Intermediate Communication Studies 202

[pugsmuggler]

The Eldabaran Gracia campus was as industrial as its students, overwhelmingly modern, with sweeping hallways gilded in glossy white and textured aluminum, doorways shaped from frothy blue glass, and ceilings the arced up like a whale’s ribcage. Eldabaran Gracia was not a school of excessive grandiose, but it was a school of considerable wealth. It had to be. Being a reputable school of technology and science among a galaxy full of competitors required up-to-date resources and tools. Of course, Eldabaran’s far-reaching range of technological equipment were not for play, and enrolled students became increasingly aware of this their first year — several dropped out within the first semester. Everything was focused, clinical, and serious, and newcomers certainly couldn’t help but notice how remarkably clean everything was, from the pale-washed walls to the reflective, slick floors.

Calibri would have noticed on that particular day, that the halls weren’t, as they normally were, populated with students poring over notes last minute or having conversations about recent test results. The halls were instead quite empty. Class 318-C, Intermediate Biochemical Pharmacology and Toxicology, was similarly empty. A class that normally hosted around 50 students (give or take) now hosted lines of empty desks and unused lab equipment. Down the stadium steps of the classroom and sitting with his feet propped up on center desk in front of the projector screen was Garamond, reclining back in the professor’s chair with a small glass of brandy. He smiled when Calibri came through the doorway.

“Good to see you again,” Garamond said. “It’s been what? Two years? How old are you now?”

Comments

[tactician]

Looking up from where he had been staring at the compounds composing the IV drip, Calibri opened his mouth and promptly found that he was parched. His tongue felt like dry sandpaper and the insides of his mouth were not much better off. Even when he breathed, it felt like he was blowing out dust and air instead of moisture. It was not uncommon for someone that had undergone a poisoning, considering the body would have worked doubly hard to flush out the foreign elements from its system, but it never quite ceased to be uncomfortable, even for someone so used to dealing with them.

"Water," he mouthed.

[pugsmuggler]

Garamond retrieved a bottle from a mini-fridge and handed it over. Calibri still looked a little pale, but he seemed to have regained the strength in his limbs. Garamond pulled up one of the metal chairs folded up against the counter and laid it out beside the reclining table where Calibri lay. He sat down in it backwards, arms folding over the backrest.

"Hanging in there? You were asleep for awhile."

[tactician]

"There doesn't seem to be any lasting brain damage," Calibri reported dutifully after taking a few sips of water, as if that were the most pressing concern of them all at this immediate moment in time. Holding the bottle in one hand and resting its base against his lap, he held his other in front of him and flexed the fingers, waggling them one from thumb to pinky finger and then back the other way. Good - he seemed to have regained control of all his limbs and digits, which made re-capping the bottle and placing it on the bedside stand much easier.

"What is my current location?" he asked, looking up.

[pugsmuggler]

"About ten miles from your campus," Garamond said. "You're at the Eldsboro docking bay. This is the my ship."

I NEVER GOT AN ALERT FOR THIS

[tactician]

So not the chemistry lab, then.

Eyes trained on the sheet covering his legs, Calibri lowered his head, clearly abashed. "I see.... I apologize; the concentration of the substance in the champagne was much higher than I thought."

[pugsmuggler]

"Ha ha ha! I'd say I'm in more of a position to apologize," Garamond admitted with a smile. "Didn't exactly foresee a business social attracting this kind of chaos, but I guess I'm a popular guy."

Garamond sat up in his chair, his arms still hanging off the backrest as he rolled his shoulders into a shrug. "I'll arrange for someone to take you back to the dorm when you've got your wits about you. I don't imagine we'll be seeing each other again any time soon, so you should be able to finish the rest of your education in peace."

[tactician]

Nodding along to whatever Garamond said, Calibri looked up sharply at the last statement. "Will you be all right?"

By which he meant, will your money, which funds my education, be all right, at least until the end of my term?

[pugsmuggler]

"Of course I'll be all right," Garamond said as if the answer to the question was obvious.

"And a contract's a contract," continued Garamond. "Even if for some reason I'm not all right, you'll still get your funding. Revoking that from someone who I may owe my life doesn't exactly make a lot of sense, now does it?"

[tactician]

"That depends on whether it was a hostile takeover or not," Calibri pointed out, apparently not at all ashamed that his real meaning had been seen through so easily. To his credit, it wasn't as if he was trying to hide it particularly well. "New management and new rules are often precursors to the annulment of prior responsibilities and debts, to my understanding," he commented, lacking the proper social custom understanding to realize that it was not in particular good form to speak of such unfortunate possible ends so plainly. "But either way, I am relieved that that's the case."

A pause.

"That you will be unharmed, I mean," he added as an afterthought.

