PART 2

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“Sometimes you seem so mature,” Samantha mused while looking through the tax forms, “but only sometimes. You have absolutely no patience for finances.” Bath grumbled something indeterminate under his breath.

“I just don’t care about money,” he said, rolling his eyes.

“You should,” Brian admonished, holding out a W2 form to his wife. ‘You can’t depend on us forever.” Bath didn’t know whether or not to laugh. In a strange way, his human self did completely depend on the McLanes for food and shelter.

“Sure, sure. Don’t worry, I'm smart; I'll land a nice job and then hire an accountant to deal with everything else.”

“That’s so pathetic,” Samantha lilted. “I hope we’ve taught you to be more self-sufficient than that.”

“It’s not that I'm not self-sufficient, it’s that I would rather die than fill out tax forms.”

Brian held up his hands in supplication. “Fine; at least Lisa has a mind for these kinds of things,” he scoffed. Bath sighed. Brian and Samantha seemed certain the two of them would get together. “She'll be going with you to Alens, anyways, so even if you flub out she'll be able to support us.”

Bath gaped. “Wow; you have so much faith in your only son.”

Samantha and Brian smiled warmly. “We know you'll do great.” The couple squeezed in to give Bath a joint hug. “We love you!” they crooned obnoxiously.

“Stop!” Bath laughed, pushing them away in mock resistance.

He gazed contemplatively out the window. His and Lisa’s plans were starting to come to a head, and he wasn’t sure he was truly confident in their success.

It had been over three years since he and Lisa had detected the strange mind-manipulator in their neighborhood. Since then, they hadn’t been able to find anyone else with mind-manipulation abilities. She had assured him multiple times that if there was a mind-manipulator, she would be able to pick them out.

For a solid year, Bath had brought Lisa all over the United States in search of mind-manipulators, only to come up blank. While there were other benefits that came out of the search—such as Lisa mastering the art of riding inside of Bath—they hadn’t gotten any leads.

Since they couldn’t address the unknown threat, they had worked on the first stage of their World Domination Plan (as Lisa nicknamed it, the “Big WD”): Authority. The point of this plan was to build up both Bath and Lisa’s authority in the world so that when they eventually took over, everybody would already know who they were.

Bath knew that this was a justification for Lisa wanting to go to college, but he didn’t mind. Lisa, as a human, was entitled to the typical young-adult experience. He didn’t think the environment would devolve completely if their plans waited until after graduation.

Besides: he was beginning to think that college might be fun, after all. He was going to Alens for Ecology and/or Paleontology, perhaps the two subjects that he genuinely wanted to contribute to. Lisa was going for Political Science, with the intent to study systems of government.

Bath had thought that when he and Lisa agreed to take over the world, the result would be a dictatorship with Lisa at the helm and him as her enforcer. But Lisa had other, perhaps more idealistic, plans centered on democracy. Bath was willing to humor her plans until they failed, at which point he'd appoint her as de-facto emperor and be done with the whole “representative government” charade.

After all: If you want to take over the world, you have to do it completely. In his experience, ruling the world went hand-in-hand with every living creature cowering in fear and running away from you as fast as they could.

Of course, Lisa didn’t have that kind of time to instill fear in her subjects, but humans were smart, and Lisa could make people afraid just by influencing their minds.

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“Bath!” Lisa called out, barreling into him with reckless abandon. “You're here!”

Bath laughed and turned back towards the car to get some luggage from the trunk. “Nice to see you.”

The McLanes exited the car. Samantha and Brian went to the hatch while Avery walked over to Lisa.

“Hey, Avery!” Lisa grinned. “How’s school?”

“It’s good, I guess,” she pouted. "Definitely not as fun as college.”

Bath scoffed. “You don’t even know what college is like.”

“I've seen it on TV! There are parties every day!” Avery cried.

“That’s TV,” Lisa pointed out. “But you're right: College is supposed to be more fun than middle school. You'll get there one day.”

“In, like, a million years!”

Bath gathered Avery into a hug. “Kid, you have no idea how long a million years is. You'll be here in the blink of an eye.”

“Okay, whatever. Let’s see your dorm!”

“Where are you living?” asked Lisa. “I'm in Ellis C-21.”

Bath frowned. “Where are the rooming assignments?”

Lisa’s mouth was a line. “Online.”

“Oh,” he stated flatly.

“Typical,” Lisa grumbled. She pulled out her phone, went on the housing portal, and typed in Bath’s information. “You're so helpless.” A minute later, she announced: “Bath is in Ellis G-44.”

“What does that mean?” Avery wondered. “Are you guys in the same building?”

“Yeah, but we're kind of far away. Look at the map,” she said, holding up a sheet of paper she pulled from her purse. “He’s over here,” she pointed to the bottom-left corner of the map, “and I'm over here,” she indicated a spot to the top-right. “Oh well. At least it’s the same building! There was only a one in eight chance of that.”

“Have you and your parents already visited your suite yet?” Bath asked.

“Yeah, we're on our second furniture trip now. After we finish up, we can make our way over to your suite.”

“Alright,” Bath said. "See you soon." His gave her a look: Lisa recognized the expression and held her head still. Bath fastened a small mouth and ear onto the back of Lisa’s ear, under her hair. He saw Lisa shudder slightly, still unable to fully hide her repulsion. They’d developed this method of emergency communication three years back. Bath knew Lisa thought it unnecessary, but Bath wasn’t going to risk Lisa’s well-being on the caprice of humanity. Regardless of whether another mind-manipulator appeared out of the blue, Bath wanted to make sure he was available if normal people ever stormed Lisa before she could mount a riposte.

He didn’t doubt Lisa could fend for herself, but all the same...

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“It’s just us now,” Lisa said solemnly as she swung on a hammock. The courtyard was relatively empty in the dark summer night. She faced away from him, towards a gate in the center of the courtyard’s northern face.

“Do you miss your parents already?” he teased gently.

Lisa remained still on the hammock. “Yeah. It’s irrational, I know. It’s hardly been a few hours since they left.”

“Have you already looked at the classes being offered on the selection website?” Bath asked, changing the subject.

“No; have you?”

“...A bit.” He sighed. “Lisa, I don’t really know what I'm doing here.”

“Bath, come on. I want you here because you're my best friend. Moreover, I think you can get a lot out of college. You've been a human for eighteen years now, but you haven’t really lived as a human with other people.”

“What?”

“You lived with a family. That’s completely different from living in college in a dorm with other people who are all your age. I think you'll be able to learn a lot about what being a human is about.”

Bath grunted and rolled his eyes. “Why do I want to know even more about the depraved stain that is humanity?”

Lisa turned around, shot him a glare, and punched his shoulder lightly. “Stop being so melodramatic. People are flawed, but at their core, they’re usually good.”

Bath shook his head in disagreement.

“Take it from the girl who can read minds,” she said firmly.

“You can’t really read minds,” Bath countered. “Just emotions.”

“That’s already good enough,” she asserted.

“Why do you think humans are good?” Bath asked with a sigh.

“Because I’ve seen the shells of children,” Lisa said, “and their minds are good, plain and simple.”

“Come on,” Bath growled, exasperated. “Children are often terrible.”

“They’re always good before society corrupts them. Don’t you see that the root of the problem isn’t humans but society that they’ve created?”

“...You're being naive.”

“Just...think of college as a chance to experience humanity to the fullest before taking over the world with me. You might never get another chance.”

Bath couldn’t deny her logic. “I suppose...”

Lisa scootched over and hugged him. “Thanks for deciding to make the most of Alens!” she smiled. “It'll be so much more fun with you here!”