Group Projects (Richard)

[Ami-Lynn Rose]

Ami-Lynn sat patiently in the front row of her Biology lab, she watched as the teacher wrote on the chalk board, the sound of students coming in late behind her. With her arms folded in front of her, Ami-Lynn couldn't help but tsk to herself about the late comers. 'You'll never go anywhere in life if you're always late,' the little brunette thought to herself.

Finally there was silence as everyone watched the teacher write on the board.
GROUP PROJECTS! He wrote, and Ami-Lynn could feel her heart sink. No, she thought to herself, almost wanting to hit her head against the desk so she could have an excuse to leave. She hated group projects. Group meant she wouldn't be working on it alone, it meant she'd have to work with other people.

She hated doing group assignments with other students. They were usually unorganized, lazy or worst of all, just down right stupid. Sitting in silence, Ami-Lynn waited for her name to be called and her partner's name to be called out as well.

"Ami-Lynn Rose!" The teacher called, and Ami-Lynn shot her hand up, "And Richard McAuliffe!" Immediately Ami-Lynn's head jerked to look around for the student who would raise his hand. Her blue eyes fell upon the large blonde brute in the back. She let out a small sigh as she eyed the student down. He looked like a jock, the type of guy that used to tease her when she was younger. She wouldn't lie he was attractive, but they always were. One could only hope that this one wasn't as stupid as most of them were.

After being told to join their groups, Ami-Lynn stood, collected her things and made her way over to the other student. Once arriving at his table, she placed her things down and gave the boy one of her friendliest smiles, "Hi I'm Ami-Lynn, I guess I'm your lab partner for this. I wonder what we're going to do!" She said quickly and sat down, her face turning a light pink. 'OH! MY! GOD! I'm screwing up already,' She screamed in her head, as she opened her binder and tried to look busy.

[Richard McAuliffe]

Biology, Richard hated biology. It was quite possibly one of the most boring subjects ever created by mankind, rivaled only by the likes of math and physics. So as one of the "too cool for school" kids he entered class among the last and took a seat as far back as possible. On the way to the seat he "accidentally" bumped into one of the more nerdier kids, which generated a chuckle from one or two of their classmates.

It wasn't long after he had dropped him bag on the ground with a loud thud and plonked him self loudly on to his seat as the teacher wrote "GROUP PROJECTS" on the chalk board in big, capitalized letters. "Well, shit..." mumbled Richard. This was probably going to be an unusually boring class, although with luck he might be paired up with some science nerd with thick glasses who could take care of all the work.

Heck that was actually probably the only reason how he had managed to pass most subjects in the past ; somebody was doing his work for him. It wasn't that he was stupid or anything, it's just that he absolutely didn't have the patience to sit down and read a book for crying out loud. Besides most of these subjects were relying on students having basic knowledge of the preceding subjects. Knowledge he didn't have because somebody else had done all the work for him. This all was so frustrating that he had efficiently given up on trying.

So when the teacher started calling out names and pairing the kids together, it would have been an understatement to say that Richard raised him hand rather enthusiastically when the teacher said his name. It wasn't until he saw his partner that he cheered some what up. He sort of had been expecting one of these guys that looked like Spook or what ever the guy with the pointy ears in Star Wars was called. But no, his partner was a pretty decent looking girl.

Richard took his feet off the table as she approached and sat down next to him. "Hey," he said and smiled at her as he straightened his Hammel varsity jacket. "I'm Richard. Nice to meet you," he replied to her after she had introduced her self. Pretty interesting name he thought and couldn't help but wonder how it was written. He shrugged these thoughts off as he noticed that her face was quickly turning pink.

He looked away from her to get the books from his schoolbag. "Don't worry, I don't bite y'know" he said chuckling at how much she seemed to be avoiding eye contact. This wasn't a situation he was unused to, girls actually reacted like that quite often when they sat next to him. What he didn't really understand was why, talking to people was one of the easiest things he could think of. Regardless of how attractive they were. "So uhh... what are we suppose to do? I didn't quite catch it?" Truth be told he hadn't been listening and didn't really care. But looking like he was at least slightly interested in what they were doing was usually important when he was in a group project.

Getting guys or girls to do schoolwork for him were two completely different things. For guys it was usually enough to just give them a rough idea what he could do to them in next gym class. But for girls... he couldn't intimidate girls. Well, he probably could and probably did sometimes inadvertently. But no, for girls he needed a bit more of a subtle approach. He needed to find a way to make them want to help. And that's what he intended to do...

[Ami-Lynn Rose]

Ami-Lynn smiled softly and shook her head, "You not paying attention... That's not going to be a problem we're going to have is it?" She asked as nicely as she possibly could. It was in this moment that Ami-Lynn also cringed under her skin. Was she right about this guy? Was she just another oaf she would have to work with? A gorgeous oaf, albeit, but still an oaf.

Turning her binder over to Richard, she pointed to her notes. "Well... It's pretty simple actually," She said with a comforting smile, "Basically we're just going to choose a virus of our choice, and replicate it's genome with common household material, y'know? Like... A science project!" Ami-Lynn laughed at then turned her binder back towards herself.

"So what virus were you thinking of doing...? If not that we can choose another organism and replicate their genome. I'd rather replicate RNA rather than DNA, seems more fun!" Ami-Lynn blushed a light pink, and started flipping through her textbooks looking for ideas.

"How about this one...?" Ami-Lynn asked, "Capillaria genome, it's said to effect all animals from tiny ones like hedgehogs to humans..." She read out loud.

'Ooohh, effects hedgehogs? I like this one!' She thought to herself excitedly before turning her attention to Richard waiting for his answer.

[Richard McAuliffe]

"What? No-no-no, that's certainly not going to be a problem," he said trying to sound as sincere as he possibly could. "I was just a little bit late, that's all" he added after a second.

As Ami-Lynn turned her binder over to him and pointed to her notes, Richard adjusted his position so that he was sitting up more properly. Scratching his chin he forced him self to listen and show interest in what she was saying.

"Yeah, yeah I get it" he said smiling and then chuckled along with her as she laughed and turned the binder back to her self. Richard still didn't have the faintest idea what they were suppose to do. Replicate genome with common household material. What the f*ck is a genome? He wondered.

He nodded to her. "Alright so I guess we've got to choose a virus first," he said as he leaned down to the side to get his books. "Thank god," he mumbled as he realized that he hadn't forgotten them like he usually did.

Putting the book on his desk, Richard flipped randomly through it in an effort to find something that could help him make a choice. Entirely lost since he didn't even know in what chapter they were, it came as a relief to him when Ami-Lynn suggested something called capillaria genome.

Sneakily he looked at what page she was on and turned to the same page. "I think it's an excellent idea Emily!" he said and smiled widely at her. "I love humans and I love hedgehogs, it's perfect!"

Richard scratched the stubble on his chin as he stared to think about this project. "So... what do we make tis out of? Can we use like... legos or pencils taped together or something?"