I plucked at my dumb skirt as I watched all of them eat. My stomach sat on the edge of growling, and I almost regretted my decision to skip food today... and that's after drinking Jack's Sun Kicker this morning! Maybe I should bring a cup with me And fill it from the canteen whenever its running low? A normal cup would be a lot less eye-catching.
Aaron, the dog-like guy, smiled brightly at me. “So, I haven’t seen you around here before?”
What a shit pickup line. “O-oh, I’m new. J-just started today!”
Jayce glowered at Aaron, not even looking at me as he asked, “What’s your name?”
”Meno Maeni… Jayce, right?” I put on the biggest and brightest smile I could in hopes of easing along the conversation. Sure it was a disgusting social interaction that I’d rather not involve myself in, but it had a purpose. Sean Sentinel, the son of Sentinel’s CEO, was on my list of individuals from Mr. Kalis.
Jayce froze for a moment, probably shocked I got his name right after only hearing it once. The moment passed as he slowly nodded his head and his cold blank expression returned. “Meno, huh? Odd name…”
Sean coughed lightly. “I think your name is beautiful, Lady Meno. Don’t mind these fools.”
”Th-thank you.” I forced another blush to my cheeks and looked down. Ever so slowly, I twirled a loose lock of hair behind my ear and 'shyly' ducked my head.
Aaron quickly spoke up, shooting a subtle glare at Sean that wasn’t all that subtle. “Your name matches you in b-beauty.”
Has school rotted these guys’ brains? Why do they keep bringing up beauty? It’s the inside that counts, ya know? Guess it's a good thing I dropped out after all. I can’t even imagine what my life would’ve been like if I had grown up like this lot.
Sean tapped his metallic palms together once more. “So, do you have any hobbies, Meno?”
Did he not hear me earlier? I could’ve sworn he was in my first hour. “I- I like to read… and mechanics are cool. I uh, absolutely love art too.”
I shrugged and sent a glance around the room, ignoring most of the common rabble. Three things immediately stood out to me. First, Torren’s plate was absolutely loaded as he went through the cafeteria to the point it was a surprise he could even hold it up. Second, there were far too many eyes on our little table. Most of them seemed like idle curiosity, but there were a few that stood out with more calculated Cues. There were even quite a few who looked on with poorly hidden hostility, which seemed just about right all things considered. Third, the three guys seemed like they must be pretty popular as I caught sight of far too many teenage girls staring at me in envy. It was icky.
I dropped my observations and returned to whatever Sean was saying. “…like me could only love high-class hobbies. In particular, I find Holo to be quite entertaining. Don’t you agree?”
”I-I’ve never tried Holo, so I wouldn’t know.” What the hell was Holo?
Aaron laughed lightly. “Holo is alright. Not quite exciting enough for me though… you said you were interested in mechanics?”
I put on that radiant smile once more. “Of course! It’s all so- so interesting.”
”I-“
Torren finally returned, cutting off Aaron as he walked up to the table with his plate laden with food. The plate looked like it would snap under the pure weight of the food as he gently set it on the table like it was a precious child. He looked around, seeing that there were no seats for himself around me.
“This- this is Trovare, my closest mikato.” I flashed an innocent smile to Torren.
Torren gave a nod and moved around the table to an empty seat, sitting down and immediately diving into the food with a muttered, “Hey.”
“Mikato, huh?” Sean said with a well-hidden sneer on his face. If it wasn’t for the subtle twitching of his eyebrows and a slight tilt of his mouth, I never would’ve noticed it. It didn't seem like it was directed at me for once.
Part of me wanted to get in his face about the sneer, but that wasn’t Meno. I calmly wrung a hand through my hair. “‘Course! A-and bringing him around puts my grandfather’s mind to ease…”
“Grandfather?” Jayce asked as he pushed up his glasses.
Sean took an even more prideful look onto his face. “Lady Meno here is the granddaughter of Archduke Maeni of Pyrus.”
”Ah.” Aaron nodded as he snidely looked at Sean. “Makes sense why you took such an interest then-“
Sean coughed lightly once more, his voice sounding incredibly posh as he stared Aaron dead in the eye. “Someone as lowly as you could never understand my interests.”
Torren chuckled, the pitch being incredibly deep just the same as his voice. “Classic corpos.”
Aaron’s friendliness dropped significantly. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
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”Ah, you just fit the stereotype is all.” Maybe he didn’t want to get into a fight on the first day? Regardless, Torren quickly changed the subject. “M’lady, how are you holding up so far?”
It worked, and the conversation tilted back towards asking me questions. I tried to keep up the best I could, though it was difficult when they started asking about my ‘home’. I had done some research about Pyrus, 'course, but their questions were very pointed. Eventually, though, lunch ended and my next hour began. Claire ever so kindly popped back up after lunch to guide us.
After that was a rather boring Tech-ed class. Basically, it seemed to be an introductory class to all things technological, specifically surrounding the Net and the baseline dos and don'ts. It was all stuff I learned back when learning Net from the interface, so I breezed through the class with a light nap.
After that, things got more interesting. Claire came to get us the same as the last couple of times after class. “Oh, you two have different classes.”
”We do?” Torren asked as he gave me a side-eye. I subtly tried to give a nod of reassurance. It was difficult as I also tried to keep up a slightly panicked look.
