The Life Of Normal-Taro

After a long time of contemplating, Ponnappan opened his mouth. "Okay, here's the thing." He was about to go on a rant about how this decision was one of the most difficult ones he had to make, but before he could do so, Lonappan interjected yet again, much to his displeasure.

"My goodness. I thought that it would be an easy decision. I mean, what the heck, dude?" Lonappan shrugged. He had already given up on this argument, but surprisingly it seemed as if he was still in contention.

"Yea, I didn't think it would take this long for you to come to a decision." Just this time alone, Lena agreed with what Lonappan said.

Seeing both of the ganging up on him like that, Ponnappan snapped. "Hey! You were the ones who asked me to make a fair and square decision. And it wouldn't be fair if I'm going to side with one for no apparent reason. I'm having this timeout so that I won't have to regret about it later." He explained his side.

"Ah, makes sense. Good job, honey." Lena gave out a kissy face to appeal to Ponnappan, but it was to no avail since he was seriously pissed.

"Dang, man. I didn't think you would do that." Lonappan looked at his commanding officer with admiration.

"Of course, you wouldn't think so! I'm a better person than y'all think!" Ponnappan pouted.

"Hey, we know that! Don't we, Lonappan?" Lena turned towards him and asked.

"Well, if you are not considering the numerous complaints that the trainees have for him…" Lonappan was stopped midway by Lena's stare and was forced to change the track of his dialogue midway. "…which would be nil even if we were to consider it, I'd say that he's a better person than most people think." He saved the conversation at the very last minute with a well crafted sentence… is what he thought, but it wasn't hard for Ponnappan to get his previous statement.

"Dude, you really gotta report to me if someone has something against me. At least, I should make an effort to understand their hatred towards me, right?" Ponnappan asked.

"Hey, no one hates you! I was just trying a funny opener for a heartfelt line. Seems like that didn't work by the looks of it." Lonappan sighed.

"Is that so?" Ponnappan asked, but he still wasn't convinced with what his subordinate said. "Even if that's the case, if you saw someone saying that they are having difficulty being under me, do report me, okay?" He asked again.

"Yea, sure. Will do that." Lonappan nodded his head vigorously as he replied.

"So, shall we go back to our main point then?" Ponnappan asked.

"Oh yea, you were gonna tell your reasoning behind your decision and also the decision itself, weren't you?" Lonappan asked back.

"Dude, why even say that? I mean, we all know that I'm gonna do that now. So, who are you even explaining it to?" Ponnappan shrugged.

"I said it just so that we're all clear about what's going to happen." Lonappan replied.

"Then? Are we all clear now?" Ponnappan asked.

"Crystal." Lonappan replied with a slight nod and a nice smile on his face.

"Okay, then. As I said before, I took a lot of time because I had a lot of things to consider." Ponnappan took in a deep breath.

"You never said that before." Lonappan interjected yet again, to the point that it got annoying even for the reader.

"Huh?"

"You never said those exact words before." Lonappan replied.

Ponnappan sighed. He was this close to beating the living shit out of Lonappan. However, he calmed himself down at that moment. His patience was simply superior than anyone else's.

"Why does it seem like you're doing this intentionally?" Lena's husband asked.

"I don't know, man… I just feel like I'm gonna lose. And you know how I hate losing, right?" Lonappan asked back.

"Oh, yea. The memory of you handling your loss against me like a chump is still fresh in my mind." Ponnappan said as he reminisced about the times with a bright smile on his face.

"Wait! What happened? And how come I don't know about that?" Lena, who got curious about the story, asked.

"Babe, let me tell my decision first. I mean, we've been dragging it for way too long now that it feels like I'll entirely forget about it by the time we finish up with the other story." Ponnappan spoke.

"Is it that long?" Lena asked again.

"It really isn't… However, I like to tell a story the way it should be told—as a story. So, it might get a bit long, who knows?" Ponnappan shrugged.

"Dude, I told my wife that I was gonna go for a walk to Mundur. At this point, she might accidentally think that I walked to Thrissur." Lonappan said with a concerned look on his face.

"Shush, Lonappan. Can't you see that Ponnappan's preparing to tell the story? Don't ruin the mood like that!" Lena warned.

"Whatever, dude! I have nothing to say. Go on with the story then." Lonappan scoffed.

"You just don't want me to learn about your humiliating lose, huh? I mean, the more you act like this, the more I want to hear it. So, be my guest and keep acting like this. I'm totally fine with it." Lena folded her hands and waited for Lonappan's reply, which never came. "It seems like Lonappan has nothing to say now, so get on with the story, honey." She requested.

#

Years ago. A young upstart named Lonappan was getting ready to face his senior Ponnappan in a fight that decides his fate—specifically, his name.

Honestly, Lonappan hated his name. It sounded weird and not modern at all. With all the Abhisheks and other fancy names, his just struck out like a sore thumb.

However, it was his opportunity to win the right to pick his name now. The only thing he had to was to beat Ponnappan, his senior.

He had fought his senior quite a few times and each time he did that, he had gained the upper hand. His senior was a tactical genius, but lacked in the physical department.

So, Lonappan was out there with his utmost confidence. In fact, he even challenged his senior face-to-face that he'd beat him clean, something that no junior had tried to do before. He was that confident at it being his absolutely victory.

Thus, when he was faced with a loss rather than a victory, Lonappan was bewildered. He didn't know how it happened. He thought he had it all sort out and yet in the end he lost.

"How? How come I didn't win? How come you are way stronger than the last time I fought with you?" He asked to Ponnappan, who was enjoying his grand victory.

His senior laughed as he patted Lonappan's head. "Okay, kid. You gotta remember this super important thing, alright? Never outright show your strengths and weakness to someone else, especially if you know that you'll be facing this person somewhere along the way." He spoke.

"So, what you mean is that you lied to me during this entire time. When you got injured on that one fight against me, was that faked too? What about the time I beat you clean as heck? That too?" Lonappan asked to which Ponnappan slightly nodded his head.

Seeing his senior nod, Lonappan got furious. Not only he had to live with the awful name, but he had to listen to the people around him ridiculing him after the bold proclamation he made earlier.

While he couldn't do anything about the first thing, he felt like he could do something for the second one. The ones around him were talking about how weak he was and how they could beat him easily if they were to go on a fight against him.

"Oyy, fuckers! If you have the balls to back your words up, then I challenge you. Put your name on the line and let's see who wins." He spoke.

However, everyone else were hesitant in doing so even after everything they said about him. Someone argued that it went against the rules.

But much to everyone's dismay, the commanding officer Chinnappan decided to interfere with the proceedings and said that it wasn't against the rules.

However, he clearly stated that Lonappan would gain nothing from winning this fight, but would lose his right to become a senior field agent if he were to lose the fight. And if the others lost, they would only have to revert back to their original names—which meant they had to forfeit their right to pick a name for themselves.

While some still hesitated, other extremely confident dudes stepped up to the challenge. However they didn't expect what was coming for them. Lonappan lost clean to Ponnappan, who was actually considered one of the best of the base. If it was anyone else, he would've won and he was demonstrating just that with the one vs sixteen match he had.

However, his anger wasn't quenched with just that. Instead, he forced every victorious participant to fight against him. Since they were genuinely terrified of him, they silently accepted their fate and lost gracefully. Thus, Lonappan's batch became the only one without even a single name change and Lonappan and his temper was the only reason behind it.

#