[pugsmuggler]

He smirked at the blunt edge to Calibri’s words, but he exchanged an understanding nod. He reached into his coat pocket, unpacking a thin cigar, and looked up at Calibri with a surveying glance. "Generally, that’s the case. But as a business we like to make all of our payments in full, meaning you’re already paid for. Only reason there’s a waiting period between each stipend is so that it’s not spent unwisely. Taking on any kind of debt isn’t in the best interest of our circle. If we don’t have the money, it’s not budgeted." — He didn’t add that debt, particularly debt owed to him by governing parties, was how the circle stepped so easily outside the circle of the law. Money is king.

"Don’t look it, but you’re pretty tough, kid," Garamond lit his cigar. "You might actually have potential for our kind of lifestyle."

[tactician]

Taking care not to rip more skin than was necessary as he cautiously extracted the IV needle from the inside of his elbow, Calibri looked up and paused as Garamond took the first drag of his cigar, butterfly needle still in hand. "That's detrimental to your health. You should stop, if possible," commented Calibri off-handedly as he lowered his eyes back to the needle, because ingesting poison when you knew it was poison was so much healthier.

"And thank you." He looked up again with slight consternation. "If that was a compliment."

[pugsmuggler]

"Is it, now?" Garamond smiled, eyeing the cigar with a raised brow as if it had been the first time he had heard about its negative side effects. Of course, he had, and he took another puff immediately after. The smoke smelled vaguely of leather and spice.

"And it was just an observation," he added. "With your pedigree it's unlikely you'll end up somewhere like the circle."

[tactician]

Kicking the covers off, Calibri swung his feet over the edge of the bed. It was rather high-set, so his toes couldn't quite reach the floor. "I don't think," he said, "that the Circle is a particularly bad place to end up."

[pugsmuggler]

"You should," Garamond replied, and in one sweep, he stood and folded his chair back into compact square. He carried it with him as he headed over to the lab counter, propping up against a cabinet door.

"Terrible place," he said, flicking his cigar into the hollow of a sink. "But not unbearable in the right company."

[tactician]

"I don't care much for specific company," Calibri said, toeing around the hospital floor until he found his shoes. They were still dress shoes, considering they hadn't gone back to the school after all to retrieve his own garments, and as such they were ill-fitting and slightly too complicated to get on. He had to kick one foot up on the edge of the bed to even tie the laces. "As long as the work is rewarding."

[pugsmuggler]

Garamond raised a brow. "So what, exactly, do you want to be when you graduate?"

[tactician]

"More tolerant of ingested poisons," Calibri answered, which was, unsurprisingly, a practical and rather to-the-point desire, more unfortunately attainable than it should have been, much like the owner of the desire himself. He kicked up his other leg and did the shiny, waxy black laces of that shoe too before slipping off the hospital mattress and onto his feet. They made a small, synchronized 'clicking' sound as they hit tile and as they did, he looked up to face Garamond.

"I should be getting back to my studies soon."

[pugsmuggler]

"Applicable, I guess, if you're planning to make a habit of poisoning yourself," Garamond laughed. Calibri seemed to have little investment in anything beyond his interest in poisons.

"I'll call you a cab, need some cash?"

[tactician]

"Yes. My wallet is still on campus," he answered, voice drifting from behind the small curtain he had stepped behind to change back into his clothes. They, like his shoes, were still more applicable to a formal dress event than anything practical, and considering the state of both Calibri and Garamond after the smoke-slash-gun fight, they were in a bit of disrepair, which was a shame considering the no-doubt hefty price. The seams of the dress shirt pocket were coming undone, there was a rip in one of the jacket sleeves, and the hems of the pants legs were definitely fraying beyond any state of possible repair.

Also his tie was entirely absent.

Stepping out, Calibri examined himself with a skeptical, clinical eye. "I assume you will not be wanting these back."

[pugsmuggler]

"Don't need them. Can't return them at this point, anyway," Garamond dismissed, reaching into his inner pocket for his wallet. Clipping the cigar between his teeth, he pulled out two hundreds from the thick wedge of bills, likely around four times the amount that Calibri would need for a cab, and handed them over.

"Your ride should be here in a few minutes," he said afterward, inputting a few coordinates into his communicator.

[tactician]

"Thank you," Calibri said, reaching out to take the bills, neither impolite enough to forget the token gratitude, nor polite enough to notice that it was way too much and return the extra. He pocketed them in his suits jacket and then spent a few seconds awkwardly standing in front of Garamond, eyes lowered and narrowed as if trying to puzzle something out.

Finally, with a sort of 'devil may care' desperation, he reached out again and jerkily sought out Garamond's hand again, pulling it between them and giving it a good shake - once, twice - before letting go. Then, he nodded to himself, apparently satisfied with whatever perceived social custom he had perfunctorily carried out just now. "Very well," he said, straightening his back. "Until next time, Mr. Garamond."

[pugsmuggler]

Garamond smiled, and thinking it not particularly important that he corrected Calibri's handshake, he nodded his head in agreement. "Next time I'll try not to bring my friends."