Working on chibi!Concord right now. I would like a drawing tablet. And the not-free version of photoshop. A mouse for the laptop would be nice, too.

*

Concord Krause

Gemma comes running down the hall, blatantly ignoring a newbie. "You wanna get into the gravity room?" she asks. I nod. She goes into her room using a remote. Has she lost her keycard?

Gemma comes out, keys and remote tight in her fist. She closes the door behind her and says, "Before I go and do this, I want my payment."

"If you get caught, I was in my room," I remind her. "You haven't seen me since breakfast."

"Yeah I know," she says, rolling her eyes slightly. "Just hand it over." I look around, then I hand her an iPod classic, one that's as good as new. Some boy in our hall had it (he hasn't been around along enough for me to remember his name, but I'll know his name if I see him), so I bought it off of him and refurbished it. It was originally one of my pet projects, but it's a commodity up here.

Gemma looks at it, weighing it in her hand before slipping it into her pocket. She moves away without another word, and I take my cue from her and do the same, going in the other direction. My room is in adjoining hall.

Once there, I lock my door and hurriedly open the cover to my laptop. Gemma will flip the Artigrav switch for all the common areas and this should cause chaos long enough for me to talk to my brother. Just moments after I set up everything, the artigrav turns off and I start floating. Gemma has done her job. Nobody will notice a stray Wi-Fi signal while they're trying to organize a bunch of floating students- especially since we just received a batch of newbies and the administration will be eager to assure them that no- this is not a common occurrence.

I open the Skype link, and my mother's face appears on the screen.

My first thought is: she must have caught Ethan.

My second thought is: Ethan is too smart to get caught, he told her for some reason, the conniving little traitor.

I don't have time for a third thought because my mother begins speaking. "Hello Concord," she says, smiling at me. "I know this must be a bit of a surprise."

I don't say anything, just stare sullenly at the screen. There are new wrinkles around my mother's eyes, and she doesn't look like she's taken a comb to her hair for two days. "As soon as we found out," my mother says hesitantly, "Ethan told us right away about what you two have been doing for months. Every two weeks, he said. He wants to see you, Concord."

My younger brother and I are close, always have been. We've been doing this for months, once every two weeks, just talking to each other because we're just needy like that. It's completely against the rules, of course.

Oh. No. No.

There is only one reason, one real reason, Ethan would miss our scheduled meeting and tell our parents about it.

"Concord," my mother says softly, "Ethan's relapsed."

Oh sweet darling, no. "I-" I say.

He wants to see you, Concord.

"H-how bad?" I ask. I clear my throat, desperately clinging to the last shreds of my composure. "How bad is it this time?"

My mother does not answer at first, just sighs and closes her eyes. "It's bad," she says, her voice breaking in places, my heart along with her. "They're not sure, I mean, there's a good chance he's- oh honey," she starts in a rush, "he might not make it and he wants to see you so dad and I are doing everything we can to get you home."

I blink tears back. It won't work. They can't get me back. No one goes home, not from the SSE. She doesn't know that, but Ethan does. I've told him. "Okay, Mom," I say, my voice cracking as well, "I'll-I'll do what I can. To get back. Okay?"

"I love you Concord," my mother says, "but I have to go back now."

"Okay," I say, "Tell- make sure Ethan knows I love him and I'm doing my best to come back, okay?" I say and quickly shut the lid of my laptop.

Ethan has leukemia, he has relapsed, my mother is crying, it is possibly fatal, my little brother wants to see me, and I will rip apart anyone and anything that gets in my way.

With that thought, I dry my tears, use my sink to scrub at my eyes, adjust my uniform, and go out. It will not be long before I am missed in Advanced Chemistry.

I will have to make friends. Or at the very least, temporary allies. I have neither the expertise nor the manpower to commandeer a shuttle and fly it back to earth, much less make it through security from a completely different part of the satellite. After all, impeccable composure and neat clothes will only get me so far.

Kids are floating around in the halls, giggling. I pass Gemma, who is propelling herself off the walls. "Get what you needed?" she asks under her breath.

