The Prom Party
A/N: The third in my Restoration Series, this- like all the others in that group of stories I am writing- was originally uploaded to this site in December 2011 by another user. It was deleted, along with all the others, sometime in 2016, and December 2016 is when I became aware of it. Eight stories were deleted by this user, all of them top-notch. Well, I was able to remember the exact titles and find, through hours of tedious searching, some of the other details. Words, plot details, lines of dialogue. In a few cases the description as well as the story title are exactly what was there for the original.
That's the case with this one. The title ("RS3:" excepted) is exactly what it was with the original story, and so is the story description.
I do not know the original story's word count, but I know it was longer than the 480+ words I managed to recover. What I did get, though, plus my own memory, allowed me to recall enough of the story that I simply rewrote it from there. I knew the essentials of the approximate length and plot of the story, and with some genuine pieces of original dialogue and POV narratives inserted into the story, I had all I needed to write this. My Restoration Series was started in December 2016, which is when I uploaded "Caught Before the Act" and "That's Just Fine". This is my third completed rewrite and the first one for the new year. I can't tell you how much work has gone into this. It is much, much harder to faithfully recreate what someone else originally did than to create it by yourself. If you're trying to build a modern city, in all likelihood that is going to be a lot easier than trying to recreate and restore an ancient one from ruins. Because you aren't just coming up with a plan, ideas, details yourself. You're trying to remember what the last people did, how they did it, and how it all fit together.
This is not plagiarism- I will say that right now. I am replicating the story titles and basic plotlines, lines of dialogue and such where possible and story description if available. But I am not copying anyone else's work and presenting it as my own, the basic definition of plagiarism. I fully acknowledge someone else wrote a story by this name, description, and basic plot before I did. But that user deleted this and their other 7 stories last year without explanation, and it cut the Zero Day fandom down to almost nothing. These were all some fine stories, every one of those deleted 8. The point of the Restoration Series is to give some truly fine and insightful work for one of the greatest films of the early 21st century back to the readers of this website. If even one person appreciates all the work I did and will do in replacing these deleted stories, then the entire effort was and will be worth it.
This was such a fucking waste of time.
There were no words to describe the boredom that Calvin Gabriel was feeling. The mind-blowing, skull-fucking, incomprehensible boredom. Anywhere he glanced, the blond teen beheld a sea of idiots. A fucking sea of them. Left, right, straight ahead- there were stupid motherfuckers everywhere.
They all were so shallow and immature it defied description.
Only one solution existed for this problem, and it was out of the blond teenager's reach. So unable to deal hot lead death to his 'peers', his 'classmates', Calvin just sat in his folding chair, the one he'd been in for twenty minutes, fidgeting occasionally with his bowtie, with his tuxedo's white collar. It was so tight the fucking thing felt like it was trying to strangle him.
Maybe that would have been for the best. Maybe the goddamned bowtie and the goddamned dress shirt should have come along and finished the job years ago.
When he was just a kid in elementary school, Calvin had once thought about what it would be like to be dead, riding the bus home one afternoon. He'd tried, out of nowhere, to imagine if there was nothing afterwards. No afterlife, no Purgatory, no Heaven, no Hell. Nothing at all. His mind had been unable to comprehend it, and yet, it had given Cal the strangest feeling. An oddly pleasant feeling. He hadn't thought about it much since then, but he sure had remembered it.
It was funny because he hadn't even been depressed at the time. Through to the fifth grade, Calvin Gabriel had lived a pretty good life. It was once he'd gotten to middle school that things had gone to shit.
And now, looking out at all these stupid children enjoying their dumb, insignificant dance, their useless, meaningless lives, Cal wanted to tell them to take those fucking smiles off their faces. He wanted to tell them that it didn't fucking matter if they "got some" tonight or any other night. None of it mattered. "Life is shit," in the words of the great Archie Costello, and Calvin heartily agreed. Everything in life- everything- was shit. One glance was all you needed to tell that none of these children believed that. They were dead wrong all the same. Life was shit. The blond teen couldn't wait to leave it all behind and go… anywhere, really. Anyplace but here, this mundane, pitiful, empty existence.
Calvin had thought that maybe one night as a normal teenager would do him some good, somehow. That it would cheer him up, maybe. For one night, just one, he'd get to have some fun, enjoy the Prom, be just like everybody else.
He'd been lying to himself, and he knew that now.
