He is spiraling outward from where they've sat in the past, mostly, with detours to avoid vents.

And - oh, there's Raleigh. Val grins at him.

"Hey! Sorry, we're over this way, usual table got nabbed by some indie seniors because Larisa and Landon are walking all of us to and from class now. How were your morning classes?" 

"Really good, I had one on zoology. How about you?"

"Fine, I guess? I had language lab first thing and then I had my History of Magical Conflicts class again, which I guess was slightly more interesting and relevant than the session on Friday. Wish it had advice on how to handle a conflict like 'rogue freshman maleficer on the loose', though." 

"Yeah, that's - yeah. Guess we'll have to figure that one out without the school's help."

"You got a buddy to walk to classes and stuff with? If your schedule's convenient for it then we might be able to fit you into our roster for that." 

"...That might be useful."

"Cool. Landon's got the schedule for it. Aaaaand here we are." 

Larisa is tiredly shoveling food into her mouth and doesn't even look up.

Cassie does. "Oh, hey. You're the kid who's borrowing my mana box for a week for reasons? Oy, Landon! That kid's here." 

Landon is a table over, talking to the Oakland junior. He glances up at the sound of his name. "Oh - I'll be right over!" 

"Cassie, can you move over a bit so there's space for both of us to sit?" He gestures for Val to sit down with them. 

Not very with it, are they. Not that he's going to give any hint of thinking that.

"Thank you."

Raleigh smiles brightly at him. "Right! Let's do some intros. This is Cassie, that's Larisa, next to her is Vanya - other side of the table is Tristan, Justin, and Killian." 

The kid introduced as Vanya doesn't look up, though the others nod or wave in acknowledgement. Vanya is small and very thin, to the point of looking almost sickly. He's very pretty, for a boy, with the contrast between his black hair and pale skin. He is also radiating a sense of intense misery.

Yeah, that's concerning, he's concerned. "It's good to meet you all. I'm Val."

The kid introduced as Tristan leans forward. He's older than Val and Raleigh, probably a junior or senior. "Lovely to meet you, Val. Where're you from?" 

He names a small town and omits the state.

Larisa thinks this is weirdly evasive of him! She's kind of suspicious!

He's...probably not their maleficer? No physical signs, no weird aura in either the creepy direction or the too-nice direction; mostly he seems a bit tense and jumpy, which isn't what a maleficer powerful enough to control the signs of it would go for. Still. She's going to be keeping an eye on him. 

Landon returns to the Sacramento table and sits down beside Tristan, opposite Val. "Hi. I understand you're interested in doing us some favors in exchange for a mana sink loan?" 

"I might be! But I don't think I've heard yet what favors you're looking for?"

"Well. It's...slightly complicated to explain." He glances down the table. "Were you introduced to Vanya?" 

"Yes! Raleigh just said 'that's Larisa, next to her is Vanya'."

Nod. "Anyway. Vanya...had a very bad time of it, last session. He's still recovering and he needs a lot of support, right now. And right now we're very stretched, thanks to this maleficer situation. We have everyone in the enclave rotating through keeping him company and making sure his homework gets done. If you were willing to take on some of that, we'd be happy to lend you mana storage for as long as you're doing it." 

"What kind of keeping him company, is it just being around or do I need to think of things to talk about?"

"Just being around is fine." 

"You might have to remind him to eat and do his homework and stuff, but he's not very chatty unless you happen to want to talk about music." 

"Music's fine, I don't mind music. Tell me more about the specs for the mana sink?"

"Of course. Cassie, over to you?" 

"It's my design. Made with a one-inch tungsten cube, because for some reason in my freshman shop class the supply cabinets showed up a box of, like, fifty of them. It doesn't have a huge capacity, that's the main downside, but it's small and convenient and it barely leaks..." 

"That does sound useful. And - hmm, but I can't agree yet, I've just talked with you but it's Vanya I'd be hanging out with - do you talk?"

"Me and Vanya? Yeah, I mean, we've got the exact same schedule. Vanya's pretty cool. He's, like, really smart? He's taking calculus already as a sophomore. - He randomly bursts into tears a lot but you shouldn't take it personally, we all know him a lot better and we still can't manage to avoid that." 

"...I'm glad he's very smart. Um, I mean, it sounds like an okay plan, but I don't want to definitely commit to it because we might end up not liking each other. Having at this point literally never talked to each other."

Aaaaaaaaaaaah he obviously needs to talk to this other person but Vanya wishes the enclave would STOP finding him BABYSITTERS. It's really awkward. He can't be mad about it, not really - it's true that he can't really be trusted to be left alone during the day, even when he's not constantly resisting the urge to find something sharp. 

He is failing to actually make himself open his mouth and say words. 

Cassie knows that look; it's the expression Vanya gets when he's too overwhelmed to make decisions, it just means he needs some external nudging. 

