ANGEL | Neo [The Martix]

Prologue

PROLOGUE

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    The narrow halls ahead of the girl were less crowded than usual. Freshmen and sophomores roamed and stood happily, relieved knowing that the upperclassmen were on a field trip to the city's aquarium.

    Well, most upperclassmen.

    Angela walked out of the school's crowded lunchroom, the murmuring of the crowd trailing behind her. She had already found herself unlocking the combination of her locker without even thinking of the number sequence, instead twisting and turning how she had done the entire year.

10-13-33

    The dark haired girl pulled the lock and opened her locker, her eyes landing on the reflection of herself. She fixed her headband first before reaching into her locker to pull out her white Philosophy binder and her black pencil pouch. Angela closed the gray locker, locking it, before walking away to her Philosophy class.

    The absence of her Junior friends by her side gave her time to truly think of how long it took to walk from the second floor to the third. The windows in the staircases were open because of the change of weather in Chicago, it was finally warm and sunny. Though, throughout the day Angela found herself tugging her white skirt down from time to time and pulling her light gray knitted top once in a while.

    Angela reached the third floor and turned down the hall heading straight for the open Philosophy classroom. Upon entering, she gave the teacher a small smile then headed straight for the first seat of the first pair of desks. Eight desks in total were paired in twos in a curve in the middle of the classroom.

    She was the first to enter, and as she smoothed out her skirt and crossed her legs over one another, other students were entering and the sound of the hall just outside increased in voices. The students paired up at the desks amongst themselves as Angela sat still at her own desk.

    "Okay class, I didn't expect it to be this small, but I took out the other desks to make things less claustrophobic," the male teacher laughed.

The usual class of twenty junior and senior students was instead a class of eight desks for the day because of the aquarium field trip.

   He spoke again after no one had laughed, "Well, we won't be learning anything new today. I only have a small packet for you to work on for the rest of the class period. You can work in groups or pairs as long as you turn in the packet completed by the end of the period," he dropped the pile of packets on the table in front of the classroom and returned to his desk.

   As Angela shifted her legs to the side to stand up, a packet fell on her desk in front of her. Her eyes staring at the dirty and scuffed white Nike sneakers on the classroom floor, trailing up to meet a warm smile.

   "You're late Mr. Anderson," the teacher stated from his desk.

   The dark haired boy clutched a notebook and unsharpened pencil in his hand and turned around, "I know, sir, I'm sorry," he said, taking a seat next to Angela.

   The teacher shook his head sighing, "Jobs won't tolerate sorry in the future, Thomas."

   Thomas only nodded before turning to face Angela, "Thank you, Thomas," she spoke, gesturing to the packet he grabbed for her.

   Thomas nodded, "I would have thought you would have gone on the field trip," he admits, shifting in his seat.

   Angela shakes her head, "Well I thought the same for you," she replies staring.