"Yes," I reply, and in a way, I have.

I don't think Noah has a roommate yet, but please ignore this post if I'm wrong.

Kioni--

Finally, a free period. I walked down to my dorm, eyeing the newbies as I passed them. There were 20 in all, and I had had classes with most of them by now. I opened the door to my room and stopped with my hand on the door knob. There, next to the unused bed was a tall, dark haired boy unpacking lots of green bowties from an open case. 

"What are you doing in my room?" I asked him curtly, going over to sit on my bed, but keeping my eyes trained on him. He sighed heavily.

"The principal wanted me to have a roommate so I can make friends." He sounded aggravated and confused at the same time. "This was the closest available dorm." It was annoying, but okay, really. The principal had put people in my room before. They usually got scared away after a few days.

"Fine," I grumbled, grabbing a helmet and air tank from under my bed. "Just keep your stuff away from mine." Now he looked directly at me.

"Any particular reason?" he asked, both eyebrows raised. I finished attatching the air tank to my suit and smiled up at him. 

"Because it will probably catch on fire." I winked at him and slid my helmet on, attatching a cord to the outside of the window frame. Just as he started to ask why, I jumped out of the small window, slamming it shut behind me.

Just an illustration today.

Random: Is this school a year-round thing? Are there vacations from classes? How are the grades divided? Speaking of that, how are things graded? Should we use As, Bs, Cs, etc. or some other system?

After English, I'm going to back to my dorm room for a small break when I notice a piece of notebook paper on the ground. I pick it up. The date is written at the top and directly underneath are the words, "I want you to make friends. You can't go to space alone." 

Momo-chan peers over my shoulder. She has to float to see because we're exactly the same height. "Is that Twin Spica?"

Kin takes a look at it. "No, the second part is, but the first bit isn't."

"I wonder who this belongs to," I say and put it in my binder. I like collecting random pieces of paper. 

The dorm room is exactly as I left it. Well, nearly. I put my orb down in here so it wouldn't bother me and it seems that a friend of mine called. I pick it up and listen to the message the orb recorded. "Hi! I'm so sorry, I forgot all about your birthdays! Len only just mentioned them! Happy birthday! I don't have anything for anyone but Momo... I'm so sorry I forgot! Um... I guess you can come pick it up whenever you're available? I'm sorry I forgot! I won't forget again!" The bubbly blond girl saying that is Rin. She doesn't live in this world, so I gave her an orb. I give orbs to a lot of my friends so they can call me if they want to talk to me and I can call them without having to go visit them. Momo flies off to go get the present. Kin, Momo, and I have the same birthday. I don't remember what day they started talking to me. It's complicated because they have always existed in some form or another and they start talkign gradually and it takes a while before their voice and bodies became concrete and stop changing. Kaze still changes sometimes so  that's one of the reasons why he mostly stays in my head. 

Momo comes charging back in through the roof. "Look!" she cries. "Rin gave me this cute hair piece. It's a peach blossom!" She puts it in her hair and grins in a very Momo-ish way.

Kin asks, "I thought our flower was the red lily?"

"We have our own flower? Since when?" Ao-kun asks.

"We've had our own flower for at least a year," Kin remdins him. "Do you ever pay attention?"

"I do, but it seems a bit much to have our own flower... It's not like we're a country or anything weird!" Ao-kun says.

"We're a military force. Isn't that close enough?" Kin asks.

"A military force of five people-" 

"Well, we're all really good at we do, right? That's enough, I guess. Besides, doesn't the Metal have his own flag?" Momo-chan asks.

"Yes, but he has a giant corporation-" Ao-kun begins.

Kaze cuts them off. "It's not safe to talk about this here. We don't know if there's any others around."

No one talks for a minute until I say, "Besides, the House isn't what you really would call a corporation, is it?" 

"It's a political party and organization that's incredibly large and we'll leave it at that," Kin snaps.

I pick my orb back up and put it in its pocket. I don't really want to leave it lying around here. Kaze's right, this place could be really dangerous.