It was impossible for him to enjoy any of this. Having achieved self-awareness and risen above the mundane nature of a doomed, empty mortal existence, Calvin knew- with the absolute certainty of someone who could think and know things on the level of a god- that none of this mattered. It just didn't. A bunch of kids moving around to music while dressed up and pretending like they had dignity and class one night a year. Who the fuck would ever remember any of this so much as a year from now? Who would care?
How he had ever talked himself into doing this, Calvin had no idea. He had known that this was a waste of time, deep down. He had known it would be for a long time.
Yet he'd gone anyway, trying to be like everybody else, one last time.
But now, sitting here, watching the crowd, the lights, listening to the music play and that fucking disco ball spin overhead, Calvin realized.
He would never be like them.
He did not want to be like them.
A tremendous amount of mental dumbing-down would be necessary for Calvin to even have a chance at being like the rest of these shallow, insignificant people. The blond teen would have to give up all his intelligence, all his maturity, all his self-awareness.
Calvin would rather die than submit to that. He'd rather put a bullet through his head than start caring about how new those shoes were, were those designer pants, and God forbid, you got that shirt at J.C. Penney? Are you a faggot or something?
Death was better than being like the rest of these people. Death was better for Calvin… and for them. It was what they needed. What they fucking deserved.
Soon enough, Calvin promised himself. We'll see about that soon enough.
Andre had warned him this would be a waste of time; he'd warned Cal not to go. But he'd already asked Rachel by then, and of course she'd said yes, in keeping with the little crush they had going back and forth but had never actually acknowledged.
Calvin knew his best friend in the world did not approve of him doing this. Andre had tried to argue, had tried to talk Cal out of going. But Cal had agreed anyway, and committed himself to an evening of being surrounded by fucking idiots. Having no car of his own, Calvin had come here with Rachel. Or rather, Rachel and her moronic friends. He sighed.
The ride here in the rented Lincoln Town Car limousine had been an unholy nightmare, filled with stupid, noisy teenagers, all of them shouting and laughing and practically screaming in Calvin's ears all at once. Rachel's friends were the 'normal', immature bunch that everybody else was.
He really hoped he'd get to take a few shots at them come Zero Day.
He had thought about Zero Day many times in the limousine. He had thought about it many times sitting here since the dance had started. And Calvin knew he'd be thinking about it when the limo took him and Rachel and their group, some more of her friends, back to their homes.
Standing up, Calvin stretched and thought about putting a bullet through the head of the kid next to him, and the one he spotted across the room. Man, that would be something, wouldn't it? Oh, God, my brains, you hit me in my brains. Sucks for you, dude.
Rachel had sat with Cal for a while, accepting his various excuses for not wanting to dance. Cal had always been shy, had never been that excited to do anything in front of a crowd, to say the least. But Rachel was so nice, she just let it go. A lot of other girls wouldn't have, but Rachel did. She understood Calvin well, having known him all these years, and she knew how he worked.
Well, she mostly knew how he worked. There was a lot she didn't know, and she was going to find that out the hard way soon.
She had been a good friend all these years. Calvin probably would have gone for broke and tried to actually date her by now, but he'd known Andre since 1998, and Andre fucking hated Rachel. And while he could be friends with both of them- though he knew Rachel and Andre would each have loved it if he'd stopped having anything to do with the other- nothing more could ever happen with him and Rachel. Cal could never date anyone who didn't like Andre.
That was just how it was. Absolute, non-negotiable. Andre was Calvin's best friend, the finest friend he'd ever known. Cal had never felt such a strong bond with someone, such trust. Rachel, as good a friend as she was, as nice a person as she was, could never compare to that. Andre and Rachel could at least tolerate the other being friends with Cal as long as the status quo held. If Cal had taken it past being "just friends" with Rachel, if he had even tried, that would have messed up everything.
Speaking of her…
The brown-haired girl hurried up to Cal, pretty in ways she didn't realize in that she didn't realize in that light blue dress. After wandering off and talking to some of her friends that had come here separately, she'd come back to find him, and Cal knew before she said a word that she wanted to dance.
"Cal!" Rachel grabbed his arm, pulling him out onto the floor.
"What?" Calvin replied, smiling in his signature shy, self-conscious way. "What's going on?"
"They're gonna play one of my favorites, come on!" She tugged insistently, and Cal let himself be led the rest of the way out onto the dance floor.
"Well, all right," Cal replied, even though dancing was about the last thing he actually wanted to do.
