Low Effort

CHAPTER ONE

Riice woke up to the sound of knocking on his dorm window. It sounded like a stick, and he was pretty sure it was. He rolled out of bed and tried to get his hazel eyes to adjust to the bright room. It was dark out, but he forgot to turn the lights off.

“What time is it?” He muttered to himself.

“2:36”

Riice jolted his head up. Did he hear something? Or, at least thinks he heard something. But, it didn’t get to last long as another bang on his window hit the glass. Riice decided to get up and look out of the window. There was a group of people, three guys, and two girls. One of the guys was holding a large stick, but he looked like he was struggling to keep his balance.

“Hey, Riice! Come on out, you promised me two days ago! Besides it’s Friday- well Saturday now!”

One of the guys said. Riice knew the guy holding the stick yelling at him, he was a classmate, but the other four people he had never seen before. Riice let out a sigh as he really didn’t want to leave his dorm. There were many things going through his head right now, but most of all he had to keep up appearances, he really didn’t want people to think he was boring, so he closed his eyes, exhaled, and went downstairs.

They stood huddled next to the parking lot as they waited for Riice. It was cold, he could hear the muffled laughter from afar and saw their breath puff like a cloud. He looked at them, they were decent-looking people, and there were no distinct qualities about them that made them interesting.

They were just people.

“I’m here.” Riice joined the group, he stood next to the man with the stick. He put his hand on Riice’s shoulder and loudly exclaimed

“This right here is Riice! He’s fuckin’ hilarious, you guys will love him! Riice, these guys are Tony, Liam, Stacey Chloe, and me, Ryan, obviously. Ha ha!” He laughed. They laughed. These guys obviously seemed like the fake and annoying douche-bag types, but Riice decided to humor them.

They walked, and there weren’t many cars that were on the road. It was 2:00 in the morning anyway. The conversations they were having weren’t meaningful in any way, just light banter that the group kept making to keep from silence. That was until one of the girls interrupted.

“Guys, did you hear about the attack that happened the other day in Hazel City?” Chloe started talking. “I don’t know why, but so many anomaly attacks have been happening more and more lately…” she said. One of the guys chimed in “Yeah, maybe they’re mad the snow didn’t cancel work.” The group laughed. “It is kind of odd though, you know, the way these all-powerful beings just show up out of nowhere and we are just supposed to be alright with it? Isn’t that kind of shitty?” Chloe said.

Riice interjected, “I don’t think we are supposed to be okay with it, that’s what ESAC is for, right?” he said, “ESAC? They have been on TV every single day talking about a new dome they’ve been trying to create specifically for Lemon City, they don’t give a shit about any of us nobodies. Just keep funding them until we are all too broke to say shit anymore.” Ryan responded while laughing. “Don’t even get me started on that A.D.S. shit, private Anomaly syndicate? They won’t ever show up unless the end of the world is upon us.”

Riice looked at Ryan as they kept walking. Although he was very opinionated, he was sort of right. A.D.S. stands for Anomaly Defense Syndicate, and ESAC stands for Eradication and Specialized Anomaly Containment. Both are organizations that work to protect the public from Anomalies which are beings that humans can’t even fathom. But at the snap of the finger, they can destroy cities or even the world, the worst part is that they look just like humans, the only way to know what it is you’re talking to is to look at the irises. Humans are normal, but Anomalies have unique irises. They can look like stars, spirals, crescents, etc. The weird thing is, that some anomalies are not dangerous.

Riice remembered that there are a few anomalies he is in class with. It’s not like Anomalies are segregated at school, and some of them were actually nice to him and talked to him. A part of him felt a little bad hearing Ryan and the others badmouth the anomalies, but he quickly shrugged it off. “Look guys” Tony said, “there’s the rest of the group!” Riice was surprised to see that there were 6 more people, he thought this was going to be a small group outing where he could fade into the background and go back to his dorm to sleep. He wasn’t much of a drinker, and these people weren’t the most interesting people to be around.

The bar that the group was standing in front of didn’t have a name Riice could see. If it did, it was one of those obscure ones that was in a font somewhere small he couldn’t see. The bar was not really full but it also wasn’t empty. Riice looked around, Ryan nudged him with his elbow and pushed Riice forward. They entered the bar.

