It was an early morning maths class, and Tedros was busy taking notes. Not on whatever was on the board, that was as boring and incomprehensible as usual. Instead he was looking over the people stuck in the game, on who could be a potential ally. Mateo and Terrence seemed to be the two biggest allies, and Ines might be a valid pick, even if she's a little weak. Elijah? Him and Natalie seemed strong, but they seemed scary, and he wasn't sure if his gang actually did anything besides smoke in an abandoned building site. But they'd probably be open to working with him if they asked, so they were put in the 'maybe' pile. Blair? She was back in school, but she still seemed pretty sad. Again, maybe pile, but with an extra note to wait a while before asking her. And as for Leon…
"Tedros!" Mr Shankly's shrill voice cut into his brainstorming, and Tedros shot his posture straight into something more respectable to reduce the amount of shouting he was going to get.
"That doesn't look like your regular maths notebook! Are you perhaps using my class for out of school activities? Because you have sixteen hours in a day to devote to that!"
"Sorry, Mr. Shankly?" One girl asked while raising her hand. The typical goody two shoes who didn't defend anyone caught slacking off. "Apologies if you weren't aware, but his sister died the other day."
"Oh really?" He said, the girls statement clearly not making any impact on him. "Well, I had students lose parents and show up the next day and pay full attention, so maybe excuses are just that. Excuses!"
Several of Tedros classmates looked around after that final statement. Any whispered were stopped, perhaps in anticipation of an apology, or at least the hopes he'd walk back that statement a little. Tedros went back to his notebook, only to get a second interruption by the guy next to him. He was displaying his palm, with the word 'cry' written on it in pen. So this was the plan? Cry in the hopes of stopping class even further and maybe getting Shankly fired. He wasn't going to do that. But what he was going to do was take this as an excuse to hide somewhere else and work on his notes. Nobody followed him, Mr. Shankly muttered something under his breath, and went back to the board.
The rest of the day went on as normal. School ended, and Evelyn finally got to enter the music room. Very basic room without much in it. She was fairly convinced it was going to be used for something when the school was first being built, but whatever that purpose that was has been long gone. She took her violin out of her case. A chunk of wood on the left side was gone, but it was still capable of playing music. She hadn't had time to practice to her exams, and any time she could dedicate to violins was instead devoted to her job at the local pizzeria. And any time dedicated to neither was for not dying to some psychotic gods idea of a good time. But for a brief moment, none of that mattered. She had the string. She had the violin. She had the sheet music. And that was all she needed.
Until the violin was out of tune.
That was unfortunately much shorter than last time, so she took a seat and began tuning it again. Getting it precise was also getting harder. The violin was admittedly something she was using since she was a little kid, but no way in hell was the thing breaking before her audition to college.
"Something up with the violin?"
"Get out, Janet." Evelyn muttered.
She felt Janet's presence in the doorway without looking up. Holding her trumpet case, ready to fill the left side of the school with another mix of trumpet and whatever pre-made beats she found on the internet. Maybe with some added singing. She was never devout to any religion, unless it was praying that Janet didn't sing that day.
"Hey, I'm not the one breaking the agreements we set up. You get Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I get Tuesday and Thursday. It's Tuesday."
"I couldn't make it yesterday." Evelyn responded, trying out her newly tuned violin.
"Did you not think to leave a note?" Janet asked.
"Look, have you ever considered just buying your own studio!?" Evelyn snapped.
Janet looked at her for a second. Presumably. With those stupid sunglasses, she could be looking at the ceiling, floor, remembering where her keys were, anything.
"That'd be…a real pain in the ass."
"A pain in the ass?"
"I mean, my mom wouldn't like it, and even if it did happen, getting stuff like planning permission or whatever would suck. Not to mention the construction noises. Read somewhere there's a link between exposure to loud noises and heart disease…"
"Okay, I'll leave!" Evelyn shouted, putting her stuff away.
"Your Violin looks pretty messed up." Janet said casually. "Want me to take a look at it?"
"Piss off!"
Evelyn stormed out of the room, leaving on the bus. She brushed off her grandfather's tweed jacket as she got on the bus. She opened her phone. One text from her dad. First three words were 'so the factory' so she didn't read the rest. She looked out the bus window as it pulled into Strovam, and there was the warehouse. Pretty much the only place still hiring, and where she could very well be spending the rest of her life if the music scholarship didn't work out. She had to practise harder, otherwise she was done for.
Leon and Jay came back from a long day of work. When they got to their floor, Allan was sitting by the door. Wasn't even doing anything, just staring at the wall.
"Allan?" Leon asked.
"Leon!" He snapped, leaping to his feet. Jay stepped away a little bit, and Leon gave a small hand gesture to reassure him that this is in fact an acceptable interaction.
"Okay, don't freak out, but the cameras are gone!"
"Gone?"
"Look, there's no frequency!" Allan took his phone out, showing him what was meant to be the live feed of the front of the warehouse. All that was shown was static.
"So you were right?" Leon asked. That didn't feel good to say. At all.
"Yeah! The gods were there!" Allan yelled out. "Look, I've already updated the guys online, so they'll help out if anything happens. Tomorrow, we go there and look straight after school."
"I have a job." Leon replied flatly. "Also, there's gonna be a game tomorrow night, isn't there? And we'll both have to compete in that, since we didn't compete in the last one."
"Shit!" Allan yelled, causing Jay to look around at any neighbours who could get pissed at the noise. "Okay, okay. I got this, alright? This is on me for not having a backup plan. I'll find someone else to help, right? And they can scope the place out. We'll get through this. And one more thing. Can I stay the night at your place?"
"No." Leon and Jay said in unison.
"Follow up question. Do you have bus money? I don't think my regular one passes this time of night."
"I'm eighteen and sharing an apartment. I don't have money."
"Okay, it looks like the time to stakeout a different business. I'm pretty sure the local bodega is a human trafficking front, so I'll investigate that. See you tomorrow."