In the Scholomance, stealing food is no mere inconvenience. "That's blatant. Who's Garbage Dump Kid?" 

"That one guy in Maleficaria from 1700, I don't know his name- I mean, obviously- skinny, black, vibes but also looked and smelled like he'd gotten everything he had on him out of the literal garbage?  One of the Shanghai freshmen is teaching him Mandarin- which, like, I wouldn't, but nobody's going to be stupid enough to go after Shanghai." 

And she really needs to figure out whether the Shanghai freshman in question is dating her before avoiding him gets any more obvious.  (For mainly this reason, Connie doesn't tend to sit places where she can see the Shanghai table.)

"Oh, the Shanghai thing - I think I saw him a few times at meals, Shanghai table can be, uh, dramatic - that might be the reformed maleficer Holden talked about on Monday? Masozi from Malawi." Alexius sounds eerily like Holden himself when he pronounces this. "He was supposedly cleared though..." A thought occurs to Alexius. "Did you see a gun on the thief, by chance?" It would normally be stupid to carry that around, but it is also stupid to steal cookies from random people while oozing maleficer vibes, so who knows. 

"No, but I wasn't looking all that closely- didn't look like he was gonna leave me alone so I just.  Shoved him and ran."  She'd gotten through the post-hoc adrenaline crash that evening, locked in her room as it sank in just how close she'd probably come to dying, she is not going to start shaking again now.  She takes a gulp of weirdly-chemical orange juice. 

Honestly this is a weird account altogether. A maleficer looking for prey shouldn't leave their victim alive and shouldn't be stopped by mere shoving, and a maleficer not actively hunting shouldn't blow their cover to steal cookies, what the heck. 

Mom told him that weird stories are a sign of people lying, but darned if he knows what motive Connie would have to lie about this. Garnering sympathy maybe?

"Did you tell anyone else?" If she told enough people to get word to New York or Shanghai, they have the resources to figure out if she's lying and that makes it much less likely that she is. You know, at least assuming Connie is not insane, because someone involved in this fustercluck definitely is. 

She gives a one-shouldered shrug, turning the sausage over on he plate.  "Haven't been shouting from the rooftops, but- one of the seniors from Mathematical Models, my bathroom pack, a few kids from Intro Incantations- I've been looking for Holden but haven't run into him yet, gonna let him know when I pick up Naomi's calc homework.  And there were some other kids in the hall, but nobody I knew and they weren't gonna get involved for a stranger."  She does a decent job of keeping her tone matter-of-fact; it's not like anyone would expect them to.

And here he is, all about to get involved. This is a point in favor of Connie being truthful, but... "It'd be good to tell one of the enclaves involved in the manhunt, too. Holden would probably get word to them but you could also go straight to New York?" He's seen enough contrived drama in movies to know that the thing to do when you have this kind of information is to immediately tell whoever needs to know it. So many horrible subplots that could be resolved with one full sentence of decent communication...

"You think they'd listen?  'S not like I have any proof, right, aside from the vibes he could just be a dick upperclassman and I'd have to find him again to point him out..."

"If he's acted like that once he's probably done it before, and if they get enough reports of an asshole with vibes then a pattern emerges, yeah?" He's starting to sound a little aggravated but maybe it's the spice. "If you don't want to tell 'em, I can. Every bit of info helps." 

"You're probably right, I just-"  Don't want to be associated with maleficing to any more enclavers than she has to, which is stupid, a reputation of 'victim' is less immediately dangerous than 'villain' but will get you just as dead eventually, but 'whistleblower' is probably fine?  And Boston has probably told them by now anyway. 

"I'll find a way to let them know, I guess.  I'd have to be the one telling them what he looks like anyway- uh, Asian kid, yea tall, hair like so, really skinny, if you run across anyone like that with vibes watch out."

"Noted. I'll keep an eye out. Do you want, uh..." he can't say "a bodyguard" because a) he's not that good yet and b) it might be insulting, so, "...help? Like, to pair up between classes? I have the counterspell and I think I could last longer than average against a freshman maleficer, buy you time to run." 

