No sooner had Samaul finished reading the journal than he did as it commanded.  He tore out every page with writing and watched with fascination as the pages grew back, though now they were blank.  He wrote down everything he’d read minus his father’s notes and the letter.  When he finished, he closed the book and shivered a little before setting it down and standing.  He left his room and entered the kitchen, grabbing the box of matches out from the lowest drawer by the oven.

	When he returned to his room, he set the pages he’d torn out on fire, watching as those pages burned with blue, smokeless flames.  With that finally done, he was released from the power of the words written upon the pages and he let out a sigh of relief before grabbing the book and throwing it at the wall in rage.  Now he knew what it felt like to have no choice, no free will.  It made him sick to his stomach and he curled up on his bed, shivering.

	He was just thinking about pulling on clothes when he heard his bedroom door open.  Raising his head, he saw his mother standing there wearing only a towel and looking very concerned.  “You okay, sweetie?” she asked him, her emerald snake eyes watching her wingless red dragon son so carefully.

	He wiped his eyes and nodded a little.  “Don’t worry about it.  Just… I have a lot on my mind right now,” he told her.  He could have ordered her to leave but after having his own freedom stripped from him, he couldn’t bring himself to use his power on her.

	His mother, a Banana-Boa Naga, slithered over to him and ‘sat’ herself down on the edge of his bed, rubbing his bare shoulder.  “High school isn’t that scary, honey,” she told him softly, misunderstanding why he was upset.  “It’s just a new environment.  You’ll have fewer classes and the workload is easier, from what I remember.”

	He let her believe that as he rolled onto his back and placed his right hand on her tail just below her towel, rubbing gently.  He knew it hadn’t been two hours yet since he’d failed that command, so she wasn’t about to get naked so he could stare at her marvelous form so instead he showed off his own naked body to her. “I know but… I guess I don’t like change too much,” he lied softly, gazing up at her with his orange-gold eyes.  He watched her gaze break from his and travel down him.  He was only fourteen, so there wasn’t much to look at except the gradually growing erection sliding out from his sheathe.

	When her eyes settled on his cock, she gave a little teasing smile.  “Was earlier not enough, honey?” she asked softly, sliding a hand down his stomach to lightly tease the tip of his ridged dragon cock.

	“Earlier was amazing,” he whispered to her, “Just remembering it is getting me hard again.”

	She giggled softly and started to stroke his hard length once more.  “Oh to be young.  You’ve got such boundless energy.  If you’re not careful, you’ll wear your old lady out,” she warned with a smile.

	“You’re not old,” he told her sincerely, “You’re young and beautiful.”  He rose up onto his elbows as she stroked him more and rubbed her thumb across his tip.

	“Oh hush.  You’ll make me blush, duffass,” she scolded teasingly before lowering her head and slowly sliding her forked tongue up the length of his cock, drawing a moan from him.  He lowered a hand and slowly stroked her bald, golden scaled head as she took his tip into her mouth.  To his embarrassment, even after climaxing so recently, he still came just as she started to really suck him off.  She was crazy skilled at it, or so he liked to believe. In truth she was a bit rusty, but he didn’t know that.  He watched and listened as she noisily gulped down his thick, sticky seed and when she pulled off his cock, she grinned at him.

	“There, that should help you sleep,” she said with a proud tone as she stroked his thighs with her hands and rose up.  “Now no more throwing stuff around, okay?  Go to sleep so you don’t fall asleep during class,” she warned before sliding off the bed and slithering out of the room, wishing him goodnight before closing the door.

	He took a deep breath and let it out in a long, slow sigh before climbing off his bed and walking over to the journal he’d thrown across the room not twenty minutes earlier.  He was still angry, but not overwhelmingly so anymore.  He carried it back over to his bed and whispered, “You should lock.”

Convince Ability Initiated…  Dice Roll Commencing… 13!  Roll Successful!

	Sure enough he heard a click and when he blinked, there was a small metal lock on the journal.  He wasn’t sure where it had come from, but after some searching, he couldn’t find the one that had been on it previously.  Giving up, he put the journal under his pillow and went to sleep.

	When he awoke the next morning via the sound of his mother knocking on his door, he groaned and got out of bed.  The first day of high school was today, a Thursday of all days, and marked the end of his summer vacation.  He dressed lazily and when he came out into the living room, his mother was waiting, sipping a cup of coffee.  She pointed at his mug on the coffee table and he grumbled thanks before sitting next to her.  She was wearing her silk robe and from the nipple bumps, it was obvious it was all she was wearing.

