Becca looked down at the ring and thought, “I like guys with muscles. Being held by someone who is strong, but still gentle makes me feel so safe, but sometimes guys can get kind of out of control and a bit scary. I think the world would have been a better place if a girl was being able to take a boy’s strength away if she felt he wasn't using it in a good way, like a mother takes away her child’s toy if he misuses it. We girls would feel a lot safer, and maybe the boys wouldn't always be getting in so much trouble! What do you think?”
“If you think it is best, then it will be done,” the ring said.
“Oh, you agree! Good!” she thought. “Then do it!”
Becca suddenly felt slightly different, as though she had a kind of perception she didn't have before, but she didn't know exactly what it was. She looked around the common room. She could see an aura around each of the boys. They all were different sizes. John’s was the largest by far, followed by Chad and then Clem, while some of the nerdy boys in the corner had almost nothing at all, just like the girls. She felt like she could touch it. It must be their strength! Yes, of course! She could reach out and take as much of it as she wanted. Ooooh! This was exciting! She put her hand on John’s arm. “John, you're hurting him now. Don't you think Chad's learned his lesson?”
John turned around. “Becca, let me handle this, please! You're a girl. You don't know what guys are like, ok?” Still, John didn't protest long. Seeing Becca’s disapproving look, he let him go.
“John sure knows who’s boss,” Chad teased, still smarting from John’s hold.
“Chad!” Becca said sharply. “That’s not nice at all!”
Chad looked at Becca anxiously and then down at the ground. “Sorry, Becca. I’ll behave better,” he said quickly, hoping he was quick enough.
“All right, Chad,” she said, satisfied. She was very pleased with herself. Just the threat of using the power that she and other women had kept the boys from fighting. The world was going to be a much better place.
“So,” she said, changing the topic, “are you looking forward to your game against Northern State Saturday?”
John looked at her quizzically. “What game?”
“The football game, you dummy!” she said, giving him playful tap on the shoulder.
John looked puzzled. “I don't really care about girls’ football.”
“I mean YOUR football game!” Becca insisted, getting annoyed.
John looked at Chad and shrugged. “Honestly, Becca, we don't know what you mean. Boys don't play competitive sports. You know that. I mean, what’s the point? There’s always some girl around who wants to have a little fun and take away a guy’s strength in the middle of a play.” Clem and Chad nodded.
“And with girls from the opposing school in the stands, you could never have a fair game,” Clem added. “It’s ok. I mean, we like to play, but there's no sense taking it seriously. Guys only play for fun and to stay in shape. It’s funny, but that's just the way it is. I mean, we are naturally stronger than girls, but we can never depend on having our strength when we need it. It sure is a funny world.”
“Yeah, life’s strange,” Chad agreed. He flexed his muscle. “Look at this bicep, compared to yours, Becca. I bet I could bench four times as much as you, at least, yet in a blink of an eye you could be twice as strong as I am and beat me to a pulp, and there’d be nothing I could do about it.”
“I wouldn't do that!” Becca declared.
The boys looked at each other and laughed. “Of course you wouldn't, Becca,” John said, “but she does it all the time,” he added, pointing at Greta, who was sitting in the corner. Greta waved smugly, flexed her fat, but not unmuscular arm, and went back to her book.
Becca wasn't too sure this was what she had in mind, but it did seem quiet and peaceful around the dorm, and it was nice not hearing the guys go on and on about last week’s game and next week’s game. Girls were just fairer than boys and wouldn't take advantage of them. She still thought she had the right idea. Maybe she just had to get used to it.
A few doors away Mark was frantically searching his room for the ring. How could he have been so stupid to take it off? It was no longer in the pocket of his sports jacket, and it hadn't fallen on the floor. It must have been blown out of the room when he flew out in such a hurry, but everything else he owned was in a pile below his window. Someone else must have taken it, they would have its powers now and could take away his superpowers at any moment, as easily as some random girl could take away his strength.
He couldn't remember now why he hadn't changed the world to eliminate that horrible female power when he had the ring. It should have been the first thing he did! He could have made the whole world better, both for himself and other men. He tried to imagine what it would be like not to be at the mercy of the whims of every passing female, whether two years old or 102, to have to do what she thought was right or become as weak as a kitten, but it was beyond his power to conceive of.
He remembered his crushing dismay when his sister Wendy first started using her power on him. He was six years old then, she was nearly five, and she had just come back from a birthday party. She had shown him a basketball she had received as a party favor, and he had taken it away, saying she was too little to play basketball. She looked like she was going to start crying and call their mother, when she started staring at him.
“You're being mean! I may be little, but I’m gonna make you too weak to take my ball away!” she said.
“What?” he said. “You can't do that!” he replied confidently.
“Yes I can! Amanda showed me how at the party, and she learned it from her big sister, who's eight and is older than you!”
He was holding the ball up in the air, too high for her to reach, when it started getting heavier and heavier. He lowered it to his chest, hugging it with both arms, but they were getting more and more tired. His knees were going wobbly too.
“See? See? I told you I could do it!” she said. She pulled the ball out of his arms and held it over her head triumphantly. He tried to take it back it back, but could barely grip the ball, much less wrest it from her hands. Even standing up was becoming too difficult.
“See? I took away your strong by pulling your ohla away. (She meant his aura, he later learned, something boys couldn't see but girls could.) And I won't give it back unless you promise not to take my ball away, ever again.”
He tried several times again and then agreed. Suddenly he felt his strength return, so he grabbed the ball and started running away with it. He only got a few steps away before his legs became too heavy to lift off the ground and the ball rolled out of his arms.
“You're bad!” she said, standing over him with the ball. “Boys are bad, and that's why girls take their strong away until the boy decides to be good.” She put the ball down and sat on top of him. He tried to push her off, and she laughed. “No, no, silly! You can't. You're only two year strong now, and I'm almost five so I'm much stronger than two year olds!”
Just then their mother came in. She immediately saw what had happened and pulled Wendy off him. She sighed and said, “Oh, I'd hoped this wouldn't happen for another few years, but children do talk! Wendy go to your room. Now! But first, give your brother his strength back.”
“But Mommy, he was being bad! He took my ball away. I'm supposed to take his strong away when he’s wrong! Amanda said.”
Mark’s mother looked at him and sighed. “Well, Mark won't do that again. Right Mark?” Mark nodded and his strength returned again. He wanted to hit Wendy but didn't dare, not with their mother right there.
Mark never beat Wendy at anything physical again. By the time he was eight he just stopped trying, while Wendy played competitive sports throughout school. Life is so unfair, he thought, and now he had blown the one chance in the universe to make it fairer!
Just then, the door opened. It was Pam, back from her class. She stared at the hole in the wall. “What happened here? It looks like a tornado!”
Mark shook his head. “Um nothing,” he said. Not telling the truth to a girl was always dangerous. She would just take his strength away until she was satisfied she had the full story. The less he said the better, until her suspicions eased. Then he could look for the ring again.
Pam looked at him closely. “Oh really? I think you're lying.” She laughed. “What IS this?” she said, looking at him carefully. Mark felt his super-strength vanish in a flash, although he reasoned still had his other powers. “Somebody’s keeping a big secret from his girlfriend. That’s not nice, is it?” She walked closer. Mark tried to use his super breath to blow her away, but his weakened muscles produced little more than a sigh. It seemed his loss of strength also negated his super speed and his flying power, and although his invulnerability kept her hold from hurting him, she made him too weak to break it.
“So, what’s it going to be, Mark?" she said. "Are you going to tell me the full story, or am I going to make you too weak to get out of bed?"
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