Stage 6.2 - Chanty´s secret and the salty prank
teams included, in order of appearance: Firulais by @Angelustyle, Chitko by @MrdjaNikolen, Hilbilly Rollers by @Knugcab and Shift Happens by @Madrias
After a quite unspectacular stage, the Primus Legacy arrived at the site, with Chanty still being unusually excited for her habits.
“Oh this looks like a nice camping si… eeeh, nevermind.”
“Damn! This looks like some muddy parking lot for industrial vehicles.”
“Maybe because it is, Jan… but well, for being one of the few men that have never been on a construction site, that was a good guess, I must admit…:”
“Dad, don´t insult him! He is a real man as you are!”
“Hey, that was a compliment, Chantal.”
“I KNOW YOUR SO CALLED COMPLIMENTS TOO WELL BY NOW! And why are we only seventh?”
“Maybe because we had a food stop even if we told you that we could buy you something for less money after the stage and don´t have to order food on the highway restaurant.”
“BUT I WAS HUNGRYYYYYYYYY!!!”
Chanty now blamed herself for the mediocre result and took an emotional support cigarette. As she still had some pain after the conftrontation with 150 kilogram of hillbilly rage, with every part of her body aching like she was put in a car crusher, she was relieved of the duty to build up the tent, and Angel came over to look for her. As the teams built up their campsites next to each other in order of their finishing, both the Firulais and the Chitkos were close to the Rhinos, so Chanty had her favourites near her.
“Oh…”
“Mh?”
“It is just… that you look worse than I thougt…”
“Yes, I know, but I was not really a beauty before, so a few scars more or less are fine…”
“No, Chanty, you are beautiful, don´t say that.”
“eeeh, no free flirting here, hugging is free, but I charge an expensive fee for more from her.”
, laughed Jan, knowing well that Angel would never dare to take away Chanty from him, also well aware of the fact that Chanty wouldn´t dare to cheat on him either, but he wanted to ease it all up with a funny comment.
But actually, Angel got it wrong and felt like being caught and called out, as he really does feel very close to Chantal and stress started to build up, a factor well known for starting mindreading incidents.
The next step towards the inevitable disaster was Josué passing by, being curious what Angel is doing, asking him in a spiteful way, taking revenge for ruining his flirting at Mosoto:
“Look who is the Casanova now!”
Just in that moment Angel also realized which song Thomas was playing with the car´s audio equipment to motivate himself for cooking… and the title alone is self-explanatory while it finally made Angel having the next attack…
This time it was almost taking two minutes. For spectators, it seemed like Angel was burning alive, and he went through Chantys whole thoughts once again, but more in depth. He saw again all negative things, like the ugly divorce of the parents, her first pet dying, being bullied in school, losing friends, being cheated at… but this time it went deeper into details, also making him feel what Chanty feels for, or better said, against herself, and it is not positive, to say the least. He was not even spared of Chantys most painful core memory, and that was her father almost dying from a heart attack in Sweden last year.
As if this was not enough, he also went through some happy events in Chantys life, and there were actually some very beautiful memories in her, like her first feeling of love, getting an ice-cream after falling on her knees as child, or sitting on the lap of her father when he drove, being allowed to honk, and many more. But by sharing her thoughts, these wonderful memories made Angel also fall into an even deeper hole.
He just discovered the reason for Chantys sadness despite keeping positive memories. For her, it hurts more to remember good things that are no longer there. Or, if it was still present, her first thought would be when it´s over or the loved one would leave her in the one or other way.
The one minute and 43 seconds felt like an hour, and Angel remained on the ground, not even trying to get up again. He seemed stuck processing the information he had just seen.
What Ángel found was a very similar sight to what he usually saw… He being bullied not only at school, but at work, at home, even sometimes by himself… The cold feeling of Far Eastern Russia with a douce of Japanese Awkwardness, His never-ending clumsiness which always made him a troublesome person, or, more like, a person who easily got in trouble. His endless Own-Goal scoring Carrer… And, how could he forget, the war at the Kuril Islands, which is the reason why he has only one eye.
But seeing Thomas nearly die, that was the thing that put Ángel in shock. He understood the sort of traumatizing feeling that Chantal may have gotten when that happened. It was as bad as what he had with Kivenaal who lost his homeworld. This incident broke Chanty so much that her already existing depression became a lot worse from that night on, and Angel was forced to read all of Chantys plans what she would do after Thomas dies from a heart attack, and this would be too dark to even mention a tiny bit of it.
Only one single thing was good about this extreme mindreading incident - at least he was now relieved that his stronger-than-usual affection to Chantal was not neccecarily romantic interest, more feeling of her like a very much loved younger sister, as they have matching characters and have lived through similar events.
Jan, medically trained, checked for Angel, and he was… more or less alright, but having lived through Chantys mind clearly ruined his mental health.
“Damn, we need to cheer him up before we let him go back to his team.”
“Hey, Jan, I got an idea.”
Chanty took off her t-shirt and gave it Angel.
“So, its one with an angel, and I think that fits to your name…so, the little Rhino you got from me won´t miss me that much if you have something else from me.”
Angel opened his eyes, well, his one left, and stared at Chanty, and he blushed a lot before desperately trying to look away from her, which was easier said than done with only one eye.
“Eh, Jan, better bring me another t-shirt, I guess he´ll explode otherwise. Damn, Angel, have you never seen a girl, or what?”
