Chương 17: Blood & Lack Of Sweat

"And that's how I fell asleep with a shadow woman under my feet reading a book on worm ovulation." June wasn't the quiet type whatsoever; he was in fact quite the talker and a loud one at that. It's just that in the previous past days he had to adjust to the fact his voice sounded different and the effect it had on others, not to mention he was awkward with new people.

He had to be especially quiet for his midnight gaming session with friends; he didn't want to wake his mom up, and he also didn't want his friends to notice his very different voice. Every time they said something about it, June gave an excuse like mic issues, being ill, picking up singing as a hobby, or learning how to pronounce his words properly.

He used to trip over his words; he wouldn't be able to find the right words in time either, but regardless of that, it was either never talk or just talk, but now that his mind was remade in a way where he could properly process his thinking at a surplus speed, he had become a much better communicator, which made him feel happy, but at the same time, now that he was able to communicate like a normal person, his voice had become the issue instead.

His voice sounded more natural in the waking realm, but even if the difference was noticeable, his Dreamer status made his words carry will; his vocal cords were still remodeled. Frankly, his voice went from a little squeaky yet deep to sounding like he was an idol; hell, it even stunned June when he heard himself talking. Though his new voice would sound infinitely more angelic than any idol he could think of, which wasn't many.

Fortunately now, it was just June and Fin walking down a bike path in the forest at a time when few people went; it was nice to be able to speak out loud with his regular cadence, except for the fact that some of the local wildlife had started to gather and follow.

He started to feel like one of those princesses from those nondescript movies that sang and wildlife would gather around them to accentuate their beauty, but in the area the only real wildlife was squirrels, seagulls, the occasional pigeon, and a couple of trash pandas. He was like a DIY princess; if they were to make a movie about him, he did have the looks, but he didn't know of many princes who had the same powers as these princesses.

At the moment June and Fin were walking along the path back to the spot they originally met; they were going to head to the subway so they could travel to Fin's university. If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. Oddly enough to be considered lucky, June's clothing was often cheap; his jacket that he typically wore for its warmth and amount of pockets looked like the type drug dealers wore in movies.

June also had sweatpants on since he planned to do some physical tests today; he had a camo face mask that he had left over from a pandemic a couple years back and wore sunglasses and a cap; he looked suspicious enough to warrant people off. If animals that usually avoided humans stopped to stare at June, he was a bit worried how other humans would react to his appearance. So Fin, who was dressed casually, was just followed by a shady-looking figure who spoke quietly when others were nearby.

The two did do some tests while they were on this long bike track. They ran a race, and June won by a wide margin despite his shorter height. Finn timed June for a give or take hundred-meter dash, and June made the dash in less than four seconds this time. They tested June's new strength in a couple ways; first, June lifted up the clearly bigger Fin with one hand. It was too easy, so they moved on to the next logical idea.

June ripped a medium-sized tree, about 15 meters tall, out of the ground and then placed it back down so as to not destroy it. The tree was already rotting, so the strength test might be inaccurate.

"Someone said I have body manipulation powers; I think I can heal." And before Fin could reply to that, June grabbed a sharp stick and tried to jam it on through his hand, but it simply couldn't pierce through.

"You have scalpels at your school, right?" Fin looked at June incredulously.

"Don't do that." June looked at Fin for a minute, then slowly nodded.

Eventually they made it to the university. The subway they took wasn't as full as it usually was, so the trip basically went off without any hitches. They walked into the lab after taking a detour in the school labs; social anxiety and the power to pinpoint exactly where people are, even through several walls, had an interesting effect on the route they took towards the lab. It was the first time June had been here.

Fin and June wasted no time; they tried getting a blood sample, but the needle simply snapped when his skin grew taut. While Fin was thinking of an alternative, June grabbed one of the cleaned scalpels and jammed it into his hand after failing to make a slit in his finger. He bled into a petri dish, but the bleeding stopped almost immediately, so he had to reopen the wound a couple of times. Fin, on the other hand, was totally unaware of this happening since he went to a different classroom to find another needle.

June had no idea how anything worked; all he knew were the tads and bits he learned from movies and other media. He wasn't anything close to Fin's knowledge, but June did have times where he went through rabbit holes on weird topics, so he had a gist of how some of the instruments in the lab worked.

So he slid the petri dish with small splats of blood into a microscope, the wound on his hand already closed, which was a surprise to June since he hadn't gotten injured in any way since his transformation; it was more of a gamble than anything. June looked at his blood through the microscope and...

'What the hell am I looking for?' He didn't think he would get this far before Fin got back.