Survival Of The Fittest

(Continued from the Math Wing)

It should be noted that Ariel has never in her life done anything wrong. Maybe a few white lies when she was a kid but other than that she was innocent. To call her naive would be pushing it a little too far. She was just not mischievous or anything like that. Now that we know just how good she is, it would be very unusual to say that Ariel was considering skipping class.

It wasn't that she didn't want to go to class though. It was the fact that she was tired - her face was probably flushed pretty badly and once she'd walk through that door looking so tired... everyone was going to stare. She didn't like the idea of that. Not one bit. So instead of heading back right away, she decided to duck inside the Library.

The library was bigger than most high schools - about two floor filled with books and videos, all neatly organized. Ariel usually never went in there but when she did it would be for very long periods of time. She would usually be sucked up looking at all of the books that the library had. She was very into reading because her life was so boring that reading was the only reason she still had her own sanity. The library at Bayview did it's job quite well - so many books that it would take her years to finish them one after another. This made her very happy.

She found an empty table around the library, literally collapsing onto the chair set right next to it. She sighed, then stretched and let out a loud yawn. She opened her eyes and noticed that a group of three kids were situated across the room and that they were looking right at her. She shifted in the seat, nervous with a pair of eyes fixiated on her, and then got up. Ariel reached a bookshelf and pretended to look for something. They would have to leave at some point - they'd have to stop looking at her at some point.

Damn, what a boring day...

If you see Mike Maszer in a library it means that he's either extremely bored, or extremely desperate. During his school years in Poland, he learned to hate them. As long as it was foreign literature, it was all fine, but after Poland have lost it's independence at the end of XVIII century, every, EVERY Polish book had hidden message of fighting for freedom. And of course Mike had to read 3/4 of those so called 'Classics of Polish Literature' for Polish lessons. Definitely too much pathos and 'oh look at me, I'm so intelligent and patriotic' content for him. Now, Mike avoids books as hard as he can, unless it's something really interesting like...

XX century literature. Now we're talking!

Maybe it's because of interesting topic (Science Fiction, both World Wars etc.), or just because of more 'user friendly' language, Mike loved those books almost as much as he hated all others. He was now checking books on the shelf, and it turned out, that he already read most of them.

Umberto Eco, Gunther Grass, George Orwell, Franz Kafka, Ray Bradbury, William Wharton, Albert Camus, Erich Remarque, Mikhail Bulgakov...

Wait, what?

Mike took one of the books from the shelf, and checked the cover.

The Master And Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov...

...

WHAT A BULLSHIT! It's Michaił BułHakow! To hell with changing letters to more 'English Friendly' ones, that's normal... But Bulgakov? What's 'g' doing in there? No wonder, that Russians hates America... I would hate them too, if they would change my name like that. Geez...

Mike has put back the book on it's place an moved along. Suddenly, he spotted someone. A girl. An... albino girl. Wow... It was amazing for him. He knew the albino does exist and all, but he never actually saw one with his own eyes....

She looked really nervous for some reason. Maybe she was looking desperately for a book for next English lesson? Eh, what the hell... Since Mike's trip to library turned out to be a complete waste of time, maybe he can help someone at least...

"Hey, You're looking for something? I checked most of the books here just a few seconds ago, so I can help you finding it."

{{continued from Running Tackle}}

Well, I got nothing better to do for the rest of the day...

Duncan stepped through the front door of the library, casting his gaze around the room. Getting his class schedule took longer than he expected, and when he got out the current set of classes had ended. He took a while to look around to Maria, but failing to find her anywhere, he assumed that she must've left, or was in a different class or something.

Might as well take a look around. He had decided, wandering around the building and getting himself acquainted with where he'd spend the rest of his senior year. Duncan continued past the front door to-

BZZZZZT!

"SHIT!"

The obscenity coming from the startled Duncan rang through the library. Looking towards the source of the noise, he noticed he'd walked through one of those book scanning things that prevents people from walking off with library books without checking them out. It must've been on the fritz or something.

Wait, did I just say...

Duncan stood frozen like a deer in the headlights as most every patron of the library stared right at him. He'd committed a cardinal sin; not just yelling in a quiet library, but cussing too.

