How To Disrupt Someone's Day (Tag)

[Calahan Witt]

Slamming his head onto the table he was using was starting to sound like a better and better plan the longer Cal sat at it. He was swamped with homework and he was having a hard time focusing for longer than five minutes at a time, which wasn’t super unusual, but it was more frustrating today than usual. He had been in the library for about three hours, was on his fourth coffee, and his laptop had just died. For a normal person, this wouldn’t be a problem- but because Cal is who he is, he had neglected his charger, leading to a fray in the cord. This fray caused his cord to short and now Cal was sitting with a smoking charger that no longer worked.

This should be a cue for Cal to pack it up for the day and just go home, but he was determined to finish at least one assignment. So with a sigh, Cal packed up his workspace into his backpack, including the broken charger, and trudged over to the bay of computers provided by the college. After a quick walk around the area, Cal realized with dawning horror that the only computer that was available had a backpack sitting in the chair. He looked at the man sitting next to the backpack and knew that he would have to go talk to him. As he approached, he noticed that the stranger was using a very familiar website- Aegis Associates.

Cal spent a lot of time on said website, not only enjoying the content, but also to assess if anyone was on the trail of Nightwalker. So far the blog had not posted any content related to him, which both relaxed him and secretly made him a little grumpy, because while he didn’t want a ton of attention, he wanted a little bit.

He stopped for a moment to formulate what he was going to say when he got to the man at the computer (“Hi is this computer taken”) and after a moment he started moving again. He got to his destination and opened his mouth to say his rehearsed statement, but instead of asking if he could use the computer, he said “I love that website.”


Rory Kain

[Rory Kain]

Rory rubbed at his temple with an exasperated groan, willing away his hangover with pure determination as he reached for a bottle of Pedialyte. He desperately needed to study for his chemistry exam but last night he prioritized throwing another frat party over his academics. Normally, he didn't fit the stereotype of dumb frat bro so well. Studies were typically on the forefront of his mind considering the only thing keeping him at the damn school was his sports scholarship that required good academic standing to hold on to it. Sure, his position on the basketball team wasn't bad. He was in the starting position as point guard and was known to typically do pretty well, but he knew realistically not to bank on it for a career. Injuries were already plaguing him and his passions laid elsewhere.

He'd only recently gotten to the library, having snuggled in bed with his roommate Slug who'd ended up there at some point in his own drunken stupor throughout the night, still mildly drunk from the night before. He eventually got up and showered, throwing on a black sweatshirt and black sweatpants on before heading out the door and finding himself at the library's doors.

In front of him on the desk was his chemistry homework, various notebook pages sprawled out haphazardly. Many of the pages had doodles in the margins of a mediocre variety. Nothing on it exactly screamed Picasso. In the mess of doodles were odes to Icarus, his favorite superhero whom he fancied.  In one corner, in tiny letters, read the words "Rory Starr," but were only visible to those who really looked.

Rory spent a couple minutes tapping his pencil aggressively on the desk, warranting him nasty glares from some of the surrounding students which he blissfully ignored. When it was clear the pounding in his head was making it far too difficult to concentrate on the problem, he pushed the papers to the side, throwing his pencil down on top before dragging the desktop's keyboard closer to himself, deftly logging in and pulling up his very own blog.

Rory was just scrolling through some of the recent comments and responses to his article on Icarus being hit by a lightning bolt outside of Aegis headquarters that he had witnessed first hand when someone talking behind him jolted him from his reading. Rory jumped in his seat before immediately clutching his head and groaning annoyedly at his head's pounding momentarily worsening. He gulped, waiting a couple moments to let it pass before wheeling around to look at the man that spoke. He didn't recognize him, but that wasn't strange. Rory came across many people, and their campus definitely wasn't small.

"Sorry, man. I am mildly hungover," he offered with a smile accompanied by a wince, visibly still dealing with the raging headache. Rory gave him a bright smile when he finally registered the comment that had actually been made. Pride filled his eyes.

"Yeah, it's my baby," he commented heartily.

"I'm glad to know my page is well received," he added with a laugh, running a hand through his hair.

"I admittedly probably put way too much work into this site..."

Rory was reveling in the praise, ignoring the rest of the world. He wasn't sure if the man knew that he had approached the very owner and writer of the website. Rory didn't hide that he was the one that ran it, but it wasn't like he had his face plastered all over it. It took him a moment, but he eventually snapped out of his self-praising moment and realized how full the library was and the fact that his backpack was hogging up a chair.

"Aw shit, my bad man. You wanna sit?" he asked. Without waiting for an answer he pulled the chair out a little and removed his backpack from its spot and threw it carelessly on the floor, nothing of value aside from his basketball shoes inside. He quickly swiped his hand over the seat, making sure it was all cleared off of any random dirt or scraps of paper. He winked and gave a big thumbs up to signal it was all clear for landing.

Calahan Witt