It was a week since her first lesson. The other classes were just evaluations and her spending at least 10 minutes a class getting the boys to focus on her.

A difficult and patience consuming task.

As usual, she felt tired, even contemplated using her off day to only lie in bed and not get up until her next session with them.

But of course, her own body reminded her about her usual neglect to eat yesterday.

Her mind thought back on the staff dining halls. No one usually took the time to chat or speak to her, which she preferred, thus making her usual trips a quick and easy one.

Getting her lunch and dinner and eating in her assigned bedroom alone was something she hoped to continue. The crowded dining halls always looked exhausting, even just entering one of them she could internally count how much of her energy was being sapped out of her with each second she spent getting her meal.

However, she knew she could not skip food like usual; she had a job to maintain a certain level of performance on.

A teacher...maybe she was not cut out for something like that.

It was an inherently social job. Although kids were never as draining to her as others her age and older, she also knew very well a normal size classroom would be hell.

Bring her thoughts back to food, she made up her mind. So with sluggish efforts, she forced herself out of bed and combated a painful attack with a painkiller. She did the minimum amount of grooming, to not instantly give off an off-putting impression, and headed towards the cafeteria.

She had to use this rare time of peace to clear her head.

Carole already saw what was on the menu via the staff announcements and thus made the usual plans.

Go in and leave to her room.

simple.

As she walked down to the elevator, she heard an increasing irate argument among the other staff.

The altercation grew in both volume and harshness of tone the longer it went on.

Normally she would have just tuned it out and been on her way, but she heard a familiar voice from among them that caught her attention.

“You know... You guys have a lot of interest in me. That is very understandable, many people already find me irresistible,”

“Listen, jackass”

“I can't believe they even allowed this beast around here anyway,”

Hide continued in his usual jovial tone even as his eyes glared at the group, “A beast? Have you ever looked at yourself in the mirror? Bet it’s your mom’s looks with those teeth on you-”

Then the sound of flesh making an impact with flesh. She finally cautiously approached the commotion’s direction.

Hide was on the ground, holding his hand upon the area most likely they made the attack. By the looks of his clothes, both wrinkled and scuff marks, this fight may have been going on for a while.

“Shut your damn face!” roared one of them to the downed man.

This was... not surprising, neither were the mouse and pig beast-kin staff joining in.

She never understood exactly why, but with Beast-kin in positions higher than basic servants, they tend to not do very well among the staff hierarchy.

Which is worse? Absurdly high expectations, or absurdly low ones?

The answer was neither. It is not worth pondering, anyway.

Although she had overheard the bets placed on her about when she would enviably quit.

Hide was a beast-kin, not only that but one who works in tech from the largest corporation in the city, an active threat to those who would look upon him with disgust. However, these attackers' faces mostly grew in disgust.

Hide was still holding the area of clear pain, and then an epiphany came upon her. They were blocking the way to the cafeteria.

“This little creep is getting a little too bold nowadays, Someone needs fucking show him his pl-”

She then quietly approached the offender who did the blow and tapped him on the shoulder, interrupting his brief speech.

“What?!,” He spun around to face her with lips twisted into a sneer and of course, his companion had to chime in.

“What do you want?”

It was just a tap, nothing to get that upset about. Already giving her a headache. She then took a deep breath before she said, “You’re blocking the way to a facility... Isn’t that a staff violation?”

“so?”

Carole cocked her head to a side, “Not only that, it would be awful if it turns out a lower level staff broke an important programmer's hand while committing a staff violation," she closed her eyes, "not a good look.”

He seemed as if he wanted to say something back in defence of his actions, but he scoffed at her and turned away, and muttered, “Whatever…. nosy, self-righteous bitches not worth my time.”

With that, his other champions followed suit, occasionally giving her a firm glare in her direction.

Carole sighed, “don’t these people have work to do,” she thought to herself as they left her alone with the boy who had been oddly quiet during her exchange.

She honestly did not know what to have expected, but when he looked at her, he had an odd look of... disappointment? With an odd flush.

It turned to a rather fake shy, pained smile as he held the right side of his face that was already swelling and darkening with time.

“You know even if they broke something, I’ll still get blamed for it, right?”

