Battles and Boobs
Chapter eleven
Dex
“Unholy shit,” Dex cried as he was jostled this way and that as onlookers converged on the scene, most of whom already had their phones out to record.
Niki was screaming bloody murder as she attempted to crawl away, but Cya coiled their tail around her waist and dragged her back. “I’m gonna rip out your wings, you anthropomorphic cavity!” they roared as they wriggled on top of the wailing Spryte and yanked out a fistful of her cotton candy hair.
“Help! Get this tranny psycho off me!” Niki sobbed, beating against Cya’s chest.
As they rolled around in the black grass, no one—not even Noodle Boy—tried to stop it. If anything, he looked too scared to intervene. Too bad. Dex kind of wanted the Sypent to try so he could watch Cya bitchslap the scales right off him.
Since Dex was, for the most part, a pacifist, he huffed in exasperation and shoved the gathering bystanders out of his way until he was standing over the dueling duo. “Okay, Cy, that’s enough.”
Dodging their jabbing elbows, he bent down and grabbed the Sypent around the waist. It took more effort than he expected to peel Cya off the wailing Spryte, and even when he managed it, they struggled against his grip.
Hissing barely intelligible insults, they writhed in his grasp in an attempt to get at Niki again.
“Cya, stop! Would you just—deities, how are you this slippery?” he muttered as he clamped his arms around their wriggling body to trap them.
Tears streaming down her face, makeup smeared, Niki held the strands of her hair that Cya had ripped out and caterwauled. Now that Dex had Cya somewhat contained, Kent swooped in and fretted over the Spryte. He cooed and doted, casting scathing glares in Cya’s direction.
“She ruined my blowout,” Niki blubbered like a toddler. “Hermaphrodite bitch!”
“Backstabbing whore,” Cya shot back, lunging at her again.
“I think you need a timeout,” Dex declared.
He threw Cya over his shoulder, pinned their muscular tail to his chest, then strode purposefully away.
The crowd parted for him, mostly to keep out of Cya’s reach as they continued to screech and flail.
The lower half of their tail wound around Dex’s middle and flexed, rattle smacking his stomach as they beat their fists against his lower back.
“Put me down, you oaf,” they commanded, but he ignored them.
Without much forethought, Dex headed to the dyscus training field.
This late, it would be empty of athletes, and he knew where Coach kept the first aid kit in case Niki had managed to hurt Cya.
He didn’t think she had, mostly because Cya had fully dominated that fight, but he didn’t want to take any chances.
“Dex, for deities’ sake, put me down,” they ordered again.
“Nope,” he said easily.
“This is entirely undignified!”
“Don’t care.”
Another wordless screech, then they started to smack whatever part of his back his bookbag wasn’t protecting.
Either they were purposefully pulling their punches, or they were too weak from their life of luxury to do any damage, because their strikes didn’t hurt much at all.
Like he had when his sister had been young, Dex let the tantrum run its course in hopes Cya tired themself out quickly.
Halfway to the field, the Sypent stopped struggling, going limp in his hold.
He couldn’t tell if they’d simply run out of anger, or if they were trying to lull him into a false sense of security so he would loosen his grasp enough to allow them escape.
Or maybe they were simply using their dead weight to make it harder on him. They were petty enough, after all.
Since he spent whatever free time he had at the school gym, he was strong enough to shoulder their weight pretty easily. He was only panting a little by the time he climbed onto the empty bleachers overlooking the training field and deposited Cya rather clumsily onto a metal bench.
They yelped as they scrambled for purchase, hair falling out of their messy bun in wavy chunks. Their tunic was ripped down the middle nearly to their belly button, and they held it together with one hand as their other tugged on the hem where it had ridden up to their hips.
To preserve their modesty, Dex looked away and shrugged off his backpack, digging around inside for the hoodie he kept at the bottom. He held it out to them, and they startled at the offering. “Wear this. You can”—he gestured vaguely at their ripped clothes—“you know, cover up or whatever.”
Cautiously, they took it and placed it in their lap, tracing the letters of his last name printed across the shoulders. The tattered edges of their tunic fluttered in the breeze, parting enough for the moonlight to glint off the thin gold chain strung between their—
“Whoa, your nipples are pierced?” he blurted, causing Cya to press the bunched up hoodie to their chest as they shot him a glare. “Not that I was looking! I wasn’t, like, trying to… Sorry.”
A chuff of dry humor clattered up their throat. “It’s not like I have much in the breast department for you to see anyway.”