"Uh..."

The boy wracked his brain trying to think of something to say, and failing that, quickly took off for the nearest bookcase aisle, hiding himself from sight.

Well that was a great first impression...

Ariel had not expected someone to say anything to her. In fact she didn't even think that anyone was in the same aisle as her. She wasn't even quite sure which aisle she was in but it seemed to be something of interest. Now Ariel was studying the boy as though he were some strange species of ape, one whose habitat was in the library. After a few seconds she finally responded.

"Oh hello," Ariel gave the boy a faint smile, the smile she gave to everyone. She had seen the boy around the school before, Mike she thought his name was. He sounded like a person who moved from a different country, though she would be stuck as to name which specific country it was. After remembering what exactly he had said, she gave a shake of her head. "No, no. There's nothing wrong. I'm just looking around. In fact I... don't even know which books these are."

She blushed slightly though a blush for her meant only a slight tint of pink. Of course she really wasn't looking for any books. She was here to skip class and nothing else. The fact that she lied made her feel bad, like she was doing something that was unforgivible.

"I'm sorry," Ariel apologized cheerfully, "That wasn't entirely right. I'm skipping class... I'm just wasting time." She quickly changed the subject. "but I think this is the first time either of us have spoken to each other. Your name is... Mike, right? My name is Ariel." She tilted her head to one side, looking at him. She was thinking of something to ask him.

"Umm... you're a foreign exchange student right? Which country were you born in? I heard that you moved here a couple of years ago. I have to say though, your english is very good!" She nodded. "I tried to learn Spanish but I guess I'm not cut out for foreign languages, I forgot everything I learned two months later. Haha."

This was what Ariel was good at, conversations. After all, she didn't know anyone all of the names of the nurses that worked at the hospital she stayed at for nothing.

So, the very shy albino girl meets friendly guy from abroad, while someone else in the background is in comedic embarrassing situation. It sounds like some kind of comedy drama, doesn't it?



It was obvious right from the beginning, that the girl was not really good in improvised conversation. Luckily, Mike was. He listened very carefully to Ariel's word, and waited till the girl will finish everything she had to say before answering (after a few trials and awful errors, Mike was aware, that interrupting a shy person almost always ends with shutting him/her up completely, and ends conversation entirely).

"Wow... You know, I'm really surprised, that someone actually knows my name around the school. Cool feeling..."

"But, let's go back to your question: You're partially right. I'm not exactly an exchange student. I moved out from my home, and since my uncle has got a new job here, I decided to go with him. And my home country? Poland... Really weird place, where absurd lies down on the streets. But the good thing about living there, is the fact I was learning English from the age of 9. And now even kids in kindergarten are learning it. After 9 years, it would kinda pathetic, if I still wouldn't know too much about the language..."

"On the other hand, it's still imperfect. My grammar is awful... And sometimes, I just stop my line, because I'm forgetting the word I wanted to use... Oh, and it's a good thing, that you are not one of those 'fast-talkers'. I can barely understand them, when they are spitting hundred words for a second..."

The dialog was slowly changing into monologue on his side. It was really hard to stop Mike's talkative nature, and the more he was saying, the bigger chance, it will be really fucking stupid.

"Ok, but enough about me..."

He looked at the albino girl once again. Well, at least now she wasn't so nervous.

"So, you are skipping classes?" Mike smiled and shook his head with fake disapprobation. "How could you? You are a bad person... Just kidding of course..."

Mike had no idea, how girl will react for that kind of jokes, so it was better to explain everything immediately.

"It's a normal thing. When I am extremely lazy, I'm skipping whole days, and no one is making problems with it. What lesson have you skipped? And why? You don't have a homework, or something?

Ericka was almost finished with the long trek from her previous class to her home away from home, the school library. It was quite large, requiring help from volunteer students, as well as staff, and Ericka was one of those volunteers. Mrs. Collins, the school's librarian, was out trying to get someone to repair the book scanner, and it was now Ericka's turn to oversee the library; as well as to make sure it was kept the way Mrs. Collins liked it; neat, and well organized.