Everyone huddled in the far corner of the bar, there was a giant booth. Riice has never seen this type of booth in a bar, but he has also never been inside a bar. He watched what the others did and mimicked them to not look too out of place, no one seemed to notice. When everyone started to order their drinks and food, Riice ordered water. The group booed him and urged him to get an actual drink, Riice glanced at the wall and ordered a “French 75” to which the group let out a collective “wow!”. He started to notice that as the night dragged on, the group started to entertain themselves, he wasn’t needed. Ryan who had bothered him to come out, had now totally forgotten he was there, not that he minded.

But, now it was time for Riice to leave.

Riice turned to the table and set down some money from his wallet, 20 bucks. For the drink and a tip, he felt bad that he only took a few sips of his drink. As he put his wallet back in his pocket and turned around to run for the exit, he accidentally bumped into a girl, and she spilled her drink on her jacket. Riice was stunned but in his panic, he stuttered out an apology, “I-I’m sorry, are you okay? H-here let me get a napkin for you-” he felt ashamed that his voice began to shake along with his hands.

There were a group of girls who were with her and they laughed and said not to worry, one of the girls put her hand on Riice to tell him to step aside, and he obliged. She held her hand out in front of the girl and Riice’s vision got blurry, when the blurriness passed the stain and wetness were gone. This girl was an anomaly. He felt a little dizzy and stumbled backward a bit, but was caught by the girl.

“You okay? You know, humans aren’t supposed to stand that close when an anomaly uses their abilities.” The girl said, her voice was low and calm. She almost didn’t even sound alive, but it was soothing.

“This is my first time ever seeing that…this close I mean.” Riice said, “I really am sorry, to both of you. I was just on my way out-” Riice picked himself up and proceeded to head for the door when Ryan and the friend group noticed the commotion.

“Hey Riice, I see you found yourself a couple of beauties! Get over here man!” Ryan got out of his seat and held his hand out waving for Riice to come over. All the girls began to move, the girl holding Riice chuckled to herself and patted Riice’s back, “Let’s go, I’m bored anyways. Maybe you can entertain me.” She smiled. Riice thought she was extremely beautiful, but wasn’t sure if she was used to smiling because she looked weird sort of uncomfortable with the gesture.

“I’m Riice, by the way, I-I forgot to tell you that, by the way.” He waved his hand.

“Um…I’m…Alison?” She said. Riice noticed she said it with an upward inflection as if she was hesitant and wasn’t sure, but decided to ignore it.

They decided to sit on the far edge of the booth so the group wouldn’t think they were bored but not directly involved in the conversations. Riice watched Alison, she looked tired, not physically, but as if she was tired of watching them talk. Alison had an air about her that seemed like she was above them, it made Riice feel shame for being a part of them. Riice made sure to not be obvious that he was looking at her, at least he thought he was until he saw her looking at him instead of the group. There was no point in hiding it so he decided to strike conversation.

“Uh, you seem bored, are you?”

“And if I say I am?” Alison looked at Riice with dead eyes.

“I’d say, you’re not alone, I am too.”

Her eyes widened for a split second, Riice was able to make out her unique irises, and crosses. Looked just like the ones in Christianity. Alison cracked a bit of a smile, it looked more genuine than the one she originally showed him earlier. Then she leaned into the conversation a bit more, “Riice was it? Like the food?” her head tilted. “Yeah, it’s a long story, but it’s not my real name. But I don’t like my real name, so everyone just calls me Riice.” He averted his eyes, and she chuckled. “I guess we’re the same.” It was really quiet to the point that Riice couldn’t hear her, but he laughed anyway so as to not look awkward.

“Um, this might be weird to ask, so you don’t have to, but what is it like being an anomaly?” Riice felt nervous asking, but he was innocently curious.

“Well, tell me this. What’s it like being a human?” Alison looked at him and stretched out on the table resting her head on her arm. “Don’t look so confused, It’s exactly what you think. I still get hungry, I still have to sleep. I still get weird looks and bullied. I have had all the same experiences a human would have in life. I’m just like you.” She pointed her hand directly at Riice and wiggled her finger.

Riice looked at her and chuckled “You know, it’s kind of hard to believe someone as beautiful as you has been bullied before.” Alison looked at him in confusion. “You know, most people actually get bullied for being attractive, It’s common for others to bully due to feelings of jealousy and resentment from those who feel they did not receive the same lev-” Riice put his hand out to cut Alison off. “I-I know, I realized where my mistake was the second I decided to speak…I was trying to be cool regardless, I just wanted to try sounding like those cool guys.” He slouched in his seat and sighed, muttering to himself “I shouldn’t have come, if I was just gonna embarrass myself in front of the only girl my type here…”

Alison rose up and looked at Riice again closer, leaning into him. They were now face to face. “Who said I thought you were embarrassing?” Her eyes shined, instead of looking away as Riice habitually did every time, he looked her right in the eyes. Alison smiled, he noticed she had been doing so a lot more, and it was hard to imagine she was struggling to do so just 20 minutes ago.