Carole shrugged, “They didn’t think of that... so it doesn’t matter does it?”

Hide grin at her, not at all hampered by the now prominent swelling on his face.

“Although me getting Very badly hurt would not do them any favours,” He said, “Maybe you’re my discount guardian angel old lady.”

She narrowed her eyes at him as he pretended what he said was not at all offensive.

He seemed to stare at her for a bit before releasing a mischievous smile, “If I were you, I wouldn’t eat anything from the cafeteria for a while. Unless you enjoy spit.”

“Huh?”

He got off the ground dusting off his pants, “I’m just saying they were probably going to do that. You're not a human and you pissed off one of the cook's friends. Piggy pork boy.”

He then tilts his head to a side, “I’m saying this out of the goodness of my pure heart, so show a little more gratitude, old lady.”

Great, she already regretted her decision to even bother with this kid. He then held up a cylindrical silver flask from his bag previously sprawled out on the floor.

“Hope you can enjoy vegan crap, this handmade radish salad is way too much for one guy”

Carole almost tripped in surprise at his offer, as she said, “... Did you make it?”

“Pfft, can’t cook for shit. Stole it from some idiot”

Figures…

Hide turns around, “I’m not up for places full of these kinds of idiots. So eating somewhere else. Oh, and don’t worry. By tomorrow they’ll probably forget you're a little hero moment. As I said they're all idiots.”

Why did she even bother?

Thus she found herself outside in a little corner of the garden eating a delicious salad with Hildmire. As the sky had the usual reddish, oppressive hue from the smog and the usual awful chill causing her to tighten her jacket for warmth. If it was not for the meal, she would have outright asked why she ever thought it was a good idea to eat outside whilst they freeze to death.

How he can even tolerate it in those tiny shorts?

In his other flask was apple juice, which he more or less kept to himself and never offered her a drink. Although she would not have even asked nor even accepted his drink either way.

Carole at this point concluded the boy enjoyed the sound of his voice. Even if she tried to ignore him, he would just talked and talked and talked again.

Occasionally sprinkled with the obvious joke of, “Did you fall from heaven cus it looked like you tumbled all the way”, she wasn’t sure if it was a dig at her appearance or her disabilities. However, before she just got up and left outright, he cleared up that question by adding, “Must have been a pretty nasty face plant”, putting it firmly into childish insults territory.

“How old are you anyway,” She asked, genuinely curious and hoping he would at least say 14, as improbable as it was.

He gave his signature grin, which would have been oddly charming if you ignore everything associated with it, which she did not, “I turned 19 a month ago, I’m up for anything. I’m a fully consenting adult”

“I asked your age, not your porn star audition tapes, ”

“Well, you don’t go around asking randos their ages, it’s rude,” He took a bite out of his salad, “what if I decide to ask How Old Are You? Asking middle-aged ladies their age is impolite.”

“I’m not middle-aged..”

He scoffs, “well you sure act like one,” he then looked at her now devoured salad and gave a smile as he sipped his apple juice.

“I’m surprised, you like vegan crap?” he asked

“I’m a vegetarian…,” she averted her eyes a bit, “Ex-religious reasons”

Hide eyed her a bit and said, “ex-follower of one those servants, Ver right?,” he took another sip from his drink, ”I don’t get it if you left religion, why keep some of that crap with you? Pretty pointless, if you ask me.”

She did not ask

Carole shrugs her shoulders, “It’s not any of your business."

Hide gave a faux appearance of shock, “an atheist! Oh, Carly, why art thou such a disgusting heathenous harlot. I’ll have you know I used to study to become a holy man as a kid. Thus you are being very offensive.”

Kid? Does he mean last year at 13?

“Him…. a holy man,” was Carole’s thought. It did not seem to fit with him now.

He cleared his throat and told the tale as if it was something that he had heard and said a million times before, “The god Orbis had two servants, each representing a piece of humanity, Ver the servant of life and Fer the servant of wisdom. Each one assisted with the creation of the original angels and humans intellect, while the god Orbis managed and led them all.” he took another sip, “But this isn’t a religious education class and you of all people should know what happens to ex-followers of Li, angel lady”

“Then why are you even bothering then,” she kept that thought to herself, hoping to at least gain some silence as she ate her meal. But of course, the gnat continued his chat.

