I seem to have trouble with the first chapter. They are usually shorter than I would like. Please read and review!
Oh and I don't own the wheel of time series either.
Chapter 2: School days
A couple days later, Bobby was back at school. Our group, as it was, consisted of 6 members. There was Bobby and myself, Davis, who was a know it all and a cheat, Nathan, who had longer hair than me and earrings and people still knew he was a guy (not that I'm bitter or anything), Jenny, the only girl, and finally Michael, the leader. Bobby and I actually were more on the periphery of the group. Bobby hanged around with everyone, but we just happened to be the only group whose schedule matched with his. I didn't really fit in with anyone, but this was the closest match. Of course we all had friends outside of the group, but we would hang together during lunch and hold gaming sessions on the weekends.
"So, did you read the latest book? I can't believe how long it was, and still he's not done." Jenny remarked as we ate the artificial chicken that was served.
"You mean RJ's? I haven't even finished Eye of the World." Mike snatched a fry from Jenny's plate and dipped it in some concoction of mustard and mayo. Bobby put his finger in his mouth and feigned throwing up.
"Why you don't like Jordan?" Davis mistook his gesture, thinking he meant the books. Bobby stopped and looked at him sideways. "Dude, Jordan is a great author, just slow. I meant..." he said as he pointed to Mike who was biting down on the fry.
"What?" He asked as he swallowed it. "I always eat them this way."
"Yeah and it's always disgusting." I replied, picking at my fries with the Spork.
"Hey, I don't complain about how you eat food in a spiral." Jason retorted. That was one of my quirks; I always ate the outside of food before the inside.
Quick to change the discussion, I turned to Bobby. "So I heard you were sick on Monday. Did you catch a bug?"
"A toad more like it…" he mumbled just barely loud enough to hear. "Nah, I just came down with a fever or somethin. I'm fine now. I missed yesterday because of a family thing."
"Ya know, you guys always have family things." Davis said. Bobby looked at him weirdly, and Davis continued. "You Xaviers, I mean. You guys are always having family issues? Is that what it's really all about?" I stepped on Davis's foot to stop him from his line of thoughts, but all I got was a severely more injured foot in return.
Bobby just smirked though, and picking a fry, tossed it playfully across the table, landing it on Davis's Plate. "Yep, we are all a bunch of terrors to our parents. You guessed the true meaning of Christmas and all that." Davis grinned as he picked up the fry, only to frown as he did so, changing the topic. "Dude, this cafeteria food just gets worse, this fry is still frozen."
The day went by as fast as any other day. I was waiting, lingering if you like, outside the main doors of the school, hoping to catch Bobby. We'd moved up the gaming session to earlier on Saturday than usual, and I had forgotten to tell him at lunch. When he came out, he flanked by the other kids from the Institute. Slim Summers was behind him with the Cheerleader and Kitty was by his side. Kurt was clowning around just in front of them. It was a kind of close knit group that seemed totally foreign to me, and I could feel the envy in my rising. They were almost by me, when his eyes grazed over me and he pulled away from the others. "Hey Trist, What's goin on?" I noticed the other kids had stopped a little bit a ways, waiting for him. Kurt was giving me a funny look which I turned away from.
"Not much, just wanted to tell ya about a change in the schedule Saturday. We're gonna start at 12 instead of 2, so be there then." I hefted my backpack higher up on my shoulder as he nodded. "Cool, we're going to keep goin with the Lost Forge Campaign, or was Jenny going to start hers up?"
I shrugged, "Don't know. Haven't been informed about that yet. Jenny is hosting though, so meet at her house. And on that note, we're still waiting for you to get permission from your Professor Xavier to have a session at your place." Bobby gave me an embarrassed smile and brushed his hand through his hair, "Yeah about that. Ya know since the party, he has disallowed us from hosting things. So it will be a while. Sorry."
"I guess its no problem. I mean, you can't change things like that." Bobby nodded and began moving back to his own group, when a glance from Kurt stopped him and he turned around. "Hey Tristan, mind if Kurt joins us this week?" My eyes opened in surprise. The German had always struck me as the kind of person who would do well role-playing, but he never seemed interested. We didn't have a large group and were always looking for new players, so this was a bit of good news. "Heck no. You know we need new fodder, I mean blood." I gave him and Kurt a grin and waved as I began to move down the side walk. "See you guys then."
Bobby waved back, grinning, while Kurt nodded and turned to Bobby, probably to ask about my statement. Their little group moving off in the direction opposite from the one I traveled.
When I arrived at school the next day, the air was a buzz with gossip. It seemed that a group of kids had trashed the new mall. The police suspected they were from our school, but they had no leads, and it seemed like they couldn't even figure out what caused some of the damage. It has made a lot of people angry though. The mall was supposed to open next week and now it looked like it would be another month or so.
My first class of the day was Science, and I kinda just drifted through it. I didn't know anyone in that class, and the teacher was new and not nearly as interesting as Mr. McCoy had been. This unfortunately made it a good place for the gossip to take place.
"I heard it had something to do with those brotherhood guys. They're pretty sketchy you know. I mean, just look at Freddie. He flipped out first day of school and the guys he hangs out with are just as dangerous."
"Yeah I know what you mean. I don't know what Kitty sees in that Lance kid that's with them. They're all just punks."
"Well no offense, but Kitty is one of the Institute kids. They're kinda weird themselves. I mean, Jean's okay, but the rest of them….they're just as bad as the Brotherhood, just not as destructive."
Looking over my shoulder, I could see two girls whispering two rows back. I recognized one from the other day, she'd been with Kitty. The other I didn't know, but I thought she was a cheerleader. The bell chose that moment to ring, causing the girls to look up and stop their conversation. I grabbed my books and notebook, shoving them into my backpack, just thankful to be out of class. Listening to gossip was something I didn't like to do, but I had a hard time ignoring it.
Once in the halls, I edged my way through the crowd, just trying to make it to Social Studies before the bell rang again. I saw Davis at the far end of the hall, and hurried up, trying to catch him before class. As I pushed my way through the throng of people, I bumped into a very weary looking Kurt. I nearly did a double take, swearing I had touched some fur, despite the fact that he wasn't wearing anything resembling such a thing. "Dude, sorry."
He gave me a tired irate look, which softened into something just weary. "Na, its okay. My bad." With that he hunched his backpack on his shoulder and moved down the hall, feeling his arm where I bumped him. Shaking my head, I turned back the way I was going to find that Davis had already entered class. Letting out an exasperated sigh, I moved through the crowd, no longer in a hurry, managing to make it through the door and grab a seat just as the bell rang.
As class started, I couldn't help but think about the gossip I'd heard. I knew strange things had happened since the institute had opened, but it never really meant anything to me. Now though, I was curious. Everything strange around here did seem to connect to the Xavier Institute or the Brotherhood, and Kurt definitely looked like he'd had a bad night. Maybe something was going on with them. And I now had a burning desire to know what.