Starting outside the Slithering room, the line of sexually spent nagas led outside, then to a large pond on the far side of the building. There they slipped into the water and thrashed about until they were clean. Jon did the same, then discovered something else about nagas.
Jon was twisting and writhing in the water, following no particular pattern, when he felt another shoulder bump his from beneath. Without thinking, Jon rolled face down in the water and spotted Joseph as clearly as if Jon had been wearing a face mask. Then, after the two had locked eyes, Joseph dove deeper and Jon instinctively followed.
Deeper and deeper they went until both nagas reached the bottom. Then Jon watched as Joseph took control of a large catfish. This was obvious because the catfish stopped swimming and froze, just as the apes had done in Construction class. The catfish, however, wasn't even breathing.
Jon wasn't sure what to do next and turned toward Joseph. Joseph, however, merely looked at Jon inquisitively, as he'd done in Construction class. That's when Jon got the idea and tried taking control of the same catfish.
"What's up dude?" Joseph asked with his mind.
"With what?" Jon replied mentally.
"In Construction class. Just now. You seem off today. Hey, are you breathing? You better start breathing, man. I don't want to haul you out of here and have to explain why."
It was then that Jon realized how deeply they'd swum, and how long he'd been holding his breath. It has been four or five minutes, at least!
OK, Jon thought, that might be possible. He'd already noticed, especially when eating and pooping, that his entire body was elongated. His lungs extended below where his hips used to be, then came his stomach, then his intestines. His rectum was at least twenty-five feet from his mouth! But even lungs that large couldn't hold out forever, even with a human body. And his naga body was eight or ten times the mass!
Then suddenly, Jon couldn't hold his breath any longer. Looking up, he didn't think he could reach the surface either!. This is it, he thought! This is curtains, here in this weird naga body, at the bottom of a weird naga pond, in a weird naga school yard! I'm going to drown this way! I can't even speak a wish, not here, underwater, with no air left! Then, instinctively and having no options, his mouth opened and his lungs tried to breath the water! Then suddenly he felt much better!
Joseph was still hovering nearby, still controlling the catfish, and definitely looking strangely at Jon. Jon didn't understand yet what had happened, but he guessed Joseph wanted him to try controlling the fish again. He did.
"What now, dude? Did you forget how to breathe?"
"Sorry, man," Jon replied through the fish. "I just had a couple of things get out of hand today, you know?"
"Out of what?" Joseph asked with some surprise. "Dude, you're creeping me out. You been havin' ape dreams or something?"
"Maybe one or two," Jon temporized. "Is that serious?"
"No, not after we've been hooking into those ape brains every day since school started," Joseph replied. "You wanna stop that if you can, though, and don't tell any teachers. You should know that. Did you eat lunch yet?"
"No, why?" Jon asked. Somehow, the signal was getting weak.
"This catfish is almost a goner. I haven't been bothering to make him breath. I was gonna eat 'im anyway. But you can have 'im if you want."
"No, that's OK," Jon replied, then within a split second Joseph swallowed the fish whole and began looking for more.
Altogether, Jon and Joseph spent about forty minutes skimming the bottom of the pond. Joseph ate half a dozen more catfish and three large turtles. Jon ate his share of catfish too, plus a few large bass. Catching them was easy once Jon realized he could mentally control -- and therefore freeze -- almost any kind of animal he wanted. The same trick didn't work on lizards or reptiles, though, and certainly not on nagas.
Eventually the two nagas surfaced, blew out their lungs, and slipped onto the grass near the pond to bask and dry. Then, all too soon, everyone started sliding back inside for class. Jon tried to wave at Karyn, who was across the grass, but of course it was futile. At least he could shrug his shoulders, he thought.