	“Sexy,” he commented lightly and she slapped his arm lightly.

	“I know right?  Your father’s old shirt is dirty- I wonder why- so I have to wash it before I can wear it again.  By the way, you never gave me the forty that Ms. Granger gave you,” she told him, nearly causing him to choke on his coffee.

	“Right! Sorry, sorry,” he said quickly as he set his mug down and went back into his bedroom.  When he returned, he handed the two twenties to her and she thanked him.  “I really don’t want to go to school.”

	“Too bad.  Doing things you don’t want to do is part of being an adult and while you’re still a teenager, it’s never too early to learn harsh realities,” she told him before giggling softly, “Besides, you might meet some cute girls today.  Why pass up that opportunity?”

	“Well I have a beautiful mother here at home,” he told her before sipping his coffee, causing his mother to lightly slap his arm again.

	“Yeah well I won’t always be around, honey.  I do have work despite the unwanted mini-vacation I’m currently on,” she reminded him and he sighed softly before quickly finishing his coffee.  He gathered up his things while his mother watched and he stepped out of the apartment wearing black jeans, shoes and an old red hoodie that read “Zombie Chicks Like Me For My Brains” on the front.

	He waved hello to Ms. Granger on his way down the hall then two flights of stairs later, he was on the first floor and out the door into the morning air.  The high school wasn’t that far away so he planned to walk, despite there being a bus that ran through here.  He needed time to think and he really didn’t want to be stuck inside a cramped bus full of little kids.

	He watched as a few cars passed him as he walked down the sidewalk, passing building after building.  They didn’t live in a particularly nice neighborhood, but no one had bothered him as of yet.  Soon enough he arrived at his school just as one of the buses did.  He mingled with the flow of other high schoolers as they climbed off the bus then entered the school.  There were signs everywhere for freshman to go to the gymnasium so he did just that.

	The freshman class wasn’t all that big this year it seemed, seeing as the principle- a stout pig man- claimed it was the smallest in the last ten years.  Samaul let his gaze sweep over his fellow freshman but no one really caught his eye as interesting, though he knew eventually he would make some friends.  They were divided by last names and sent to various homerooms to pick up their schedules and after an hour, Samaul found himself sitting in his first class which turned out to be English 9.

	There were introductions from his bunny rabbit teacher but he wasn’t really listening.  He was bored, so incredibly bored.  He wanted to be home and found himself wondering what his mother was up to.  Probably doing the laundry like she said she would be.  Maybe she was helping one of the neighbors to earn a bit of extra cash?  Suddenly the bell went off and he sighed as he stood along with the others and left for his next class.

	This one was Keyboarding, which the whole goal of the class was to teach the students how to type quickly and efficiently.  This class was a mixed one, with several older students in it, including three Junior girls.  They looked like models, at least to him.  One in particular was a Brown Rabbit with long black hair tied back in a pony tail and remarkable silver eyes.  Her breasts were all perky and probably C-cups, seeing as they were not as big as his mother’s.  He learned her name to be Jennifer Willians from the roll call and found himself crushing on her hard.  He had no idea what was in store for him.

	No sooner had the class ended than he was confronted by the three girls.  “I saw you staring at me, Freshman Pervert,” Jennifer said with a pretty voice laced with more venom than a cobra’s bite.  “Keep your eyes to yourself or I’ll fuck your life up,” she warned him, sneering at him while her friends cackled coldly.  So much for having a crush on her.  He was instantly both pissed off and repulsed by her sickening personality.  Why did the pretty ones have to be such cunt bags?

	“Oh trust me, I won’t ever look at you again, skank,” he dissed as he turned but no sooner had he started to walk away then her friends grabbed him and shoved him up against the wall.

	“The fuck did you call me, you lizard bastard!” she growled at him, obviously mad.  When Sam looked over at the teacher’s desk, he saw the teacher had left already.  Instantly he felt the desire to use his power on her, but he felt in his gut that now was not the time.  The book hadn’t said anything about the power working on more than one person at a time, so he would just have to talk his way out of this one.

	“I called you a skanky hoe bag,” he told her smoothly and instantly contorted, grunting with pain as she kneed him in the balls.

	“Don’t ever fucking think of speaking to me like that again.  Hell, don’t ever fucking speak to me at all,” she growled at him, her silver eyes so full of anger that it looked like she would gouge out his eyes if her friends hadn’t released him and pulled her away, saying he wasn’t worth getting kicked off the cheerleading squad.

	After they left, he growled low in his throat as he slowly and carefully got back to his feet, rubbing his balls lightly.  If he ever found himself alone with her, he would make her his bitch, he swore to himself.

