The Man Test

Well it turns out that he's not grown into a drug dealer. Instead my fears had been realised and he was to be meeting up with some girl.

Being a counterbalance has its perks. One is the fact that we have the ability to mess around with time and space. We hear both what our Host thinks and says. We can also freeze time for short periods to have conversations with them. Both of those would come in very useful in this instance.

The unfortunate thing about this is that the other counterbalance is not effected by said changes, and so may get involved in heated debates which to our Host would appear to have extended over a split second.

Another unfortunate factor is that we can't see the counterbalances of another Host. This would have been great for working out what the other Host's motives may be. I would only have my intuition to work this current situation out.

Hearing Tylers thoughts clarified the entire situation for me. This girl was apparently 3 hours late and had already eaten, so the original plan of going for a quick takeaway and spending the evening conversing in the local theme parks grounds had clearly folded. He couldn't drive, was short on cash and lived in the next town, so he had biked over 4 miles to his mums to save bus fares, and had not eaten, as he was expecting to meet with this girl earlier. Tyler had yet to mention any of this to the girl.

The next situation he was faced with was perfect for me as I would be able to find out what he had become without my influence.

She tells him that she has a few friends at a local pub, so if he liked, they could both go there to spend the rest of the night with them.

This sounded to me like either a test or a blatant blow out. Judging by Tyler's pre-response i'd say it was a fair to assume that he hadn't realised that this could be anything other than a blow out.

I saw Tyler's face drop momentarily. She probably hadn't noticed to be honest. Andre hadn't either, he was too busy toe tapping and head bobbing with his ipod in his ears. Tyler was on his own here and looked as though peer pressure was getting the better of him.

I could tell in the few seconds of seeing this girl that she was no good for him, so at this moment I had no choice but to intervene.

This would be a surprise attack. Andre's headphones might buy me a few seconds, and hopefully that's all i'd need to help Tyler pass this man test.