Oops, My Bad (Reeve)

[Adrianna Carstyn]

Stress, exhaustion, insanity. All the things that had been piling up higher and higher, feeding into the chaotic mess that was her mind. Things had to get better at some point. It seemed as though as was close enough to rock bottom that life couldn't get worse. Between Craven leaving, her mother's condition staying just as it was and her confusion about Lani, it was pretty bad. But could it get worse? Of course.

Running hadn't helped at all so, she figured maybe just relaxing would work better. The student lounge was always open and maybe she'd find something to do or someone to bug. The second was more likely. Her emotions were all over the place and she couldn't find a good distraction alone. So, the next best thing was socializing.

The weather was acting slightly bipolar and today was one of those colder days. Luckily, the lounge was warm and Adrianna had dressed accordingly. She was wearing dark denim jeggings and a swoop shoulder I LOVE PINK neon green shirt. She walked into the room with a confident, yet somewhat shy stride. Walking straight to the pool tables she figured she'd attempt to play even though she was pretty terrible.

A few kids were scattered around, some familiar, other she'd never met. Racking up the pool balls, the song that had filled the small space changed to a new one. Adrian grabbed a poolstick and danced a little as she mouthed the words. She placed the white ball in its spot and lined up to take a shot, which hadn't gone too well.

She pulled the stick back a little too far and accidentally hit a boy right in his side. With a squeak, she turned around and a flow of apologies passed her lips, "Oh my gosh! I'm so sorry, I didn't even know you were there! I didn't hurt you did I?" She asked frantically.


OUTFIT

[Reeve Rzeznik]

Reeve rarely paid much in the way of attention lately. Drifting like a ghost from class to class had become even easier, ever since he built himself a brand new MP3 player from scratch, one that streams music at will from both his extensive collection on his computer, and from any other publicly-accessible sources of music, such as iTunes accounts active currently over the Hammel intranet. Add in a couple of nearly-unnoticeable ear buds that have sound transmitted wirelessly to them and the genetic ability to browse for new tracks with your brain, and you have a sure-fire way to escape the need to communicate with anyone you don't want to.

And lately, 'anyone' for Reeve has read more like 'everyone.'

At the moment, he'd been searching rapid-fire through a few open iTunes accounts, and finding nothing, simply tapped into his own personal stash to find something deafening enough to get him through the student lounge without having to hear anyone. He quickly stumbled upon THIS TRACK, and the violin loops wafted in through his ear buds.

Usually, he'd just go around. The student lounge always had at least a few other kids inside, lounging about, or stalking the pool tables, pretending to be better at the game than they really are. There was nothing in the lounge that Reeve found particularly entertaining, at least that he couldn't also achieve in his room, like TV, movies or video games. But today, his reasons for being here were two-fold. For one, it had been one of his better days, and he was willing to risk human contact. He didn't wake up and try to forget that he had to get up and go to class, although he did backdoor his first period's attendance program and notify it to change his attendance from absent to otherwise after the class, so he could sleep in. All the same, he'd wanted to get up, and that in itself was all that mattered.

Reeve tended to clutch at anything resembling desire, these days.

The second reason was a bit more prudent: He was starving. He skipped lunch to hop on Star Wars: The Old Republic for a quick Flashpoint, so even a quick snack would do. So as the beat dropped in his headset, he dropped about a dollar-fifty in quarters into the machine to receive a honey bun.

He was just savoring his first bite when the pool cue struck him.

He recoiled back and whirled around to face his attacker, letting out a little gasp of surprise escape his lips as he lost his balance, thanks mostly to the lounge chair irresponsibly placed too closely to the pool table. He tumbled over the armrest, his butt landing in the chair as his legs draped over the side.

"I, uh." Reeve faltered for a moment, looking at the girl that had hit him. She had dark hair and eyes, and was, by all means, stunningly beautiful. That alone caused him to hitch, as the sight was more than his poor fleshy central processor could comprehend alongside being struck with a pool cue.

More importantly, however, his earbuds were still in, roaring dubstep practically directly into that same fleshy central processing unit.

"...what?" he asks, sending a quick mental suggestion to his MP3 player to pause.

[Adrianna Carstyn]

Having been so caught up in her own mind, Adrian never would have been smart enough to check behind her before taking a shot. Her brain was beginning it's overactive fit that it always went into when a lot was happening to her. It was times like this, she wished that emotions weren't real. She hated being so tied down by her feelings because it only made things so much harder. It just caused her more and more stress and stress was the last thing she needed.

There were times, especially when she was around people with certain powers, that she could more or less turn off the emotions. Telepathy intensified the emotions and also threw in other people's emotions, empathy did too along with telekinesis. The powers that involved the mind were the ones that either intensified feelings or dulled them. She'd witnessed multiple things like that, some a little more forceful than others. Being with Lani always intensified her emotions because his power ran on his emotions.

As she pulled back, she felt the resistance of the pool stick not going back as far as it should have. Then the domino effect happened. She hit him, he fell back, landed in a chair and the guilt began. Really, she should have checked to see if everything was clear before she took the shot, but that just wasn't happening, so instead she hit a guy. Real smooth. She got a vague feeling of his power, but not enough to really fully understand it because there were several powers looming around her.

While she was on her apologizing rant, she hadn't even realized he couldn't hear her until he faltered. She paused for a moment and collected herself before speaking again, "I'm really sorry about that. I didn't even look around to see if no one was in a ten-foot radius of me and my inexperienced pool playing fail." Adrian stuck her hand out towards him in order to help him up, a guilty and somewhat distracted frown settled on her face. This was what happened when she started thinking way too much. Bad things always come from it.