To be honest, Dex hadn’t really noticed. Cya usually wore loose clothing, and he was always more interested in their unique jewelry than whether he could make out the shape of their tits or not. Besides, he tried really hard not to be gross, and staring at girls’ boobs was creepy.
Unless they invited him to stare, in which case, he happily obliged because boobs were awesome.
Instead of saying any of that, he said, “That’s okay. Size isn’t everything. I bet you have great tits.” Their eyes widened at that, and he backtracked. “Uh, that’s not—I just meant that you shouldn’t be insecure about your body because you’re smoking hot.”
When their eyebrows shot up so high they nearly reached their hairline, Dex started to panic. “Not that your self-worth is contangent on the male gaze or my validation. Honestly, the beauty metric is rooted in patriarchy and pedophilia, so as a society, we should fully reject it.
“Plus, beauty is subjective. What trips one person’s trigger might be a big turn off for another. So trying to conform to an unrealistic and unattainable standard is feudal, anyway. It’s just a form of control and abuse by toxic men who are embarrassed about their height or dick size.
“Which is also patriarchy, by the way, even though incels try to blame it on feminism which just feeds the cycle—”
Cya held up a hand, and Dex gratefully swallowed his next bout of word vomit. They folded their pinkie and thumb into their palm, leaving three fingers up. “Three things.”
“Okay,” he said meekly.
“One, it’s contingent, not contangent.”
“What’s contangent mean then?”
“It’s not a word,” they said with a slight air of condescension. “Secondly, feudal refers to a medieval social structure. Futile means hopeless or ineffective.”
“Noted,” he whispered.
“Thirdly”—they lowered their hand to rub at the space between their eyes—“what the fuck are you even talking about?”
He kicked at the metal floor and shrugged. “I dunno. I panicked.”
Silence stretched for the beat of two seconds before Cya snorted a laugh, slapping a hand over their mouth to smother it. Dex grinned sheepishly, and the Sypent buried their exasperated amusement in his hoodie. They slipped their arms into the sleeves and shrugged it on over their head.
It was too big for them, the sleeves swallowing their hands until only the tips of their fingers peeked out from the cuffs. They released the last of their hair from the bun and secured the scrunchy around their wrist as the wavy strands tumbled over their shoulders.
They looked cozy and comfy and… shit. He liked Cya wearing his clothes. They’d smell like him now, and if he ever got the hoodie back, it would smell like them. Which was wonderful. And terrible. Because they weren’t actually friends.
This felt like friends, though. If Dex was being truly honest with himself, this felt like more than friends. This felt like a crush, a big, fat, probably self-destructive crush. But he didn’t want to stress about that part right now. He had other, more pressing priorities.
“I’m sorry, Cya,” he said, and the Sypent’s head jerked up so fast he worried they’d given themself whiplash.
“What?” they asked in disbelief.
He avoided their gaze and tucked his hands into the pockets of his gym shorts. “I’m bad at boundaries. It’s probably ’cause of my abandonment issues from my dad leaving and stuff, but it’s not an excuse.”
“Dex,” they tried to interrupt, but he wanted to get through this quickly, if only to save himself some semblance of pride.
“You kept telling me to leave you alone and not talk to you, and I just… I assumed you were putting up a front or something.” He took a shuddering breath and shook his head.
“But I should have listened to what you were saying. I should have just believed you, and that was my bad. So I’m sorry for bothering you, and I’ll leave you alone from now on. ”
“Dex,” they said again, but he really just wanted this to be over.
“If you still want me to tutor you, I will. I don’t want you to fail the class. But we can do it here at school; I bet Professor Myls won’t mind if we stick around the lecture hall for an hour. Outside of that, we can just… not anymore, you know? Clean break.”
When he finally made eye contact with them again, Cya was gaping at him like he’d grown a second head. He rolled from his heels to his toes, then back again. They continued to stare. He blew an awkward raspberry, then jabbed his thumb over his shoulder.
“Okay, cool. I’m gonna go because this fucking sucks. You can keep the hoodie.” He half-turned, then thought better of it. “Actually, that’s not true. I want the hoodie back. But not now. Whenever it’s convenient for you, I guess.”
“Dex,” they said for a third time, and he splayed his hands as he walked backward.
“We’re cool, Cya. I promise. Don’t gotta make a deal about it. It’s cool.”
They surged up from the bench, golden eyes flashing. “No, it’s not!”
“Cy—”