The sun had barely risen, leaving the town of Slough covered in a grey mist. It was an unusual sight for three students in particular because they had never woken up this early in their lives, much less come to school at such an hour.
Innu was groggily walking up the stairs to the Westbridge’s roof and could see the door just a little ahead. The teenager was still in the middle of a stretch, yawning so wide that he could have fit his fist inside his mouth. When opening the door, he was surprised to see that he was apparently the last one to arrive.
“You’re late.” Kai stated, not even turning around as he continued to look out from the roof’s fence. The blonde teenager was staring into the distance. As to where exactly, only he seemed to know, for all Marie and Austin could see was the school field, that was currently empty, as well as the shapes of a few buildings. It was something the others had seen Kai do several times in the short amount of time they knew him.
“Late?” Innu checked his phone, which revealed that it was five past six in the morning. “Oh come on, it’s only by five minutes.”
Under normal circumstances, he would have still been asleep. At this hour, the only person who one might expect to see at school would be its caretaker. However, he lacked the energy to argue right now, so he silently moved over to his fellow Howlers members. Marie and Austin looked just as tired as him, their bodies slumped over.
‘How did Austin manage to get here before me? He doesn’t even live in this area or go to the same school?’ Innu worried.
“Aren’t you worried you might be late for classes?” He eventually asked, looking at the large student, who seemed to be fixing his hair.
“Worried about the classes I never go to? At a school that will never get me anywhere in life? I thought joining this gang made it pretty clear that I have nowhere better to go.” Austin gave Innu a look that made him feel like an idiot.
Just as Innu was about to say something back, Kai stopped staring outside and turned to look at his fellow gang members.
“Enough with the chit-chat. After our fight with the grey colour gang, each one of you came up to me individually. You all told me how useless you felt when faced against those freakish twins… Well, I felt the same way. Which is why we can’t stay the same. If we do then there is no hope for us.
“Our gang is small and has only just started, but I hope that soon enough it will be the Howlers instead of the Underdogs that people will associate with the town of Slough. Once we have achieved that, we can go for the county, then the country and finally the whole world.”
It should have sounded crazy, hearing that type of talk from the mouth of a teenager, yet somehow, when Kai told about his ambition, none of the other three felt like laughing, nor that it was unrealistic. They might not yet know how, but he seemed determined enough that he would come up with a way to achieve that goal.
“Of course, if it was that easy, anyone could have done that already. Along the way, we will face countless enemies who will make the grey colour gang look like a bunch of clowns in comparison. I won’t sugar coat it, we’ll eventually have to deal with Altered, and I mean real ones, not whatever those twins turned into!
“As such, I want you to never forget the fear that you felt that day. How it was mostly luck that we’ve even made it out alive…
“Now, I’ve come up with a strict training regime for all of us. We’ll be practising two hours each day before school starts.” Kai explained with a sadistic smile.
Everyone had their fists clenched tightly, and it looked like they were ready. The little pep talk had almost gotten rid of their tiredness, and everyone was put into action.
Innu and Austin were told to start with some warm-up activities. The idea was to build up their basic stats. The two of them were talented and although Innu trained he had done so nearly always alone. While Austin was the opposite, never having attempted to push his body to the limit but always getting in fights.
The two teenage boys began running around the roof a few times, increasing their basic strength with push-ups workouts and more, and eventually would finish up with a few spars here and there. They were learning a lot from each other, and their competitive nature made each one try to outdo the other.
“Forty five!” Innu loudly announced how many push-ups he had already made, sweat dripping down his forehead, falling on his chiselling abs, as he had long since taken his shirt off, same as Austin
“Bullshit, you call that a push-up?” Austin questioned him, as he demonstrated how to do it ‘properly’. “If you can’t do it with proper form, then that means you’re done, don’t try to force it!”
“Talk to me about form once your bum isn’t all the way in the air!” Innu argued back.
Next it looked like the two were moving onto squats, however they weren’t regular squats. At least for Innu, who placed one of his legs out straight and was going down using just one of his legs. Seeing this, Austin attempted to do the same, but his balance was horrible.
When he got down to the bottom, he attempted to push off but it was something he had never done before, his whole body was shaking and just when he was about to fall over he felt Innu grab him steady.
“It’s harder than it looks.” Innu said. Austin was expecting a smile but Innu didn’t have one on his face as he lifted him up. “You’re a strong hitter, and for you to have punches that strong while having weak legs like yours. If you improve your legs like mine then your punches will have even more power in them.”
When walking back to do his exercises Austin was looking at the sheer size of Innu’s legs. His thighs were thick like tree trunks and it looked like in his trousers there was no space for them to breathe.
‘I thought that guy was just naturally strong like me, but it looks like it was all hard work in the end.’ Austin thought.
*****
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