[Features: Portals, yuri, sex through a portal]

Jared was a normal guy, really. By all metrics, totally average, well, okay, that’s being generous. He was a bit nerdy, but hey, who wasn’t? He was a bit thin, a bit of a wallflower… alright all said, he was the closest the modern times get to a stereotypical geek. Thankfully for him, (and like any introvert he most certainly didn’t feel thankful at times), he had a few friends.

“Yo! Jared, how’s it going buddy?!”

That would be Marah, the loud extrovert that had basically “adopted” him. She would check up on him, yell his name from across the hall, and generally be a giant glowing neon light of attention. She had done it since high school and college hadn’t changed her one bit. No, now it was even worse really as college professors were a lot more lenient as long as you were quiet in class.

“Marah you’re so loud. At least give him a chance to relax.”

And that was her girlfriend, Milly. Now she was mostly average. She was sadly mostly defined by what she wasn’t when around these two. Not as quiet as Jared, definitely not as loud as Marah. Not as shy as Jared, not as bold as Marah. Etc etc. She was the warm water between a golden ray of sunshine and a shadow that just wanted to hide.

They had ambushed him as soon as he had sat down. He hadn’t even had the time to get a cup of coffee yet. Truly, they were heathens the both of them. Devils sent to extract all his energy and disperse it among the lands. Usurpers and, man, he really needed that dang coffee.

“Hey guys. What do you want?”

“Don’t be like that sleepy pants! We just wanted to check up on you. How are you finding college? I heard there was even a cute guy in your class!”

“I’m not gay.” Jared casually said.

This however seemed to come as quite a shock to Marah. That wasn’t too abnormal, she was quite easily shocked by a lot of things. It was the widened eyes on Milly that really hurt him and left him a little shocked.

“Really?” Milly said.

“Yeah yeah, really? You’re not into guys at all?! But we’ve been right here and you’ve never even once seemed interested in us!”

He just deadpan stared at them. Marah continued to wait as if he was about to give some sorta great announcement to the world and Milly had the good nature to at least look chagrined.

“Must’ve slipped my mind or something.” He said in the tone of the dead.

“Amazing! To believe you could resist our good looks and you’re not into guys?! Are you sure?”

When would this torture end.

“Pretty sure.”

“But are you really, really, really sure?!”

“Marah, come on now. So anyway, back to our original question. How have you been finding college? It’s certainly been a bit of a change here.”

“Fine.”

“No no, tell us more! Come on, how were your classes, how were your classmates, what interesting things have been happening?!”

“Boring, I don’t know, and nothing.”

“You’re no fun.” Marah pouted.

Milly at least had learned in her time how to make him open up a little.

“Working on any new gadget since coming here? You always did like tinkering.”

Jared’s coffee less eyes did open up just a little at that.

“Not really, I had to scrap most of it when we moved around to here but I did manage to get something new ordered from a friend of a friend. I don’t know much more than that, just that he assured me it was worth it. I’m pretty excited about what he managed to get his hands on.”

Marah looked none too pleased at all about the mention of “that” friend.

“Is that the one that gave you those X-ray glasses that didn’t even work?”

“They worked just fine, I told you, they weren’t X-ray glasses and they weren’t meant to look through clothes. They were X rated glasses, for the unknown. No one knew what they did. I did finally figure out that they actually somehow managed to work kind of like a microscope except there was some….” and he continued on.

Marah had already started tuning it out while Milly at least tried to listen but it wasn’t that terribly exciting, at least not to them. But this was only the time when they really saw their friend break out of his shell a little so they were polite enough to listen. Well, Milly was while Marah just pretended to. She didn’t do a very good job at that.

“...and it also turned out to somehow see heat. Heat! I’m so disappointed that I had to give it back but Relos promises me I can keep this one for my own personal use. I can’t wait to see what it is. It’s another X rated item.”

“Yeah yeah, as long as they aren’t as boring as those false X-ray glasses this time around. I hope it’s something actually exciting! Anyway, can we come over tomorrow morning before school? We wanted to grab some food together. We’re still setting up our place today so we can’t do dinner. Anyway, knowing you, you’re all already set up!”

God, that sounded terrible. Marah, not only pre-coffee but pre-food as well? He didn’t like drinking the stuff too early but he might have to make an exception this one time. Sadly, saying no wasn’t ingrained into his list of possibilities so he said:

“Yeah, okay.”

“Terrific! We’ll see you then!”

Fuck. He had made plans. Oh how he wished he could call them off already but he had tried that with Marah before and been absolutely mortified to see that her brain didn’t work that way. She had even lost friends over the breach of privacy. If you say yes to her coming over, she’s coming over. No if, and’s, or but’s. And if you don’t show up, she will go to your place specifically and ask why you weren’t there. She had done that for prom when he had said he’d be there and then decided not to and she had dragged him there. He should’ve known better but alas, he wasn’t a perfect human being.

The rest of the day went by both slow, because it was boring, and fast, because it was easy. The early days of college weren’t exactly pushing him but only time would tell.

When he got home, there was a pleasant surprise waiting for Jared. His package had arrived. He had, lucky enough, managed to get his own room in an apartment instead of having to share with anyone. That college scholarship was paying dividends.

He took the package inside and wasted no time actually opening it.

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