Notes
Sorry it took slightly longer than planned it was a bad week, sadly I still own nothing. Hopefully the next chapter will be out much quicker than this one.
Claudia was really starting to think today was the world trying to make up for the great day she had had yesterday by making this the worst one. First she had woken up and been unable to find her laptop after having not looked for it last night since she had gotten back so late, she had gone into the kitchen to look and see if someone moved it before spotting the remains of it on the table, it was completely smashed, screen cracked, hard disk broken open and the only clue was some thin tyre tracks on the casing. She had hoped it was just an accident, Walter ran over things all the time but after seeing the smug look on his face as he saw her she knew that it was not the case. The day had only gotten worse from there.
Claudia had made it through two lessons already, she had sat with her feet up on the desk fiddling with some scrap metal she had in her bag carefully twisting it with pliers, she hadn't been without her computer like this since she had made it just over a year ago and didn't really know what to do with herself. The teachers weren't really sure either, they skirted around her even more than usual seemingly worried by the lack of computer on the desk in front of her and fearing what her reaction to anything may be.
By the time she sat at her desk in biology she had completed the small charm she had been forming and added it to the growing collecting on the necklace she was wearing, the one she had made was shaped like a small gun to remind herself that days could be that good. Suddenly she heard the noise of a scraping chair besides her and looked up to face a tallish boy with blue eyes and a short buzz cut.
"Hi I'm Steve Jinks." The boy held out his had for her to shake, she was impressed at the fact he was talking to her, since she had joined the school only a handful of people outside of the gifted group and Todd had spoken to her and most of those were never more than once.
"Claudia." She replied shaking his hand abet slightly hesitantly. After about five minutes of the lesson Steve turned to face her.
"Since we are lab partners then I should ask, have you done anything towards this project yet?"
"Huh?" Claudia looked at him confused having not really been listening to the lesson, looking around she saw that each table was talking so clearly the teacher had allowed them all to discuss the project on DNA she had set for them at the beginning of the term. "Why are you my lab partner Jinksy, why did you hate your old one so much to switch for me?" Claudia was unsure to why anyone would voluntarily choose her as a partner, in fact she had spent the past few weeks making sure no one would, however while looking around she could see no one partnerless.
"I didn't, I started today, you were the only person without a partner. So have you done anything on the project." Steve was watching her a little too closely for her liking.
"Don't worry it's all sorted, you don't need to do anything, just stay quiet and I'll let you sign your name at the end." Claudia had already created a model of the sequence of the bacterium responsible for one form of the common cold and her laptop, which luckily had been saved to the cloud file she had highly encrypted.
"Okay, can I at least know what it is." Claudia could already tell he was going to keep going on all lesson asking questions she really couldn't be bothered to answer. Carefully so he couldn't see she pulled the device she had made a few weeks ago out of her pocket and pressed the button. All of a sudden the lights turned off, along with every computer, every phone, anything running on electricity. Then the panic started, no one could get anything to turn on and quickly the school was evacuated. It took another thirty minutes for the power in the school and on any phones to return at which point Steve walked back up to Claudia.
"Was that all you?" Steve asked having seen her be unfazed by the situation.
"Nope, had nothing to do with this Jinksy."
"You're lying." Steve shook his head and walked away.
"I assume the little incident today had something to do with you." That was the first thing Claudia heard when she walked into the Library.
"Of course, some kid just wouldn't leave me alone, I had to act."
"Miniature EMP device?"
"Yep." Then Pete stood up from where he was sat on the table and held his hand up for a high five which Claudia happily gave him.
"You kid, got me out of a geometry test." He ruffled her hair as he turned back to the table putting his arm around her shoulder and leading her over with him.
They were half an hour into the session when the boy from earlier walked in and looked them over.
"I'm here to get some books, is the librarian here?" He asked giving Artie a full once over.
"She's back there." Artie pointed to the front of the Library unsure to why the boy would use the almost completely ignored back entrance that they used.
Fifteen minutes later her was back but this time with a large stack of books in his arms.
"What are you guys doing here anyways?" He asked being unable to see a connection between a jock, a nerd, a trouble maker and a quiet girl who tried to draw very little attention.
"Study group." Artie replied with, it was their usual explanation.
"You're lying."
"Oh god not this again." Claudia groaned.
"Fine we are a book group."
"Lying again."
"A historical society."
"Why do you keep on lying to me?"
Artie looked at him before huffing, "Fine, okay. We are a super secret government group that trains gifted kids and makes groups to solve the unsolvable problems and cases. You happy?"
"Yes, thank you." And then Steve walked out of the Library.
Artie turned to Claudia before asking, "Who was that?"
"Why the hell do you think I know?" Claudia started becoming defensive immediately.
"You said, "Not this again" you met him before." Artie tilted his head and looked at her expectantly.
"Fine he was the one who wouldn't leave me alone earlier, his name is Steve Jinks."
Artie stared to walk away muttering to himself "Steve Jinks."
It was getting close to the end of the session when Claudia started to get nervous, she wanted to ask Artie if he had been serious about the offer to give her materials to make a new computer as she had hated today and wanted to know if she was going to have to scavenge for scraps again. However with only ten minutes left Artie finished the lesson and turned from the whiteboard he was writing on.
"Now as we all remember Claudia won yesterdays paint balling game." Both Pete and Myka muttered quietly that it wasn't a fair win, "And as you remember there was a prize promised. Claudia you haven't had your laptop today, did something happen to it?"
"It got,… It broke." Claudia decided it would take too long to explain what really happened.
"Well then the prize is even better than planned, tomorrow bring in a list of the supplies you need to make a new one and I can get hold of them for you." Claudia was grinning ear to ear already planning the schematics out in her head. If she could actually get the right parts she could make one that wouldn't overheat and could process fast enough to get past even the worst encryptions.
She was still shaking slightly with excitement while walking out when Pete slung his arm around her shoulder.
"Hey we're all going to come to my house to hang for a bit, you want to join us?" Claudia looked hesitant trying to decide if it was a good idea, she wasn't sure if she wanted to get that close to these people however she had nowhere better to be.
"Sure, I'll come, we heading straight there?"
"Yep my Mum is coming, she'll give you a lift unless you have someone already here."
"Nope, no one here." Claudia replied quickly following them as they headed across the almost empty car park to a large SUV getting in the back between Leena and Myka.
Hey so Steve's here now, you have a few more chapters before the story line is going to become more clear. A couple of chapters I said this was the longest thing I have written well I have now long surpassed that length, we're over 10K so it's probably now 4X longer than the previous longest thing I have written so yeah, go science and maths not requiring essays. Please do keep reviewing, I just like the reassurance that I am not yelling into the void and please do tell me what you think or if anything needs changing. Now I am very much rambling but all mistakes are mine do tell me if you find any.