[6/7] Something Awesome [1.3 - Redwatch] [Slot Open - Accepting Entries]

Otto chucks his gloves in the bin, and strolls up apparently-arbitrarily to Melinda's table.

"I'd heard the school board was going to win a Nobel Prize in Chemistry for managing to make whatever materials go in the school lasagna into something that not only fails to kill people who eat it, it's actually got nutritional content! As for those kids..."

Otto gives a meaningful look across the table to Donovan, perhaps an eyebrow+moustache wiggle combo if he's just swallowed a mouthful.

"Hah, no. That's what your English teacher would call a non-sequitur. Or juxtaposition? Maybe these are just malapropisms. Anyway." His tone darkens, and he shoots Miranda a truly exquisite glare. "Do you have any leads? Because I think I had a bone to pick with one of them."

Arthur continues what he was doing, leaning against one of the back walls and wondering why he isn't getting chased by security right about now. Maybe they've just accepted it at this point, the fact that King Arthur runs around these halls delivering justice, fighting for the people, but given the metal detectors and something about the Lunch Lady's piercing glare says otherwise. The only other theory he can draw is that they have more pressing matters to attend to than hunting down a Knight in full armor, carrying a sword, while punching students and staff alike, which in a place like this should probably be their top priority.

But today, it's clearly not, there is a distinct sense of foreboding in the air today, rumors spreading about so missing students is never really a good thing so he will have to pay extra attention today. At least the lack of people makes it easier to keep track of everyone today, he keeps his eyes on that Janitor for now, his visor hiding Arthur's spying, because frankly the man scares him just that little bit.

Otto wordlessly raises his gaze to the purported King, points at his eyes, then jabs with the same two fingers across the room. He then pulls out his own lunch (packed sandwiches) as if nothing happened, and starts talking to Nate as though the kid wasn't already in a conversation.

"Hey. So. Nice mass frog escape in the second-floor biology classroom. Classic."

Donovan coughs, spitting out the few chunks of what was left of the lasagna in his mouth onto his tray. He shoots Otto a glare, realizing his mistake when he sees who was talking. He opts to go for a safer route, popping open a bag of chips. At least he knows these were safe. Sort of.

Donovan barely hears Nate's recommendation of him to the new girl, turning to scowl as the other wiggled his eyebrows. "Yeah, thanks a lot." He supposes that he shouldn't have told Nate much about what he's good at, but that was a risk he took when they became friends. Kind of. He sighs and looks over at the girl that recently sat down. "Hate to say it, but as much hype as this has gotten, I still don't know much about it. I mean, c'mon we just got a report yesterday. Nate."

Melinda shakes her head at Otto. "Nope, I've only been here for a week. All I heard was that there were missing students, and now they're probably dead." She'd heard all about the janitor already, though. He seems surprisingly neat, more interesting than most janitors Melinda's come across. Just one more layer of intrigue added to this school. She wonders if she could convince her parents to let her stay in this town for a lot longer than the norm.

She takes a bite of her peanut butter-banana-bacon sandwich, and then immediately coughs and spits it out when she gets a mouthful of pepper instead. She stares at her lunch for a moment, confused...and then takes another bite. Not bad, she decides.

"So, not much to go on yet," she says around a mouthful of sandwich. Swallowing, she decides to change the subject for now. "Has that knight guy always been here?" She gives a little giggle, wanting to know the full story more than anything. "What's his deal?"

"Sorry, kid," Otto mutters to Nate. "Already got my own plans for the day on that front." He stands and stretches in a noticeable movement, leaning on his cleaning cart, definitely not looking at a weedy little sophomore by the name of Jordan Dreyfus.

Otto pages through a pocket diary with the critical glare of a well-trained secretary. "Mr. Pendragon should have wrapped up his appointments, however with enough time for an afternoon pranking if you get yourself organised. Mr. Selman."

"Now I'd best be off, young scholars. I've got a bunch of frogs to chase up."

Otto saunters off, presumably to go catch frogs. Just at the moment he conveniently blocks King Arthur's line of sight to Jordan, the kid yells something about how he's already spent his lunch money and could they please let go of him.

Otto notices one of the aforementioned frogs hopping around the cafeteria entrance. The frog leaps into the hallway, and then out of sight.

Arthur responded to Otto's warning with an uneasy shuffling and pretending to avert his gaze, but as he sat down to eat his packed lunch he snapped to attention and continued to stare him down from across the room. If there is one person in this school he can't deal with, it's that seedy Janitor, Otto, it goes without saying that his notorious vigilantism causes a bit of mess in the halls and that ruffian has been a problem since day one.

