Alicia normally has music at 9th period, but the teacher is absent today, which is a rare sight. Mr. Pawn took his work seriously, and she would have enjoyed his class if she wasn't assigned the clarinet. When Mr. Quincy, the principal, passed by the chaotic classroom, he ordered them to go to the second-floor library.
As her disorganized horde of a class finally reached the place, she quickly spotted an empty table by the corner and claimed it before anyone else could. There, she pondered on how to spend the free period. Physics homework, read, or studying.
Her phone buzzed. Maybe she could just pass the time like a teenager of her age.
"Hey, I just remembered something"
An unknown number texted her. Since she had nothing to do at the moment she decided to clear up the confusion.
"Who is this?"
"Oh, it's me, Miller"
She frowned. "How do you have this number?"
"Josh gave it to me"
Of course. She was required to give him her number if he had any questions about the FBI's pending job offer. Handing it to random strangers was not what she had in mind.
"All right." She texted back, her fingers zipping through the keys. "So what do you remember?"
"You know this girl named Anastasia? Think her last name's Pallas, a senior"
"Who doesn't?"
"Josh"
Good point. "What about her?"
"Well, I remember seeing my brother talking to her a lot. They meet almost on a weekly basis, talking in the hallways. She might be a part of the Chinese zodiac club"
Or she could be his girlfriend, but Alicia dismissed the thought as an impossibility. Anastasia Pallas is widely known around the school as a self-proclaimed lesbian, as well as a passionate follower of the modern feminist movement. Tristan Jackson is the last person she expects to hang around with her.
"All right."She texted back. "I'll keep an eye out for her."
"Be careful. It goes without saying, but she's almost certainly a stand user"
She tried to think of something witty to conclude the conversation, but Miller texted that he's got to go. Alicia proceeded to add him into her contacts afterward.
"Excuse me, is this seat taken?" Someone dropped their laptop across from her. A living fashion statement of today's expressive youth, her asymmetrical undercut reminded her of an ocean's trench, deep and dark blue. The shaved side of her head was streaked with black, and her ears and lower lip were practically a mass of piercings.
Speaking of the devil. Or rather, texting.
"No, you can sit."
Anastasia Pallas. 18. President of the Feminist Club, LGBT Club, Photography Club, and co-founder of the Edison High Writing Program. Senior. Owner of various online blogs and a recently viral website. Had seven girlfriends last year (according to rumors).
She took out her binder and feigned the impression that she was studying.
And, according to the defector Miller Jackson, possibly a Stand user, as well as a member of the Chinese Zodiac Club.
Anastasia, with a brush of her one-sided hair, placed herself down and opened up her laptop.
"A nice day, isn't it?" The senior said, not looking up from her computer. While Alicia doesn't know her personally, Anastasia is something of a keyword for their school. A charismatic individual, her services in her clubs helped to raised over $20,000 last year in total, all donated to helping out the charity (though it was, curiously, exclusively reserved for women in need). Many girls in the school look up to her like some sort of deity, admiring the way she doesn't hesitate when speaking out her opinions. If Bryce Bull-Moose represented the boys of Edison, then she is the pride of the other half.
To think one of the most popular girls in the school is part of a group that is behind several murder attempts of the newest celebrity, Joshua Jiu. She thought. Tsk tsk, these guys. They are not jealous, are they?
"Hey, you are Anastasia, right?" Alicia looked up from her notes and put on her trademark smile, warm, but not truthful. "I've been looking at your site, and I have to say, some of your insights are quite intriguing."
"You obviously haven't read the guidelines and the FAQs from my blog posts," The senior replied, clicking away. "Educate yourself first before bothering me with such trivialities."
Tactlessness, check. It seems that some rumors are not completely baseless, not matter how much of a saint someone is believed to be.
"Anastasia," the librarian called, a lean woman in her thirties. "Your teacher came looking for you. She's in 220 if you still need her."
The senior stood up and walked out of the library. Many greeted her on her way out. Alicia looked around. Everyone was busy talking, reading, working, or simply staring at their phones. Could this be her chance?
No, she stopped herself. It may be a trap. Who leaves their laptop open like that?
