Mike woke up early the next morning as he had expected he was in his room. What a nice dream he thought. Then sneezed.
He went downstairs to have breakfast with his family. Mary was cooking bacon while the twins filled cups with juice. His mother had made a stack of lumberjack sized pancakes topped with mounds of butter, maple syrup and plates of bacon. Mike sat down to his favorite hearty breakfast."Say mom what's the occasion?" Mike asked.
His father looked over at him beaming. "Mike you received a triple gold rating on your most recent assessment. You're skipping the rest of the year and being placed directly into the BWCHS #4 in time for you're sixteenth birthday. Happy Birthday son."
***
It was Mike's first day of class and he was dropped in halfway through the first year of high school. He glad he didn't have to go to BWCHS #1 or #2 those were for the eggheads destined for political scientists.
High school #3 was for the navy no surprise that it was not very popular in the desert. High schools #'s 5-12 were for those boring customer service careers while #4 prepared students to take border wall security.
Secure the border wall to safeguard the country. However, BWCHS#4 was the farthest high school away from his home with a five hour commute. He would have to dorm there.
***
The principal was nice enough to help him settle into class five. It was the class in last place. Fifty students in his home room and he was the only guy. He was place in the back row next to the sleeping students.
"The school works on a merit system based on entrance exams and weekly assessments. Gather enough merits and you can take the place at a higher class level. Sorry but you missed the entire first half of the year so your score is rock bottom." The principal said.
"Students often challenge each other to battle in official matches. The more official matches you win the more merits you get. There are also unofficial grudge matches which are discouraged but do take place now and then."
Then the principal gave Mike his dorm key. "This is your dorm key don't lose it. Room number is printed on it. Your classmates also live in the same dorm as well. That way if your sick or otherwise incapacitated you know where to get your missed homework from."
At this Mike was alarmed. He was the only male student. "By the way any misconduct may be grounds for expulsion. Keep that in mind please."
Mike used his key to open the door into the common room. Opposite the entry was obviously the bathroom. To the left and right of the common room were doors to the bedrooms. Seeing one door unadorned with a name in glitter he went to that room.
Inside was a chair, desk, bed and closet. No pillows or blankets. At least the air smelled clean he thought. It was also his last peaceful thought in his new dorm. A ruckus was heard from the common room.
Three attractive fifteen or sixteen year old girls were wrestling together. Twisting arms, pulling hair and biting. "It's not my turn get the new girl to do it." one said.
Mike cleared his throat getting their immediate attention.
The trio stopped fighting and stared at him so long it was getting awkward. "Hi. I'm Mike. Are you ladies my roommates?" "How did you get in here?""Hurry call security there's a boy in our room" "Hi honey, I'm home!" were the initial responses.
After security left and my room assignment confirmed we began laying down some ground rules for cohabitation. It was going smoothly until the bathroom subject came up. It seems they share it simultaneously keeping the door unlocked. However, now that Mike was there it would obviously be scheduled. This led to an argument and as with everything else in school ended with a challenge. With the loser ending up with the winners decision.
Mike was in the dorm dining room on his second handstand push-up. He had been in the dorms a week before the challenges began to roll in. His opponents were his roommates three buff looking girls with well developed biceps. The three had easily lost the first challenge to his four hundred pushups ten minutes before.
He was able to do handstands for ten minutes at a time but had not considered doing handstand pushups. These girls probably planned it this way. Like many people in the dorm they went by their last names Jefferson, Clark and Floyd with their first name the same Anne. All three were natives of the great state Kentuckiana. Just East of Tornado Alley.
"Ka suso, suso, suso" the other girls were chanting. Mike no idea what that meant but he has sure they were swearing at him. A couple of others something like "pretty boy" and were giving him the evil eye.
Exhausted Mike folded and fell after his third rep while the Annes powered up to ten. They righted themselves and laughing Anne Jefferson said "Okay weakling your cleaning our rooms this month."
***
Cleaning was exhausting work. Mike has difficulty keeping his own room at home neat but now he has four bedrooms to cleans and their common room. He went back to his room to sleep.
Mike had just closed his eyes when he heard. "Pitiful, just pitiful. I leave you for two weeks to explore and this is what happens to you."
It was a woman's voice and definitely not one of his roommates. Mike shot off the bed assuming full combat stance scanning the room. He would have made a minuteman proud.
Then he saw near the ceiling a tiny woman hovering. A voluptuous woman in green grey dress but the size of a golf ball. "Well hello again. Do you mind if I call you Mike? Though I know that's not your real name."
Mike peered back assessing her as a opponent. He was unsure if he could hit her even if he jumped. She flitted around his room taking stock of his belongings.
"Who are you and why are you here?" Mike asked. His hands stayed where they were and not yet strayed to his knife. Depending on her answer he could unsheathe it in a flash.
"I know what you're thinking and besides we've met before. I'm Fei Fei the fae. Fae as in fairy not fae as in fat."
Mike thought it was all a dream, a very strange dream, but it seemed that wasn't the case. He took it all in before saying. "Then it wasn't a dream. There was a mutant pig killing ducks. How did you get here? Why are you here?"
"Well I had summoned a hero from the other world in our hour of need against the high boar. After it was defeated you unsummoned yourself. That had never happened before. So I made myself smaller and hitched a ride with you back to wherever I summoned you from."
Mike thought about that. "I don't recall seeing you." He said. Fei Fei looked happy "Didn't you feel something in your nose?"
As a matter of fact he did sneeze the moment he woke that morning.