"Here, Vanya, swap places with me?" 

....Sure, he can do that. 

How does small talk WORK this is so unfair. "I - um - I'm Vanya." What a stupidly redundant thing to say. "I - what's your affinity? Mine is music." 

"Shields, I think. I wonder if there's any way to combine those usefully but it might be kind of a stretch."

"Ooh. I'm trying to think... Can you sing at all, I bet I could write a co-cast spell that boosted the shield power a lot, but usually when I write multi-person spells everyone needs to be in the song at least a bit." 

"I... can sing at all," he says, slightly wry.

"It might also work if you could play an instrument, even if it wasn't very well? Oh, hmm, I think maybe drums would work well for shielding. You can use rhythms for structure." 

"I didn't bring an instrument..."

"I didn't get to bring almost any instruments and music is my affinity! Weight allowance is brutal for that. I made a guitar in shop. I bet drums would be really easy to make, you just need a hollow cylinder and an animal hide or something to stretch over it?" 

"Yeah, I think not having an instrument is a pretty solvable problem. Maybe we could go down to the shop and work on that at some point, if that seems worth it."

Nod. "What track are you going for?" 

"Alchemy."

"Cool! Same as Killian, then. Oh, and have you met Shannon? She's a freshman, indie from Canada but we traded a slot for her since Sacramento only has Raleigh this year. She's alchemy track." 

"Yeah, I was going to trade for her healing potion. Maybe also her mouthwash. I wanted to pay in mana but I didn't have storage and Raleigh smelled opportunity."

"Oh. Yeah, that makes sense." 

Vanya feels like he did a reasonable amount of conversation but that was so much talking and now the cafeteria feels way too loud and bright. 

Rebecca ventures over. "Hi Vanya! Hi everybody else! Especially Landon! Who's this?"

"This is Val. He has a shields affinity and he's doing alchemy track." 

"We've just been hammering out arrangements to loan him mana storage." 

"Is it as useful if you're just borrowing it? Isn't the point to save up lots over a long time?"

"I think the idea was that he wants to be able to trade a week's worth to someone but he can't save up that much with nowhere to put it?" 

"With Shannon, yeah - we were all on the same supply run, on the weekend, and Shannon's selling her healing potion." 

"Oh, that makes sense. Landon, does this work period work for you for my thing?"

Landon had, in fact, forgotten about this entirely - he keeps a schedule in his notebook and is normally very good at remembering his appointments, but the note is now, like, six pages back. 

"Yeah. Just give me five to finish eating?" 

"Sure, no problem."

"Rebecca, you should talk to Val here," Cassie says brightly. "Convince him that Vanya's not hard to get along with. He's worried they'll hate each other or something." 

"What, no, Vanya's great! Very musical, great voice, he has a guitar and let me play it a little bit - if I can get through all the languages I have to do right now I'm gonna do Russian next."

BLUSH.

"Would he have to be terrible not to end up liking me? I'll take that as a compliment, but I believe you about him being great."

"Well, I don't know you at all," she points out, "so maybe you guys just won't click but Vanya's great."

"I'm also great. Admittedly less musical, though."

"Well, maybe you'll have something else in common."

"I hope so."

"I don't usually not like people?" Vanya says, staring down at his lap.

"Right, yes, we all know you've got trouble disliking people even if they're actively horrible to you." Larisa narrows her eyes at Val. "Don't be horrible to him." 

"I'll remember that your advice included, and I quote, 'be horrible to him.'" Ugh this is the one way teenagers are worse than Catholics, they just say you shouldn't be horrible and part of the test is that you have to figure out what counts as horrible.

Larisa, maybe noticing some of that in Val's expression, frowns. 

"- Take a quick walk with me?" she says quietly to Val. "I should - probably convey some background about, er, this request." 

"...Okay." He'll follow her wherever; if it's a trap it's not like he's not doomed anyway.

"Sorry, won't take long." She casts Vanya's silencing spell. It's not in-affinity for her but it's not like the mana cost is prohibitive for a senior.

This NEVER gets any less awkward, does it.

"Uh. Right. So - I'm assuming you've noticed that Vanya...isn't very happy." 

"That seems like what I've noticed."

"Well. Something - happened, last year. We don't talk about it much for - reasons that will probably be obvious once I tell you. So I'd appreciate if you don't spread it around either. But..." 

And, briefly and tonelessly, she describes the major events of the maleficer pileup as they affected Vanya. 

"Oh, uh, that sounds like a fustercluck."

"Yeah. That's an understatement." 

"So he's... sad about that, or sick from what happened back then...?"

"We don't entirely know what's wrong. He was very sick from being nearly drained, and no one has any idea how long the effects of that last, and he directly experienced - whatever emotion an out-of-control maleficer with a powerful affinity for emotions is feeling while they drain and murder half a dozen people in a vengeance spree - and no one knows the long-term effects of that kind of mind-magic either." 

