangely. He tapped my shoulder. I lowered my gun and removed my earmuffs.

“You don’t seem to be affected by the recoil? I have never seen people fire like this. I’d like you to try another gun. Just for fun. I’m curious if you can handle it.”

“Ok,” I told him after pondering it. I wondered if I could keep my aim with a heavier weapon. Jonathan handed me the piece. It was weighing a bit more but not spectacularly. I stood in my stance and froze myself again. I didn’t want to knock myself out on accident. I squeezed and … there was a recoil but nothing that urged me to move. On top of that I shot perfectly through the centre. I mentally slapped myself when I saw the bullet hit.

Suddenly I realized... “Recoil! And I effortlessly hit the bullseye!”

I faked a recoil effect and cheered loudly. “This gun is so much better! I hit the centre! I hit the centre!” I sang.

I dropped the gun on the table and jumped up and down enthusiastically in front of Jonathan. I was desperately trying to make it look like dumb luck and to diverge the attention from my fake recoil animation.

I ran to Steffi. “Look! I hit the bullseye!” Meanwhile Jonathan was retrieving the card.

“This is the most perfect shot I ever saw,” he said surprised. “I had a hard time seeing the hole since it perfectly replaced the black dot. You must have some very good eye-sight to have seen this on a glance.”

“Fantastic,” I thought, “He didn’t notice the fake recoil. But he commented on my above average eyesight.”

“You must be really strong, Marie. There aren’t many people who can fire that gun with as little movement as you displayed.” Jonathan said while examining me with a pensive look.

 “What gun did she fire?” Geoff asked. He was also finished shooting.

“That one.” Jonathan pointed.

“She didn’t knock a hole in the wall behind her?” Geoff smirked.

“Not really. Her gun went up a bit, but she hardly suffered any recoil.”

“Oh-oh, it seems I severely underestimated the amount of recoil I should have displayed. I just didn’t want to look pitiful.” I thought.

“She fired that monster?” Steffi exclaimed.

“Yes, she did. She even hit the centre with that gun. Just look at this card. It’s the most perfect shot I ever saw. We have to give it to the owner. He can hang it in the gallery. He displays perfect single shot cards.” Jonathan answered.

Meanwhile Geoff had placed a new card and took the gun himself and shot. The recoil made him take a step back. I looked in surprise. I really, really underestimated this gun. He didn’t say a thing. He just handed the gun to Jonathan. Jonathan did a bit better. His arms moved a lot more, but he didn’t lose his balance from the shot. He silently gave the gun to me. I took aim. “Where should I hit?” I wondered. I concentrated on my stance and shot through one of the numbers on the side. I faked the recoil again. A bit more than the first time but still a lot less than the recoil of the boys.

“Wow!” Steffi exclaimed looking at my admiringly. “You are really strong. A lot stronger than you look!”

“My school has a lot of PE.” I explained.  “NOT!” I thought, “I still need to have my first lesson over there.”

“I think you have a talent for this. This is only your intro, and you already shoot better than me” Steffi said happily.

“Really?” I bounced back.

“Yes! And I’m sure if we hand over the perfect shot card, you’ll probably get a reduction or even some membership months for free!” Steffi smiled at me.

I looked indecorously at her.

“Well, I’d rather spend my money on clothes than on a gun license and membership. I liked the introduction and the company, but I think guns are just not my thing.”

“Can we go shopping now?”, I smiled back innocently.

I never planned to invite them to my shopping spree, but these guys were just friendly, and I was enjoying myself. Paris has taught me that shopping with friends is fun. I used my sweetest smile and biggest puppy-eyes to sway them over.

“Yeah! This is a fantastic idea!” Geoff said. Jonathan was nodding enthusiastically. Steffi looked at them as if they had grown extra heads.

“Omg, they are looking with even dumber looks at me.” I thought dejectedly when looking at Geoff and Jonathan.

The shooting range was only one block away from the shopping mall, so we went by foot. I only caused one collision on the road over there. It was all Steffi’s fault. She was doing silly moves and I just felt like following. Something I would never ever, ever, ever have done in the past. In the middle of a silly sexy pose, we hear sounds of a crash. A male cyclist had hit a pole and was sprayed out all over the sidewalk. It was a funny sight. We couldn’t stop laughing all the way to the first shops.

I did some happy modelling ordinary and more daring clothes in the shop. I loved it! I did it in duet with Steffi. Those two uni-boys were getting a lot more than they ever dreamed off. From their looks and uncomfortable moves I could easily imagine they were raging hard and on the verge of having to run off to the toilets. Teenage hormones are just too much fun.

I ended up with a few comfortable, stylish outfits, a skirt, a few goofy but still sexy T-shirts, some more underwear, which I didn’t model, a bathing suit and two bikinis. Especially the last ones were fun to model. I felt a bit ashamed before coming out, but it was just too much fun to tease those two. I must say that Steffi was a beautiful girl too. I was just in another league. There were at least 4 men I spotted that were looking at us from a distance. Half hidden behind some clothing displays. And 1 woman...

I let Geoff help select one set of clothes for my ‘boyfriend’. He had fun with it and at the same time I drove the message home that I wasn’t free. I didn’t forget to buy shoes for myself and ‘Julian’. No way that Marie’s shoes would fit.

After my purchases we exchanged phone numbers and we parted ways. I was carrying a large bag effortlessly and walked to the bus station alone. I was wearing the skirt, a goofy T-shirt and white tennis shoes. I had a brand new scrunchie in my hair and I felt rather sexy and pleased with myself.