"Hey," Momo-chan suddenly brings up. "We've got pretty good disguises on, don't we? So we'll be fine if we go out. We ought to find out who has it here. Surely soemone does. Maybe we can make an alliance with them, or at least figure how good they are and who they answer to."

"That's not a bad idea," Kaze relents.

"It's a good idea," I say. "So, is that the plan? Try to see if anyone else has any talent and disguise it as trying to make friends?" 

The others agree. I think back to the paper. I want you to make friends. Was it a trap? It didn't feel magical at all.

"Not as far as I detect," Kin tells me. A wave of relief floods me.

"Thanks," I say. Kin is closer to me than some of the others. I almost trust him because we have the same agenda, and he's so useful. He can find magic a lot faster than even I can so if he says it's a normal piece of paper, I'll trust him on that.

Italia~

After a good night's rest in my dorm, I found a schedule taped to my door. It read: 

First Hour: Geometry                                                                                               Second Hour: European History                                                                                 Third Hour: Band                                                                                                   Fourth Hour: Chemistry                                                                                           Fifth Hour: Lunch                                                                                               Sixth Hour: English                                                                                                 Seventh Hour: P.E.                                                                                                 Eighth Hour: Art                                                                                               Ninth Hour: Psychology

All my courses looked interesting, but I was nervous as to who would be in my classes. I overheard someone talking badly about the 'newbies'.

Breakfast was the first thing on my mind. The choices were scarmbled eggs and vegetables (They looked like garbage.) or soggy waffles. I decided to go with the latter.

Searching the busy cafeteria for a friendly face in the sea of kids, I spotted a girl I recognized from the tour; I think her name was Nadia Ziof. She was sitting all alone, probably scared. Being friendly, I decided to sit next to her. She looked up as I sat down. As she begins talking, I remember that it would be polite of me to introduce myself - not everyone has a photographic memory. 

"I'm Italia and I'm from Italy. You can remember my name by saying, 'Italia from Italy, Italia from Italia'". The lunch ends after a few more words and we wander into the hall.

I walk to my first class, Geometry, while Nadia heads to Advanced Chemistry. I daydream as I walk, thinking about my family at home in Italy. My thoughts are disrupted by someone who shouts "Hey, watch it", then shoves me hard against a locker. My books scatter onto the waxed floor and the person picks them up. Then, the person hands them to a tall friend who is laughing while holding the books high above his/her head where I can't reach it. "Stop it and give me my books back!" I exclaim. The two friends just laugh and toss the books back and forth.

A figure walks toward us, probably to see what the excitement is all about, like the growing crowd of kids surrounding me and the two instigators. The figure's hand reaches out and grabs the books, then gently hands them to me. It was Principal Madden. "Come with me all three of you," he growls, but mostly at the other two. I gulp and turn to the crowd, which is quickly dispersing. Charlie gives me a half-hearted smile and lips "Tell me about it later". I nod, then rush off to where Principal Madden is.

We are led into his clean white office, filled with diplomas. There is nothing interesting to look at. Principal Madden is searching in his filing cabinet that is bursting with profiles of all the students. He pulls out three. "Italia, I expect better of you. You are, excuse me, were a government worker," Principal Madden starts, flipping through my file. The other two gawk at me. "But, sir, I didn't do anything wrong. These two pushed me and tossed my books around". He sighed, "You two should know better. Your going to have dentention for the next..."

Principal Madden never finished his statement. We were all floating in the air, like the gravity suddenly disappeared. I have to admit, it is fun, but obviously Principal Madden didn't think so. "I'll get you!" he roared to whoever cause the disruption. He pressed a button connected to his arm that shot out ropes with suction cups to the floor. He hurried as fast as he could out the door.

**********************************************************************

I left the two people who pushed Italia and stole her books genderless, so if anyone wants to be these people, they can. If nobody wants to, they can just be other students at the school. 

Celeste--

"Are you new?" I ask the girl that comes in.  Roommates tend to spring up when new students come.

