Lara ran her fingers over the words, then set the book down and ran over to the now back to herself Amanda, who had fallen to her knees and was breathing heavily.
Lara kneeled down beside her, and asked concernedly, "Are you okay?"
Amanda waved her off as she caught her breath, "Yeah, fine. Just a little out of practice." She took a breath, finally slowing down to normal breathing rate, then she brightened, "Hey, did it work?" she asked excitedly, as if this were some game that they'd invented as little kids.
"Yeah," Lara said, "It wrote in Latin across the page, a riddle of some sort."
Amanda gave her a little shove, her white-blonde hair flopping into her eyes a little bit, "Then go get it. You'll have to read it to me though, I haven't read Latin since we were in college." She flopped back onto the grass, sitting on her feet as Lara retrieved the leather bound tome and returned.
"What's it say?" she asked Lara, who was staring at the words, her eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
Lara read the Latin words fluently, "I hide among light of day, only show when to emerge myself over, upon interval when night sometimes I don't show my likeness far whole."
Amanda stared in disbelief, "Can you turn that into non-Shakespearian language?"
Lara rolled her eyes at Amanda, "It says; 'I hide among the light of day' meaning whatever it is doesn't come out during the day, but hides." She looked at Amanda who nodded. Then continued, "the next verse is, 'only show when to emerge myself over', meaning, 'only coming out' generally. Then 'upon interval when night' meaning 'in intervals at night' and finally," she gestured to the last verse, "'Sometimes I don't show my likeness whole' meaning, 'sometimes I don't show my face at all' There. You happy?" she asked Amanda.
Amanda relayed the verses in her head, trying to make sense of them.
She said them aloud, hoping it'd help, "I hide during the day, only coming out in intervals at night, sometimes I don't come out at all…"
she wrinkled her forehead in puzzlement, then shook her head. "I got nothing." she said.
Lara shook hers as well. "Maybe Zip will come up with something. He can use his internet knowledge for this."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Zip typed the ideas into the computer and then, when it came up with nothing, spun in his swivel chair to face the girls. "there's good news and bad news, which do you want first."
Lara looked at Amanda, expecting her to answer for the both of them.
Amanda snorted, then said, "Well, it's only logical to take the bad news first, so hit us."
Zip replied, "The internet fails us. Its got as much of a clue as you two."
After a quiet moment, Lara piped up, "and what about the good news?"
"The good news is that I'm smart. And you're lucky to have me." Zip said cockily.
Amanda threw her stupid face on, "Meaning…?" she urged.
"I figured it out. You guys were just thinking too hard, overlooking the answer in plain sight."
Lara gasped, "You figured it out?"
Zip just nodded.
Amanda continued, "Well what is it?" she asked impatiently.
Zip just shrugged and propped his feet up on the tech room's glass tabletop.
"It's the moon." he said as if made perfect sense. "Hides during the day, comes out at night in intervals -or cycles- and sometimes doesn't come out at all, also known as a new moon." he explained.
Lara and Amanda's jaws were both practically on the floor. Of course in their search through their brains, they would have skipped the obvious answer.
But now the question was, what did they do even if the answer was the moon?