Logs:Playing Hooky

Playing Hooky
Dramatis Personae Nanami, Scott
In Absentia	2023-09-14 Oh don't worry, this music way louder than the welder.
Location <XAV> Workshop - Xs Grounds
A large barn-like building situated at the far end of the gardens from the mansion proper, this makerspace functions as a classroom for many of the more hands-on classes. An expanse of workshop space, it is subdivided into smaller segments for the different types of activities: Woodshop, Welding shop, Machine shop, Electronics, Bike shop, Screen Printing and Photography, Fabric Arts, and the Rapid Prototyping Lab with a trio of 3D printers. The space comes complete with a large host of tools available for use, although many of the more dangerous require prior clearance from administration to use -- students with appropriate clearance to use them can gain access to locked equipment with their student IDs. From sanders to MIG/TIG welders to soldering stations to industrial sewing machines to its own darkroom, though, this space is well equipped for teaching students how to make. It's the middle of the morning and probably, many classes are in session. Currently there's not any class in here, at least. Maybe Nanami has a free period -- but maybe not; it's no secret that she's skipped more classes than she's attended, since school got back in session. Currently she is working, though maybe not on schoolwork, she took Scott's welding class a couple terms back. She has a whole lot of carefully measured-and-cut metal tubes waiting and is currently just beginning to tack weld the first of them together; at this early stage of the project it would be difficult to tell what it's planning to be in the end if not for a nearby laptop open to a diagram and step-by-step instructions on building a small garden trellis. She's in old jeans, a pink babydoll tee under a loosely-buttoned green flannel (considerably too large for her, but the sleeves are carefully safely rolled up), hair tied back in two braids and all her safety gear mostly in place. She's currently substituted the actual ear mufflers she should be wearing for a pair of oversized headphones blasting Hayley Kiyoko, but that's some protection, right? Probably Hayley Kiyoko is drowning out the sound as Scott comes into the building, though he isn't moving extremely quietly. He raises one hand to frown over at the welding shop, even though the industrial welding screens are properly in place to block some of the bright welding arc, even though he looks like he's wearing tinted sunglasses anyway, though now he is carefully fitting a pair of welding goggles from a drawer labelled "MR. SUMMERS ONLY - DO NOT TOUCH" over them. He doesn't bother with much other safety equipment beyond gloves before he heads around the screens, but the first thing he does anyway is motion for Nanami to turn off her equipment. Nanami doesnt notice Scott until he's quite close; her eyes have gone startled-wide behind her glasses when he waves. "WHAT?" she's calling back way too loud, but given that she's turned the welder off in order to look up and yell this it works out fine. "... shoot you don't got class now, do you, I can go." At least this isn't yelled but it is considerably louder than it needs to be. "Oh, no, I --" Scott is also speaking a little louder than he needs to -- maybe out of habit, maybe following Nanami's lead. He evidently hadn't noticed that those are not ear mufflers; his eyebrows twitch into a slight frown only after the welder turns off. He mimes taking off just one of the ears and says at a slightly more reasonable volume, "No, not for a few hours. I just thought the workshop would be empty, I was going to take inventory. What are you working on?" His arms are folding across his chest, but -- maybe this is more out of discomfort than sternness. Already his gaze is wandering away from Nanami to her project. "Oh!" Nanami pushes one of the earphones back behind her ears, her voice lowering once she isn't quite so drowned in noise. "It's nothing, I just, one of da kine -- uh, one of the trellises in the garden, wen get pretty rotted, I think it's like, old-old, I thought..." She looks down to the many pipes in front of her and then back to her optimistically googled design like she's only Just Now when faced with the shop teacher, comparing this project to her very rudimentary level of welding practice. At least One Doubt is creeping in. She bites down on one corner of her lip and then crinkles up her nose. "Thought this would last longer," she finishes, though less confidently. Scott nods -- "Yeah, this place is really old," he says, his voice dropping even lower to its quiet baseline. "When I first graduated I made a whole project of just -- fixing everything I could find wrong, but... less time for that now. Is that your design?" He isn't walking around the table to look at her laptop yet, but his gaze is falling curiously to the back of it. "Let me know if you need any help installing it or digging out the old one. Are you," his voice does not lose any of its mild matter-of-factness even as he changes the topic, "supposed to be in class right now?" "No -- I mean, I googled this design and I kind of wen add some things where it looked -- but no." Nanami shakes her head and -- now is abruptly looking very intently back at the laptop. "I'm doing work." This may not be an answer but her suddenly defensive tone certainly is. Maybe Scott was about to head over to look at the trellis design -- he is shifting on his feet -- but at Nanami's shift in tone, he goes still again, unfolds his arms and