The High Haven (Azeroth & 1Gr1mm)

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1Gr1mm-AOM

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"Tonight on GeneTV - two suspects from the recent 'Black Rain' incident apprehended. The truth behind their actions unveiled; exclusively on GeneTV, where everything is-"

"Oh, shut up," screen of the phone turned off, as a young boy tossed it into his backpack, "Why is it that I can't even listen to a few songs anymore without some stupid advertisement." Irritated, he pulled the headphones of his head, his black hair slightly dancing along the light breeze. He stopped for a second, looking up to the sky. It was cloudy and smelled like it could rain; perfect. Why bother sitting in a crowded room, listening to some presentation that will do him absolutely no good. The entire educational system was such a nuisance - much like every other system he had come across in the two decades he had spent alive. A crowd of people passed him on their way to the lecture, some he even recognized from his group. "Yo," a male voice called up to him as a hand made its way around the boy's shoulders, "Damian, what's up?" A wide grin rested on the face of a blond boy. He carried a guitar on his back. "Lei, why do you carry that thing around?" Damian asked, turning around to face his classmate, "We both know you don't take guitar lessons."

A slight frown appeared on Lei's face and he acted as if insulted, for a split second, before the grin returned full force - "But it gets all the ladies." Rolling his eyes, Damian started walking towards the college. Lei swiftly cut in front of him, walking backwards. "You actually going to pay us mortals, stuck in lectures, a visit?" He continued to talk, whilst Damian's focus turned to the small hill in the vicinity - he was able to see a few trees swaying along the wind. He did not get the chance to visit that place yet, but now was as good time as any. "We can go for a drink after the lecture, I know a good place. I'll even call a few of my lady friends. What do you say?" Lei extended his hand for a fist bump, one which never came.

"I'll pass, thanks." Damian sharply cut to the right, stepping onto the grass and proceeding towards the hill. He was unable to see the puppy face that the boy was trying to pull off. "I'll call you later - so you better pick up the phone!" Damian just threw two of his fingers in the air, signaling the end of the conversation. He carried the backpack over his shoulder, holding it with his right hand.

"What a bore."
 
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Nina had woken up early that morning to get a bit ahead on some coding work so she could take the afternoon of that lovely Monday to herself before her evening class started. Of course though her roommate had this time off as well because of the way their schedules worked so trying to get anything done in the room was going to be a complete bust with Becky with her incessant talking on the phone with all of her 'girl friends' and as far as she could tell at least two boyfriends.

"I am headed out Becky. Don't use my bed while I am gone." Nina called sarcastically as she walked out the door only to be met with a glare from her room mate. To be honest Nina didn't even know if her name was Becky thats just what she had been calling her since she had been forced to move in with her to piss her off for waking her up at 4 the second night of the year by coming back drunker than Nina had thought possible without passing out. They hadn't ever gotten along after that.

She settled herself up on the ridge just in time to see the little display by Damian and Lei. She honestly hadn't ever really given either of them much thought though she did at least know Damian in passing from occasional running into him around campus. She didn't really have much of an opinion of him yet either way so she just ignored him coming up and set up on top of the hill near enough to the building to get the wifi and started her work. No need to invite distractions quite yet. Just wait till he hears the random ranting at the computer and he will probably leave anyway.
 
The clamor slowly subsided as he made his way up the hill. Well, enough not to annoy him. He didn't know whether the hill was close enough to the building for him to hear the standard lecture before the lecture, about the righteousness of it all - he certainly wouldn't appreciate that. As he drew closer, a figure appeared on the hill. Strangely enough, Damian did not notice the female before - maybe Lei's remark about him needing glasses was not as farfetched. Jesus, that guy was something quite else. They were not on any kind of terms, neither good nor bad, but the boy was persistent in acting like Damian was his best friend. Sighing, Damian threw the thought out of his head.