XX
Calvin wasn't that great of a dancer; he never seemed to have any ability to coordinate his movements with whatever music was playing. But he did his best and Rachel seemed to be having a good time as the song she liked played the whole way through, and then another came on and played. Rachel was smiling and laughing, talking to Cal about this and that, or commenting on some friend of hers or another as the various couples moved around the dance floor.
The thing was, Rachel was talking way too loud. It would have made more sense if the volume had been higher, of if they'd been right next to the speakers, but Rachel did not need to raise her voice as much as she was doing. Cal wanted to tell her that he could hear her just fine at normal but thought it might be a little rude.
He didn't want to go and say the wrong thing and upset her. They'd come here to dance and have a good time. Well, no, that may have been what Rachel had come here for, but… underneath his effort to just go to Prom and have a nice time and be 'normal' for once, Calvin's motivations for asking Rachel to the Prom had been less than noble. Some part of him had thought that maybe he could get her into the fields out back, or, hell, even one of the bathrooms or locker rooms in the school.
Part of him wanted to get some physical pleasure out of this, whether or not he and Rachel were 'just friends'. Rachel might have had a crush on him, but she wasn't ready to go have a good old animalistic fuck, and Cal knew that. Secretly, he felt guilty for having those thoughts about her.
They were exactly the kind of thoughts that Andre would have approved of, though.
Cal admired Andre. The dark-haired teenager was everything no one else here was. Brilliant, mature, a visionary. He had a lot of hate in his heart and wanted nothing more than to spread it around, to take all his hate and slam it straight into this school… and just watch as the shockwaves of fear, of dread, and respect began to ripple outward.
Hate bought respect. Violence bought respect. Blood and lives taken bought respect. It got attention, and if you put enough headstones up, they'd never, ever forget you. The newspapers would talk about nobody but you for weeks. The news anchors on TV would all bring on 'experts' to figure out what you were thinking. Teachers and classmates would live the rest of their lives knowing they should've treated you with the seriousness and respect you were due. From the day you showed everyone who you really were until the end of time, you'd be respected, feared, and by some, even admired. Until the end of time you would live on in, enshrined by glory.
Everything a person wanted in life, everything Andre and Calvin wanted but had never been given… hate could buy you all of it, if you only used it the right way.
Andre understood that.
So did Calvin.
"Ow!" Rachel exclaimed, and immediately Cal blushed, his thoughts back on the present.
"Oh, uh, sorry, I- I didn't mean to step on your foot," Cal said, feeling terribly awkward.
"Cal," she said, pretending to be reproachful. "We both know you did mean to step on my foot. Come on, Cal. Be honest."
"I'm insecure and I need attention!" Cal confessed, but his smile gave him away.
"I know, Cal, you told me," Rachel said, laughing.
Calvin looked around at all the people laughing and dancing. They were having so much fun; it was written across their faces as they chatted and traded jokes and rumors. They were all having a much more 'normal' life than Cal, a much happier life.
There was a part of him that envied them.
Once the song that was on finished, Rachel fidgeted a little. "Hey, Cal, I kinda gotta go to the bathroom."
"That's okay," Cal said immediately. "How about I bring us some drinks from the punch bowl? I'll meet you back there in five or ten minutes."
"Ten minutes to go to the punch bowl, Cal?" Rachel asked, looking at him in disbelief.
"Yeah, I gotta talk to the guys about football," Cal said, and they both laughed, knowing Cal didn't give a rip about football or any other sport.
"Oh, hey, Rach!" one of Rachel's friends said excitedly as the two stepped off the dance floor.
"Hannah," Rachel said, "Cal and I were just admiring the place. I think the Prom Committee did an extra good job this year."
What? He hadn't done any such thing. Maybe she had, but… Cal hadn't been listening. It was good Rachel hadn't noticed.
"Hey, Cal," Hannah said, smiling politely, and Calvin nodded and smiled back.
"Rachel's right, the Prom Committee really did do great this year," Cal lied smoothly. "I mean, really, you guys outdid yourselves. The place looks amazing."
Hannah looked a little embarrassed at the praise.
"Well, thanks, guys, I mean-" she laughed and shrugged, at a loss for words. "You know, that's why we do it. It's great to hear that after all the work we did."
Looking for an excuse to get away from this conversation, Calvin said, "So, uh, you still wanted me to get you some punch, Rachel?"
