Chapter 44: Riding a Bike?

Chapter 44: Chapter 44: Riding a Bike?

Daniel was sprawled across the couch, bored out of his mind.

Carol was gone.

And honestly, he still wasn’t used to it.

The person who used to chatter endlessly in his ear every day, the one he always claimed to find annoying had suddenly left.

The house felt strangely empty without her. Even the atmosphere seemed colder.

As for T’Challa, who knew where he’d disappeared to?

Daniel didn’t even have anyone to hang out with.

It was too boring.

’Maybe I should go mess around in space again?’ Daniel thought.

Then he reconsidered.

’Nah.’

The last time he’d gone out into space, he’d gotten so caught up having fun that he’d stayed out all night.

Explaining that to John and the others afterward had already been awkward enough.

Just then, T’Challa’s voice rang out from outside.

"Daniel! Come look at what I got!"

Hearing the excitement in his voice, Daniel got up and headed outside.

The moment he stepped through the door, he saw T’Challa sitting proudly atop a Harley-Davidson motorcycle.

T’Challa twisted the throttle.

"Vrooom...vrooom..."

The engine let out a powerful, aggressive roar.

"Well?" T’Challa grinned. "Pretty nice, right?"

"Yeah," Daniel admitted immediately.

"That’s awesome."

The bike had a silver body, a low-slung seat, and clean, muscular lines. It looked rugged and powerful.

What man wouldn’t love something like that?

"It’s a Softail. Came out four years ago," T’Challa said proudly, patting the gas tank. "I saw it while walking through town and fell in love with it immediately."

"A family’s moving away and they’re having a garage sale. The motorcycle was too big to take with them."

He smiled.

"When I bought it, the owner even told me to take good care of it."

"That’s seriously cool."

Daniel’s eyes lit up.

He walked over and ran a hand across the handlebars.

"Come on, let me try it."

T’Challa was more than happy to share.

Without hesitation, he climbed off and gave up the seat.

Daniel immediately plopped himself onto the motorcycle.

Copying what he’d just seen, he twisted the throttle.

The engine responded with a deep, satisfying growl.

Then Daniel froze.

He fiddled with a few controls.

He waited for a while... nothing happened.

After a moment, he looked up awkwardly.

"So... how do you actually make it go?"

T’Challa blinked.

"You don’t know how to ride?"

His eyes widened.

"Wait...you seriously don’t know how to ride a motorcycle?"

"Who said I don’t know how?" Daniel shot back, instantly embarrassed.

"I just haven’t figured out the method yet!"

Trying to salvage his dignity, Daniel twisted the throttle all the way.

’Probably not in gear.’

He lowered his head and searched around.

Soon he spotted a foot lever.

’That must be it.’

Daniel stepped on the shifter while still holding the throttle open.

Clunk.

The bike violently jerked forward, but thankfully with Daniel holding it down, it didn’t go further ahead or did a wheelie, but the engine died instantly.

...

Daniel slowly looked up at T’Challa.

T’Challa stared back for a second.

Then burst out laughing.

"Hahahahaha!"

He laughed hard, showing a row of perfect teeths.

"So there are things you can’t do!"

T’Challa couldn’t stop grinning.

Daniel rolled his eyes.

"Your motorcycle is broken. That’s the problem."

He pointed accusingly at the bike.

"It’s used. What do you expect from secondhand junk?"

"That’s definitely not the problem!" T’Challa protested.

"I rode it all the way home just fine!"

Daniel felt his face heating up.

This was humiliating, he was actually getting laughed at by a teenager.

He slightly raised a fist trying to threaten T’Challa, but he wasn’t scared at all.

After spending more than a month together, he’d already figured Daniel out.

Daniel had a good personality.

Most of the time, but he was also incredibly petty.

Seeing that look on Daniel’s face, T’Challa knew exactly what was coming.

"Looks like our Superman here isn’t actually capable of everything," T’Challa mocked.

The brat was getting bolder every day.

Daniel decided he needed some discipline.

Specifically, the kind that involved being thrown several thousand feet into the air.

Daniel suddenly remembered a Superman movie from his previous life.

In that movie, Superman had tossed an annoying kid straight into the sky.

At the time, Daniel had thought it was hilarious.

Now he felt like recreating the scene... using T’Challa.

After all, the king had entrusted T’Challa to his care.

The kid had been getting a little too cocky lately.

Clearly he needed some education.

’Does he think anyone can make fun of me?’

’What, does he think he’s Carol?’

Daniel started climbing off the motorcycle, preparing to teach T’Challa a valuable life lesson.

Unfortunately for him, T’Challa had already fallen for this trick before.

The moment he saw Daniel getting up, alarm bells started ringing in his head.

"Come on, come on, let me teach you."

T’Challa came over and stopped Daniel from getting off the bike.

The truth was, Daniel genuinely didn’t know how to ride this thing.

Who would’ve thought this thing would just jerk and stall?

Daniel was a complete idiot when it came to vehicles.

