Ritual

[Slift]

A soft hum could be heard from the library this day, not uncommon at all in the first few weeks of the new school year by any chance. If one could be half bothered to follow the sound they'd soon find it grow in volume and pitch, clicking and whirring added to the noise that really couldn't be helped. The source would of course be Juno, her right arm dissected into pieces, each having a hidden USB connector plugged into a seemingly random computer, parts strewn everywhere and suspect black stains marking the desks and tiles used for the floor in the area.

The loud humming was of course the poor strained hard drives of the computers, each working at their best to process the massive amount of information a supercomputer at home did. Diagnostics on her arm, changes in classes, a little slightly less than legal database monitoring and of course the internet.

Juno's escape.

Today was like any other so far. Wikipedia had been browsed, games were being played and comics were being read... All in Juno's head. In fact, she looked like she was asleep, left hand gently resting over her eyes as the random finger or joint gave a twitch involuntarily, the source of the clicking and whirring. Juno took this upon herself at the start of the year, just to calm down and smoothen her transition into the school again from the chaos of her life in the Rogue Islands.

At the moment she wouldn't hear anyone unless they tapped her shoulder or said her name.

[Nicolette]

The work had been completed. All that remained was two days before the members of Student Council would be seated in before the front office at tables, folders sitting upright in boxes holding various schedules and school information that students would need for the beginning of the school year.

The first two days were always the most difficult with the arrival of students, the distribution of schedules and dorm room numbers, and other various information to be dealt with. Naturally, Student Council would be dreading these two days since they knew there would be endless work for them as they waited for students to come to their appropriate area to receive the information they needed.

The Student Council President was in charge of the twelfth graders, which she hoped would be the easiest to deal with since most had been their since seventh grade. Said president happened to actually be walking through the empty halls of the school, the winter uniform hanging on her thin form. In her hair, she wore a navy blue hair-band to compliment her uniform color.

The library was to her right as she passed down the corridor and paused when she heard the soft whirr of computers. Naturally, there would be some students with early flights, though they usually went through the office to get their information on dorm rooms and such, though they wouldn't receive their official schedules until the appointed days. However, Nicolette De la Fontaine did not believe there to be too many students at the school, so she was curious to hear the computers since it definitely sounded like more than one was on.

She brought her hand to the door and pushed it open, slipping inside as the door shut naturally behind her. She took a few cautious steps before she came upon the computer area of the library. She raised an eyebrow at what she saw; computers had what looked like flashdrives plugged into them, and it was definitely more than one computer. She then spotted an odd sight of a female student at one of the computers, her arm looking mutilated. However, this did not worry Nicolette for it looked like the girl's arm was made of various mechanical pieces.

She carefully walked over to the girl and brought her hand up, tapping the girl's shoulder and waiting for a response.

[Slift]

Eyes jolting open as she bolted upright, Juno would look about before eying the person that had disturbed her. "Nicolette De La Fontaine, age seventeen, grade twelve." she says rather monotone before clearing her throat and shaking her head. "I'm sorry." she nods, rubbing her forehead gently. "I was still plugged into the mainframe when you disturbed me." she explains, sitting up from where she'd been leaning back.

Reaching out the girl starts to unplug the various fingers and parts from the computers, each giving a sigh of relief as they go back to their normal capacity, the humming of strained machines dying down to nothingness. A soft clicking starting as the girl begins the task of rebuilding her arm while she talks. "I'm sorry for the noise, I'll try to do my diagnostics and updates at a time no one will be disturbed." she smiled, using a small automatic screwdriver to bolt herself back together, placing snap in panels over the screws to make the arm consistently smooth and organic looking.

"The update was necessary unfortunately, I doubt anyone would want the glitch i'd developed." She continued, flexing her hand before placing the final plate on, locking it into place. "Synaptic muscle twitches... Sudden bursts of over strength. Unfortunately more than enough to crush anything that it comes into contact with." she'd explain, pointing to the case of one of the computers, case distended and stretched as if it'd been made of putty. "I'll pay for the damages too..."