	The rest of the day went by completely uneventfully and even the walk home was peaceful, but that did nothing for his sour mood.  He felt betrayed, just a bit, by how such a pretty girl could be such a hideous monster inside.  He wasn’t actually aware of the fact that he was back home until his mother hugged him, snapping him out of his dark thoughts.  “Welcome home baby.  Did something happen? You look upset,” she asked with concern.

	“Oh uh… It’s nothing.  Just slowly realizing that you can’t judge a book by its cover,” he told her and raised a hand, running his fingers through his black hair.

	“Well that’s cryptic.  Just tell me what happened?” she implored but he shook his head, again telling her not to worry about it before he walked into the kitchen.  They made dinner together and when they sat down on the couch to eat, they snuggled.  No sooner had they finished eating than they started to turn their attentions away from the TV to each other.  Soft kisses at first that gradually grew heavier, tongues wrestling before long.  Their hands wandered over each other’s bodies, groping and fondling and before long they were working towards getting each other off.

	Slowly he slid two fingers in and out of her soaking wet pussy while she stroked his cock eagerly.  He was excited to the core of his being, feeling her warm wet depths clutching his fingers but maybe because of the knee to his junk earlier, he wasn’t climaxing like the teenage virgin he was.  It actually took his mother climaxing hard around his fingers before he lost it himself, shooting his cum onto her stomach and black pussy lips.  Together they lay there on the couch panting for a bit before they kissed each other goodnight and separated, going to their own rooms.

	Friday was just as uneventful as the second half of Thursday, without so much as a single glimpse of the bitchy Jennifer.  She’d probably skipped school or something.  He didn’t even know why he was looking for her.  The weekend passed by in a blur with him spending a lot of time helping his mom with a few chores around the house and cuddling with her on the couch.  Though they played around, they didn’t go further then masturbating each other.  He wasn’t sure why they hadn’t gone all the way yet, and it was starting to bug him.

	The next week held more stress for him than he would have cared to admit.  He still walked to school but now he did so with a heavy backpack full of books.  After every second period Keyboarding class, he found himself the target of Jennifer and her bunch’s bullying.  He was called names, made fun of, sometimes physically hit.  The anger he felt was starting to build up to dangerous levels.  Finally, on that Friday, he decided he had had enough.

	He kissed his mother deeply, passionately goodbye before leaving for school that day, his backpack slung over one shoulder.  When he arrived, the first thing he did was seek out Jennifer.  When he found her, she was with her cronies but rather than say anything to her, he handed her a letter, glared at her and walked away.  After that point, he waited for her in the library.  First period started while he was hidden in a storage room there, waiting.

	Sure enough, the door opened and Jennifer entered alone, finally without her cronies.  She closed the door behind her and walked over to him, or strutted rather.  She looked smug and proud of herself and it was all he could do to not punch that god damn smile off her face.  “So here I am,” she said to him, “Go on and admit how puny you are and how great I am.”

	There were so many commands that came to mind, but on Thursday night, he had spent many hours contemplating how to handle this issue.  If he used his power to make bad shit happen to her, others would notice and Karma would definitely come back to bite him in the ass.  So instead of telling her to smash her face against the wall until she died a horribly bloody death, he gave her a wicked smile and said, “You should be my friend.”  He watched that blood red twenty sided dice roll in his head and his smile grew as the feminine robotic voice spoke.

Convince Ability Initiated… Dice Roll Commencing… 6! Roll Successful!

	“Sure,” she replied with a smile that was no longer that smug, bitchy look she’d held before.  Instantly her stance had changed from seeing him as a maggot to viewing him as a friend, a real friend.  He had to admit that the surprise showed on his face at that smile.  She was fucking beautiful without that horrible attitude towards him.  “So what did you call me here for?” she asked him curiously, plopping down beside him.

	“Oh you know, I just wanted to hang out with you and skip class,” he told her easily, sliding into the role of friendship easier than he had expected from himself.  He was still angry at her for all the bullying.

	“Hey look… I’m sorry for bullying you so much,” she told him, her fingers laced on her lap and her gaze upon her clasped hands.  “I was being bitchy and I was kinda on my period last week,” she said with embarrassment, her cheeks flushing.  Had he been angry at her?  “I know that’s not a good excuse but I get a bit testy during that time of the month…”

	He sighed softly and reached over, rubbing her back lightly, feeling her flinch when he touched her but also feeling her relax.  Had she thought he’d hit her?  Had flipping their relationship from bully to friend been that huge of a change?  “I understand.  So you won’t pick on me anymore?” he asked and she looked at him horrified.