And speaking of problems since day one, his gaze turns to the sinister Nate Selman at the table nearby, even after being apprehended by the knight several times, even punted into the school pool the kid remains diligent to his foul acts, the kid is truly rotten to the core, harassing his innocent people for no reason other than the fun of it. He has a suspicion that the mess that was caused up on the second-floor was his doing, but with no real evidence as of now so he cannot act, it would be unjust. If only his incredible skill was used for good, he would make the kid see this even if it was the end of him.

However, something stops his train of thought, distress, a call for help from across the room. He springs up from his stance and begins looking around for the source of it, spotting the glimpse of a student getting mugged by some ruffian, this cannot go unchecked!

He leaps into action, running forward at an almost unnatural speed and shouting an intense battle-cry across the room. "Evil-dooooeeeerrrr!!"

The brigand immediately knows just what he got himself into, letting go of the innocent kid's collar and turning to run. It is too late however, he gets grabbed around the waist and before he knows it, lifted up above the knight's head, who of which yells at him in victory.

"I have ye, criminal scum!" Arthur cries, "Your crimes cannot go unpunished! Face your sins or accept the penalty!"

Nothing out of the normal here.

Melinda watches the whole scene unfold with wide eyes and a half-smile. This school just gets better and better, doesn't it? "No, seriously," she says to anyone who'll listen, "what is his deal?"

Donovan looks up. "Huh?" He follows her gaze to the man in armor in the middle of the cafeteria. "Oh. That's just King Arthur. He helps out kids that get beat up by beating up the kids that beat them up. Sometimes he beats up teachers too. No big deal."

Oren's about halfway through his sandwich when he hears Arthur clanking and yelling outside. He looks grimly up at Bob, who's still reading the news he guesses. "Scissors paper rock outta 3 for who handles that."

Screw scissors and also screw lunch duty, thinks Oren, as he jogs out of the teacher's lounge. "Uh, hey there, Art. Good job with the apprehension of the, uh, the saucy varlet. I think he gets the lesson. Put him on down."

Where's that cagey janitor fella when you need him?

Said cagey janitor fella is on a frog hunt! He follows it up the hallway, and gently (with gloves, gotta watch out for that itching powder) picks it up when he catches up to it.

He turns it over in his hands, gives it a sniff, then critically examines whatever's congealed on his fingertip before giving it a lick.

"Not bad. Definitely some store-bought stock in there, though." Otto tuts disapprovingly. "Going to have to step up your game, Nate my boy. And you," he says to the frog, "would probably like this washed off, hm?"

Otto, the frog, and the cart enter the nearest bathroom. Provided he's alone (and barking at anyone who is inside to get out, he's busy cleaning), he puts the frog in a sink and carefully cleans it up.

The frog ribbits as you handle it. Doesn't seem distressed, though. Little fella is probably happy you're cleaning him of the itching powder.

Otto's exit of the cafeteria triggers a student migration - it seems everyone was waiting for someone to leave to go about their business around the school.

Areas of interest include the courtyard, gymnasium, and library. Perhaps there'll be more interesting occurrences throughout the building.

"Where did he come from?" Melinda asks, laughing. Out of the dozen or so schools she's been to, none of them ever had an armor-clad hero meting out justice in the middle of lunch!

Realizing everyone's starting to leave, she pokes Donovan on the shoulder. "Hey, Donovan, was it? Any other rumors we could go investigate? I'm Melinda, by the way."

Donovan taps through a few things on his phone. "First sightings were made in the nearby forest, rumors began, eventually Arthur migrated into the school and now cracks down on anything he deems unjust, such as bullies, pranksters, and the like."

He looks up at Melinda. "Nice to meet you, Melinda. I don't really have anything of high priority that needs investigating, other than the recent disappearances. I was planning on heading over to the library at the soonest possibility so that I could check for similarities between these and other recent missing persons reports. Not much to go on, but it's something." Donovan gives his lasagna one final stab before gathering up his things, putting on his backpack, and standing up. "Feel free to come, but it's not that exciting to watch." He picks up his tray and dumps everything in the trash can, heading off to the library.

Lawrence throws his books down in frustration. He hated trying to throw lesson plans together at the last minute, or at all, especially when it meant he had to laboriously go over printed out notes or textbooks and rewrite them by hand. At the same time though, he hated the possibility of getting caught pirating lessons online, which was far easier than catching someone via books thanks to the modern marvel that is a search engine. So, most of the time, books it was.

He looks at the clock, and realizing that he's pressed for time (having until the end of the lunch break, specifically) decides to make a rare exception. He stands up, places his books and notes into his bag, and leaves the staff lunch room. As the library is the only semi-private area with decent internet access, he heads over there and hopes there aren't too many students lounging around.

