Sam blinked.
“What the fuck?”
“Hey sleepy head!”
Sam looked blearily towards the chirpy voice. “Rae?”
Rae nodded. “You've been out for hours! I was going to call troll but no need Thankfully, he's one scary bloke.”
Sam moved her right hand and then realised the pain she had expected had completely gone. She held out her hand utterly amazed and totally transfixed by this miracle.
“Er.. you OK?” asked Rae a little timidly. “We were a little concerned when you disappeared on us.
Sam snorted. “Yeah right, I saw Edward with the bimbo's in the pool, Paul was getting shit faced with his buddies and you were with a gaggle of girls giggling like a brood of hens with each other.”
Rae looked pained at Sam.
“We didn't do anything wrong Sam. We were just having a little fun, it's our first day here, it's been pretty stressful and there was a poolside party. One which you could have joined too.”
she shook her head. “Well I'm glad you're OK, I'm off to get something to eat, I was just hanging back to make sure you were OK, but.. well I guess your fine.”
Sam cringed inwardly and put her hand over her face and rubbed it trying to wake herself and man she was starving.
“Hold up Rae! Please? OK I know I'm not a people person and well, maybe I over reacted.. a little. Can we both go to find food? I'm really hungry.”
Rae beamed.
“Sure! You'll be amazed at the cafeteria. It's freaking awesome. I think it stocks every known meal to man!
Sam grinned at the thought of decent food. She couldn't remember when the last time she actually ate a proper meal and having Rae with her had a calming effect on the anger that struggled to get out at every turn. Which out of everything at that moment seemed to be the most important thing, it appeared Stevens had triggered something within her and she was struggling to cope with it. She hoped to see Porter and have a chat, maybe he could help.
Sam stepped into the cafeteria and felt her chest constrict at the sea of humanity before her. There was space for a couple of hundred diners and at least 70% of the seats had someone sitting in them. she slowed to a halt as Rae raised her head, clearly looking through the throng for Edward and Paul? Probably. Then Rae reached up on tip toes and waved furiously at someone in the crowd and yanked happily at Sam's arm. “There they are!” squealed Rae happily. “I think they saved us a space. Wow. It's a fair bit busier than when we first found it. I guess this is dinner time on the “storm haven” come on, you can't expect those two beefy boys to keep batting the hungry females off if you get my meaning.” Rae giggled as she walked briskly forward.
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Sam felt her inner rage coming to the fore, jeez. Too many people. she hated crowds, hated humanity. maybe she could cook something up in their kitchen instead?
Sam had half expected the cafeteria to be a few long bench's with everyone elbow to elbow grabbing whatever was in front of them, Ala hog warts. but there were scattered tables of varying sizes of anywhere between ones with two seats, to as large as tables capable of seating a dozen. It all depended on your preference she guessed, or how many friends you had. well at least it's better than her worst case scenario. Rae found the boys eating and chatting to a group of three young girls, who by the looks of things were vying for the chance to take the two vacant seats before them. Edward glanced up and a wave of relief flowed over his face as he saw the two girls walk up and plonk themselves down. Rae smiled prettily at Paul and said. “ Hi guys sorry we are late, I had trouble waking slow poke here.” Paul grinned and shrugged as the three girls shot daggers at the two girls. Sam looked directly at the meanest of the three and shooed her away with her hands.
“Thanks for entertaining our boys while we were delayed but you can go now, Go on. shoo! “ she flicked the back of her hands up at them and glared. one of the girls seeing no possible victory pulled the other two away.
“Come on girls, plenty of fish in the sea, You know who that was right?” She motioned towards Sam as she dragged the other two away. they glanced nervously back at her as the girl spoke to them animatedly.
Edward looked up as he finished his mouthful of burger and grinned.
“Nice work Sam, I just don't understand how you don't have more friends.” Paul snickered.
“ I know! Right? She's such a charmer. Anyhow at least she got rid of those vapid chav's. I was starting to get a headache.” Edward nodded. “Yeah I've been keeping an eye on the male verses female ratio, even minorities are well accounted for, it's pretty even, based on the actual percentage of the sex's and peoples of the world. looks like magic isn't as biased as the mundane world at least when it doles out the advanced learning opportunities. If we were going to be stuck fighting for the attention of a handful of girls for the next five years I wouldn't have been too happy, but it actually looks pretty good.” Sam shook her head at the thought,
“Fuck me five years...”
She shook her head miserably.
“Don't worry too much Sam, just take it one day at a time. You never know you could get time off for good behaviour. You know term breaks, Christmas etc., so it's not like a five year stretch in Wandsworth.”
Sam nodded bleakly.
“Yeah I guess.” she looked at Paul as he stuffed his face with pizza. “So where do we get to order?” She looked around but saw no facility with which to order food, yet everyone seemed to be eating and she was hungry enough to eat a cow...or at least a meat free variant.