"And the thing that makes this better is not being lonely?"

"- Uh, sure, that seems to help any, but mostly he just - needs some support right now to look out for mals and get his homework done." And make sure he doesn't walk into the void but she's not quite ready to say that yet. "I should note that if you do spot any mals, he's got some great spells for exploding them." 

"So I play lookout and help him remember what he was working on?"

"- Yeah, that's basically it. If it turns out you actually enjoy hanging out with him, of course, we'd be happy to make this a longer-term thing, but - we're all very swamped and even if all you do is keep lookout and remind him what's due that day, that's valuable enough to us that it's worth lending you the mana storage." 

"This actually sounds like the kind of thing that might be worth more than just the storage, in terms of how much benefit you're getting."

"Oh?" Larisa raises an eyebrow. "What would you say it's worth, then?" 

(Plucky kid. He didn't look like much at first but she's starting to decide that maybe she likes him.) 

"Outgrown any magic outfits lately?"

"Hmm. I think that might be substantially more, and also no we haven't. Hmm - we've got a decent stash of stuff from the graduating class, it's in my room, if you'd like to swing by and pick out some alchemy ingredients or a minor magical item or two." 

"That and the mana storage? Sure."

"Great, sounds good, any questions?" 

"What, like I'll think of them before I've said no?"

Larisa rolls her eyes but she manages to keep it to a fairly restrained eyeroll. "Guess not, then, let's head back." 

Sure, he's not about to argue.

Back at the Sacramento table, one of the juniors is leaning across and asking Rebecca when she's got her first shop and lab classes. 

"I have shop first thing tomorrow and lab first thing Thursday."

"You got any friends in the same class to buddy with?" Glance over at Val. "Same question for you, new kid. Shop and lab when, are you covered for it. ...Mals probably won't be bad yet but it's a plausibly-deniable place for a maleficer to go after freshies." 

"All the New Yorkers are taking Monday morning shop, and I'm in language lab then, but... hopefully Orion'll have cleared the place out and it won't accumulate that many mals overnight? I don't know who else is in that section or if it'll be anybody I know."

"I've got lab before lunch Wednesday, shop early Thursday. Did you want me and one of your freshmen watching each other's backs?"

"- Uh, depends if it works out at all schedule-wise, we're pretty tight - oy, Landon! Check your book of all things, we got anyone with lab before lunch Wednesdays?" 

This earns Killian a harried look, but Landon flips around in his notebook while he finishes chewing his current bite of food. "...Not in Sacramento, and I don't see how to fit him into the roster without making someone walk halfway around the school, but - oh, good, it looks like one of the Oakland freshman has the same block. ...Oh, convenient, same for both lab and shop, actually. Destiny Williams. Val, have you met her? If not Killian can go do an introduction, they're sitting right over there."

"I haven't yet, thank you."

Expectant look at Killian. 

Killian rolls his eyes, but sure, whatever, he can go do an introduction. (Why are they schedule-wrangling for random freshman again? Oh right it's because Landon is into 'cheap but positive sum interventions' and also thinks that for some reason it's helpful to know the schedules of as many random freshmen as possible.) 

Landon finishes clearing his plate, and shoves it Larisa-ward. "Right. Rebecca, let's go." 

Well, he can go meet Destiny, then. He's antagonized Killian somehow but he's not really sure what to do about that yet.

Killian is not in fact feeling antagonized by Val as a specific individual! He's just really tired of Landon giving him work to do, though mostly he's actually frustrated with Landon deciding he gets to act like everyone's mom this week because there's a freshman maleficer, even though Killian is pretty sure there's no way a freshman can hurt him. And then Larisa is in a horrible mood because she's been pulling all-nighters again, and sniping at Landon endlessly. Killian isn't even sure why she's mad at him, but it's obvious she is, and it's getting tedious at this point. 

He ushers Val over to the Oakland table, where Morty and Destiny are sitting with the sophomores and juniors. (Oakland is small, and less well-resourced than Sacramento; they have zero surviving seniors this year.)

"Destiny? This is Val. You've got lab and shop together so I figured I'd introduce you." 

Destiny is a tiny, cheerful-looking African American girl, wearing a (magical) pink headband with a bow on it despite the fact that her hair is currently buzzed to less than a quarter-inch of fuzz, and holding hands with the boy next to her.

She beams at Val. "Hi!" Gosh he's pretty. Destiny has JUST enough self-control not to say that out loud to someone she literally just met. "This is the love of my life, Morty." 

"Hi, Destiny, hi, Morty."

"Did you do something to impress Landon already or did he just adopt you like a lost puppy?" 

Morty elbows her in the ribs. 

"What?" she mutters. 

"I'm just working with Sacramento."