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Sarah yawned so much it felt like her jaw was gonna dislocate, “I am so freaking tired!” She said tiredly.

“Me too!” muttered Jessica, who sat next to her in the bus.

Sarah was studying geology at university and she really loved it. Learning about the history of the planet and how even the smallest pebble could tell you stories about what had happened in an area absolutely fascinated her, but like any student she loved the field trips the best.

“But I can’t wait to see Dagger Point Mountain! I really want to see the Cambrian marble fused with the Neoarchean granite. I heard that Dagger Point Mountain is one of the few places in the world where you can find it!”

“Yeah me too”, said Jessica, still only half awake. “I just wish we didn’t have to get up so damn early…”

It was five o’clock and the bus had just departed on their journey to Dagger Point Mountain. It was an eight hours drive just to get there, and then they would have to hike up above the treeline to the hut they were gonna stay their first night in. It would be the furthest they had gone for a field trip. However it has meant that she

“I heard that the excursion leader there is really knowledgeable, like nobody knows the area as well as he does, but apparently he is rather eccentric…” Said Jessica.

Sarah had heard the same and felt a bit nervous about it. They would after all spend several days on the mountain, having an eccentric teacher could make that rather tedious. But although her upperclassmen has told her he could be rather mean, there had never been any incidents involving him, the only known incident was when a stupid boy had decided to climb in the rain and slipped on the rocks, twisting his ankle. Apparently the teacher, Mark, had carried the boy for six hours up and down the mountain to the nearest hut, the whole while launching insults and reprimands on the boy for being so stupid.

“Anyway, I will try to get some sleep, Sarah. It is going to be a long day.”

“True, I think I will do the same.” She had barely finished the sentence before she had shut her eyes. She was really tired too.

**********************

Sarah took the last step out of the bus with a hop. Finally that had arrived at Dagger Point. The sun was hanging low over the trees. There would only be a few more hours of sunlight.

“Uaaaggghhh!” Said Dan, one of Sarah’s classmates, getting off the bus after her. “My back is so stiff!”

“Yeah mine too! It was a really long ride. I am glad we only have to do it once more, when we get back.”

“Oh please, don’t remind me!” Said Dan, before he walked off to where their hiking gear was stored in the luggage section of the bus. Sarah followed him.

When they got there she could see that there was a man there that she didn’t know. This must be Mark, she wondered to herself. He was that sort of man that looked skinny and strong at the same time. There wasn’t a single layer of fat on him that wasn’t necessary and his muscles were lean and practical, not the useless swollen muscles that most men built in the gym by practicing movement that they then never used in real life. It was clear that he had gained his muscles from his daily activities and that those activities required endurance, not explosive strength.

He was helping with pulling bags out of the bus and this showed the strength in his lean yet surprisingly strong arms, legs and back. Whosh. one bags. Whosh. Two bags. Whosh. Three bags. It was like watching a machine at work with perfect efficiency and Sarah noticed that she was not the only girl who was ogling his body at work. Jessica came up behind her and whispered:

“Damn, he is kinda hot.”

That’s when he showed his ‘eccentric’ side.

“Hey you boys, you are strong, why the fuck are you just standing around there? Get over here and help with the bags.” He yelled at a pair of guys that indeed looked quite large and strong.

“Ufff, hot, but kinda mean.” Jessica amended her previous statement.

Nonetheless it was effective, the boys he yelled at, and most of the others, came over and helped. Instead of the slow process of each getting their bag on their own, the assembly line-like work of having Mark and another guy crawling into the luggage section to get the bags, while other guys stood outside and caught the bags and moved them into a pile outside the bus, mean that they were done getting their luggage in half the time. However, he had made no friends with his outburst, but he didn’t seem to care.

*******************

They were packed, strapped and ready to go much quicker than Sarah had anticipated largely thanks to Mark’s effective, but often rough, ways.

“Okay let’s head out everyone! The hut has a bar that is open until 9 pm, if we hurry up we can make it there in time to get at least one beer before we go to bed!” Mark ordered. A few of the boys let out a whoop and Sarah could help but also smile at the prospect of having a drink before bed at the end of their long journey. They headed out.

At first the trek was easy, but soon they reached much steeper slopes and the group slowly started to segregate into those that were used to hiking and doing sports and those who were not. Two girls in particular, a blond and a brunette, were getting behind, but it was more because they were mostly chilling and not trying very hard, they focusing more on their conversion than on trying to keep pace with the group. Mark had stopped to look at them. He looked at them for maybe five seconds before he said to the group around him:

“Keep walking along the path, I will go down to help the girls.”

The group first stood still and looked at him for a few seconds while he made his way down, then someone said something about beer and they started walking again. Sarah however remained still on the slope and watched Mark, curious as to what he would do.

Mark walked with quick steps down and within a few minutes he had reached the girls. Sarah couldn’t hear what he said but he was waving her arms annoyed at them, pointing to the sky and then the forests. The girls replied something and waved with their arms and pointed at the steep slope. Mark seemed to have sighed, he looked at the ground for a few seconds, then he walked up to one of the girls with brisk steps and held out his hand towards her. She argued for a few seconds, but he insisted. She took her backpack off and gave it to Mark. The other girl did the same. Then Mark hiked back up the slope again, now with three backpacks. He looked behind him at the girls every now and then, seeming to tell them to keep pace.