But…it's there. Right in front of her. Think of it, all of the possible information she could find. All the dirt about the cryptic Chinese Zodiac Club. Her sense of self-preservation urges her to stop, but her bold and opportunity-seeking detective side promises her that it would be worth it.
And who says she'll have to go through the laptop herself?
With a deep breath, she chose to listen to the grizzled gumshoe. Her hands studied the notes, tracing the explanation for the one complicated equation she doesn't seem to get, but something that only she could see in the library came out of them. A long and thin silver cord, imprinted with what appeared to be a simple shape of a red rabbit's head on its head. It slithered its way to one of the laptop's USB ports and plugged itself inside.
A sudden flow of information streamed through Alicia's mind, and one of which included the admin password.
Using her cord, now a part of the machine, she mentally controlled the inner workings of the laptop keyboard, typing in the password. A few moments later she was in, and the home screen showed itself, an abstract piece of scenery serving as the background. More and more information stored within the laptop flowed through her brain, but none of them signaled any relation to the Club at first glance. Music albums, school work, fan fictions, incomplete blog posts, games, unfinished videos, all irrelevancies to what she was looking for.
What about her social media? Alicia commanded the laptop to click on the browser, Streak, which is universally considered to be the fastest and the most responsive. The school library's Wi-Fi proved to be workable enough, and she was able to get on Anastasia's accounts on several of the mainstream sites in seconds. Controlling multiple tabs at a time, she searched through her profiles, photos, posts, timelines, comments, history (nothing disconcerting, so far), and conversations. None. Not a single one had a slight mention to the Club.
At least it's a good thing that she forgets most of the data flowing through her head when she unplugs her Stand PATD out. Some of the senior's ideologies are disagreeable, to say the least. In one fan fiction about metrosexual elves and bi-polar time traveling vampires, Anastasia's narration blatantly went off ranting about the patriarchal society and how the Holy Bible was to blame right in the middle of a full on lesbian orgy. She had been in some dangerous situations while investigating before, but this is one of the few times she genuinely wished to pull out as soon as possible. And she was going to, if one folder with an unusual name did not stand out amidst the circulating systems of binary codes. Do Not Enter, it was named, a lone, unassuming folder hidden among mazes of her school project files. Her cursor hovered over it, and she debated on whether or not if it's worth her time indulging her natural curiosity.
It the end she decided not to. She dragged her mouse away with the intention to log out. But she couldn't. Something was stopping her.
...What? She forcibly commanded the laptop to move the cursor, but a small, pixelated creature hugged it tightly, unwilling to let go. With a white and slender body, she originally thought the creature to be a snake, but upon closer inspection it had tiny arms and legs, with two stubs on its head, presumably as horns. A dragon of the Far East. Its aquamarine eyes seemed to blink at her, despite sitting at the other side of the table.
Is this some sort of app? Abandoning the mouse, she ordered the computer to log out directly with her mind. The start menu was brought up, and the highlighted option scrolled down until it stopped at the Log out option. The pixelated dragon let go out of the mouse and flew towards the menu at an incredible speed. It was able to physically drag out the Log out selection and toss it out to the home screen, landing with a small thud on the taskbar as if it was a real object.
What is this? Alicia moved the freed cursor to click on the Log out button, now flipped upside down and lying on the bottom of the screen. The dragon got to it first, hugging it with its tiny arms and brandished the mouse away like a weapon. The cursor bounced on the left side of the screen once before falling down lifelessly. There's no choice. She has to shut it off. Using her mental keyboard she brought up the starting menu and highlighted the Shut down selection. Yet once again she was denied of her attempt by the living pixel. It brought up the Streak browser, and the option for her menu suddenly was replaced with ones manipulating the tab.
She unplugged her Stand, stood up, and went for the external power button on the laptop, but a hand stopped her.
"Haven't you been told it's not nice to go through other people's belongings?" Anastasia said, her hair covering one eye. The other studied her menacingly.
Alicia slipped her hand away and retracted her Stand, PATD. Holding onto her wrist, she narrowed her eyes at the controversial senior of the school, now an adversary.