Ganged up

This ended when I got out of the bus to fetch my car and the bus station was occupied with a shrewdness of male youngsters. The moment they spotted me they started howling. A more unkept species moved up to me.

“Hey honeypot! Let me take your bags. Clothes are so wasted on you. We better throw those away,” he charmingly opened the conversation.

“Hey you-smelly-something, I’m perfectly capable of carrying my own bags and I like wearing clothes. Please climb back into your tree and leave me out of your distorted fantasy,” I not so smartly retorted.

He looked at me with a snarl, animalistically baring a bit of fang. When he moved to grab my bags, I faked to stumble, making his greedy hands miss and giving just enough push to open a way for me to walk through.

The pack started laughing at him.

“She escaped you, man!”

“Whotcha gonna do now? Are you gonna let her run, you stupid tool?”

“Whaaa! Johny is a looser!”

The guys were insulting each other, which was fine by me. Their voices were pursuing me, which was less fine. I already saw people diverging from their path to avoid crossing me and walking into my lowlife followers.

When I reached the parking lot, they passed me and blocked my road, forming a circle around me.

“Guys, don’t be assholes and let me go. Nothing good is going to come from this,” stated fruitlessly.

“We disagree. We are hungry and we aren’t going to pass upon a delicious cheesecake like you,” one of them replied with a lecherous grin.

My car was only 50 metres away from me. If I could make a break for it, and enter it, I would be safe.

“Guys, don’t do stupid things you’ll regret later. Let me pass.” I demanded.

“Woooh, the missy thinks she has any say in this. The only sounds that she should make is moans of gratitude from our attention,” a hairy one replied while openly moving a hand up and down his crotch.

“Rude.” I muttered.

That was all the time I got. A first male, one of the larger ones with a face adored with pig-eyes moved in to grab me. I was thinking about the ‘game’ I had to play at the assessment. ‘Catch the flag.’ Car in this case.

I did something similar. The stress was already slowing everything down to a snail’s pace. I moved under the arm reaching for me, tripped his left leg and gave a shovel to his shoulder. He stumbled and took two men aside him down with him. They didn’t fall but they suddenly formed a heap of unstable arms and legs with lots of swearing noises.

Unfortunately, this was not in the right direction for my car but it gave me an opening out of the circle. I immediately stepped through the opening and started running. There was no reason left to act like everything was peachy. Since everything was slowed down, it felt like I was jogging slowly. But I was sure it looked like a dead sprint to those tugs.

After a few moments from my point of view I reached my car. I didn’t need my keys to open the car. The proximity of my keys and my touch was enough to unlock it. I opened the door and threw my bag of clothes in it. Just as I was following the bag and dived into the car, a giant fist grabbed my wrist and pulled me back.

I stumbled and fell to my knees. “Now I’m mad.” I thought. I felt a rage surfacing. Those are the guys that rape girls and think it is ok. Those are the reasons why girls are scared to walk alone. Those are the guys who terrorize and extort for living and feel fine by it.

I felt strength and speed bubbling up. The buffoon grabbed my hair while I got to one knee. He now held my wrist and my hair. I pushed forward from my raised foot like a spring unwinding and hit him with my fist at the sweet spot at the centre of his chest. Solar plexus it is called I learned afterwards. I felt something breaking.

I overtook the arm that was holding my wrist in a pivoting move and slung him away from me. I immediately moved up to the next one slamming the palm of my hand on his nose. I felt it splintering and blood splashed around. That guy curled backwards from the impact. I twisted around and placed my elbow in his crotch while crouching.

An especially smelly one was trying to grab me from behind but luckily his stench warned me. I rolled sideways effectively appearing at his other side. Since he was half turned away from me and his legs were a bit bent, I just kicked at the side of his knee, and he went down with a sickening crunch. While he fell, I placed an elbow halfway his neck. His head snapped backwards. I didn’t wait to see him fall and was already on the move for the next assailant.

At this point it was a bit unclear who was the attacker and who was the defender. I found my self eye to eye with the brute who initially threatened me at the bus station. I paused for a second and then continued moving again. I hardened my knuckles and gave him a deserved punishment. He won’t be speaking to anyone anymore. His Adam’s apple was no more. I also bent him forward with an arm outstretched sideways and use my knee to kick his elbow into bending in the wrong direction. When he went down, I was positioned after him and I kicked him between the legs as hard as I could. I think that was not a very wise move. It hurt like hell. But the kick was so powerful that he made a flip and directly landed on his feet. The sudden impact made one of his legs break. I think he lost consciousness during the procedure ‘cause he didn’t utter a word or scream.

I turned sideways and the four remaining apes were retreating. Visibly shaken.

I started shivering. I recognized this. This was shock setting in. The adrenaline was keeping me on my feet but that wouldn’t last. I quickly moved to my car and got in.

I don’t know how I reached my old house, but I did and apparently without accidents. I went inside and immediately threw myself in the shower. I curled up to a ball against the wall while warm water was flowing over me. My clothes were instantly soaked but that was the least of my worries.

I kept thinking about Shana and Lisa. If they would have been in my situation, it would have been not very likely they would have survived it. Rapped, maimed, killed, and thrown away in an ally. That would have been the likely outcome. I just couldn’t get the image out of my head. And then the gruesome wounds I inflicted. I was not sure that everyone I attacked will survive it. I was sure that everyone I touched was crippled for life. I felt very conflicted about it. It felt good and horrible at the same time. The only thing that kept me from vomiting is that, on some level, I didn’t consider them ‘human’.