"Sure, I'd love some punch," she said, smiling at him.
Cal knew she'd want to dance again when he got back. He was going to take his time before heading back over to Rachel and the dance floor.
XX
The blond teenager was in a kind of awe of himself. He really had believed he'd enjoy this meaningless, bullshit event, hadn't he? He'd actually thought it would be fun. Amazing. Rachel's friends, especially that dumb jerkoff Greg, had been getting on Cal's nerves most of all, and the blond had wanted to cringe every time any of them talked. He practically grimaced every time one of them came near him; he'd hoped to see as little of them as possible once the dance started.
Seeing their reactions to the fact that they had 'partied' with a teenage psycho would be a lot more fun than this. More than it could've ever been.
"Hey, Cal, stags for life, right?" Greg said in greeting, grinning and clapping Cal on the shoulder as the two boys passed each other. Cal wanted to skin him alive. Greg knew Cal had a date. The fucking idiot.
It was so noisy in here. It was so. Fucking. LOUD. Everyone seemed to be just yakking their heads off at once. You couldn't breathe in here, you couldn't think. Calvin needed and he just wanted to scream at them all to shut the fuck up.
God-fucking-damn-it! Shut the fuck up and give me some air!
Cal thought it, but he didn't scream it like he wanted to. God, did he want to.
XX
Calvin made it to the punch bowl, got a cup for himself, and leaned up against the wall near it.
"Why did we even come to this stupidass prom anyway?" A guy that Calvin only vaguely recognized asked a few of his friends as they stood on the other side of the table, looking out over the dance floor.
"Cause our chicks threatened not to put out for us if we didn't go," one of his friends answered.
Calvin rolled his eyes, taking another sip of his punch.
"I hate this place," a third boy said. "Shit, I'd blow it the fuck up if it'd get me outta here sooner."
"Yeah, don't I fucking know it," the first guy said. He had a stylish cut of brown hair and a jock's broad shoulders and bored, I'm-better-than-all-this look. "Four years being bored outta my fucking skull and then I have to waste all this time dressing up for Prom night. If it were up to me we'd have just skipped to going upstairs at her place. Instead I gotta do all this shit first."
"Fucking-A, man," the red-haired boy who'd answered him first said.
"Listen- lemme tell ya," the guy went on. "I'm in this for the pussy. Only reason I'm with the whore is because she's a good lay, no other reason, not one."
"Me, too," the blond with the kind-of swirly haircut said, nodding in agreement. "Christ, you know what she said earlier?"
"What?" the brown-haired guy asked.
The blond put on a prissy, high-pitched voice. "Don't you wanna go someplace quiet so we can talk?" He shook his head in disgust, his voice dropping to its normal range. "What makes that bitch think I wanna hear her talk?"
These were the type of people that were making him do Zero Day in the first place.
Exactly the type. You couldn't have picked a better example of you searched this whole fucking room.
Stupid, arrogant, shallow, absolutely obsessed with themselves. These guys lived and died off their oh-so-important social lives and their precious fucking egos.
Small laughs escaped from him, his body shaking as he tried to hold it back.
Calvin wasn't successful enough. The three boys' heads turned his way, and the one with the brown hair asked, "Somethin' funny there, kid?" he asked, his eyes flinty, his tone cold. He'd straightened up, too, no longer slouching and bored.
Cal couldn't do anything but keep that grin on his face, still trying not to completely crack up laughing. "Yeah, actually," he managed to say. "There sure is."
"Oh, yeah?" the brown-haired boy asked. "And what's that?"
"You guys think any of this shit actually matters," Calvin answered him, still grinning, still trying not to laugh.
"Well, what the fuck would you know about it, kid?" The boy with the brown hair demanded, arms crossed imposingly over his chest. "You know somethin'? I don't think you know shit."
Cal just laughed, not bothered by the boy's height, his muscle, or his demeanor. "I know a lot more than you do, trust me on that. A lot more."
"Man, who the fuck does this kid think he is, Jason?" the red-haired boy wondered aloud.
"Better than you, and that's all you need to know," Calvin said, raising his punch and finishing it in a mock salute. He headed back to the punch bowl, refilled his cup, and filled another for Rachel. "Enjoy, guys. Pretty soon it's not gonna matter."
The three boys didn't say anything to Cal as he adjusted the drinks in his hands and walked away. If Calvin had to guess, they were having a hard time believing some average nobody had just talked to them like that. They obviously weren't used to it. Kids around here normally gave them respect.
