Maiko Nakani-Maisuradze's Story

There was something about Tuesdays that Maiko Nakani-Maisuradze really fucking hated.

Maybe, she mused listlessly as she crossed the campus of the Pierreton Community College, maybe it was because Tuesday, inevitably, no matter what, came after Monday. Or maybe, corollarily, it was precisely because it succeeded Monday, the day the weekly grind of school and work resumed in full force. That was bad enough. Tuesday was just a reminder that the week wasn't even halfway over with.

Or fuck it, maybe it was just because Tuesday was just another day in a long, dull, dreary, eternally discontent existence. What more reason did there have to be?

Whatever. She wasn't gonna dwell on it. She had a destination in mind, and her body language was that of intent, the forward lean of her considerable stature contributing largely to that impression. On the way, every now and then, some imbecile would disentangle themselves from the writhing mass of nondescript flesh that comprised the student body of this hole in the middle of Fucking Nowhere, Wisconsin-- would approach Maiko, start flapping their lips about the typical inane bullshit. The consequences, one supposed, of being generally well-liked in a small town by people she ardently wished would die of a brain haemorrhage.

"Omigod, Maiko, you won't believe who I saw the other day!" one would gush joyously, as though what was to follow was going to completely rock the foundations of Maiko's existence. "Yes I will," she wanted to reply flatly. "Of course I'll believe who you saw the other day. In fact, you know what, don't tell me, I don't care. Unless you're about to tell me you saw Josef Stalin, Michael Faraday, and Ötzi the Iceman sitting out by the coffee shop discussing interface ontology, I don't give a shit. Also, it's my-ko, not 'may-ko'. Does it take any effort on your part to act like you have the IQ of a block of stale cheese, or is it something that comes naturally to you?"

She coulda said that, but she knew better than to be so open and honest if she really didn't have to, even if sometimes she almost wished she could be the kind of person to give a shit about that kind of bullshit. Instead, her high features lit up with a statuesque smile, a quality of genuine interest kindled in her green eyes, and, in a fabrication of amicability on par with a base, vile con-man's flawless reproduction of the most beautiful depictions of nature by Monet, she replied, "Well, don't keep me guessing. Who'd you see the other day?" And, lo and behold, their answer was, of course, something so utterly irrelevant that even Maiko, having steeled herself mentally to be subjected to something she couldn't bring herself to care about if she honestly, earnestly tried, was taken aback by how incredibly inane it was. "What a coincidence," she remarked with a light laugh, hoping with all her heart that, in the span of about a second, a mass of cumulonimbus clouds would form overhead, kick up a storm, and direct a stray lightning bolt right at the degenerate who honestly thought Maiko needed to hear about who they'd seen the other day.

Failing that, Maiko offered up some brief, equally asinine small talk, and then extracted herself from the idiot's presence, mentioning that she had to stop by someplace before work. And thus, following yet another dull encounter with another dull creature, just another drop of water in a vast, dull ocean, Maiko was off again, the soles of her boots crunching steadily against loose gravel, the chains hanging from her jeans clanking mechanically against one another and against the copper bullet casings that lined her belt; a white cord, in stark contrast against the general black of her leather jacket, snaked it from one of her pockets, splitting into two headphones buried in each ear, dutifully pumping blissful music directly into Maiko's brain.

Before long, Maiko was free of the campus, and heading a ways into the town itself-- though, small town like this, the college was just about all it had goin' for it. Certainly, it offered much of whatever this town had. And yet, in this case, Maiko found herself venturing beyond its borders. The campus bookstore at which she made enough of a paycheck to get by, for once, did not have what she was looking for (and, in a way, rightly so-- the shelves of the school bookstore were generally reserved for things that mattered)-- lacked resources on Maiko's latest thread of interest. For that reason was it that she found herself, then, shortly before she was due at the campus bookstore, in a decrepit old hole of a bookstore called Selene's Secrets.

Shit, by the name, you woulda thought the place sold perfumes, or lingerie, or some shit like that.

But no. It was, in fact, an establishment that specialised primarily in shit like curses, vampires, werewolves-- not even really the occult, or mysticism. She was pretty sure they were only there to make some easy cash on the kind of idiots who really, honestly thought werewolves or whatever were real and thought they could get some credible information from the books this place sold. As for Maiko? She was only here to fuel her latest passing fancy. After all, anybody knew vampires and witches were bullshit, but that didn't mean it couldn't be minutely amusing to read about them.

Upon entry, Maiko was assailed with the scent of incense drifting throughout the bookstore-- meh. Probably to add some kind of mystical atmosphere or whatever. If the incense bothered her, then as usual, it didn't show: Maiko merely directed a cordial grin towards the lady at the counter, and made to go about her business.

"Excuse me," Maiko heard someone say from the counter as she walked by. "I was wondering if you have Preston and Shapiro's 'Electromyography and Neuromuscular Disorders' in stock?"