She says nothing.

"Celeste Porte, Italy." I say, and turn back to my book.  I've had trouble finding interesting books on the ship, so I've turned to devouring anything I can get my hands on.

"You're new, aren't you?" the girl asks.

I roll my eyes. "That's the other Italian girl.  'Italia from Italy, Italia from Italy!'" I mimic.  "I'm Celeste.  The fencing one." I say.

"Good to know." she says, laying her bag on the bed on the other side of the room.

"Then we shall get along fine." I say.  I meaningfully look at the two foils I have hanging crossed over my bed.  The girl shivers and continues unpacking.

--

Someone may insert their character if desired. 

This took too long. I hate you too, Photoshop, I hate you too. Process: 1) Sketch, scanned, the sketch is still in the first layer. 2) Outlined in black, second layer. Coloring, third layer. This must have taken around four and a half hours total, but it was worth it, because I am now better at using photoshop. Even if I still don't understand what half of those things even mean.

Have a chibi!Concord, except more Dora the Explorer style than manga style (something my mother pointed out).

SC, you're breaking my heart with that post!

Gemma's Schedule (Based on Teresa's schedule bc I think it's set up great):

First Hour: Chem

Second Hour: Geography

Third Hour: Band (Percussion) 

Fourth Hour: Lunch

Fifth Hour: Pre-Calc (She'll be an advanced student in math)

Sixth Hour: P.E.

Seventh Hour: 10th Grade English

Eighth Hour: Metal Shop/Electronics/Wood Work (1 semester of each)

Ninth Hour: German 3

So, what if there are four semesters, one for each season.  You are required to go for 3 semesters if you want to attend: fall, winter, and spring.  The summer semester, if you choose to stay for it, is more flexible: you can load up on fun electives and make it more like a summer camp or you can take a class for three hours a day and get ahead in your class.  Gemma stayed on last summer and got ahead in her math classes and even squeezed in  a drama class.  I think we should just have an A,B,C,D,F grading system.  For the division of the grades, how about we have the upper level classes as normal freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior ages (high school).  The younger grades are like the middle school ages.  I think that the most are around 7th-10th grade because barely anybody goes for 6th grade and many people find ways to graduate or leave early because they don't like it there.  Except for Karla, the lone senior... 

Gemma's a sophomore.  If you have anything you want to edit in my description, I'm all ears.

I was going to post something from Gemma's POV tonight, but I'm getting a headache and it's almost 11 here.  So good night. 

Oh, are we posting now?. . . .

Derp . . .

Okay then, here goes.

Oh, and I definitely think we should have computer science as an elective because that would be very very fun for me to write about.

-Alex-

I have a couple of minutes left before my first class, which is Geometry. I have already changed into my uniform and I am sitting on the edge of my bed, hacking into my math teacher's computer and writing all of the test answers down on the inside of my arm.

When I am finished, I shut off my computer and go to class.

Just as I open the door, someone turns off the gravity. I grab on to the doorway so I can stay anchored temporarily. Most of the kids are laughing, pushing off of their desks and throwing stuff in midair. I gently push off of the doorway, rebound off of the ceiling, and land on the floor next to my desk. I pull myself in and sit quietly.

Really, fixing the gravity like that is an infantile prank. People treat it like it's something special. I could do it in thirty seconds with my laptop every morning at breakfast---AND encrypt the signal so it would be impossible to turn back on for at least a couple of hours. But I don't bother becase it's pointless. Messing around in zero gravity is silly. Moving is simple physics, although most people find it difficult---probably because they weren't paying attention when someone explained inertia to them. Frankly, the only entertaining part of zero gravity is when it turns back on.

As if my thoughts were a trigger, I felt myself sink into my seat. Most of the other kids fell out of the air and landed on the floor, or the desks. I roll my eyes. The teacher looks a little unnerved, but obviously decides the best approach is to pretend that it never happened. So he passes out the test. Needless to say, I am the first to finish. I hand it to the teacher with a wide smile. He looks a little defeated when he takes it from my hand.