Obsidian walked slowly through the halls of her new school, her nose stuck behind the pages of a book. Despite her obvious distraction she deftly avoided any persons in her way, passing by unnoticed, never missing a sentence. Coming to a particularly congested section of hallway, Obsidian finally deemed her fellow students worthy of a glance. Her deep blue-black eyes slid slowly up from her pages to determine the hold up on her destination. A couple was in the process of a dramatically loud break up and was attracting a ton of attention from both students and faculty.

Great, she thought sullenly. Irritated she rolled her eyes and slammed her book shut. This was exactly the reason why she didn't give guys the time of day. It just wasn't worth the drama.

She quickly did an abrupt turn to her left and stalked off down a nearly deserted hallway. Apparently all traffic had been diverted to observe the show. Obsidian impatiently tucked her bangs behind her ear. All she wanted was a quiet place to finish her book. She passed a few more people and made another turn. She stopped and looked around. How much bigger could this place be? She was almost certain she had been everywhere on campus at least once, but she did not recognize this hallway. There were a few closed doors. Obsidian glanced around and found herself gloriously alone. She reached out and tried the first door. *click, click* It was locked. She sighed and moved forward a few steps. Her penny loafers thunked unobtrusively as she walked slowly. At the end of the hall a slightly open door caught her eye. She smiled slowly to herself. An empty classroom would be just what she needed. ASTROLOGY LAB adorned the door in brass letters. She pushed the door open and a wave of disappointment washed over her. It wasn�t empty. The room obviously was a computer lab of some sort. The walls were plastered with star charts and other various solar bodies, but there were only computer stations with rather comfortable looking chairs.
�Hmph� they must spend a lot of time sitting on their butts staring at the stars,� she thought to herself her eyes traveling up to the glass ceiling that was currently displaying an overcast day. There were a few students sitting in front of computers. They seemed immersed in the digital world they were logged into and unaware that she had entered the classroom.

�Oh well� it�s better than nothing,� she shrugged silently, unwilling to break the peaceful hum of the computers. A large desk caught her eye off in the corner of the room. The teacher wasn�t present. Glancing over her shoulder, Obsidian ambled casually into the room. The door slowly swung back to its original place. Making her way to the desk, she steps a little closer to the students. She wasn�t a technological idiot, but computers had never really been her thing. Nothing could compare to the smell and feel of a good book. Her eyes glided over to a screen. The student was completely oblivious to the fact she was standing over his shoulder. Strange characters adorned the screen. It looked like one of those mass multiplayer online role playing games. Skeptical that the school would allow such a thing to be downloaded onto their computers, she looked back down at the student to ask him what he thought he was doing. He was dead asleep! He gave an involuntary jerk and clenched his armrest. Unmistakably etched deep into the black leather were claw marks. Obsidian took a step back.

�The game must be really intense,� she thought, glancing over at the next occupied chair and seeing similar marks under the young girl�s finger tips. Closer inspection found her to be asleep as well.
�Maybe they just needed to get away for a while and catch some zzz�s,� Obsidian reflected. She silently made the rest of the way to the desk and plopped down into the teacher�s chair. It was so plush she thought she might take a nap as well. A rare smile crept across her lips. She leaned back and slightly turned the seat with the toe of her shoe so that she was parallel to the desk. She cracked open her book and was about to immerse herself again when a list of names caught her eye. Recognizing a couple of them as names of students in her classes she leaned forward and picked it up. The heading was: ~Astrology Club Sign Up~ and the subheading was: �All students are encouraged to sign up, but know that not all students will be accepted.� Obsidian snorted softly.

�Geez� how difficult could it be?� she wondered again taking in the room. �So far all they do is sit on their butts and play video games.� Her eyes fell on another sheet of paper simply entitled: ~Astrology Club~. Setting aside the sign up sheet she picked up the outline paper.
�Thank you for considering the Astrology Club as one of your extracurricular activities. This club uses your mind extensively and to its fullest potential. All students are welcome to apply, but not all students will be accepted,� Obsidian murmured softly as she read the heading aloud. Her eyebrow arched gracefully as she read on silently. She had always had a keen sense for the sciences, chemistry being her favorite subject, but she had never considered astrology before. She glanced around again at the handful of students. Maybe it wouldn�t be so bad. The program seemed highly selective. �Maybe they won�t let in all of those damned idiots I keep running into,� her thoughts returning to the scene in main hallway. If nothing else, it would look good on college applications. She put the outline down and picked up a pen. A student sighed deeply in their sleep, drawing her attention back to them. The paper had not mentioned any online game, but had said that computers would be used extensively. Her pen hovered over the paper in a moment�s hesitancy. She really wasn�t into group activities and people made her nervous.

�Shut up Obie,� she told herself, �You can do this one thing for yourself.� She looked back down at the open spaces. �If I don�t do this for myself, then no one else will,� she thought with bitterness. Determined, she jabbed her pen down onto the paper leaving a dent on the beginning of her O. After dotting her i�s she slipped her pen back into her skirt pocket. She glanced at her watch.

�Shoot,� she breathed. She needed to hurry or she would never make it to class on time. Sighing she closed her book and pushed away from the desk. Well, it was done. She�d actually attempted to become a joiner. She stood up and walked silently out of the room unnoticed by any of the sleeping students and the strange characters flashing across the screens. At the door she turned and took in the strange computer lab one last time, then walked out closing the door behind her. *click*