From their nice suits, expensive-looking haircuts, and simply the overprivileged, arrogant attitudes they each displayed, those three were- well, at one time, they were what Cal would have given just about anything to be. Popular, athletic, money in their pockets that they didn't have to earn… but their lives were as empty as their heads. They didn't appreciate anything, not the good-looking girls each of them were probably dating, or the money and things their parents were giving them.
They thought the world just owed everything to them.
Soon, maybe, they'd find out what they should value. But Cal had a feeling these type of guys would never learn. He still had hope that some of the kids here might learn something from Zero Day but with these three, death would be the only way to make an improvement.
Calvin sincerely hoped he'd find those three on Zero Day. If he did, he looked forward to brutally murdering them all.
XX
The blond teenager worked his way back through the crowd, keeping to the edge of the dance floor. As he approached Rachel, Calvin smiled pleasantly, the barely-restrained fury within him completely hidden. He even bowed elegantly as he stopped in front of her, reaching down to hand her the cup of punch as she sat in the folding chair Cal had pulled out for her earlier.
"Thanks, Cal," she said, smiling. "You're really a gentleman."
"As my lady commands," Calvin said as he sat down beside her, "so shall it be."
Rachel giggled. "You sound so cool when you say that."
A few minutes later, a slow song came on, and Rachel immediately got up, tugging at Cal's sleeve again. "Come on, Cal, let's have another dance, please."
Cal didn't give a fuck about dancing. Didn't she get that by now?
No, and way more importantly, she didn't get that her best friend was going to be one of the gunmen on the May 1st shooting off their high school. She didn't get that one at all. Calvin wished he could tell her. Warn her. It bothered him a great deal that Rachel would be at risk of getting shot and killed on Zero Day, that he couldn't tell her anything so she knew to stay at home. It was going to hurt her so much, finding out who Calvin had really been all along, what he'd been hiding from her all these years. Knowing that Rachel would almost certainly be somewhere else in the school on Zero Day helped ease that pain- if only slightly.
"Please, Cal?" Rachel asked, pleading now.
Calvin stood, smiling graciously. "Rachel, I'd love to dance with you," he said, and her face lit up like the stars.
XX
Slow-dancing with Rachel brought out the best of Calvin's mood. He and his date happened to be the first ones back out on the floor for the first slow song, so they were at the center of the dancers for a few minutes. Calvin became aware that fewer dancers were out here with him and Rachel; way more people were sitting down or standing off to the side by now. He knew people were looking at him, including the idiotstalking about sluts and blowing up the place. It made him feel uncomfortable. What were they staring at? He was just dancing with his date. Unlike those three idiots and everybody else here who was like them, at least Cal was actually trying to show the girl he'd brought here a good time. At least he actually cared, and didn't see her as just some slut to stick his cock in.
How could some guys be that insensitive? Girls were not just pieces of meat. They weren't toys or pets. You didn't just use and discard them however you wanted.
They were people. And some of them, if you were lucky to even encounter one, were rare and beautiful people. Smart, funny, caring, and the better-looking they were, the crappier the guys they seemed to wind up with. It wasn't right. Cal wished he could've been the guy who'd showed them all what a caring, sensitive guy could offer, been the one to really treat all the pretty girls at Tielson the right way.
But he'd never been able to do that. He'd never stood a chance.
Rachel must have noticed Cal's sideways glances, his self-conscious, awkward movements as he did his best to dance with her. She noticed, but didn't mock him or laugh. Instead, she just tried to make it easier on him. She said something nice, in the kind of way Rachel had always been the best at doing.
"I'm so glad you could come, Cal," she said, looking up at him.
"Sure," Cal said, blushing for some reason. Maybe because he'd thought of a completely different way he could've "come". Maybe because of how sincere Rachel sounded, and no doubt was. Maybe it was both. He didn't understand himself these days.
"It's okay, I mean- I know this isn't your thing, really," Rachel admitted, smiling a little. "I know you probably think it's very lame and stupid-" Well, she nail on the head there! "-but you came here with me anyway, and, I can tell you really care about me having a good time, even if you don't."
Rachel's remark calmed a lot of the rage within Cal, if only for a short while. He took another look around, and noticed that most of the couples still out here were some of the nicer ones he'd seen this evening. A few were real couples, and one or two fairly serious ones. But on and off the dance floor, Cal realized he could see some decent, pleasant kids mixed in with all the idiots and assholes. Most of these teens had never said or done anything against Andre or Calvin at all.
