Nowhere Man

[Benjamin Argall]

A lot of people liked to stay inside buildings and doors despite the weather outside. Others only wanted to be outside only in the good weather. Then there were the people who wanted to be outside all the time despite the weather.

Benjamin Argall fell into the third category. He hated being indoors because it was too crowded and a little too cramped. Unfortunately, growing up in a house that was actually rather small with three sisters, an occasional brother, and his parents with his uncle and cousin spending more time in that house than in their own had left him not enjoying the indoors so much. Schools had a heck of a lot more people... and flourscent lighting.

He walked into the Main Hall and looked around for anyone he recognized and then found himself mostly just hanging around. Why was it that people seemed to get younger and shorter every year?

[Professor Estelle]

Several things were more interesting when you were blind.

Demon hunting definitely fell in that category because most demons, undead, and fae got positively gleeful when they realized you couldn't see. That was generally right before anything not nailed down (and some things that formerly were) started flying at them at high velocity in tearing winds and they figured out that just because she couldn't see them didn't mean she had no idea where they were.

Walking through crowds was another one. It was almost deafening, for one thing, even if the people weren't trying to be loud. And people kept moving, which made it harder to keep track of them.

The Main Hall wasn't overly crowded today, but the sheer noise of children and teenagers mostly made up for it. Seraphina didn't mind. She had nieces and nephews back home about the same age and had lots of practice dealing with their cheerful cacophony.

Beneath the talking and laughter, a pleasant low hum sounded and here eyebrows rose. They had decided to do regular sweeps through the school grounds, just to see if there were any more initiate stragglers Rudra or Kingsley hadn't picked up yet. That was turning out to be a good idea.

She slid her finding crystal out of its pocket and looped the chain it was on around her wrist, letting the crystal itself hide between her palm and her cane. She habitually let the cane swing anyway and that made it easier to hunt.

[Benjamin Argall]

Now, most people on seeing a blind woman would immediately get out of her way and then ignore the blind lady. Benny only knew about her being blind because of the white cane. Back home there'd been a woman who was blind with her own white cane. He'd learned then that only blind people were allowed to legally carry a cane of that color. When she seemed to be walking toward him, he stepped to the side and then forward, to her side.

"Excuse me, do you need help navigating around?" He asked before touching her, hopefully in a comforting tone.

She didn't look like a student, so maybe she was a new member of the faculty. He didn't know. Benjamin had certainly never seen her before. Though Benjamin couldn't imagine what would possess the administrators here to hire a blind woman to do at a boarding school. Kids were just too messy to be around blind folk. If this lady was a teacher, she'd get murdered.

[Professor Estelle]

The crystal did a jig under her hand when she heard the voice, and Seraphina grinned. ::Tag, you’re it.:: Of course, finding them was the easy part, so she couldn’t congratulate herself too much. He still had to step through the looking glass on his own, and that would take convincing.

Rule #15: demon hunter initiates tended towards Boy Scout and/or Hero complexes somewhere in their personalities. Otherwise they wouldn’t be interested in saving the world on a semi-regular basis.

Rule #15a: That’s painfully easy to exploit.

She turned towards his voice and gave him a pleasantly relieved smile. “Well, yes, if you have a few minutes. Do you know where the Founder’s Hall is? I have an appointment with someone there and … well, I can’t exactly read a map,” she said with a dry touch of self-depreciating humor. ::Come on, super hero, do the chivalrous thing. Take the bait. ::

[Benjamin Argall]

If Benjamin knew he was being baited (and he didn't), he didn't show it. In fact, he felt ample rage towards the people who ran this blasted place for letting a new blind person arrive and not designating someone to show her around until she felt comfortable. Wasn't his brother paying them enough for them to do that?

"Sure, I know where it is," He said, sounding slight defensive when he was really still thinking out his rage towards the school. Seriously, Ben thought he was dense sometimes, but could the bard members of the school be that stupid?

He looped his arm around the woman's arm that wasn't holding the white cane and began to lead her towards where he knew Founder's Hall was. He'd never been inside there before, but he'd walked by it more than a few times over the years.

"Come on, I'll show you the way, miss. I'm Benjamin by the way... I'm a Senior here... and you are?" He said it very quickly, trying to sound polite. He waited for a response before leading her. He didn't want to overwhelm the poor woman.

[Professor Estelle]

"Seraphina Estelle," she answered brightly. "I am ... not a Senior. In any sense of the word." She tucked her white cane beneath her arm and hoped she wouldn't have to traumatize this one too much. He was being extremely considerate about being shanghaied.

The warmth of the day rose around them as they stepped out of the Main Hall, and the doors muffled the sounds. There were people on the grounds, of course, but most of them she could hear off in the direction of the courtyard trees. That suited her just fine, as she had a student to get to know.

"So ... Benjamin or Ben? And where are you from? You have a very nice voice and I'd say the accent sounds pretty South. Am I close?"

[Benjamin Argall]

"Well, it depends on who you ask about the whole Benjamin or Ben thing. I'm not really too uptight on what people should call me. Usually I just let them pick since they've done that since I was born," Benjamin explained with a shrug. Heck, now he even had a roommate who called him Benji. How could he be ptight about it so long as they didn't call him something completely off... like James. "So I guess you just shouldn't call me late for dinner," he added, feeling very proud of himself for that little joke. Sometimes he could sneak a joke it... just not often and never very clever.

And she wasn't a Senior. He was probably right. She was probably a member of the staff. Which made this school the biggest bunch of idiots in the world. He'd have to tell Sammy about this.

"And you're really close, whole family's from Kentucky. Lived there... for I don't know how many generations," he said trying to think about it as he led her in the direction of the Founder's Hall.

[Professor Estelle]

"Around here I'd be more worried about being called dinner," she answered dryly. "It's high school, after all."

::He's comfortable,:: she thought clinically, noticing that Ben's arm wasn't tense and his stride wasn't stiff, though he was shortening it a bit. Most people unconsciously acted like she was contagious. ::Very much a knight in shining armor.:: Not that it was a bad thing, especially in their line of work. Her husband had that tendency too, and it usually just made him determined.

"Kentucky, hm? Sounds like you have a big family."

[Benjamin Argall]

"And that's why I thank God that I'm a Senior and not a scrawny little Freshmen," Benjamin said in response to the being called dinner remark.

He continued to lead her steadily towards the Founder's Hall place. He hoped she didn't need help finding her way around there. After all, he'd be as lost as she was in there. He'd never been in that place before. In fact, he wasn't interested in ever going near there.

"I'm the fourth child out of five," Benjamin said with a nod, "And my cousin Angie is practically the little tomboy sister I wish I could've had instead of one of the other three... or all of them."

Benjamin chuckled and shook his head.