Interestingly, the girl paid him no heed whatsoever as he walked up. She was immersed in whatever she was doing, he was unable to see without intruding on her private space. And he had no reason to do so. Finding himself a good spot, not all that far away from the girl, Damian took his phone out, before putting the almost empty backpack below his head and laid down. He took a few seconds to glimpse over her. Her appearance was familiar, as if he had seen her somewhere before. That was not out of the question, as there was a good chance that he passed her on the campus at one point. But, he knew next to nothing about her, which is why he found it a bit peculiar that she was on the hill herself. Then again, there were other groups and schedules as well, this did not mean that she had a lecture going on right at this moment.

Giving it another try, Damian put the headphones over his head, connecting to the WiFi. Some music would help him relax, maybe even fall asleep. He shuffled through the online database, trying to find himself something that would put him in the mood. An opera - wonderful. "Access denied." The loud artificial voice hurt his hair how loud it was. The hell? Is this the next thing that's going to be forbidden from the eyes of the public. Damn it. He frowned as he tried to open up the file a few more times.

The voice kept blaring, before the screen suddenly shifted to an advertisement. "Gene-GeneTV presents. Present the truth-Gene unveiled. Black TV, tonight..." Obviously a glitched one that much he was able to deduce, even being a little bad with technology. To make the matters worse, his whole cellphone froze. The most he was able to do was mute the sound and wait for the occurrence to pass. He had absolutely no luck today.
 
The little bit of code to bypass the lock out of a game from any sort of console other than the developers wasn't all that interesting to be honest. It had mainly involved looking through all of the lines of code she had scrounged up from the blocking program itself until she found a way to exploit a logic error and trick it into thinking everything was an allowed console rather than just what the game producers wanted. Of course what she was doing was not really legal but she doubted anyone would ever figure out where the hack had come from. It had been commissioned on a bit of a shadier old gaming forum anyway.

Her peaceful coding was not to last however as the boy who had come up to rest on the hill a ways away screwed up his phone one way or another. With a sigh she tried to ignore it hoping it would go away and possibly fix itself after a few moments, but she could see as she glanced over at Damian that it wasn't going to fix itself. Well no reason to let an opportunity go to waste.... She set her laptop down on the grass next to her and walked over towards Damian with a less than friendly look on her face and said plainly "Twenty bucks and I will fix it for you." holding her hand out for the phone now to see if he would accept the deal.

This of course would mean that her actual work would be delayed, but for a quick twenty bucks it was more than worth it. He just hoped he would go for it since she suspected it would be an easy fix.
 
He was about to give up on it all, shut his cellphone off and enjoy the clouds above him; he wouldn't mind some sleep. Then he noticed the shadow engulfing him, a female figure towering above him. No, not exactly towering, but still - intruding. He expected her to try and strike a conversation with him, but he most certainly did not see her throwing a price in his direction. That was good. She most certainly did not act as some kind of a Samaritan, trying to help him for the sake of helping. If anything, Damian assumed the noise irritated her as much as it did him. Still... "How about ten?" Damian handed the girl his phone, allowing his head to flop down onto the backpack.

Although he cared little about technology and gadgets, he had to admit it would be a shame if he was deprived of his alone time with some music, even with the advertisements annoying him. Most of the time, it was much better than listening to other people's meaningless conversations. Sure, there were certain moments when he was amused by their exchanges, but more often than not, it was all too shallow. But he did wonder - how in the world did other students care enough to spend a day like this confined inside of four walls. It was absurd; the day was perfect for a quick nap.

"Just don't be loud about it."
 
Nina would have taken the phone and pulled her laptop over to sit next to him now saying "I'll do it for 15." assuming that he would accept this she just went ahead and took out her phone from where it was charging and replacing it with his so she could start getting at the broken thing. It wasn't the most recent model, but she still knew her way around it at least since the programming wasn't that dissimilar...

She didn't bother talking at first and allowed the silence to perpetuate for a minute as she worked on the problem slowly seeming to get a bit more frustrated with it. This wasn't quite as similar as she had first thought. It seemed as though their was some sort of firewall around the glitch that both blocking detection of the area where the issue lay in the coding as well as preventing access even when she did find it. "What the heck did you do to this thing? download a virus and used it to replace your actual system?" since thats what it seemed like was going on right now...