And a good number of them were, one way or another, honestly just trying to have a good time this evening. It was a little bit strange knowing that in a few days, some of them were going to be dead. That spooked-looking freshman kid really trying to impress the sophomore he'd worked up the courage to ask out might bleed to death as paramedics tried to dig buckshot out of his chest. The girl off to his right might get shot and lose an arm. The guy with her might take a bullet to the spine and never walk again.
In a whole new way, now, Cal realized what a fool he'd been to come here and try to actually enjoy himself. He was going to be shooting these people in a few days, right alongside Andre. That was happening. It was far too late to stop, far too late to go back- even if Calvin had even wanted to. But he had been stupid to try to enjoy himself in some trivial little thing like this when in a few days he'd be killing 'innocent' teenagers as well as himself.
Calvin had been so stupid to do this. He hoped Andre would forgive him for going through with it. But somehow, Calvin knew well in advance Andre would. His best friend was angry, harsh, unforgiving, but when he dealt with Cal, he was fair, respectful, and understanding. Andre would let this go the minute Cal asked him to. That was the nature of their friendship. Andre, the boy who never forgave, would do so the minute Calvin requested it. Calvin, in turn, would help out Andre, assist him in getting through a tough week or venting some anger. Each boy's time was the other's to spend. All they had to do was ask.
"Hey, Cal," Rachel said gently, bringing his mind back to her.
"Sorry," Cal said, blushing again. "I, um, my mind wandered."
"I saw," Rachel answered, laughing softly. "You got this really distant look in your eyes. Like you weren't really here."
He was. He was absolutely here. Even though it was so far from the truth it wasn't funny- except that it was. Somehow, it was. Cal wasn't here at the Prom. He wasn't here at this school. He wasn't even here in this life he was pretending to live, as just another average, ordinary kid. He hadn't been "here" for years.
Calvin wanted to die. He really, really wanted to die. Why- for fuck's sake, why did he have to wait so long? Why be forced to endure such torment when all he wanted was the kind of release you could only find in death?
And yet he answered Rachel promptly this time, pleasant and smiling. "Just had a lot on my mind lately."
"Everyone does," Rachel assured him. "It's almost the end of the year, and we're all about to go off to college in the fall."
That, Cal thought, has got nothing to do with it. But let her think that. Let her and his parents and his teachers all think he'd actually applied to University of- oh, who gave a fuck, anyway. They'd all know he'd lied real soon.
Rachel shrugged, halfway to herself, and said, "I wonder if you were thinking about what I was just now."
"What?"
"Well, all these kids here, I mean- so many of us are gonna part ways when the year ends. We'll all just leave and a lot of us will never talk again." Rachel paused, unhappy at the prospect. "There's so many people who're going to lose friends for no good reason, and we all just let it happen every year, with every class that graduates."
"I don't think that's gonna happen to us," Cal said suddenly, with a certainty in his voice that surprised him as well as her.
"You don't?" Rachel asked, her face and voice revealing how startled she was. "What makes you say that?"
"We're just gonna stay friends," Calvin said. "Just because most of the kids here are gonna end up doing what you said doesn't mean we have to. Listen. You're my friend, have been for years, and you will continue to be until the day I die, alright?"
Rachel stared up at him for a few moments, surprised and touched. "Wow, Cal," she said in a hushed voice. "You really mean that? Until the day you die, you wanna be my friend?"
"Until the day I die," Calvin promised her.
A/N: Below are all 454 words that I was able to recover for this story, all of which were used in this rewrite:
Calvin had thought that maybe one night as a normal teenager would
Calvin wanted to tell her that he could hear her just fine at normal volume but thought it might be a little rude. Or maybe it was just a prom thing?
be one of the gunmen on the May 1st shooting of their high school.
Rachel's friends were the 'normal', immature bunch that everybody else**was.
He really hoped he'd get to take a few shots at them come Zero Day. ... He knew people were looking at him, including the idiots talking about sluts and blowing up the ...
the school on Zero Day helped ease that pain—even if only slightly.
"Cal!" Rachel grabbed his arm, pulling him out onto the floor.
Or rather Rachel and her moronic friends. He sighed.
Well, no, that may have been what Rachel had come there for, but ...
Calvin looked around at all the people laughing and dancing. They were having so much fun; it was written across their faces as they chatted ...