“Soo, what made you want to teach some stuck up rich brats,”

“I like kids…. and I enjoy teaching,” she thought for a bit, “what made you want to be an IT person?”

There was an odd glint in his eyes, that faded as soon as he said, “I like computers.. They’re not boring, but are easy to understand,” he had a strangely solemn smile, “I like them, nothing more to it than that”

There was something odd in his statement, Carole couldn’t quite put her finger on it but what came to her mind was, “does he even work in IT here?”

As soon as that question entered her mind, she heard a harsh voice yelling out, “Why the hell are you all blocking the path here?”

She looked up and saw a boy very similar in appearance to Loukas, although a few inches shorter, and with a permanent looking scowl etched upon his face.

He looked like a prideful sort of man with fingers and ears laden with jewellery and fingers with rings as he sat upon the back of a tall white horse looking down at them with obvious disgust. Standing beside him was a perky-looking horse beast-kin man, with choppy brown hair, accompanied by a tiny horse's ears and a well maintained luscious horse's tail.

He smiled through his buck teeth up at the sullen man, “Ay, Sir I think these folks are aveing a meal in damn cold”

The boy snorts annoyance, “Clearly we’re seeing the height of intelligence here,”

“One of the Asbjorn children? Am I correct?” Carole asked.

“Yes, and from what my younger brothers have told me, you seemed to have disability regarding remembering names,” his tone was dripping in irritation.

“If you must know Cherly Asbjorn, the second child of my family,” announced the man, “now get out of my way of the way before I get someone to do it for me”

It may be just her imagination but she swore she saw the muscle-bound horseman rolled his eyes at Cherly’s statement before he said to them, “Ay, it’s probably for the best, ya can all catch a nasty cold out here or something.”

Not wanting to deal with this, Carole was already picking herself off the grass to leave, only for Hide to not leave well enough alone.

“I never knew. Being second place was something to be so proud of, such pride,” he said in a mocking tone.

Cherly glared down and at the goat eared boy and said, “And take that goat with you, I can’t even stand looking at him.”

The horseman looked very uncomfortable during the exchange, although which statement made him most uncomfortable, maybe up for debate.

Hide seemed to clutch his hand into a tight fist at the remark and before he could provide a rebuttal, Cherly turned to the horseman and said, “Oris, let’s go now, Lighting is already getting antsy from all this time wasted.” With that he got the horse to gallop away from them as Mr. Oris released a bothered sigh, got into his cart and drove after the young man.

At that point, she wanted nothing to do with that garden. She gave Hide a swift goodbye, and thanks for the meal and left before she could hear any more of what he had to say.

She was, of course, a bit on edge later that evening, glad to see no one in the staff entertainment wing during her brief walk, would have only made her nerves worse.

The room normally used by workers when they played pool, darts, watched tv, or at least so she has heard. She was never too big on socializing in groups; it drained her quicker than anything, not that she had many people to socialize with... anymore.

However, she had a different reason for coming here; she checked the corner to make sure what she stored was still there. She then lifted the corner of the rug and in a still unpatched crevice, much to her relief, it was still there.

Several bottles of Dark rum that cost her a pretty penny. She took out a shot glass from one counter of the game room and poured herself a shot.

“Only to calm my nerves,” she thought.

Only a few and that would be it. Moving here had been, as much as her face could not show, a nerve-wracking experience.

That one shot turned into two, then three. Eventually half the rather hefty bottle.

The room had gained a slight spin and sway to it.

It was slight but there also seemed to be another strange rumble as most likely the Ventis was spilling into the frigid sky again.

Carole grunted in annoyance at the noise as she prepared for the... tenth? maybe it was still her second shot. She turned and in the corner of her eye she saw…. something looking at her from that corner of the room.

As she noticed it scampered away before she could properly observe its appearance, all she caught was very pale skin, a skinny hunched over almost animalist frame, and those empty red eyes.

Or at least think she might have seen that.

Did she see?

“I... must be really…. out,” slurred out of lips as she downed back the now unknown number shot.