Connie's very much in favor of going between classes in a group, and is about to offer to compare the rest of their schedules and figure out a fair trade for the extra risk, when 'buy you time to run' sinks in and her brain skips a gear.  She can't pay for that. No one can pay for that.  No one offers that.  Why is her life like this.

"I.  I can't-"

Any more words than that are not super happening right now.

"...if you don't want to, you don't have to...?" In hindsight maybe they don't know each other that well? Maybe Connie thinks he might be the maleficer, despite having met a much more likely suspect? 

Connie shakes her head and puts a hand over her mouth- that might have come off as 'no, I don't want to' instead of 'no, that's not the problem' but she can tell if she tries to clarify it'll come out a wordless squeak-

It does strongly indicate "no, I don't want to," but now Alexius is concerned. "...are you okay?" In hindsight maybe that sausage looked a little suspicious, is she nauseous or something? 

Tiny nod.  

Alexius is skeptical, but that was definitely a yes. He should probably drop it. He is, however, officially out of ideas for making conversation. He takes an extra-large bite of waffle. The spice makes his eyes water, sufficiently distracting him from whatever is up with Connie for a minute. 

Connie puts her other hand over her face as well and takes a long slow breath.  Then another.  

That's done it.  She's gone and made it obvious how badly she gets stuck and he hasn't even seen her cast under pressure yet, her best shot at an ally is going to quite reasonably think she's useless and pathetic (...unless that's appealing to baffling suicidally generous boys?  She can't really afford to be offended about that but it's not like she's Pajamas Girl.)

She is not going to cry.  She keeps focusing on her breath and peeks between her fingers, multiplying all the numbers on the orange juice carton together until it gets too big to hold in her head and she can breathe mostly normally again. 

In the Scholomance, it's supposed to be polite to ignore people when they are having a breakdown. Alexius always thought that was monumentally stupid behavior. But he can't offer a hug like he would have for Roberta, since he seems to have upset Connie somehow. So: spicy waffle. Occasional concerned glance. He is so bad at this "pretending not to notice" business. 

I don't not want to but you dying instead is not a plan.

I'm not saying no but that's a bad idea.

I'm not saying no but we need a better plan.

I'm not saying no but we need a better plan.

I'm not saying no but we need a better plan.

That's probably a reasonable sentence, it doesn't leave him much room to back out if he's changed his mind but he still can it's just awkward, and this entire situation is full up on awkward.  One more deep breath and she takes her hands off her face, still looking at the juice carton instead of Alexius. 

"I'm- not saying no, but.  We need a- better plan."

What an awful waffle he has invented. Seriously, this is painful. Alexius soldiers on, buoyed by a mental chant of mana mana mana. 

Oh good, she's talking again. Alexius swallows his awffle with a barely-restrained grimace. "...better than walking between classes together? I mean, you're not wrong, it's still kinda shit, but freshmen only have so many options..."

"No, I-"  Augh the problem with saying words is that you then have to say more words.  She starts picking a muffin apart into crumbs just to have something to do with her hands.

"For- if we find him."  Well, 'if he finds us' is probably what she should have said, but she's not going back to correct it now.

"I'm open to suggestions? I am...moderately confident I can defend myself from a freshman maleficer long enough to, like, turn it into a stabbing contest instead of a magical one. I seriously doubt I can extend that to anyone else, it's pushing it to ask my affinity to cover a counterspell in the first place but if the effect is targeting me alone I can swing it." Also if the maleficer stabs him and attempts to pull malia he's in for a rude surprise, but of course Alexius can't say that. "Ergo, run and get help." 

Oh.  Run and get help.  She's an idiot.

...well, there's still the problem of finding someone who'll run toward the problem instead of away.

"If.  If I can't find someone, though.  Or soon enough."  She abandons the half-deconstructed muffin and drains the last of her juice.  Tries to think about tactics, better to focus on that than how much of a trainwreck she's made of this conversation.

"He's seen my force-net.  Not the fire spell."

"Yeah, there is that. Think the fire spell could kill or at least incapacitate?" Also why did you freak out, are you going to be okay, what the heck...