Angel thought Jan was going to kill him now, but the opposite was the case - Jan and Chantal, despite arguing on a daily basis, have a very trustful relationship and are rarely feeling jealous.
“Well, baby, I take my time for getting you something out of our trunk, because I enjoy the sight even more than Angel does, hm?”
Thomas, busy with preparing food, ranted at Jan in response.
“CAN YOU STOP DOING BULLSHIT? MY NEED FOR DRAMA IS SATISFIED FOR TODAY. JUST GRAB SOMETHING FOR HER, THIS IS NOT OUR FKK BEACH!”
“Yeah, we should monetarize this and make you an Onlyfans account. With that income, we buy Thomas´garage, I become the boss and make him my assistant.”
“JAN! SHUT THE FUCK UP AND FOLLOW ME IN TOWN TO BUY MISSING GROCERIES. Chantal, make sure that Angel is arriving safely at his camp.”
Chanty did as ordered, and Angel, in need to talk with someone about his latest incidents to not lose his mind, started with Kivenaals mind content, describing what he saw in detail - a mistake, as Chantal did not know about this yet and started crying about the end of Aetherii that Angel described a bit too detailed. When arriving at the nearby Firulais camp, the others quickly grabbed Angel, telling him to help with the preparations for the next stage, while Chanty decided to have a mental health stop at the Chitkos. Pi was shocked when she arrived.
“OH NO! I heard what happened this morning, but… damn, this looks so bad.”
“I had worse … incidents … already, it´s fine.”
“Well, considering that Marie was your opponent, I guess you are very lucky that she left you alive. But still… that looks painful.”
“OH NO! DAMN!”
“What? Have I said something wrong?”
“Damn, I need that salt… eh… eh… here is it. I don´t want to have even more demons posessing me than it´s already the case.”
Before Pi could stop it, Chanty rubbed a lot of salt on her wounds, making her scream in pain and crying. Actually everyone in her surroundings was shocked seeing her doing this to herself, even if such behaiviour was more or less expected from her already by those that watched her a bit in the past days. Bong ran towards Chanty, ripping the salt out of her hands and spilling it all over the ground.
“ARE YOU DUMB? DO THAT ELSEWHERE BUT NOT HERE!”
“BONG! SHE IS NOT DUMB! JUST SPECIAL. How about being nice to her instead of being so harsh?”
Pi could not look at Chanty crying, as it was too painful for her, she grabbed some booze, and Andrea gently hugged her and then turned to Chanty, also comforting her.
“Why did you do that? And why in front of Pi, you know how much we like you, and that this will cause her nightmares. It might not look that way, but Pi is as sensitive as you are.”
“I … was told so. Janne told my dad that I need to do this in order to not be possessed and now the salt is gone, now I will be an easy target for demons!”
Bong, as a doctor, insisted on getting the salt off Chanty, but she refused, and he went back to his daughter Jakasxandra in order to rant, but now didn´t want their guest to hear this.
“Have you heard that nonsense? Is that Janne a total idiot? And why does her father even encourage her to listen to that?”
“I have, but as my loving father you can imagine how hard it would be for you if I was cursed by life like her, and you would try everything to make me feel better, don´t you think?”
“Sure, Jakasxandra, but why salt? This seems like a… questionnable attempt at curing her.”
“I once talked to Janne when he had a booze-fueled philosophic moment, and he said, at some point, mmh, let me put it back together, ah, yes, he said, healing and cleaning out your self-inflicted wounds is helpful to actually improve your own strength and gain trust in it. I think what Janne was up to is… that Chanty is actually very strong, but she doesn´t know that yet or has forgotten about it.”
But both really doubted that the instruction given by Janne included using almost all salt at once, causing Chantal to still cry in terrible pain after some minutes, and Bong, even if being very annoyed at his blue-haired guest about the incident, politely told Chanty that Jannes ritual includes using one single grain of salt - since it should not cause pain, but only keep the demons away.
Before arriving at her own campsite, she walked over to Shift Happens, asking for Kiva.
“Oh, what is it that late?”
“Angel told me what is in your mind. The end of Aetherii, to be precise.”
“Why did he do this?”
“He needed to vent, I guess?”
“And, what are you willing to talk about now?”
“I don´t want to talk, I just want to make your life a bit better.”
Chanty, way too small to give Kiva a “proper” hug, grabbed his leg and leaned against it, and the giant Valraadi sighed. Not that the things in his mind didn´t bother him, but having - from his perspective - kids dealing with it was not his intention. But for the moment, having the affection and gentle hug of Chantal had a positive effect on him. He even considered his team doing magic to let Chantys bruises heal faster, but on the other hand, he thought that a harsh lesson like Marie taught her might help her learning from mistakes, in this case, carelessly challenging superior opponents.
“Thanks, little one, I appreciate it. But looking at your makeup, you cried a lot today, hm? Let me bring you back to your team, someone charging other peoples inner batteries like you needs to recharge herself as well.”
When Kiva again gave her a lift “home”, Chanty arrived just in time to enjoy the dinner that Thomas and Jan had prepared and went to sleep with Rudolph, waiting for Jan to cuddle with her when he was done washing the dishes, a task usually Chanty did, but with her hands being injured, nobody expected her to do it this evening, and exhausted as she was, she was already sound asleep when Jan and Thomas joined her in the tent.