slides his hands into the pockets of his work pants instead. "It's okay to take a mental health day once in a while, I'd rather you did it in here than leaving campus. But if you're taking a lot of mental health days, I start thinking maybe it's not doing you that much good." "I'm not taking one mental health day," Nanami replies with the mild and passive derision of someone who firmly believes Mental Health is something only Crazy People need to think about and not totally sane teenagers who attacked a military prison and then got tortured in it. "I just wanted to build something. Besides," sounds less defensive and more cavalier, though the tighter curl of her shoulders doesn't quite suit the tone, "What do I need class for, now. Ryan Black wen give me big money. After," her concession is a bit sulky, "I graduate." "Playing hooky, then," Scott corrects himself smoothly. Possibly this is the phrasing he would prefer, anyway; the corner of his mouth is twitching. He looks again at Nanami's collection of metal tubes, taking a step back to lean comfortably against a heavy workstation. Maybe Nanami isn't really asking, but Scott's not really answering either. "I don't know," he says gamely. "What do you want to do? You got plans for that big Ryan Black money yet?" "What fo I need English anyway, I already know English." Nanami is getting somewhat less guarded when it seems like there is not a detention imminently forthcoming. She does look back down at the pipes when he does, weight shifting from one booted foot to the other. She's thinking over her answer -- looking up at Scott quickly, thinking better of giving her first answer to a teacher, and settles on the appropriately responsible, "I guess I'll need somewhere to live?" She sounds skeptical of that, and then turns to give Scott a thoughtful look. "How come you stay here forever?" Scott doesn't laugh, doesn't even commit to a smile, but surely his answer of, "As long as you're still in math," is not serious. He taps his thumbs against the exterior of his pockets just twice before he stills them again. "Probably," he says -- that's not a serious answer either, but when he looks back up at Nanami he says more honestly, more plainly, "I didn't have anywhere to go when I graduated, so, figured I might as well. I like it here." Nanami's brow scrunches, and she's looking at Scott a longer time, now. Maybe a little sadder, definitely a lot more curious. "All that time since," there's an unintentional emphasis here that suggests 'time since Scott graduated' is in Nanami's mind probably bare minimum, a hundred years, "You never want go?" "All my people are here too. Well --" whatever correction he was about to make dies before it is verbalized, vaporized in a sudden, short shake of his head. "I've gone to a lot of places," he says instead. "We have -- well, you've seen the jet. But I've never wanted to -- leave, no. Your world," he lapses abruptly back into a teacherly tone, "can be as big or as small as you want it to be. The trick is figuring out what that is." There's a still-further deepening of Nanami's frown, but the expression evaporates somewhere just after Scott's head shake. "Hah! My hanabata days," she's saying this like childhood was so long ago for her, "I spend on one small island. I think maybe now it should be bigger, but." She doesn't finish this but, just lets it sit in the air a moment as something a little grimmer passes over her expression and just as quick flits away into a crooked smile. "-- anyway can't stay here, fix things. That spot been taken." "My bad," says Scott, but his expression has eased too; he is almost smiling back. "While you are here, though, feel free to --" he backtracks fast before he endorses random unsupervised mansion repairs. "I could always use help fixing things up, if you want. Call it independent study. You do," this is still not quite stern, though he's straightening his spine slightly, "still have to go to your actual classes, though. At least most of the time." There's just a moment where Nanami's face lights brighter at this offer, but she's collected herself before she replies lets too much eagerness slip into her casual, "Yeah, I could help." She tucks her headphone back onto her ear and idly shifts her foot back to the pedal of the welder without yet starting it. "Next block it's just art, this teacher no good." Kind of matter-of-fact, though her expression is a little more glum than before. Her gloved hand shifts its grip on the torch and she promises with an exaggerated grimace: "Tomorrow, mebbe. Got math." Scott's mouth twitches again, but he otherwise makes no indication he saw Nanami do anything embarrassing or feelingsy -- he claps his hands together as he straightens up, very matter-of-fact, though the gloves muffle the sound significantly. "Well," he says, "you know where to find me." He gestures to her headphones -- "What's the noise reduction rating on those?" "What?" Nanami is for a moment looking blank, before her eyes turn up towards her hairline as if she could see the headphones on her head. "Oh don't worry," she's quick to reassure Scott, a little too loud again, "this music way louder than the welder." Judging by the skeptical lift of his eyebrow, Scott is not convinced by this; his gaze tracks over to one of the numerous signs in the workshop reminding students to wear PPE, then back to Nanami. "I'll get you earmuffs," he says, also raising his voice. "You can put your music on the stereo if you want, I don't mind." He does not wait for her to protest before he heads back around the screen.