There was a television in the top right corner of the bar, just above the bartender, it was on the entire time, but Riice did not feel the need to pay attention, while Alison stood in front of him he averted his eye contact, and quickly glanced at the television. It was some old obscure cartoon. Maybe it was purely coincidental or maybe by some weird fate, but the second Riice began fixating on the broadcast, the screen went black, and then bold Blue words popped on screen “BREAKING NEWS: ADDRESS TO THE NATION”. A loud beep was played to get everyone’s attention. All the chattering stopped, and the bartender used a remote to turn the TV up. Everyone looked at the TV except for Alison, who seemed to have sat back down and lost all of her excitement.

On the screen, a man with white hair wearing black reflective glasses was in front of a podium. There were two flags behind him one was the Aroma flag, but the other was one that Riice didn’t recognize fully, that’s what he gets for sleeping in history class back in high school. The man was known as President Vii. Many citizens speculate as to whether or not President Vii is human or an anomaly as no one has ever seen him other than when he is on TV. Riice looks around the bar to see that most of everyone is focused on the TV even Ryan. “It made sense”, he thought, it’s 3 in the morning and the president is giving an address. This must have been important.

He begins speaking.

“My fellow citizens of Aroma,

I stand before you tonight with a heavy heart to address the recent tragedy that has befallen our beloved city of Hazel. As you all know, Hazel City has been struck by a devastating anomaly attack, resulting in numerous casualties and widespread destruction. My heart goes out to the victims and their families, and I ask that we all take a moment to honor their memory and offer our deepest condolences. The attack on Hazel City was a cowardly act of terror, perpetrated by those who seek to destabilize and harm our great nation…”

Riice rolled his eyes, he knew it was going to be something along these lines.

“…I want to assure you all that we will not stand idly by while our citizens are threatened by these anomalous beings. We will do everything in our power to bring those responsible to justice and to protect our people from future attacks. To that end, I am announcing the creation of a new initiative to protect our cities from anomaly attacks. We will be building a state-of-the-art dome to cover the entire city of Lemon, creating a safe haven for our citizens in the face of any anomaly threat. I know we have spoken about this for a while and many of you have speculated but, this dome will be equipped with the latest technology and manned by the bravest and most skilled personnel in both ESAC alongside the Anomaly Defense Syndicate. I know that many of you may be concerned about the cost of such a project, but I assure you that this is a necessary step to ensure the safety and security of our citizens. We cannot put a price on the lives and well-being of our people, and we will spare no expense to ensure that they are protected…”

The group behind Riice let out a “wow!”, Ryan explained how respectable President Vii was and many of the others in the group immediately agreed with him. But Riice noticed Alison let out a laugh even though she was facing away from the TV with her hand on her chin.

President Vii continued, “…My fellow citizens, I urge you all to remain calm and resolute in the face of this tragedy. We are a strong and resilient nation, and we will not be broken by these attacks. We will rise up and face this threat with courage and determination, and we will emerge stronger and more united than ever before.

Thank you, and may God bless Aroma.”

The camera had zoomed out slowly from Vii and showed the logo for ESAC on the screen as the national anthem began playing. It was a logo with two hands joined together in prayer with a sun and moon outlining each hand.

Words were underneath, “United we live, united we fall, united we fight.” Then, the TV went back to reruns of cartoons. At this point, Riice noticed that he had been out for way too long, and he was starting to get sleepy again so he headed for the door but he stopped himself. He looked back towards Alison, she was still sitting staring out the window facing away from him. He was conflicted, he didn’t know whether or not he should call out to her as they were strangers, he was used to ruining chances with women or never taking initiative if he thought he had a chance with a woman. But, Riice has never in his 18 years of life fallen for an anomaly. This would be a unique experience, so what was the harm in trying? He thought to himself.

“U-um, excuse me…Alison?” He walked back up to her.

“What?”

The dead eyes were back.

“Do you wanna go walk around outside?”

“Why me?”

Riice let out a crooked smile and said, “I’m bored. Maybe you can entertain me.” To which Alison twitched. She still wasn’t looking at Riice’s direction, but she got up, went outside, and said “sure”. Riice laughed out loud.

He could tell for the first time that night that he was the one messing with her.

“She’s so cute.”

END