"Alright, sure." If Donovan can find all the intel for her, then that sure saves her a lot of work. Maybe she can dive into a book or two while she waits. Melinda scarfs down the last of her lunch, chucks the brown bag into the nearest trash can, and walks after Donovan. She'd thrown all her stuff in her locker on the way to lunch, so all she has is a couple of tiny pencils in her pocket.

Melinda, Donovan, and Lawrence make their way down to the library.

The library at Silver Hills High School is a small, isolated area at the end of one of the school's many wings. The traditional locker-lined hallway ends with a pair of double doors, which open up to a room with wall-to-wall dark red carpeting.

A small set of stairs descend from the doors down to the library floor, where tall shelves of many different books are spaced strategically along the eastern and western walls. The northern wall, directly across from the entrance, consists of large glass panes that offer a clear view of the nearby forest, separated by a road leading away from school grounds. The center of the library is an open space, populated by rows of computers, haphazardly placed couches, and some floor plants to make it look a little more alive.

The librarian's desk, adjacent to the entrance, is populated with hastily dropped-off books and an outdated computer. The librarian herself is currently not present.

It's the perfect place to do innocuous (or questionable) research into matters at hand.

Lawrence looks around, relieved to see that even the librarian wasn't around. He turns to the two students.

"Ah, Mr. Zikkit, how are you today? And Ms... Greenhill, right? How has your first week at Silver Hills been?"

"Oh, hey Mr. Beedle!" Melinda has him for chemistry; science was never really her favorite subject -- she was always more of a history person -- but even she has to admit, the man is good at what he does. He somehow manages to make every class oddly captivating. "It's been kinda boring with all the work I've had to do," she says with a small giggle, "but today has been great so far. This school is really neat, I love it here."

"Glad to hear it, and don't worry. Most people get used to the work, and you're a good enough student that I'm sure it won't be a problem. I see Mr. Zikkit and you have become acquainted too."

Flash a smile, compliment, distract, ascertain purpose. Make sure they're not going to be leaning over your shoulder. Easy peasy.

Lawrence was pretty sure that Donovan was the last person who would cause him any trouble, and Melinda seemed nice (and new) enough to be respectful, but one can't be too careful.

"What brings you two to the library during your lunch break? Is it some sort of group assignment or are you two just trying to find a quiet place to work ahead?"

"Yeah, we're just trying to get a little work done. Donovan was gonna help me with my homework, since I'm a little behind." She smiles right back. It takes more than a little buttering up to get her to share too much, especially when talking to a teacher. She's been around the block more than once, so to speak.

"Wonderful. Glad to see Mr. Zikkit helping out too, usually he's pretty introverted."

Lawrence shrugs and moves towards one of the corners of the library, far enough away that anyone coming over would be noticed but not so far as to look suspicious. The corner he picks also has the luxury of housing the school's light fiction section - one rarely visited due to its school-irrelevant material and the fact that the kids actually into reading tend to favour reading books with some actual thought put into them.

"If you two need any help, particularly with chemistry or science, don't hesitate to ask! I'll just be getting caught up on some work back here."

Arthur tenses up, but after a long enough pause, he spins around and tucks the squirming little brat under his arm, ignoring his protests. When his eyes meet Oren however, he adopts a more relaxed posture and straightens up, giving a low chuckle before responding. "Aha! It's you! The nurse!"

He watches the kid he just saved run off with his figurative tail between his legs and through the cafeteria doors, no thanks for his work, eh? Arthur just shakes his head and turns his full attention to Oren. "I wish you no harm, Elder one, you serve the people and I respect you, but should you get in the way of justice I will not hesitate to punish you for your treason!"

As he says this, the little vermin in his grip starts squirming loose a bit, Arthur clearly having trouble holding the boy with one arm, but Arthur's stance and voice doesn't waver, still standing firm. "The brigand must be punished, an example to be set to all the other... evil-doers."

Oren opens his mouth, and then closes it again. Elder one?

He crouches to the frightened bully's eyelevel, resisting the urge to puzzle out his reflection in the brawny bruiser's breastplate.

"Listen, kid. You're the one who sent Jimmy Givens to me a month ago with a chipped tooth, ain't you? Randall, right?"

He puts a finger to his lips, cutting off the pale kid's response. "Shhh. I ain't fool enough to stand up to ole Arty. Not for you. Take your lumps," he nervously pats Randall's shoulder. "And after, you just swing by my office, and I'll patch you up."

He stands up, tips his hat at the King, and heads off to go pick up that netbook and return it to the library