It was a little bit strange that knowing in a few days, some of
when in two days he'd be killing 'innocent' teenagers as well as himself.
"I think the prom committee did an extra good job this year.
needed and he just wanted to scream at them all to shut the fuck up.
Seeing their**reactions to the fact that they had 'partied' with a teenage psycho would be a lot more fun than this.
Even though it was so far from the truth that it wasn't funny—except it ...
These were the type of people that were making him do Zero Day in the first place.
"I hate this place…
"Sure, I'd love some punch."
to take his time before heading back over to Rachel and the dance floor.
Calvin rolled his eyes, taking another sip of his punch.
"Why did we even come to this stupid ass prom anyway?"**A guy that Calvin only vaguely recognized asked a few of his friends as**they stood on the other side of the table, looking out**over the dance floor.
Cause our chicks threatened to not put out for us if we didn't go.
Only reason I'm with the whore is cause she's a good lay, no other reason, not one.
Small laughs escaped from him, his body shaking as he tried to hold it back.
"I know a lot more than you do, trust me on that. A lot more.
"I'm so glad you could come, Cal.
"I know you probably think it's very lame and stupid—" Well, she hit the ...
You're my friend, have**been for years and you will continue to be until the day I die, alright?".
I think I said plenty in the A/N at the beginning, but I'll add a few things here.
The 2008 film The Dark Knight is referenced when one of the boys Cal stands near at the punch bowl is complaining about his girlfriend. In The Dark Knight, a woman asks Salvatore Maroni "Don't you wanna go someplace quiet so we can talk?" while in a loud nightclub, to which Maroni, not even bothering to look at her, says, "What makes you think I wanna hear you talk?"
If you pay attention as you read this story, you'll notice Cal's mood shifts around a lot. One minute he's angry, then depressed, then pitying, then pitiless. Calvin maintains a calm outward demeanor, much better than Andre does, but all the indications we get- especially once he is in the school with Andre on May 1st, free to show his true self at last- are that Cal, if anything, might be even angrier than Andre is underneath. Andre shows more of his anger and that makes people more wary of him- and risks getting him in trouble- but he is also letting more of it out. Cal keeps his fury tightly bottled, so when he finally lets it out on Zero Day, he's absolutely enraged.
Anyway, Calvin's shifts of mood and perspective are not indications he is bipolar or anything like that. I mean for them to show how he looks at this multiple ways in a brief period of time, feeling sorry for the kids around him, being eager to kill them, wanting desperately to be one of them, to be normal and accepted, and to simply die. Calvin is depressed, and he is aware more than Andre, and probably from an earlier point than Andre, that there was only one way that Zero Day could end for him. Calvin wants to die just as much as he wants to kill, maybe more, and I let that show in his thoughts. Yet no matter his exact mood throughout the evening, Calvin never once considers not carrying out Zero Day and in fact eventually reveals he considers it a foregone conclusion. Even though it is still two days from happening, Calvin regards it as inevitable. He is committed and cannot conscience betraying Andre now, not for any reason.
The stuff about having "self-awareness" is directly from passages of the journals written by Eric Harris and especially Dylan Klebold (the latter being Calvin's approximate real-world counterpart). Harris and Klebold believed that they had become smarter and more insightful, more powerful, than the average human, and had practically if not literally transcended ordinary human existence to have greater-than-normal awareness of themselves and the world around them.
Tielson is mentioned once as the name of Calvin's high school in this story. All of my Zero Day stories, whether the school name is mentioned explicitly or not, consider "Tielson High School" to be the name of the public high school that Calvin and Andre attend. Tielson was the name given in, I believe, "Calvin's Video Diaries", another one of the deleted stories I am aiming to replace. As Calvin is describing the making of his pact with Andre to commit murder-suicide at their high school, he names it, calling it Tielson. I picked that up for use in my own stories even before the other user deleted their 8 Zero Day stories, and have made it the permanent name of Calvin and Andre's high school in my work.
Last of all, the three boys that Calvin talks to near the punch bowl are Jason Morgan (brown hair), Chris Marshall (red hair), and John LaFleur (blond hair) making cameo appearances from my The Good Sons fanfic. No real reason for it, and the three boys in that scene near the punch bowl were less detailed in the original story as I recall- no hair color specified, no names. But I saw a chance to have these three OCs I featured throughout one of my other stories show up briefly in an AU, so I took it.