There was a dark room, in a house in a country in a world that felt particularly grateful that it wasn't one in a universe of romance novel, that belonged to a girl. This girl (in her late teenage years, but still prime age for High Romance-Fantasy-type adventures, because she wasn't yet eighteen and therefore a stuffy adult) sat at her computer in thought.

She was thinking because she was bored.

I am so bored.

"Hey, girl." Her friend called from the hallway, "You looked bored."

The girl was astounded, and turned in her totally awesome swivel chair to address her companion, "What a coincidence, because I totally am!"

"What can I say, I'm a mindreader. Hey, listen, I need you to help me with something." She glanced back into the hall, which the girl knew because her friend had jammed her head into the opening between door and wall like an ostrich seeking shelter, although the girl would never mention it, because that would be rude.

"You look like an ostrich."

Well, never mind then.

"Hadn't noticed. Anyway, are you busy right now? Obviously not, because you're bored."

"Actually," Said the girl, remembering all the fun things she could be doing now instead of helping her friend, "I kinda have some homework that I should probably..."

"Don't be absurd! Everyone knows that going high school doesn't require attendance, work, or suffering fools! It's fun time to goof off with friends and save the world and eat ice cream, and stuff."

The girl sighed, her ploy having failed, "No, I'm not particularly busy. I just got back from bringing economic stability to Atlantis, and the Apocalypse isn't until next week."

"Awesome. Here, have this fanfiction."

"What?"

But her friend had disappeared.

"Actually, she's still there."

"I totally am."

Nope.

Disappeared.

TOTALLY AWESOME BLATANT TRANSITION OF SETTING

Gerp glanced around a bit nervously, and asked, "Did anyone else feel that?"

"Feel what?" Rodle replied, stretching a rubber band around his thimble-bearing fingers. The fool was developing his so-called greatest invention in attempts to woo Padwyn, but Gerp knew that it was his shoes that ran on linux that would truly win her over. Chicks dig freeware, or so he'd been told.

"As if there was a..."

"If you say, 'disturbance in the force', I will stab you in the soul." Cloudemeh told him from the other side of the table, where she sat with a sock on one hand a marker in the other.

"Who are you?" The Graceling of Smart demanded, his binary eye scrolling past like Internet Explorer on drugs.

The Graceling of Biology added to his query, "And why do you keeping making dumb references to computers? No one thinks it's funny. No one."

"I did..." The Smartling of Grace hung his head in shame. As he should, the nerd.

"I liked our old narrator better," Rodle lifted his hand to his best friend's shoulder, "She was much nicer."

"Yeah, me too."

"Irrelevant!" Cloudemeh interjected, "This one is cheaper." Of course, she only said this because not only was she generally uneducated, but also because she had her hand in a mousetrap and was feeling rather irritable.

"Spontaneous sadism!" Gerp announced, "What an unusual phenomenon!"

"Not really, at least in certain parts of the Northeast region of America."

Rodle winced, "That looks painful."

And it was. So. Very. Much.

The annoyance that was Cloudemeh struggled with the mousetrap, Gerp taking notes, as Padwyn walked in, munching on a popsicle in what she figured was a suggestive manner, pretending to be unaware of her actions because she was far too pure to engage in lewd acts on her own. Mostly she just looked silly, since it was really cold in the castle-labs, because both laboratories and castles are generally below average temperatures.

This is because castles are large and usually constructed of stone, which isn't a very good choice in heat conduction unless coupled with another material used as insulation on the inside of a building. Drafts are common by necessity, and even rugs can't really do much since stone is slow to warm and cool. Labs tend to be more purposeful, because lower temperatures have less risk of

"HEY! PAY ATTENTION!" Padwyn demanded, "This is MY SCENE."

Speaking of scenes, Padwyn had deviated from her normal edgy attire, and wore a tank top with an oversized plaid shirt under an oversized jacket and shorts of ripped jean over mismatched leg-warmers stuffed into boots stuffed into rubber shoes with each individual toe encased (you know, the ridiculously expensive kind, which is kind of strange because they look pretty cheap). She had picked up some of the Science-Gracelings' habits.

"Anyway, guys... hey, who's that?"

"This is the new writer." Rodle explained, trying ever so much to be helpful.

"She's kind of mean." Gerp added, refusing to be outdone, "Like the new narrator."

"I don't really care." Padwyn admitted.

"Oh."

"What I do care about, is that I haven't been to the mall in two days. I'm getting bored."

Both of the friends looked at each other, then Padwyn, then each other.