[Nicolette]

Nicolette stiffened a little when she heard her name, age, and grade level spoken. She had already been hesitant enough to touch the girl and when she did, the girl bolted to almost attention in her seat and proceeded to speak information about Nicolette! It made her feel slightly uneasy... Though it soon melted away when the girl began to explain everything she had been doing without the prompt of the Student Council President.

"I was merely curious of the noise the computers were making. You are a welcomed member of the T'zenshin Institute and we want to make your stay here as easy as possible. Please just let a member of Student Council know next time so we can reserve the lab for you during the times that other students might venture in."

Her eyes wandered to the warped tower and she pressed her lips together slightly before shaking her head and turning her attention back to the girl.

"There is no reason to worry about the cost of damages... This once, I believe, I can allow Student Council to go into our fund in order to pay the costs for repair. It is only one computer." She offered a smile toward the girl.

[Slift]

Nodding Juno blinked a few times, the wash of complicated data that her augmented brain could only process in rather short clipped functional speech fading away. "I wouldn't want to be a bother. Reserving a lab just for me just seems silly when I can do it here in a few moments." She'd giggle, placing her hands on her hips. "And besides, that'd be taking resources away if there was an emergency or something." she'd smile, opening the plate on the back of her hand for a moment, fiddling about with the wiry construct inside that seemed to be her tendons, adjusting her fingers the slightest bit before nodding.

Blinking a bit Juno'd go slightly red in the cheeks. "Well, it's not just the one computer. I kinda broke an elevator pannel getting here and twisted the railing on west tower's second floor." She'd explain, counting off a bad start to the year with her fingers. "And before then I broke a light and a window in my room." she finished, coughing somewhat guiltily into her robotic hand.

[Nicolette]

Nicolette listened to the amount of damaged items about the campus there were and couldn't help but smile sadly at the thought of there being damages before the school term had even begun. However, she wasn't going to make the girl pay, especially for something she couldn't help...

However...

"We will pay for the repairs under the condition that you do some work for us at Student Council. We would not require much, but you seem to have an extensive knowledge with computers and it seems that our computers are in need of an update to the next generation, seeing as the last update look place in 2006 with the release of the Windows Vista..."

Nicolette couldn't help but let out a soft sigh. They didn't often receive major computer updates since they were so far from any major mainland that a computer specialist would have to take a plane to get there and it would cost quite a pretty penny... If the Student Council President could get this student to help out, with the supervision of herself and possibly the Headmaster, then all would be solved!

[Slift]

Rubbing her chin, Juno would think for a few moments before shrugging with a mechanical whir. "I guess I could do it, I don't really have the hundreds of dollars lying about in the meantime." she'd say, scratching her head gently, hair ruffling about before falling back into place as if nothing had happened. "Uhm, what needs upgrading? The operating system? I think I could put the new Windows Wind on them, it's not too bad." she explained. "Wait, They've gone without an OS upgrade since two thousand SIX?" the girl asked, jaw dropping as she stared blankly at Nicolette. "Windows Seven and Wind have come out since then, you're running on outdated technology!" she huffed, flustered at a waste of good upgrades.

"Show me these computers." she demanded, tapping her foot. Time was of the essence!

[Nicolette]

Nicolette couldn't help but smile when she heard the animated words of the girl in front of her. It was nice to know someone else was concerned over the fact that they had been using outdated programs for quite some time now. She brought a hand up to brush some bangs from her eyes before folding her arms against her chest, her right arm resting to touch her left elbow and her left hand placed delicately on her upper-right arm.

"I must ask you to wait just a moment while I at least ask you your name. I may be the president of Student Council, but I am afraid I do not know every and all students in this school... I would introduce myself in return, but you seem to already know my information..."

[Slift]

"Ah!" Juno would blush bringing her right arm up to scratch between her eyebrows. "Juno Vashire. Grade Ten, age fifteen, room five-oh-six west tower, comm frequency three-oh-tw-." she'd blurt out, clicking her sandal heels together, looking rather militant for a moment until she forcibly relaxes mid sentence. "Sorry, kinda been drilled into me." she'd explain, running a hand through her hair, the vibrantly coloured strands falling back into place as if they didn't want to move out of the simple haircut she owned.

