Confessions of a Middle Schooler

Chapter 6: Danger Days and Razor Blades

So, here's the first confession... Leave feedback!!

Confession: Dan

Dan's POV

I'd done some dumb-ass things before, but joining 9T9 is probably the most dumb-ass thing I've ever done.
Well, I guess I didn't really join... whatever, here's my story.

I was overweight. And not just overweight, I was obese. That's right- tall, muscular me, was once obese. I had binge eating disorder, BED, and it was owning my life. Meals melded together, and once I ate a buffet's entire stock of fried chicken by myself when I was 9. It was terrible, and one day, I decided to change it. So I started working out, first a bit at home, then at the gym. I still stuffed my face, yeah, but I burned off every calorie. My life had turned around- and to celebrate, I went to a concert. I was an 'early bloomer,' so I looked 16 when I was really 10. I went to a MCR concert, and it was great. I partied, sang, and I'm pretty sure Gerard got drunk after the concert.

Now, the concert was hosted by some charity I couldn't care less about, but it turns out they were helping kids who were obese lose weight. One of the organizers had heard from some other guy who heard from some other guy, you know how it is, and the chain went back to the gym manager, who'd apparently been watching me and seeing me transform. So, as a reward, they gave me a backstage pass. So I went back, and met the band (this is where I think Gerard was drunk,) and enjoyed myself. It was a great night, and it ended around 2 AM. I was walking home, still singing House of Wolves to myself, when a bunch of guys came out from a back alley. They all had knives, and no masks, which meant they didn't care if I saw them- they didn't plan on me getting home. The first guys charges me, and I kick him square where the sun doesn't shine, and he's down. I pick up his knife, and point it at the rest of them. "Ya see him?" I say, kicking him in the chest. "He's an example. Now I got a knife, and honestly, if any of you scumbags live, you'll have been beat up by a kid. I'm giving you a chance now to le-UMPH." The reason I didn't finish was because some guy had come up behind me and hit me with what felt like a rifle stock. I collapsed, and just before I blacked out, I saw the guy who'd hit me.
He had a gleaming, bloody, razor blade embedded in his arm.

I woke up in a dark room with a single bright white light, tied to a chair, dazed. "Well well," Razor Blade says. "We caught a little fish trying to beat up the sharks." He looks me straight in the eyes, and says what I thought was a joke; "We want you to join us." I take a second and, if I'd been drinking something, I would've sprayed it everywhere. I laughed like a maniac, and I swear I saw a red dot aim at my throat. Razor Blade screams at me to get me to stop. "YOU THINK I'M KIDDING?! YOU JUST GOT MUGGED AND BEATEN, YOU'VE BEEN OFFERED A CHANCE AT FREEDOM, AND YOU LAUGH!?" I shut up right then and there. "The name's X, and we've been watching you." He moves closer to me and sits in a chair that I'm certain wasn't there before. "We watched you evolve, and get stronger. Now, we want you to join us."
"Us?" I ask in disbelief. "Who's 'us'?"
"We," X says, gesturing to the other men in the room, "are the Razor Blades. And yes, the name did come from the razor in my arm.
"We're a gang, and we commit every crime you can think of- murder, theft, vandalism, armed robbery, illegal drug possession; if it's illegal, we've done it.
Now I'm giving you a choice," he says as he takes a silenced rifle off the wall rack (was that there?) and points it at my face, the barrel so close I could see the rifling, "to either join us, or die."

I chose the former.

The room then lit up, and I saw that I was not in a room as much as a compartment. The 'walls' were taut gray curtains, and I was really in a massive complex. It had a food court, shops, a game room, and a sign that said 'Dorms.' The place looked, and felt, like a shopping mall; there were people laughing, running, buying, some were just passed out and red-faced. I noticed almost immediately that a) there were a LOT of girls and b) all people had the right sleeve of their top cut off (if they were wearing a top) to expose a tattoo of a razor blade dripping blood. A mob carried me into a tattoo parlor, someone gave me a flask of what smelled like beer, sat me in a chair, and ripped my right sleeve off. I don't remember what happened in there, but I left with a tattoo in my arm and beer in my blood.

I woke up the next morning feeling great, but by the time lunch came at school, I felt like I was about to throw up. Not to mention my arm had begun to sting bad where the razor was.

I was on my way to 5th period when the nurse stopped me in the halls. "Hi, are you Daniel Yousef?" she asked.
"Yeah," I answered while somehow keeping my lunch down, "but it's Dan. Never Daniel, never Danny, always Dan. And you are?"
"Ms. Katherine Jennings, the nurse. You don't look so good, you ok?" she replied. I opened my mouth to answer, but she must have smelled the beer on my breath because her eyes widened and flickered to my right arm. "You're not ok, come with me," she hurriedly said. She took me to her office, locked the door, and put me in a chair. "Explain last night. Every detail. I already know most of it, so just tell me," she says before I even register she sat down. I recall every the previous night's events, and her face took on a serious tone. "So you got mugged by the Razor Blades, and lived?" she said in disbelief. I nodded slowly, wondering what was wrong. She then opened a cabinet, then a safe inside the cabinet. She pulled out a medal with the phrase "9T9 Lives" on it in black and red. "Ever seen this?" she asks. Seeing my confused look, she explains what 9T9 lives is, and you probably know what that is by now. She then pulled the medal apart to reveal a.. cookie cutter? She pushed it into the back of my hand, and felt a sting as the cookie cutter (which was actually very sharp) cut a 9T9 into my hand. "You've been inducted. Welcome to 9T9 Lives, Dan."

The day had one good point: I'd missed 5th period, so I didn't know that my old hag of a teacher had tried to microwave pizza with the foil still wrapped around it, so it caused a fire.
I had no school for a week.

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It's a bit longer, but hey, there's more happening. Please leave comments and suggestions, I'll probably use them!!