Third floor common room, Saturday around noon

[lovemykilt]

Malcolm had spent the morning wandering around, boggling. Harken had never looked like this before! They must have remodeled the whole dorm! Of course, that meant he kept getting lost -- Malcolm wasn't that great at finding his way around on a good day. But there were all these new people around! It was his duty as a long-standing Harken student to meet them, right?

He just wished he could find Jake or Zoe or even Mr. Felcher. They'd know what was going on. . . .

He finally settled into one of the large common rooms and sat perched on the couch. Maybe someone would come by who could tell him what was going on.

[ooc: open! I have to run to work in a few hours and am greedy and want to get some play in. *grumbles at stupid work scheduling me all weekend*]

Comments

[not-a-mused.livejournal.com]

At some point, a girl had to obey the call of her stomach. Rubbing her eyes still in a bit of a daze from wandering around the dorms in an apathetic shuffle, Calliope found a room with someone in it and a kitchenette, and maybe food too.

"Um, hi," she said. "Is there food in that fridge? Food for eating?"

[lovemykilt]

"Well what else would food be for?" Malcolm joked, feeling terribly witty. "But I don't know. I haven't checked. Maybe there isn't?"

[not-a-mused.livejournal.com]

Calliope just looked at the boy for a moment; he looked like a total prep, and that made her almost grunt a little in distaste.

"I guess I'll check, then," she said, shuffling over to it as her stomach let out another little gurgle.

[withoutverona]

Somehow, Luke had found his way out of the dorm room and down two flights of stairs. For a group home, this was pretty big; he wondered if they'd shipped him off to some kind of school instead.

The Seavers could have at least left a note.

He nodded a greeting to the other boy on his way to the fridge. "Hey," he said. "D'you know if all this food is for us?"

He was already taking out some sandwich fixings, ready to run if the answer was no.

[lovemykilt]

Malcolm laughed. "Your stomach sounds funny. You sure must be hungry!"

Genius, I tell you.

[lovemykilt]

"Do you think it might not be?" Malcolm asked, suddenly worried. "I don't want to get in trouble!"

[withoutverona]

"You can blame it on me and I can pull the poor starving kid act," Luke decided. He was already assembling a bologna-and-American sandwich or five. "I'm Luke. You been here long?"

[not-a-mused.livejournal.com]

"That's because I haven't had anything to eat," Calliope said, deciding that, yeah, this guy was as stupid as he looked. She tugged open the fridge, eyeballing the choices in the bright light. "And if you don't eat anything, your stomach starts eating itself."

[saltandammo.livejournal.com]

Tom had got his stuff together and ventured out of the room he had woke up in. He still didn't know where he was, but one floor down he finally found other people.

And stared. Because the other person kinda looked like a younger version of himself.

[lovemykilt]

"Doiiii," Malcolm said. "I'm not stupid."

Yes, yes he was.

[lovemykilt]

"I'm Malcolm! And oh yes, I've been here forever, it seems."

No, no he hadn't.

[lovemykilt]

"Hi!" Malcolm said cheerfully, not yet noticing that they were kinda like very different ages of the same person. "I'm Malcolm! Are you a new teacher?"

[not-a-mused.livejournal.com]

Callie decided that she wasn't even going to bother holding back a roll of her eyes and a skeptical look over her shoulder toward him.

"There's what looks like leftover Chinese in here," she reported. "Want some?" It looked a little gross, but it also looked easy, so she'd nuke it but wouldn't eat all of it.

[saltandammo.livejournal.com]

"Teacher?" Tom repeated, still staring. "No. I'm... I'm Tom. Hanniger. I don't- I'm not- I don't really know what's going on here, but... No, I'm pretty sure I'm not a teacher."

[withoutverona]

Luke perked up at that. People who knew the ropes were always useful. "Yeah?" he asked. "Are the people who run the place pretty nice, or are they gonna have a bunch of dumb rules?"

[lovemykilt]

Wow, this guy was even more confused than Malcolm was!

That . . . was hard to do.

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Hanniger. Maybe you're the janitor?"

Oh hey! That rhymed! He couldn't wait to tell Mr. Rhodes.

[lovemykilt]

"Oh, there's lots of dumb rules. But we always have fun, anyway."

[lovemykilt]

Malcolm bounced slightly in his seat. "Oh, yes please, I'd like that, thank you!"

He knew his manners.

[darkangelsawyer.livejournal.com]

Peyton hesitated in the doorway of the common room. "Can anyone here tell me where I am?"

[lovemykilt]

"Oh yes, ma'am! You're at Harken Academy!"

No, no she wasn't.

[saltandammo.livejournal.com]

Tom shook his head. "My Dad always said I made messes that he had to clean up." Not that a janitor would be able to clean up the kind of messes Tom had made, but still.

[darkangelsawyer.livejournal.com]

"The..." Peyton stared at him for a minute, her whole body drooping. Maybe she hadn't run away. Maybe Dan had sent her here to get her away from Lucas, to control her even more until she agreed to do as he said.

"Some sort of boarding school then?"

[saltandammo.livejournal.com]

"That seems to be the big question on the menu," Tom said, feeling strangely more at ease knowing that he wasn't the only one with no idea where they were.

[lovemykilt]

"Oh yes, ma'am," Malcolm said again. "One of the best. Jake even lead our fencing team to the finals!"

[not-a-mused.livejournal.com]

That was definitely bouncing, and Calliope, as she went rummaging for plates, was left wondering what she had ventured into. She wondered if he'd notice if she spit in the chow mien before nuking it.