A few moments later of concentrating she got something, but she didn't know what. The screen started displaying a scrawling message that she read out loud as it came across the screen in white lettering on a black background "Raid on High Elf containment compound of Orcs at 0400 5/29/15... Mages Yordle, Hanz, Japan, and Regent are to deploy at 0413 to round up escapees and take them to safety... What the hell is that supposed to mean? are you a LARPer?" quite confused at this point as she held the phone out to him to take a look at what is going on "Those are some pretty shit code names too you know."
 
He quietly groaned as the girl proceeded to negotiate; Damian was sure that he was more than capable of lowering the price a bit more, but there was no point to that. "Sure, good luck." Soon enough, his gaze was fully entranced by the sky above. The sight was always incredibly beautiful. The only thing that seemed to remain pure in this world surrounding him. Unable to help himself, however, he did shift his gaze towards the girl a few times. He was able to see bits of frustration showing on her face, but it not bother him. She brought it upon herself, he figured.

At one point she asked him something, but Damian already moved on with his thoughts that he didn't even register the question. Judging by the silence that followed, she wasn't expecting an answer. As he waited for her to finish, Damian started slowly dazing off, he was just like that - able to fall asleep anywhere, anytime, as quickly as lightning. He was only brought back to reality when she started talking longer sentences and held the phone close to his face. "What are you mumbling about?" Muttering out, Damian took a quick glimpse at the screen. "I don't even know what LARP is-" he squeezed his eyes, taking in the context of the message. For a moment, he pondered the meaning behind it, but he was unable to come up with any explanation besides it being some kind of an inside joke he was not familiar with - or maybe an invitation of some sort. Since he genuinely knew little of the message's true nature, Damian stated as much. But somewhere deep inside of his gut, there was a certain feeling that told him it was something more than just a joke.

"I don't know what that was, besides..." he grabbed the upper part of the phone, flipping it in her own hand, so that she was able to see the screen, "Whatever it was, it's gone now." All the potential of his sleep was washed away by now, and he (strangely enough) had no desire to lay down anymore. Maybe he would have been better off going to the lecture. "Whatever the event is, it's tomorrow. Could be a private party or something. Wait... what did you say about code names?" An idea sprung inside of his head, but it was still far to ridiculous to even say it out loud.
 
She gave a bit of an exasperated sigh as she saw her client for lack of a better word for their as of now dozing off next to her instead of answering the somewhat rhetorical question. The dosing was answer enough she supposed that he had no idea what was going on with his phone, plus he wouldn't have payed her if he did. He seemed a bit more of an outdoorsy type anyway form what she had seen of him so it fit the memo. "The random message that bugged out your phone as far as I can tell. Some mombo jumbo about High Elves and Orcs. Also Live Action Role Playing. One of the nerdier endeavors out there but not without its merits." She had dabbled a bit herself if she was honest but hadn't actively sought out a game in a while.

"Well what were you doing on your phone? I mean before this happened to it? that might be a good place to start." Now honestly more interested in trying to figure out this message than the money now. She was a sucker for a good challenge and a bit of mystery and this hidden message was supplying both for her. It wasn't as though an opportunity like this happened all that often after all. If she had to guess at this point it might be some more exclusive event that this was an invite too, broadcast out as a virus to only bring in skilled parties. It wouldn't be the first time she had heard of something like that, but it would be the first time she had actually received one... well techniquely Damian had but that was a small detail.

"Oh I just figured things like Mage Japan and Mage Regent sound too weird to be peoples actual last names so I would assume they are either code names or the whole thing is code for something else. I would have to try to get more of the message if we wanted to actually know... well assuming there is anymore to be had."Which she certainly hoped there was but it seemed doubtful now that his phone had gone black. She at least had the bits of code that had created the message so she could look through that, but otherwise it would seem the phone was returning to its normal behavior and function. Well at least she kind of did her job... enough to claim credit anyway.
 
