Wyman Hall, Baltimore, Late Thursday Afternoon

[bitten_notshy]

Jack's promise to take Allie to a class was coming into play today, and they'd made it to campus without her bursting into flame or attracting any special attention.

He was inclined to call that a win.

"We're supposed to talk about Othello tonight," he told her as they stepped through the double doors leading into the building's atrium. "The professor seemed very hung up on religious imagery last week, so if he forgets you aren't in the class and asks you a question for some odd reason the answer's probably something about that."

Comments

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

They'd made it off island without flames or Allie landing on her ass back at the causeway's edge. Definitely a win. For the moment she was going to focus on the bustling campus and not worry about whether or not she was going to get back to the island after class.

"Othello, religious imagery. Okay, I'll keep that in mind," Allie said, glancing about the atrium. Trees. Indoors. Intentionally. Go figure. "I should have asked you what book was going to be discussed tonight. I would have tracked down a copy and read it."

[bitten_notshy]

Jack gave her a curious look. "I should have told you before now," he said. "Would you really have read a whole book for one 90-minute class you aren't even taking?"

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"Probably?" she shrugged, looking a little sheepish. "I never had a chance to go to school. But I remember my mother talking about it when she taught me to read. About learning, and how much knowledge had been lost because it was easier for the vampires if people were stupid and scared."

[bitten_notshy]

"How long before you were born did they take over?" he wondered, with just the slightest wince at the reminder of how bad most vampires in her world were. "It must have taken a while for so much to be lost."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"Kanin said it had been about fifty or sixty years since Red Lung first appeared," Allie replied.

"When we went looking for my sword, he took me to what he said was the sub-basements of a museum." Yes Jack, Allie used a centuries old Samurai sword to kill zombies. "The building above had been destroyed. But everything there in the basement is waiting to be rediscovered one day."

[bitten_notshy]

"I would love that," Jack said. "Not the destruction. But the exploring. The chance to look through all the treasures that had been preserved."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"The memories. The knowledge of what people had been capable of before..." She shrugged again, "But that's why I would read a book for a ninety minute class I'm not taking. If that even makes sense."

[bitten_notshy]

Jack nodded, pulling open the door to the classroom. He nodded greetings to a few of his classmates as he steered toward a seat near the back of the room. As easily as he made friends, he tended to keep his distance from his classmates; he told himself that was because his commute and work schedule kept him too busy to do much socializing, but he knew there was more to it. The lycanthropy made him different, and while that wasn't a problem on Fandom where everyone was different, it was hardly the norm in his college.

"It does," he assured her quietly. "And makes me feel very lucky."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

Allie smiled at Jack, glad that he appreciated both what she said, and the opportunities he had. "Who knows, maybe if I'm still here in a few months, I'll see if I can join you."

After taking a seat in the back of the room, she watched the rest of the students stream into the room. "Do you think any of them are going to notice or care there's an extra person in the room?"

[bitten_notshy]

Jack shook his head. "It's a large enough class they shouldn't," he said. "I picked it because it's my largest. And I don't think any of them are sensitive to you being -- what you are."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"You say that so politely," she teased. "But I understand why. No need to cause a panic if someone doesn't understand. I've had that happen. It's not fun."

[bitten_notshy]

Jack chuckled softly, lowered his voice to a level he knew Allie could hear but doubted anyone else could. "My world tolerates vampires," he said. "But that doesn't mean it's a fantastic thing to announce in public. Not fun at all."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

Mobs with torches, or in the case Allie experienced, lots of automatic weapons, were never fun.

"How about for other unique types?" Allie asked, wondering if Jack faced similar issues.

[bitten_notshy]

"A lot of people would tell you I just don't exist," Jack told her. "Armies give some special forces a lesser type of lycanthropy and sometimes you'll see another were-thing, but straight werewolves -- they were thought extinct for a very long time. But no, not exactly polite conversation."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"Does that make it hard for you? Will it be harder for you later?" She half listened on some of the conversations around them. Homework, dates, jobs... "Everyone else's life seems ridiculously uncomplicated.

[bitten_notshy]

"They lie," Jack said, honestly believing it. He'd never known anyone whose life was simple, not up close. "And I don't know. It makes things interesting, at least."

The professor moved to the lectern, and Jack reached into his bag for a notebook and his copy of Othello. He passed the play over to Allie -- he suspected she'd need it more than he would.

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"They don't seem like they're worrying about their next meal. Or if something is going to kill them while they sleep tonight. It's simple enough." It's possible Allie's ideas of simple were a bit skewed.

It was a book, of course Allie was going to immediately crack it open and start to look through it.

"Is this even in English?"

[bitten_notshy]

"This would be the way people wrote four hundred years ago," Jack told her. "It's easier to follow if you hear it spoken. A little, anyhow."

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"I'm going to have to take your word for that." Because this was like nothing she'd ever seen before.

Picking a page at random, Allie quietly read the words out loud, hoping to understand them better. "O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;
It is the green-ey'd monster, which doth mock
The meat it feeds on. That cuckold lives in bliss,
Who, certain of his fate, loves not his wronger:
But O, what damnèd minutes tells he o'er
Who dotes, yet doubts, suspects, yet strongly loves!"

It helped, but only a little. "I'm not exactly sure what I read, but it sounds pretty."

[bitten_notshy]

"It's saying it's better not to worry about lovers cheating on you," Jack summarized. "If you suspect, you're miserable. If you don't know, you're happy."

His own feelings on the matter were complicated.

"And yes, it's prettier in iambic pentameter."

[OOC: Sorry, missed this notif!]

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

"That sounds like the plot of one of those cheesy romances I read when I first got to island," she said with a soft laugh. "I guess story topics don't change much."

[bitten_notshy]

Jack shook his head. "One of my teachers freshman year said there were only seven plots," he said, and looked at her with some pity he couldn't quite hide. "Did you have any books where you came from?"

[allie-vamp.livejournal.com]

Allie knew that her life hadn't been the greatest. Jack's pity just added to her desire to go back and change things and make them better. Of course the question of how one girl was going to change a whole world still needed to be answered.

"I had a small collection of books I'd scavenged in the ruins and one my mother had given me," Allie told him. "But after I was turned it took a while for me to get back to where I'd been living before...In that time other people moved in. They burned everything just to keep warm."