"Uhm, my outfit isn't too bad for the job? I can change if you want." she'd explain, since school hadn't started yet... And wouldn't for another two days, the girl had just worn her usual throw-on set. Black bra, white unbuttoned shirt, blue short pants and her aforementioned sandals... At least she'd put on the pants and the shirt before wandering down this time. "Though I don't have much else to wear, just my school outfit and formal dress as well as some scrappy clothes for laundry day."

[Nicolette]

Nicolette nodded as Juno listed off the information and gave her a smile to let the girl know that she didn't mind her actions and way of speaking. She brought a hand up to brush her bangs from her eyes again as she nodded in greeting.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Madame Juno Vashire." She commented, using a more French address as a way to address her. She then proceeded to look the girl up and down for a moment to examine the outfit she wore when she asked her question. She nodded again. "The attire you have chosen is perfectly fine for the time. It is a casual time for school is not in session. The uniform is only required on school days."

She moved back toward the back of the computers, looking over the large rows before turning her gaze to Juno. "Now, for the matter at hand... I apologize for suddenly springing this upon you and I can absolutely give you as much time as you need to get everything situated, but the computers in need of update are all the computers in this room, the computers in each classroom, the office computers, the Student Council computers, and the computers in the Student Freedom Force office. The only other computers at this school would be the students' personal computers in their dormitories, which they can update when they please."

She looked down at one computer screen, checking the date and time. The Headmaster was sure to be in his office at the time, considering he arrived shortly before Student Council did. She wanted to run the information by him quickly before anything was done.

"I will speak with the Headmaster this afternoon and see to it that we receive the proper software for you to be able to run the updates. Do you mind if I supervise you while you do this?" Better to be safe than sorry.

[Slift]

Stopping herself mid step Juno would take a breath. "I can be done in... About an hour? I could do it in shorter time but i'd need access to the school's mainframe, and I don't trust myself with it. I'm sorry." she'd explain, taking the warped computer case in her hand and gently molding it back to something somewhat normal, a few dints and bumps here and there, nothing a hammer couldn't fix. Blushing at the idea of accessing the school's mainframe... All the information she could get about everyone in the school. She just wasn't the type of person that did more than just sift though for typos or odd little errors.

"I'd only need one computer and a copy of the software, I'll just ghost it onto the other computers to replace Vista, simple." she giggled, crossing her arms with a soft whir from her artificial one "Then you'll be up and running after it installs, I wouldn't even need to check over it. The only problem would be having about forty five minutes in the least while all the computers are down and updating, unless you want me to put in a phase setting so the computers update one area at a time so people can move about to the other ones that are not or have been updated?" Juno explains, feeling like most of it is wasted breath.

[Nicolette]

Nicolette thought for a moment. She then nodded to herself and focused her attention back to Juno.

"Could you meet me at the Student Council office after dinner this evening? I will discuss with the Headmaster during lunch and see about acquiring the software. I will let you know the plans after dinner, if that is quite alright with yourself."

[Slift]

Nodding Juno'd smile. "Sure, that's no problem." she'd giggle, wiggling her fingers before scratching at a scratch of paint on her index finger. "I don't sleep very well during the night anyway, certain problems arise from being unable to... ehm, as much as i hate the term 'Switch off'." she'd explain, tapping the side of her head. "Extra memory and processing ability doesn't help when i'm unable to direct what all of it goes towards..." she'd laugh bitterly.

"In the meantime, I guess i'll go to my room." she'd explain, grinning. "Room five-oh-six if you need me." she'd grin, thinking for a second before leaning forward and giving a teasing wink before giggling loudly as shi'd exit the library.

[Nicolette]

Nicolette kept the number in her mind and gave a small nod as the girl departed from the library. She turned her eyes to look over the room for a few more minutes, taking a deep breath before she turned toward the exit of the library.

It was going to be a long day...

[Thread Closed]