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Khaldun darted around a corner, his shoes making a protesting squeak on the hallway floor. The P.E. teachers' offices were in this hall. In one hand he held a writhing, chirping plastic bag full of crickets he'd bought the other day with some payoff from a blackmailing scheme (as he didn't exactly have any other places to get money). In his pocket was a paper clip bent into a makeshift lock-picking device. As far as his other hand, it was.... out of commission. He was pretty sure that girl had broken his finger judging by how swollen it had become overnight, and the fact that even trying to move it hurt like a b***h. But that would have to wait. This little experiment was dedicated to the dumbass who'd tripped Khaldun leaving class earlier in the week. The boy owned a frog, so the blame would have to be easy to pin on him; Khaldun had unsurprisingly spent an entire night trying to devise the revenge he was about to take. And as for Drew, whose office Khaldun was now moving toward, well, he was an a*****e. All the time. It was only fair to make Drew's life miserable - that's what Drew did to every student at Hillworth who couldn't break the sound barrier on foot. Like, say, Khaldun himself.

Mealtimes were always the best time to make a strike. There was no light coming from Drew's office, so he was probably busy eating the disgusting cafeteria food. And no teachers were patrolling this hallway at the moment.

So far, so good.

Khaldun gave the hallway one last glance around and moved in to pick the lock. They were easy ones - you just had to rake the bent-up paperclip through the lock once or twice and turn the handle fast, and you were in. All those crickets were almost ready to be moved into their new home...

The lock finally clicked in defeat, and Khaldun gave an inward cheer. But just as he lay his good hand on the doorknob, a voice interrupted him. Drew's voice, to be exact. Hearing it made him feel like someone had filled his spine with ice. DAMN IT. DAMN IT. DAMN IT. It had almost worked. The cricket bag was just lying there on the ground now. Khaldun didn't want to turn around, but he had to. He gave himself three seconds to take a breath, and turned, his face now a picture of innocence.

"DREW," he said with his surprise only half-feigned. His new record of going a whole week and a half without being caught was now out the window, for one thing. Crap. He drew the hand with the broken finger where he hoped it would not be seen, and let himself go on verbal autopilot. Better make this excuse a goddamn good one this time or it'd be THREE MILES of suffering, maybe more. "I was just looking for you!"

"Mister Drew. Oh man. I forget that one sometimes because we're the same rank." The 'Khally' nickname was not doing anything to endear Drew to him. So the potshot was too much to resist, and even if anyone overheard they wouldn't know what in the hell he was talking about anyway. No harm done, except hopefully to Drew's enormous hulking ego. Khaldun tried really, really hard not to roll his eyes, but he just couldn't seem to stop himself from it. He kept the injured hand with the fingers stiffly together, but with Drew bearing down on him here he was starting to brush the swollen, broken finger against his clothes, which really hurt. His back was to the door now, and he slouched a bit. "I'm actually suffering enough right now, but thanks for offering. Really."

"You've got it all wrong. I'm actually here about the crickets," he started, with no idea where he was going. He felt like a cornered rat, but he had an advantage. He was a cornered rat with rabies. Well, metaphorically speaking and all. He reviewed his options. He could keep talking, and maybe somewhere in Drew's twisted, blackened, marathon runner's heart he would find an emotion not unlike human pity. He could run - no, he couldn't run, that would be like running from a fighter jet that also knew where you lived should you actually make it. He could try the unlocked door and escape through the window of Drew's office, but not only did he not remember if there was a window, but he couldn't hide for long that way either. So it was back to square one, talking his way out. Instinctively he began to gesture with both hands for maximum storytelling magic, forgetting his broken finger until it was too late. "Mr. Drew, you see, last week there - aah!"

And now he was nearly doubled over nursing the hand with the broken finger, his eyes squeezed shut from the pain, very nearly ready to curse the girl that had broken it. Khaldun was unfortunately what some would describe as "delicate", and was not happy to be standing here looking like a p***y because his finger was broken. This was not working at all. He'd lost his train of thought and now Drew the Dumbass was going to rip his intestines out through his throat or something over a bag of crickets. "Ah - I'm okay. I'm okay. Nnngh. The crickets.. uh..."

"You've become so generous in your old age," Khaldun grunted. A whole six minutes to run it, oh boy. It was usually four minutes on a really bad day. No one ever made it.

"Or..." Khaldun reached down very slowly and took hold of the bag with his good hand. Very slowly, he rose up again, with the chirping crickets breaking the silence. It barely seemed to crinkle the whole time. It was plastic, and filled with feeding crickets. He could rip into it like butter with his fingers using barely any effort. There would be crickets everywhere. Obsidian's laughter was grating on him like the edge of a knife, mocking him.

He really, really wanted to do it.

He couldn't. Obsidian knew too much.

"We call it a draw?" Khaldun's dark eyes had the same humorous twinkle in them as a submerged crocodile's. "I go my way, you go yours, and the crickets just.... disappear."

Khaldun gave a stiff and two-fingered salute from his forehead with his splinted hand, dipping his head as he did. His loose ponytail of dreads bounced along with the movement. "Until next time, lieutenant."

Obsidian had purposely shoved into the arm of his injured hand, jostling it. The splint only did so much - getting elbowed like that hurt. When the door clicked shut, Khaldun slunk back down the hall with his chirping bag. Breathe, Cilentani, breathe. This wasn't over, not for Obsidian or the kid with the frog who should have been the one to suffer. In the meantime, there was a bit of blackmail Khaldun intended to collect on this evening. A little more cash ought to buy him a better chance next time. There was no real feasible way to settle the score he had with Obsidian short of perhaps treating him to a slow and painful death, but that didn't stop Khaldun from trying again and again to find a next-best option.