She gave a slight jolt when she heard the buzzer, and then the obscenity, echo from her destination. 'Oh dear,' she thought, her speed picking up, 'and here I thought I'd have enough peace and quiet to get some reading done.'

She reached the door and without entering, lest the buzzer disrupt the silence of the library once more, addressed the young man on the other side of the door. "May I help you sir?" she asked in a hushed tone, suitable for the library, while still trying to sound authoritative. "The librarian is out right now, I'm Ericka Bradley, one of her student volunteer assistants."

Duncan lingered in the aisle, decided to wait a while until the people in the library had (hopefully) forgotten about him and his little expletive before making his escape. To pass the time, he took a look at his surroundings. Apparently he ended up in the Fiction section, possibly the T-W section from the looks of it. As he casually browsed through the books on the shelves, he heard a voice behind him.

"May I help you sir?"

Uh oh. He hadn't even officially started school here yet and he was already in trouble. A great first impression, indeed...

"The librarian is out right now, I'm Ericka Bradley, one of her student volunteer assistants."

Oh? Not an OFFICIAL faculty member, then. Maybe there was still hope yet. He turned around to face this student volunteer assistant, ready to try and smooth things over.

"Oh, uh, sorry. I didn't mean to...well it was an accident, I got startled by that buzzing noise. I didn't mean to yell out 'shit'-I-I MEAN..."

As he tried to explain himself, Duncan felt something in the back of his mind shaking it's head slowly.

Ariel knew that Mike was joking, it was quite obvious but she still blushed. It wasn't like her to go skipping classes like she was right now and even now she was feeling very guilty. Her eyes wandered back and forth nervously.

"... English class, with Mr. Burton. He's teaching us Romeo and Juliet this week and I just can't stand that play. I liked Hamlet and Macbeth but those plays I would call alot more action-oriented. Nothing really happens in Romeo and Juliet, it's just a love story and while I'm all for that I just hate it. So I skipped."

Even admitting this fact was embarrassing despite the fact that Mike wasn't going to judge her. Most likely he's skipped more classes than she could even consider. It was a wonder he wasn't even expelled for skipping whole days. She let out a tiny sigh from her nose, closing her eyes slightly.

"You know, it's never good to be skipping whole classes. Trust me I should know." She smiled with her eyes still closed. "My trips to the..." She stopped suddenly, not even bothering to finish. Why the hell would a stranger like Mike be interested in her life? It wasn't even that noteworthy to begin with and besides you don't normally tell people stuff like hospital visits the first time you speak to them. "I... was sick for like two weeks. Bad flu... literally knocked me out cold. I had to make alot of work up, nearly got held back."

She tilted her head to the side. "So, umm... are you skipping class too, or are you just hanging out here? I'm curious."

"Hey... at least they both die at the end, so it's not that bad, I guess..." Mike smiled, and immediately went back to listening mode.

Ariel was definitely hiding something. Trips to... where? At first Mike wanted to dig out the topic, but he quickly rejected that idea. She was probably too shy to tell him anyway, and he would look like a too curious guy, and *gasp* maybe even a gossiper. Besides... Why should he know? I she didn't want to tell it, then it means, it wasn't necessary for Mike to know. After all, Mike also had a few things, he didn't want to tell anyone except from a good friend.

And then she asked about his purpose to be in the library. Well, that was an easy question...

"No, I'm not skipping class again. In fact, since I started to learn here, I was trying to be a good student, so no skipping... You know, first impression and all that stuff. But... now it's a year and a half already, so maybe I should sometimes." Mike smiled again.

"But I digress... Yeah, I'm already after school. This is the only day in the week, when I'm free to go so quick. Usually I have much more lessons, and in a half of those days, it's not the end, because of Soccer or Capoeira practice. But today, I have a day off. And uncle even gave me some cash to spend, so I wanted to go out somewhere with Charlie Beckwith, Ross Baker, or Cisco Vasquez, but they are nowhere to be found. SO I thought, that maybe I'll find some interesting book to read..."

"Long story short: I was bored so I came here..."

((Mike Maszer Continued in Fix))

As Ericka listened to the boy's attempts to save himself from punishment she couldn't help but sigh.