Back in his previous life, he’d even failed his driver’s license test three times.

And that was when the tests were easy.

In the end, he’d only gotten his license after training for 3 months.

"This is the clutch."

T’Challa pointed at the left handle.

"When you shift gears, you have to pull it in first. Then shift."

"After that, slowly release the clutch and the bike will start moving."

"Yeah, yeah, got it."

Daniel nodded impatiently, trying to hide his embarrassment.

He restarted the motorcycle.

"Pull clutch. Shift gear."

He muttered the steps to himself.

"Then release the clutch."

Daniel let go of his left hand.

Clunk.

The engine died again.

Daniel turned toward T’Challa.

T’Challa desperately wanted to laugh.

But he valued his life, so he didn’t.

"You have to release it slowly."

He demonstrated with his hand.

"Slowly."

"Okay. Slowly."

Daniel restarted the bike.

Repeated the process.

Shifted into gear.

Then carefully, very carefully, released the clutch.

Clunk.

The engine died again.

Daniel slowly turned his head.

His expression was getting darker and darker.

T’Challa swallowed.

"That was too slow."

"What?"

"It has to be slow, but not too slow."

Daniel stared at him.

"Weren’t you the one who said slowly?"

"I did."

T’Challa nodded.

"But not that slowly."

Daniel gritted his teeth.

"Fine. One more time."

He tried again.

Clunk.

Failed.

Again.

Clunk.

Failed.

Again.

Clunk.

Failed.

Again.

No matter what he did, Daniel simply couldn’t win against this motorcycle.

Finally, he threw up his hands.

"Forget it!"

"I’m done!"

Daniel climbed off the bike in frustration.

At this point, he was convinced the motorcycle had developed a personal grudge against him.

The more he looked at it, the more annoyed he became.

"This piece of junk is ugly anyway."

He pointed at it angrily.

"Whoever wants to ride it can ride it. I’m not touching it again."

At that moment, Daniel genuinely wanted to kick the motorcycle into outer space.

T’Challa secretly rolled his eyes.

’You’re just bad at riding.’

’Don’t blame my motorcycle.’

Of course, he kept those thoughts to himself.

"Why don’t you try one more time?" he suggested.

"No."

Daniel crossed his arms.

"I’m not looking at that thing again."

T’Challa thought for a moment.

Then he came up with an idea.

"How about this? I’ll put it in gear and make it move ahead."

"As it gets speed, I will slide back, you just hop on quickly and continue to ride it, with your speed you should be able to do it."

He felt this was necessary.

Otherwise, judging by the way Daniel was glaring at the motorcycle, there was a real chance he’d sneak out tonight and dismantle it piece by piece.

T’Challa had absolutely no doubt Daniel was capable of something like that.

"Well..."

Daniel pretended to hesitate.

"...I guess that’s acceptable."

Unfortunately, the eager look in his eyes completely gave him away.

T’Challa restarted the motorcycle and shifted it into gear.

"Okay, hurry up."

Before T’Challa had even finished sliding back, Daniel had already pushed him back.

He was so excited that when he pushed T’Challa back, he had used too much force that threw T’Challa off the motorcycle, thankfully he stabilized himself quickly.

Then Daniel cranked the throttle wide open, excitement written all over his face.

The motorcycle shot forward like a bullet.

"Hey! Slow down!"

T’Challa shouted after him.

He wasn’t worried about Daniel.

Daniel was basically indestructible.

He was worried about the motorcycle.

He’d only just bought it.

He hadn’t even had enough time to enjoy it yet.

At the speed Daniel was going, if anything crashed, the motorcycle would be the one ending up in critical condition.

Daniel certainly wouldn’t.

The motorcycle was nowhere near as tough as he was.

"Hahahaha!"

Daniel laughed loudly as he raced down the road.

Nobody in town was going to stop him.

So he kept the throttle pinned all the way.

The wind whipped through his hair, sending it flying in every direction.

This was fun... really fun.

’This is way more entertaining than flying.’

’Although...’

’It’s a little slow.’

T’Challa had only shifted into first gear.

And after everything that had happened, Daniel didn’t dare touch the gear shifter.

What if he stalled the bike again?

Absolutely not.

...

When Daniel eventually rode back into town, the motorcycle was still completely intact.

Seeing that, T’Challa finally let out a long sigh of relief.

"Thank goodness it didn’t crash."

What he didn’t know was that, a few minutes earlier, Daniel had nearly driven straight into a tree.

The only reason the motorcycle survived was because Daniel had jumped off, sprinted ahead of it, picked the entire tree up, and moved it out of the way.

’Can’t let it get damaged.’

’I’m not done playing with it yet.’

That had been his immediate thought.

Daniel slowly rolled the motorcycle to a stop in front of T’Challa.

Then he got off.

Trying his hardest to sound casual, he nodded once and said.

"Not bad."

After delivering that evaluation, he turned around and walked back into the house with an extremely smug expression.