Damian had no real knowledge of this Live Action Role Playing that she was talking about. It seemed as if the activity required a bunch of people to play, so he wasn't even all that interested in it. Besides, he had more important things to do than raiding fictional encampments. Hm. Not really, but still. "Whatever, I'm not a Role Player of any kind. But yeah," he snatched the phone out of her hand, shuffling back towards the thread that he was about to enter before, but refraining himself this time. He was getting slightly curious himself, might be something to break the monotony. "This is what I was doing before. Wanted to listen to some opera, but then it glitched on me." He handed her the phone back, slowly getting back to his feet. "Think you could maybe work something out on your laptop? Would be nice to know what the hell that was, so I know not to repeat it. Or how to recognize it." Damian sighed as he shrugged his shoulders.

"Or something along the those lines." He was not all that fond of technology and with every single thing that the government took away from the Internet, he found himself less interested in it. Most of the enjoyable things were already removed. He positioned himself to see the screen of the laptop, trying to deduce what he saw on it. To no avail. "Yes, and you especially don't go around proclaiming you have a group of mage friends. All of this kind of reeks of something more than just a LARP thread."

His gaze shifted from the girl to the monitor, back and forth. He was trying to see what she was about to do. Although he wasn't exactly the one to poke into matter that were not his own, he also did not like when he wasn't familiar with what was happening. And especially since his phone was in a stranger's grip, for all he knew - she could have coded a few more viruses onto his device, and then make him pay a lot more. And that was certainly not a train of thought he was pleased with. "Just don't ask for any additional cash for this, 'cause that was not a part of the deal."
 
"Eh I can see what there is anything more on this mystery opera glitch of yours." She said more interested in what was going on than the actual money at this point. Not to say she wasn't going to collect. "I could look into it a bit more but your going to have to buy me lunch. Its going to take some time and I am hungry." With a bit of a smirk over at him switching through a tabs now as she downloaded teh song file that he had tried to open. Oddly enough though the file was massive for what it should be... even if it was a long Opera this was a little obscene.

She quickly lost focus as the file finished downloading and she could pull it up... or try to. It didn't seem to like being opened for some reason that was quite frustrating to her... Whatever this was it wasn't an Opera. "Why not? seems about as likely to get you in trouble as going around claiming your a werewolf." she commented half jokingly but she knew he was probably right that this wasn't about a LARP. No one would bother making such a pain in the ass program for a LARP invitation therefore it must be some sort of code....

"No extra cash just lunch if you want to find this out. You still owe me 15 bucks though.... Oh and I pick the place." She knew he was as curious about this now as she was so getting a free meal out of him seemed like a pretty good option. SHe hadn't gotten to eat yet today so she was quite hungry to be honest.
 
Damian had to stop himself from groaning - it was his fault for even trying to pursue the matter. But it's not like he really held money in high regards and without the will to sleep, what did he have to lose. Maybe some company could do him good, it would be foolish to just assume anything without trying. Besides, she didn't really seem like one of the loud, obnoxious types. Well, at least he hoped she would not pick some expensive place. No, didn't seem like it. If anything, Damian figured she would opt out for some peace and quiet. Hopefully, that won't be the same place Lei ends up going to after the lecture. That was the last thing he needed right now. His roommate wouldn't let him breathe if he was to see Damian alone with a girl.

"Do you really believe in werewolves? I never saw one in real life," he spoke up, looking around. For some reason, he was not comfortable talking about that topic. It was just one of those that made his skin crawl, but without any sane reason. "You know what - fine, I'll buy you lunch." He finally stated, almost not believing his own words. It is most certainly the hunger kicking in, upon focusing, he was able to feel his stomach eating itself. Yeah, definitely hunger talking on his behalf. But what is done is done, no need to pull his words back now.

"Lead the way... hm, what is your name?" Damian tried looking directly at the girl, realizing that the two never properly introduced themselves. Of course, there was little to no reason to do so before, but if he was about to pay for her lunch - might as well get to know for whom he was paying, Damian figured. "I'm Damian, if you care to know." He sighed as the realization kicked in; he would miss out on the opera. With the threads subject to change on daily basis, it was only logical that he wouldn't be able to find it tomorrow or by the time the girl managed to get to the bottom of it all.

It was a shame. "And such a good opera at that..." he mumbled to himself.
 
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