"uh... It's okay, I guess," she began to respond, her temporary jolt of authoritative confidence having just now failed her, "I was... kinda late to my post here, so I can't um... I can't exactly turn you in, I guess..."

She finally entered the doorway and, as the buzzer went off, noticed for the first time that the library was much more crowded than usual for this time of day.

"Oh my... so many people. Am... am I the only one in charge here?" she thought out loud "How will I deal wit all this?"

Nathan Connors had gym this period. Thus, naturally, he was walking into the library, rolling a d20 back and forth over his knuckles. He didn't need the grm credits anyway. The only reason he'd taken the class in the first place was because the school guidance counsellor had insisted on it, and he always gave into pressure for these kinds of things. But now he was out of the counsellor's office, and couldn't care less about running around in circles for ten minutes before being drafted into some lame-brained sport.

Just as he walked in, one of the volunteer librarians a few aisles down said "Oh my... so many people. Am... am I the only one in charge here? How will I deal wit all this?" Nathan sighed quietly to himself. He was a volunteer librarian next period, so he probably knew exactly what to do to help out, but he wasn't really obligated until the next period and he wasn't the type to go out of his way to talk to people, even if it was to help them out. But this girl needed his help and the only people who helped out geeks were other geeks, even if he didn't know her.

Finally he sighed again and walked up to her. "Um, hi," He said awkwardly. "I don't usually help out here 'till next period, but, um, I know how it works, so, if you need help, I can, um, help you, I guess." Social interactions were definitely not Nathan's forte.

{{Shittacular post AHOY!}}

"Uh...yeah, sorry again..."

"Oh my... so many people. Am... am I the only one in charge here? How will I deal wit all this?"

Duncan looked rather confused by her sudden statement. Was she trying to tell him something? Did she want him to lend a hand or something? Duncan sighed to himself quietly. He never did understand women.

Thankfully, the moment of awkwardness was interrupted as another boy stepped in to offer help, and Duncan decided to take this moment to excuse himself. He wasn't supposed to stay for too long, anyway.

"Listen, I have to head home now. Uh...see ya." Duncan said to Ericka, passing back through the scanner (BZZZZZZ!) and heading out, remembering that he had to email Maria when he got home and tell her where his new house was.

{{continued elsewhere}}

Ariel had just realized the foreign hint in Mike's voice, though it took awhile to even realize this. Ariel certainly was not the kind of person who would criticize people, much less point out how someone didn't speak English too well - besides she could understand him pretty decently so it really was nothing to bug him about. However when he was explaining why he was at the Library, the words seemed to blend together and she really couldn't make heads or tails of what he was saying. She heard "Charlie Beckwith, Ross Baker, or Cisco Vasquez" quite well but all the rest seemed like Greek to her.

"Long story short: I was bored so I came here..."

"Oh!" Ariel nodded, finally understanding. "Okay."

She looked around at the clock on the wall. The bell was going to go off in, what, fifteen minutes? Time moves by just so fast. She really hadn't realized the time. She gave a tiny shrug, smiling just a bit but not too much. It wasn't like her to go smiling broadly - tiny smiles were more her fixture.

"I really would love to keep talking to you Mike but school's about to end and I really need to get to my locker, it's over near the science department and that's over near the other side of the school." Ariel gave what looked to be a frown, but she certainly didn't realize herself that her expression had changed at all. "I know I don't have any classes with you but I hope we meet some other time. I... I come here alot. Whenever I can, actually. If you don't mind I'd like to talk some more some other time."

Ariel wanted to add something along the lines of "Over coffee" or "at the mall" but the words could not form in her head. She just left it at that, quite unsure of what else to say. With a slight wave and another tiny smile, Ariel turned her boy with her head still pointed in Mike's direction and started to walk away.

"Goodbye." She said before leaving the library quickly.

((Ariel continued elsewhere...))

Ericka nodded and accepted the other boys offer. They worked together to help the many people in the library check out their books. When that was done the bell had already rang, so Ericka gathered her things, said goodbye to her helper, and walked out the door.

*BZZZT!*


((Ericka Bradley continued elsewhere))