Claire looked over our hastily scrawled schedules with a small frown on her face.”Yeah, looks like… Meno has a STEM class and you have a Physical Education class. Um…”
“O-oh.” I tried to sound as disappointed as possible as we stepped out into the hall. It was surprisingly easy. The day had been rather nice with Torren blocking all attempts by students to talk. His leaving meant facing the tides of teenagers by myself. I'd rather fight Dune Walkers.
Claire led us through the throngs of students until we reached our first destination: the STEM classroom. I smiled weakly at Torren. “See you later.”
He nodded and looked around the classroom quickly. “Have fun, m’lady.”
”I- I will.” I gave a more resolute nod and headed into the classroom.
Unlike the other classes I had been in throughout the day, the STEM class had forgone the typical rows of desks. Here, the tables were all smacked together into groups of four. Almost every seat in the room was filled.
A student- no, a young-looking teacher based on the staff lanyard half shoved into her pocket, walked over to me at the entrance of the room. “Ah, you must be Lady Meno. I'm Mrs. Broadsworn. I would say have a seat anywhere, but most of these are taken…”
“She can sit with me!” A bright voice called from over my shoulder.
I looked over to see a cheerful-looking blonde sitting with two other girls. All three were decked out in a full assortment of makeup, their original skin barely visible below it. No, that wasn’t quite right. The blonde didn’t have as much makeup on as I thought. It looked more like Chemskin.
The teacher nodded several times. “Okay. Have a seat over there by Christine. Christine, would you mind helping Meno to get all caught up with our current project?”
“Of course not, ma'am,” Christine said. She seemed to be well-mannered. Really, what was up with people making corporate kids to be spawns of evil? They really weren't that bad.
I headed over, intentionally stumbling over my feet slightly. As I sat down, a student from every table stood up and headed towards a back counter. There, they all started to pick up what looked like model buildings made out of small plastic rods.
“We were just getting into our theoretical Quaker engineering,” Christine explained. “Oh, sorry. I’m Christine Valmont.” What the hell is a Quaker?
The other girl still at the table, a brunette, smiled warmly. “I’m Trisha Vern.”
The one who went to get the project returned. She had a thick mane of what looked to be natural red hair. “Did I miss introductions? I’m Jayne Voils.”
”N-nice to meet you…” I said as I looked over their project. It seemed pretty solid all things considered. They went with a stilt supported structure that was lifted off the ground- err, table.
”So basically, we decided...“
Time flew by as I chatted with the group. They were all incredibly friendly, to the point I was confused about my location. This was supposed to be a corporate school, and yet everyone so far had been quite nice. It was weird.
In that time, I helped out in building reinforcements for their plastic model. It was rather nice and simple work. And I found out what a Quaker was. Apparently they were an eight-legged beast known for toppling buildings by causing localized earthquakes. They were a real problem across the pond.
It was about when class neared its end that things became far more interesting though. Christine put one last plastic rod onto the model, patching up a hole in the wall. “So, Meno, you have any hobbies?”
What was with everyone asking that? Was there an ‘introductions’ guidebook somewhere? I missed. “Oh, I- I like mechanics. And I adore art. I-I’m not very good at it, but I find it all so fascinating.”
“You aren’t the only one.” Trisha laughed. “I love it too. Speaking of, there’s an art gala being held this weekend. Do you want to come? I can get you an invite.”
An art gala, ay? Part of me wanted to instantly shoot down the idea since it would involve more social interaction, but that small side was instantly shot by the rest of me. I was just wanting to ‘borrow’ some loot and create a stash, what better way of scouting out ‘donors’ than an art gala?
”R-really? It’s been a while since I’ve been to one.” I rubbed at my arm. "I would love to come! If- if that's okay."
”Course girl! Becky, you probably don’t know her yet, is the daughter of the host! They’re supposed to have some extravagant pieces this time around too…” Trisha cast her eyes sideways as if telling me some major secret. “I heard there’s even supposed to be some stuff from Cwalu.”
”Really?” Damn, that stuff was expensive. Anything brought back from the ‘land of the dead’ was bound to be.
“Yeah-“
The bell rang, cutting her off.
The three started to pack everything up. Christine waved me off as I tried to help. "It's your first day. You go on ahead."
"T-thank you." I rubbed my arm and headed for the door. Claire and Torren already awaited me out in the hall. As I came out, a smug smile faded from Torren's face and returned to the 'knightly' neutrality he had been going for all day.
Claire clapped her hands together as she spotted me. “Alright! Last class of the day. Ready?”
—
I flopped onto my bed and I took a moment to settle myself back down. School had been… not exactly as I remembered, and yet it had been the same in some ways. Still a drag, for one.
But it was kind of nice? Sure there were… people, ew, but interacting with people my age-ish had been a refreshing change of pace. They were all probably from uber-wealthy families and I wouldn’t share anything in common outside of my lies, but it was still kind of nice.
Other than that, my targets had been… interesting. I’d have to get the other two's opinions, but as it stands both were slightly suspicious.
Sean seemed to be an elitist, which really wasn’t all that surprising considering where he came from. Elitism could be a scary thing. And Claire- well, Claire seemed to be completely unfazed by her best friend's disappearance. Sure, she could’ve already moved on, but it still seemed a bit quick.
As for the Inquisitor's request, nothing stood out to me yet. To be fair, I had only been around most of the teachers in passing, so there was still ample time to find something amiss.
Overall though, I had a surprisingly good day back to school.