	“Of course not!  I’d never pick on my only friend,” she told him which made him frown.

	“’Only friend’?  Surely I’m not the only one you call a friend?  What about Brittany and Heather?  They’re your friends right?” he asked but she shook her head.

	“They’re just on the cheer squad with me.  They aren’t really friends.  I’d never count on them for anything,” she told him honestly and he raised his brows.  Well fuck a duck, he thought to himself as he looked away with furrowed brows.  Now that had come as a surprise, but yet it also made sense.  She was a huge bitch, and not just to him either, so it made sense that she didn’t have many friends.

	Chewing on his lower lip, he kept rubbing her back while she played with her floppy left ear.  All thoughts of gradually fucking her over had slipped from him, like someone had stolen the wind from his sails.  “Here,” she suddenly spoke up, making him look to her, seeing that at some point she’d written her phone number and email address onto a slip of paper.  “Text or email me anytime,” she told him and he accepted it though he apologized and explained he had neither a phone nor a computer.

	She looked horrified at that and even said “You poor thang” while patting his leg.  That made them both give soft laughs before they settled in.  She pulled out her phone from her little black purse and they snuggled together, watching YouTube videos quietly.  They spent the rest of the day like this, skipping all their classes until the bell rang to mark the end of the day.  They talked a lot too and after a while, Sam learned that Jen was the only child of a lawyer mother and a businessman father.  As they got up to leave, Sam got a good eyeful up her black skirt at her bare pussy with its pink lips which made her push down her skirt in a rush and blush heavily.

	“You saw didn’t you?” she asked quietly and when he nodded, she bit her lip and turned away.  “I didn’t feel like wearing any today so I… I was celebrating being off my period and… I uh…” she stammered a bit and he chuckled softly, lightly patting her back after he stood.

	“You don’t have to make excuses to me.  If you don’t want to wear panties then who am I to complain?” he asked, “Not that I would.  It’s hot.”

	“Oh you!” she said frustrated, turning and slapping his chest lightly, still blushing.  “So pervy,” she scolded lightly before grabbing her purse.  “Friends don’t talk to each other like that,” she told him, clearly embarrassed.

	“I believe in honesty among friends,” he told her truthfully and she bit her lip lightly.  “Hey, we should get going or we’ll get found and get in huge trouble,” he told her quickly and she gave a little jump before nodding quickly.  They snuck out of the library like two thieves in the night and when he started walking towards his house, she stopped him.

	“You’re not going to take the bus?” she asked and he shrugged, admitting it was quicker to walk.  “Come on, ride the bus with me.  We’ll sit in the back and stuff,” she urged and he gave in with a nod.  After briefly speaking to the driver, who stopped him and asked where he was going, the two of them made their way to the back of the bus.  There were only about ten other high school students on this bus, which revealed that the bus would also be picking up children from the grade school up the road.

	Brittany and Heather were there in the back of the bus and looked thoroughly confused as the two of them sat together.  “Hey… Why are you sitting with the wimp?” asked the salamander Brittany.

	“He’s not a wimp and we resolved our differences.  He’s actually pretty cool,” she told them, defending her new friend.

	“We just got off on the wrong foot last week,” he told the two of them and they rolled their eyes with a soft ‘whatever’.  Giving a shrug when he looked over at Jennifer, the two of them snuggled down in their seat and out came her phone again.  They took a few selfies before returning to the infamous YouTube, watching videos until it was time for them to part ways.  Jen got off the bus in front of a rather nice looking house while he himself got off at a stop sign up the street from his apartment building since that was as close as the bus would get.

	The whole trip had taken an hour and a half longer than if he had simply walked home but he felt happier than before.  His mother was at work, so when he entered the house, he was alone.  He picked up a few dirty dishes and settled in to watch TV.  He realized then that because it was Friday, he had the whole weekend before he’d see Jen again.  He frowned to himself at that thought and the disappointment he felt.  Just yesterday he was so mad he’d contemplated killing the girl by brutally strangling her while she struggled in his grasp, but now he was looking forward to seeing her on Monday for a totally different reason.  Was this a proxy effect of his power on her?  Had his view of her changed as well when he’d told her to be his friend?

	He hunted down the journal and after unlocking it, he wrote down a note to himself saying “Be careful when commanding a relationship change as it affects you along with the victim.”  After writing that, he had no doubt that because he’d ordered her to be his friend rather than be friendly to him; he’d also changed himself to be her friend.  It was one hell of a double edged sword, his power.  He’d have to be more careful.