Issue 1 Downtime

Haley shivered in her light jacket, wiping the tears from her face as she walked around the gardens, her arms hugging her chest. She woke up screaming again, another terrible nightmare, and her roommate stalked out of the room while she sat in bed crying.

Bitch...thinks she's so perfect...her gorgeous hair, and ridiculous body, and her perfect at everything...ness....

She'd wanted nothing more than to just get out of her room where nothing but nightmares waited for her, so she popped open her window and floated herself down to the ground so she could take a walk and not be bothered by anyone...or bother anyone else apparently. She finally stopped her walk outside the entrance to the hedge maze, a small grove of trees surrounding a brick patio with several benches. The moon was somewhat bright, so it had an eerie beauty to it as she took a seat and let herself finish sniffling the tears away, pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her chin on them.

((open!))

There's a faint buzzing in the air coming from inside the maze, slowly growing louder.

....the hell?

Haley froze, a much different kind of shiver running down her spine, her eyes glued on the entrance to the hedge maze.

Shit...shit...shit...why didn't I just stay in my room...

"Somebody there. Wonder what the hedges taste like. Should be asleep. The air tastes salty. Who cares. See what's wrong. Hide in the maze. Moon's pretty tonight.

The buzzing carried with it the whispering of voices. At least it seemed that way, echoing in Haley's head. And then suddenly a stream of locust rushes from the maze and swirls around and around over the grass.

Haley watched the bugs with more fascination than terror as they swarmed out of the maze.

What the hell...can I hear bugs now?

The swarm keeps dancing for a while, slowly collapsing into a more and more dense cloud until they all kind of blur together into a short black-haired woman in a light summer-dress.

"Hi. Hope we didn't scare you too much..." she smiles faintly.

The whispering voices are still faintly audible if Haley listens though they seem a little more muted now.

Haley breathed a gigantic sigh of relief. Just a fellow mutant.

"It's okay...had kind of a rough night so I'm scaring easily," she said shyly. "Are you one of the university students?"

"We are." she nods. "We heard you crying. Are you okay?" she goes on, walking over to Haley.

We...oh...all the bugs?...

"Yeah...my roommate is a heinous bitch, and this new school gives me really bad nightmares. I dunno what it is. Old houses or something..."

"That sucks... We miss our home too, but it's much better here. Why don't you get along with your roommate?"

"We both like the same guy. She got him so I don't know why she needs to be a bitch about it too. I mean, she head butted me in the cafeteria over him! Now we're here, and by some cruel fucking joke we're rooming together."

"That's not very nice of her... Maybe they wanted you two to make up and get along?"

"Maybe..." she said. "Not working though. I wake up from having a nightmare and she just yells at me."

"That's horrible." she frowns. "That kinda explains fleeing the room in the middle of the night."

"She left too...but I didn't want to be there when she got back," she frowned.

"I don't know why she hates me so much. I mean if not for the guy thing we'd probably get along okay, but she's just so mean to me all the time now..." she sniffled.

"Maybe she thinks you're still after him?"

"Who knows..." she sighed. "She can have him. He's cute but I'd rather not touch anything else she's touched."

Teri nods. "Good on you for being the better person."

"I guess..."

Haley sighed wiping her face again. "So what's your name? I don't think we even got that far. I'm Haley."

"Oh! We're so sorry! We're Teri."

"Nice to meet you, Teri," she smiled. "So do you fly around the hedge maze in the middle of the night often?"

"Sometimes. It's nice to just drift around and people don't like it, usually, so we do it out here."

"So like....what's more.... I guess comfortable...to be like this or like...all swarmy and stuff?"

"Sometimes it's hard to make up our mind and being like that helps."

"Sorta...let the majority decide?" she asked.

"Yes. No."

"Sort of. We're not sure. Maybe?"

"I...can see how that would be hard sometimes. Lot of opinions."

"Sometimes we get distracted." she nods. "But swarming helps."

"Well at least you've got something that helps. My TK gives me headaches and acts up a bunch.

"Wish we'd have advice, but I'm sure you'll figure it out." she nods.

"I hope so. Stress in my room probably doesn't help things."

"Have you tried getting along with her?"

"I try to be nice...maybe I should be really like...really really nice?"

"It wouldn't hurt, right? Turn the other cheek." she smiles.

"I will...maybe I'll leave her a nice note and like...ask her to dinner to like...clear the air..."

"See, that's a great idea!"

"So can you talk to like...other insects too?" she asked changing the subject.

"Oh, yes, we can! Though they're not quite as smart as us."

"All kinds?"

"Yeah. But we like ants and bees the most."