Maiko probably wasn't gonna say anything about it until the lady at the counter mentioned that they didn't have it, which made sense, because this was where you came for shit about vampires, not for actual information. At that, however, Maiko did what she figured she was, of course, supposed to do in that situation; she turned to the woman in question-- she looked vaguely familiar to Maiko, probably went to the college, they all looked the same to her. "s'cuse me," she interjected politely. "But if you're looking for that book, we should have it in stock back at the campus bookstore. Feel free to drop by there anytime to pick it up." She punctuated it with a brief but friendly sort of smile-- y'know, the kind you were supposed to give when you acted all nice to people. At least, as far as Maiko had gathered.

((Had permission from xRoo for the bit of Neveah telling Xandy they don't have the book in question.))

Xandy sighed with a little bit of annoyance. She should have known that Selene's Secrets only had books related to absolute drivel like vampires. As she was about to leave, a girl said,

"S'cuse me, but if you're looking for that book, we should have it in stock back at the campus bookstore. Feel free to drop by there anytime to pick it up."

The girl smiled, but Xandy could tell that it wasn't a real smile. She didn't really care whether it was or not. Xandy glanced at the girl, recognizing her from walks around campus. Her name was Maiko, and she seemed like one of the few people on campus that were not complete and utter idiots. Xandy might have taken the time to talk to her once in a while, but there were too many... airheads hanging around Maiko.

Xandy nodded curtly.

"Thank you for your help," she said, not returning the smile. She walked out of the old bookstore and breathed in fresh air. Christ, was it stifling in that bookstore. No matter how much incense boosted brain function (the number of alpha-2 in the left posterior portion of the brain rose significantly), it smelled awful to her.

She made her way back to the campus bookstore, where a petite, over-excited girl was all too happy to help her ("Hi there! I'm Claire! What are you looking for today! You know, we just got a huuuuuuge shipment of new books, so if you want to take a look at them, it'd be totally awesome! Hey, you're Alexandra Vittoire, aren't you? We have a class together! Hey, isn't that cool?"). It made Xandy want to dash her head against a rock, but that would cause significant brain damage, and that would be a shame. She purchased her book from Claire (finally!) and made her way to Neuro-Oncology.

She was less than thrilled to see that many of her classmates from Operative Skills in Neurosurgery were here as well. Then she saw Claire, waving at her with a huge smile plastered onto her face.

This would be a long, long semester.

The lady in question merely directed a curt little nod Maiko's way, and, with all the expression of a boulder, said, "Thank you very much." And then she just turned around and walked right out of the old bookstore. Man, what a dick, Maiko immediately decided. Not really for not returning the smile-- Maiko would probably have just figured her for yet another imbecile, one of the many others who polluted this campus. You'd expect that in some densely populated hole of human refuse like New York City, or Los Angeles. Who knew I'd be dealing with it in an insignificant little town in the middle of Wisconsin? But, more to the point, on the subject of the woman being a dick, there was just something... oh, to hell with it, Maiko just didn't like her. Did she really need to start thinking of reasons to not like people for being there?

Hell, now she was in a bad mood again.

"Anyway," she said in a bright voice, turning back to the woman at the counter with a good-natured smile. "I was wondering if you, perchance, had any books on Thelemic occultism..."





It was shortly thereafter that, with the newly purchased book in tow, Maiko set off once more for the college-- in particular, the campus bookstore, destined to spend the next few hours diligently retrieving whatever bullshit college students wanted from her. Really, if it wasn't for school, then it was almost invariably something that simply wasn't worth the time. Sure, Maiko was more than prone to disparaging the campus bookstore, and it wasn't like its content was flawless, perfect, worthwhile reading throughout. Still, there had to be something these idiots thought was worth reading more than the latest Twilight book or whatever. All the amazing things to read about in this world-- physics, biology, anthropology, you name it-- and yet I couldn't for the life of me enumerate the sheer volume of people who come into that store consistently showing absolutely zero interest in any of it. Apparently, a book about a sparkly vampire with apparently crooked nipples is more relevant.

It was enough to make anybody lose their faith in humanity, except Maiko hadn't cared much to replenish her stocks of that rare commodity in many years.

Maiko had already begun to scan over the foreword to the book on Thelema she'd purchased as she encountered a cross walk and stopped, waiting for the light across the street to indicate it was permissible for her to cross-- or, more importantly, waiting for when there weren't any cars prohibiting her from just crossing anyway. She glanced from side to side for any cars, but looking to the right down a sidewalk devoid of pedestrians revealed no cars. Instead, far down in the distance, Maiko caught sight of what appeared to be a person-- some freakishly pale man, in a black coat, off in the distance. It was much too far for Maiko to make out much in the way of details, but she did know from the second she saw him there was something definitively off about him.

A recurrent tone tore Maiko's attention from the man, and she looked across the street; the light on the post had switched to an image of a walking stick figure, indicating that it was now time for her to cross. Still, somehow, Maiko couldn't help a second glance towards the queer man in the coat. And, predictably, when she went for a second look, he was gone.

... well, either some anemic dude in a coat's got some bitchin' ninja skills, or I just found myself in the plot of some kind of horror movie. Maiko figured in the latter case, she'd probably be the first person to die-- as it always is in movies, where the first person to die always gets the most violent death so that the rest of the protagonists have a total 'oh shit' moment.

As far as she was concerned, though, as she crossed the street and walked onwards, there was no horror that pale person could inflict upon her worse than having just one more degenerate ask her if they had Twilight in stock.