Chapter Text
~
They finally stood in front of that door. Boy, was that train ride long. The door was labelled; names, presumably Rhen's new roomates. Aruna and Cass, though Rhen was informed they'd have three roomates. Maybe the third was just late? Or maybe they declined at the final second, who knows.
Pushing the door open, Rhen discovered the room was completely empty, save for three beds, one against the left wall, one against the back, and another against the right wall. The walls were a pale yellow, and the floors plain oak. He was the first to arrive, undoubtedly.
He went for the bed against the right wall. In his mind, it made for more privacy, since the door swung towards the right wall meaning the left would be on full display and the one against the back was.. well... right there, in the middle.
They chucked their stuff down. Kandi, beads, a couple pairs of clothes, a pillow and a sheet. They didn't bring much to the dorms. They didn't need to. Rhen was told they could always go back home if they missed anything, though the thought of that wasn't pleasant. Please, no more train rides. Not any time soon. They weren't sure they could withstand that hell of a transport system again.
Gently closing the door, he started to unpack. And then the door was burst right back in again.
A flurry of brown pigtails and bright pink wings raced in, before purple eyes locked onto Rhen and started to look very apologetic.
“Oh, hi! Sorry if I disturbed you... Uh... My name's Aruna! We're roomates, right?” She said, resting a large duffel bag onto the middle bed. The middle bed of all places. She's got courage, huh?
“Oh, yeah! My name's Rhen..” They said, before shifting their gaze back to unpacking like they first were trying to do. “Hey, have you met Cass yet? It seems like if we're both here, he could be right behind.”
“Aruna” seemed to be thinking for a second before answering, “Nope.” Not the answer Rhen was hoping for, but he didn't mind that much.
~~~
It was 6pm. 6. FREAKING. PM. And this “Cass” had still not arrived. Rhen was going to assume that they weren't going to arrive at this point. Until he walked in a minute after Rhen thought of that.
Cass had red hair with blue strands framing their face. Antlers sprouted from their head and light brown wings were drooping from their back in exhaustion. Rhen would've talked to them, if only they hadn't immediately gotten onto the one remaining bed and went out cold.
Aruna was very obviously feining sleep, which Rhen interpreted as wanting privacy to do other things, so he left.
What he'd do out in the corridor? Beyond him. Maybe talk to people in other dorms. Maybe just wander. He ended up deciding on the latter.
... Rhen didn't know how long he was out there for, but when he came back Aruna was definitely, actually asleep this time. He could tell. She snored.
Good news for Rhen though, because it seems that Aruna had an alarm clock. It was just sitting on the floor, since they didn't have bedside tables. It read 12:00am. Wow, he'd been out there for a while.
They climbed back into their bed, and tried to rest. They don't know why they couldn't. They ended up staring at the alarm clock until it was 5:30, because that's when they heard very loud, incessant sprinting down the hallway. Then the door opened.
The person who opened the door had purple hair, and at least one braid, because that's all Rhen could see. She only seemed to be peeking in a little.
“Hey? I hope one of you is awake, because I'm going to get floors one and two to have a group breakfast since we're all in the same year!” The speaker paused to take a breath, “It starts 6am at the Traffic cafe. Okay bye-!” and then she was gone. Didn't even close the door.
Rhen got up groggily and went to close it. Then he decided it was time to wake his companions. He turned the light on, and made his way over to Aruna. Picking up the alarm clock off of the floor, he attempted to find a way to make it go off. It was actually pretty easy, and soon Aruna was up and getting ready, be it a little shaken, maybe a little woke, you'd say. (Why am I like this)
Now, Cass... Cass would most likely be a little harder. With how tired they seemed the night before, Rhen would be surprised if he could even open his eyes at all. And it came as a bit of a shock when almost immediately, Cass got up. Must be a really, really shallow sleeper.
It was 5:50am when they were all ready to get going. The cafe was about five minutes away, so no real rush. Aruna had offered to drive for the three and Rhen was very clear on their intent to take up her offer. Cass didn't seem too sure but went with it anyway.
Traffic cafe was a beautiful place. There was a theme of green, yellow and red hearts in every crevice, and they somehow didn't make it look too overused. If it wasn't any of those colours, it was dark grey or brown, a nice contrast to the bright hues.
Once they entered, it was very clear where they'd be sitting. That person who was setting this up had rented the biggest seating spot they had, and there were three seats that were untaken, perfect for the three of them.
Once they sat down everyone started to introduce themselves. The purple haired organiser turned out to be called Aether.
Others at the table were named Blu, MP, Lia, Reza, Cass, Dove, Bison, Grass, Cosmos, Salmon, Ferret, Milly, Walrus, Aurie and Blos. Then Aether handed out the menus.
Flipping through the pages, Rhen didn't really find anything they liked. Not in breakfast, at least. And then they saw the kids section.
“Dino nuggets. There's dino nuggets.” They felt eyes turning to stare at them, probably wondering why they were talking about a kid's dinner meal when they were an adult at breakfast-
And then everyone started excitedly chatting about Dino nuggets. When the waitress came back, Aether almost immediately handed the menus to her, and Rhen could barely hear her say “Dino nuggets for all eighteen of us.” He smiled wide.
It took them half an hour to get the essentially feast of Dino nuggets to them, but lord it was worth it. It was hyped up so high by everyone while waiting.
For now, Rhen would be okay with this. Maybe they'll have Dino nuggets again tomorrow morning. Who knows.