Seeing Mark making his way up the slope with three backpacks and not just keeping pace, but catching up with the group was impressive. The girls, however, were not happy. They muttered between the two of them, but they kept pace.

Once they had caught up to the group, Mark again caught up to the front of the group and took the lead, despite his heavy burden. Sarah joined the group around the two slow girls and listened to what had happened.

“He said ‘come on girls, why are you so slow? keep up the pace, the sun will go down soon and it will get dark. I don’t want to have to go looking for you in the forest if you get lost.’ He was so rude.”

Explained the slow brunette. The other girls agreed with her.

“Really? yeah that is rude, couldn’t he see that you were struggling?”

“Yeah, like who does he think he is? A drill officer in the army.” Another girl agreed.

“It is actually called a drill sergeant or drill instructor.” Said one of the not-so socially gifted boys. The girls stared daggers at him.

“But why did he take your bag?” Asked Sarah.

The girls squirmed for a bit, then the brunette answered:

“Well, when we said that the slope was so steep and we were tired from the bus trip, he said ‘you are too tired to walk because you have been sitting on your ass all day in a bus? Are you kidding me?’. He was so mean! Then he said ‘well fine, I will take your bags, so you don’t have to carry anything but your own asses, then you should be able to keep pace and we can all make it to the hut before it gets dark.’”

“What, really he said that?” Asked one of the girls. The slow blonde interjected a small protest.

“Actually he didn’t say anything about carrying around own asses.”

“Well he might as well have!” Said the brunette in a dejected defense.

****************

As Mark said, thanks to the slowest girls not slowing us down, we indeed made it to the hut before the darkness hit and the bar was still open as promised. It was a good mood at the bar, despite the incident, some boys even managed to get two beers before the bar closed. Mark however did not mix with the students, instead he sat at a table by himself in a corner and read a book. Sarah had noted that he never bought any alcohol from the bar for himself. The whole thing about getting to the hut before the bar closed had been entirely for the advantage of the students, not for himself. He was drinking a glass of water.

Sarah couldn’t help but to keep glancing at him from her table with her friends. What a strange man. He was so rude to people, yet he was all the time doing things and making extra effort for other peoples’ advantage. He was so different from most men in her life, Sarah wondered. Her father was an alcoholic and never gave a shit about her and usually just insulted her and had her do chores for him that he was supposed to do, but was usually too drunk to do. Her mother had not been much better, she promised a lot, but rarely kept her word, including about leaving her father.

Her choices of boyfriends seemed to have been similar. She somehow all the time ended up with good-for-nothings who liked to drink and party, but were flaky and never took responsibility.

She looked over at Mark again.

Mark was not like that at all, he took on responsibility before anyone even asked. Wait, why was she comparing Mark to her ex-boyfriends?

“Sarah?” Someone said in the background.

Did she like him? Was that why she wondered of him that way?

“Planet earth to Sarah? Can you hear us?”

She felt a jab in her rib.

“Ouch, what did you do that for?” Sarah said to Jessica, who had jabbed her.

“Because you weren’t listening, Sarah, you were drooling all over our drill officer.”

“It is actually not called…” was all the less-than socially gifted boy could say, before all of the girls at the table yelled “Shut up!” in chorus.

“I was not drooling over him! I just thought he looked lonely over there…”

“What? Do you want to go over there and talk to him? Maybe you can keep him company in his bed tonight too!” It was the brunette who had slowed down the group earlier.

“Shut up, Amanda” It was Jessica, coming to the defense of Sarah. “Your slow ass almost had us miss the bar. If anything, you should be his bed warmer for the night.”

“No way, that guy is a creep and an asshole.”

At that moment Mark had gotten up from his take and started to address the group.

“All right, I am going to bed and so should you! Don’t stay up too late, this is not a party trip. I will be merciless to anyone who doesn’t keep up with the group tomorrow.”

As he finished the last sentence he was, probably not entirely coincidentally, looking at the brunette, Amanda.

************************

Mark had kept true to his word, the second day he drove them mercilessly. They went up and down peaks and valleys, looking at all kinds of interesting geology. Mark was indeed extremely knowledgeable and seemed to know the history of every single stone and boulder. He even knew the timing of the retraction of the glaciers and could tell by a quick glance the rough age of any rock they pointed out.

Even the girls who got in trouble with him the day before were reluctantly impressed and didn’t cause any further problems, even though he continued to reprimand openly anyone who slacked or did something stupid.

He was also unbelievably athletic in his own way. The way he would almost run up the mountain impressed even the sportiest of students in the class. Some girls had the courage to approach him and try to flirt, but he was so unapproachable and rough that they quickly gave up.

But Sarah couldn’t keep her eyes off him, she often found herself studying his face rather than listening to what he was saying or listening to his voice without actually listening to the content nor taking notes.

It was frustrating, she wanted to be a good student for him, but she was so distracted and every time she got close to him her heart would race. When he would address her and look her in the eyes she felt pierced by his eyes and momentarily paralyzed. She stammered and made a fool of herself, much to his amusement. He wouldn’t hold back on her and simply smile mockingly at her and tell her to stop muttering and spit out what she wanted to say.

In the beginning this made it worse, but by the end of the day, she had for the most part gotten over herself and was mostly able to respond normally, even if her heart still raced like a rabbit whenever he looked at her. Fortunately, she was not the only girl with problems to talk to him, except they were afraid of him, rather than mesmerized, like Sarah.

Link to [Chapter 1/5 Part 2](

NSFW: yes

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