fandomhigh | BWI Airport, Portalocity Lounge, Saturday Morning

So everyone else had, like, dramatic backstories and reasons to show up here and stuff. Which was fine, you know, if you were emotionally in the zone enough to go to those kinda lengths. Denise had just been, you know, chilling with her dad last night watching some hockey guys really pound in on each other - no, seriously, really get into it. One of them broke a rib or something, which was kinda cool.

Then she'd been dropped off at the airport, gotten a ticket stuffed into her hands, and that was that. No reason to get all dramatic and touchy-feely about it.

And now it was Saturday morning and she was on the airport. Sitting around. Chugging water and listening to her discman while watching the kids down the hall, trying to figure out how they were gonna croak. Sure, there was some kind of shuttle supposed to show up, but it wasn't there yet. A girl had to keep herself busy.

She figured the dweebs starting to mill around the terminal were probably classmates or something. Lame.

[[ ~~wait for the~~ ocd up! ]]

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Rinoa had, too! They could be coma buddies! It helped that Rinoa hadn't carried any of her own luggage.

The blonde girl was probably not looking for a knight, however.

"It's a long trip, isn't it?" she asked, taking a seat next to the other girl without any preamble. "And strange. I think I'll stick to trains."

Knights in shining armour were for those who had the time and inclination for it. Rosalind had neither.

Mostly. Perhaps the inclination in a few snatched moments to daydream at the end of the day but certainly nothing more than that.

"Or cars," she agreed, able to admit to that. "Though it might get easier with practice, if you're going back and forth." As soon as she could convince Tseng she was back to full strength...

"I'm Rosalind. It's a pleasure to meet you." Or was polite to say anyway. Not entirely a lie either. She had no preference either way.

"Rinoa," the dark-haired girl replied. She stopped to point out the other members of her entourage. "The dog over there is Angelo, she's mine, and the guy who looks like he hates everyone is Squall."

Not hers. She was working on it.

"Are you a student, too? I'm starting to think we all are."

Rosalind silently filed the names away. The dog was easy enough, the man distinctive in appearance.

The girl... right beside her. Hard to forget then. "I am," she said, reigning in her urge to complain. "Do you know anything about the school?"

"Just that it pulls in a strange crowd," Rinoa laughed, glancing around at the room. "And that they must not mind last-minute registrations. What about you?"

She dropped her voice slightly as another thought occurred to her. "You don't think they mind students having pets, do you?"

If she couldn't bring Angelo, then she wasn't staying.

"Another last minute registration; I know very little myself," she answered and considered the girl's other question. "I think the brochure had a few pictures with pets in them."

Which was about as good of an answer she could come up with. It hadn't said anything about allowing pets but it had seemed more enthused about going on about the multi-verse and Fandom High's unique population...

"Guess I should have read the brochure," Rinoa admitted with a laugh. "You don't think it's part of Garden, do you? I don't think I'd do very well at military school."

But then, it would probably be named 'Fandom Garden' if it was. So.

Rosalind would have preferred it to be a military school. She did well in those.

Well, the one she'd attended.

"Part of Garden?" Rosalind asked curiously. "Is Garden a company name?"

Like ShinRa?

Squall would have been more circumspect, but Rinoa didn't have his training. She liked talking to people, anyway.

"No, they're schools," she said. "Balamb Garden, Trabia Garden, and so on. You've ... never heard of them?"

Huh.

"I guess we're really far from home, then."

"Have you ever heard of a city named Midgar?" Rosalind asked, doubting it. "That's where I'm from."

She thought that was safe enough to share. "It's not in this world."

... Which made her sound absolutely insane she was displeased to note.

"A different world?" Rinoa was staring. A little. Yes. "Did you come on a spaceship? I've only been on one once but I didn't really like it."

To be fair, she'd been comatose half the time.

"There's spaceships where you're from?" She couldn't help feeling a little envious. "I walked through what was called a portal. One moment... home and the next, not far from the airport."

Rosalind had absolutely no idea how Tseng had managed to arrange one but when it came to Tseng... there was little he couldn't arrange.

"Only a couple," Rinoa said, shaking her head. "In Esthar. Esthar doesn't like anybody else, so they keep all their technology a secret."

Esthar was probably more concerned about containing the crazy Sorceress running the place than being snobs.

"We took a portal, too. I wonder if the school sends them out?"

Edea might have done it ... except she had Edea's powers now. And she couldn't have done that herself, without realizing it. At least, she hoped not.

"That might explain it," she mused, nodding slightly. "And it solves the problems of last minute registration neatly."

Rosalind approved of that.

"I guess if you're sending portals, you don't have to worry about travel time," Rinoa mused. "Just finding places for everyone. Must be a big school."

"They could have an enrolment cap to keep it from getting out of hand. Who knows how many students they let in?"

Was there some sort of qualifications needed? A pre-test done at the school?

"Maybe they were short on admissions this year," Rinoa teased with a grin. "Said 'no' to the wrong ones and their 'yes'es didn't stay. So they snatched us up just to fill space."

She winced.

"I'd rather not be a fill in."

She had her pride here.

"There would be nothing you could do about it either way," Rinoa pointed out.

"It would annoy me less," she replied, not arguing about whether or not there'd be nothing she could do.

Rosalind knew that.

"Are you annoyed?" she asked, noting the word choice.

"I..." Rosalind paused and shook her head. "I would rather be home."

Being useful instead of being protected.

"This was a sudden change."

"I've had a lot of those lately," Rinoa admitted, with more honesty than she had intended. "I'll be happy if things calm down a little."

BWI Airport, Portalocity Lounge, Saturday Morning

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