"Charmed."

She does not look charmed.

"Pleased to meet you, Bella, Bobbie." Masozi says the words on rote, again, very briefly pausing to make eye contact with each of them. He's been distracted, circling the group to check the perimeter for mals.

"- Right. I'll go in front. Bobbie, you watch behind us?" She looks like the toughest of this crowd by far." And I'll yell if there's a mal I can't take, but shouldn't be, I haven't seen any big ones at all yet. ....All right, which supply rooms do we need to run by? Sophie wants fabric, I dunno where that's kept. Bella, you need paper? We can do the school supplies room first maybe." 

"I think fabric should be in the artificing workshop cabinets."

"Shannon, Raleigh, what do you need?" 

Raleigh really has no excuse to need anything! "...Uh, I'd probably grab some things from the artificing cabinet to set up my room better, but nothing really urgent. Shannon probably needs school supplies, yeah?" 

"Yeah." Shannon can just about manage one word without stammering. She's exhausted, already, and only partly from hauling around a 20kg backpack for half the afternoon. 

(She is SO dead...) 

"School supplies first, then." And he leads the way. 

He dos spot a handful of mals on the way, well before anyone else does, but they're small and hiding and don't seem eager to jump out at a group this size, so he just warns everyone else when to watch their step. 

Shannon sidles up to Bella. "Um, what kind of school supplies are a good idea to have, here? And - I'm going to be alchemy track, I think, do I need anything for that before classes start or can it wait?" 

"You might want the very basics in a mini-lab in your room. Some people tap their gas lines, for a burner. And you might want some containers you can carry, to collect any useful things you encounter unexpectedly. School supplies wise it's mostly notebooks and writing implements in your favorite format, whatever will help you in classes."

"Oh, containers is a good idea. Thanks! Uh, are some writing implements more likely to go bad and try to eat you? I have a mechanical pencil but I don't know if that's a good plan." 

"I wouldn't worry too much about a mechanical pencil. Even if it tried it couldn't hurt you very badly."

"Mmm. Thanks." 

She peers anxiously into the school supplies room, like it might bite her, which honestly she thinks isn't unlikely. 

"Hey, why don't I help you find things?" Raleigh offers brightly, offering her his arm. "My father made me memorize what the layout was like back in his day, I should be able to find things faster." 

Why does he keep HELPING her this is CONFUSING. It seems rude to refuse, though, and the last thing she wants to do is offend the kid from the wealthy enclave.

Shannon takes his arm. "I guess I need a notebook, or at least some scrap paper, and I could do with more pencils - I don't like pens - and if you see any containers, that'd be useful..." 

"Oh! I should just give you back the rucksack you brought in for me - I have a backpack already, I don't desperately need it or anything. Oh, and did you see if your room's desk came with drawers? You should dismantle those, they're just a mal hiding place, but then you can turn them into sort of square buckets and use them to carry things..." 

This room seems like a pretty high risk place for mals, though so far he's only seen agglos. Masozi isn't letting down his guard, though he'd better grab more paper for himself too, he doesn't have much. 

Bella checks cabinets carefully until she finds spiral bound notebooks. There are six and she takes them all.

Wow, that's a lot of notebooks. 

Masozi nabs himself some paper. It's strange paper, coloured and stiffer than normal, but eh, it'll do. 

"Are you going to trade the extras?" he asks Bella. "Or do you just take lots of notes?" 

"I take lots of notes. I have a magic pen, so I shouldn't need to come here often if I have enough notebooks."

Bobbie can't take too much before she's got something to carry it in, and she doesn't see any such things in the school supplies. She grabs paper and some pens but will have to come back another time for more, loose paper is not easy to carry without anything to put it in.

Sophie does the same - paper, pens, pocket. Not too much, she wants to leave room for fabric.

Raleigh is still wearing his backpack, but emptied of the bulkier personal items, now stashed in his room with a ward that will bite anyone who tries to break in and steal them. He will carry all of Shannon's things for her! 

"Artificing supply room next, then?" Masozi glances around to make sure everyone's ready to go, then leads the way. 

Shannon manages to hang back enough that Raleigh doesn't immediately start gallantly escorting her, and then glues herself to Bella's side before he can notice this and try to come back for her. 

"....Hi," she says, feeling awkward and tongue-tied again. "Did you, um, get what you needed?" 

Bella doesn't strictly need anything from the artifice room today but she can at least scope it out for supplies, she has room in her backpack.