Is This Safe?

Who: Sammy and Linn
Where: MSHS; Science lab
When: Second period

Sammy looked warily at the counter in front of him and the different chemicals and equipment that lined the metal top. The very sight of them was displeasing to him as he stared discontentedly at the burners and beakers and different solutions that were all supposed to do something to make something else and, oh, why was he in this class? He wanted to melt into the floor or shift into a bird and make his escape but, really, it wasn't possible and so he could only sit tiredly in terror as the teacher called out who was paired with him in this lab.

"Linn Constable, you're with Sammy. He's the one by the window at the front and to the left."

Ah. So THAT was that curly-haired boy's name. Linn had noticed him in the class, but hadn't quite managed to hang onto his name yet, though he'd heard it a few times when Mrs. Wu had called attendance. And the poor guy looked absolutely glued to his seat in terror. With slight amusement, Linn slung his messenger bag over his shoulder and made his way across the room, accidentally knocking his bag into a girl without noticing. "Heya," he said, offering Sammy a grin as he plopped onto the stool next to him. "Please tell me you're some kinda Einstein..."

“Out of luck.” Sammy set his notebook on the gleaming counter careful of everything since – hey – he didn’t know if anything set in front of them was acidic or not. “I take it you aren’t some kind of genius, either?” And already he could see them failing this experiment because neither of them knew what to do. That would be just great, except…it really wouldn’t be great at all. It kind of sucked in fact. Sucky dream-following morning turning even more sucky.

"Not a genius in the classroom, no," Linn said. He didn't look too broken up over it. It was a fact that he had gotten used to by now. But this kid looked hard-core worried about it. Either Linn'd need to show him that there's more to life than worrying about grades... or he'd need to straighten up and try harder on this project so he wouldn't let the kid down. He'd have to decide which way to go... "She doesn't mind if you talk in class, you know. No need to pass notes."

Sammy looked up from the instructions Mrs. Wu had left beside them, eyebrows raised and mouth in a somewhat “oh” like way as he blinked at Linn. He set the paper down – still careful, though this time of the burner rather than the chemicals – and grabbed his pen from where he’d left it. “Uh, not passing notes…” He laughed slightly, a bit surprised he could considering the dream from earlier. “I can’t talk.” Hm. Would that cause a problem here? If he actually got something, had to explain in a hurry, and then couldn’t because he had to write it all out? Well, they would probably find out.

"Oh." Linn tried to smile encouragingly. "Well. This is my second year taking chem... maybe it won't go so badly this time around...." He took the instructions and glanced over them. "Okay. Want me to read the procedure-thingy so you can do what it says? It's kinda hard to read directions and follow them at the same time, yanno?

“I…” Sammy considered that for only a second then offered his own grin to Linn though it was less encouraging and more ‘okay, so, maybe we won’t die after all.’ “Alright then, though, if acid eats my hands off I’m not going to be so very pleased. I might sue.” He looked down at his hands then shuddered – okay, so, that was pretty much the most awful thought ever more or less.

"Sue me? Or sue the school?" Linn asked with a wrinkle to his nose. His folks didn't have much money, what with all the kids and everything. "And it says here that first they want us to make a Mixture A by melting specimen 1 in liquid x, and then adding liquid y to dilute it. Got that?"

“Um…” He scratched his back for a second, bending his arm at an awkward angle to do so. “The school,” Sammy finally decided, nodding so that the beads at the ends of his braids slid against each other – he couldn’t sue Linn, he hadn’t put the chemicals there. “Definitely the school.” He reached for the mentioned supplies and carefully – double checking the ingredients – started to do what the instructions said to do.

"Good... Maybe I'd sue the school, too. For endangering my partner and making it so that I have to work alone, which would SUCK... The only good thing about chem labs is getting to spend the whole class in anti-chem commiseration with a lab partner." He watched the way Sammy mixed the ingredients carefully. He felt bad that the guy couldn't talk while mixing, since he couldn't write. It must be REALLY hard not being able to talk ever... He wondered what happened so that he couldn't talk. Maybe he'd ask him.

Sammy added the last part of the experiment and set the beaker he’d poured the diluting liquid from down. He watched the mixture for a few minutes, his knee jiggling nervously, then turned to look at Linn and point his pen at the paper he still held. “What’s it supposed to do?” He asked, eyes flicking warily to the beaker that held everything, almost like he expected flames or shadows or something to come shooting out of it or for it to explode or… …Well, a whole lot of things, he decided, could happen to it that would be Bad with a capital B, but with any luck it was…doing what it was supposed to. “I hate chemistry…” I hate science. Period.

"I think it's supposed to be blueish and sorta milky?" Linn looked carefully at the greenish, semi-clear liquid for a moment, before touching Sammy's knee with his hand to stop it from jiggling. "Well. Maybe if it sets up for a while?" He smiled brightly. "So. Mixture B? We gotta take specimen 2 and let it melt in liquid z... then stir it over the open flame until it has the same consistency as Mixture A."

Vaguely Sammy wondered if he had mixed the wrong ingredients into the first mixture, but there really wasn’t anything he could do about it, and so he started the second mixture. His knee tried to jiggle again, but the weight of Linn’s hand on it stopped the movement effectively so he stopped completely, not attempting it again. A noxious smell wafted from the beaker the second he combined the two ingredients, and he scowled, trying to repress the feeling of nausea the scent created - no smells...not right now... “…is it supposed to smell? Please tell me it is…”

"Heck if I know," Linn said, squinting slightly as he looked first at the directions, then at their little experiment, a small smile on his lips. "Wanna go wander around the room and smell other peoples' projects? I'll let you free..." He laughed at the way he was still holding Sammy's knee, much more amused with the whole situation than Sammy. "Though the smell's not so bad... I bet it's fine."

Sammy made a terrible face, recoiling at the very thought of wandering among the other smelly chemicals and the girls who smelled of perfume and the boys who smelled like they had bathed in their cologne. “Can we?” He asked, though he wanted to say that he refused to do so on the grounds that he’d had a terrible, smell-filled dream that morning and smells were bothering him.

"YOU can. If it's so important to you." He grinned and hit Sammy's knee slightly, then reached up to pull the rubber band out of his own hair. He quickly smoothed his hair down before re-doing his low ponytail. "I think it looks and smells just gorgeous and that we should finish up this experiment so that we can spend the rest of the period playing Su Doku puzzles for extra credit. THAT's how I'm gonna pass this class..."

For a minute it looked like Sammy was going to get up and actually do that – just to make sure that that their experiment was alright – but in the end he decided against it. He wasn’t going to go around smelling everything just to find out that their experiment smelled like none of the others and either theirs was wrong or everyone else’s was wrong. Which wasn't likely. He stayed in his seat and hooked his feet underneath it. “We get extra credit for completing Sudoku puzzles right?” He blinked at Linn. “Honestly?”

"Yeah, man. Wu's dad has like, Alzheimer's or something. So she wants us to do these So Duko things so the same thing doesn't happen to us..." He glanced furtively up at the teacher, then leaned in close to Sammy's ear, and added in a soft, breathy whisper, "But you know what I think?"

Sammy shifted in his seat so he was further away from Linn and could see him easier. “Whassat?” He asked before leaning in to sniff at the second experiment again. Carefully. In case it decided to come shooting out of the beaker to burn him or eat his flesh off.

Linn's cell phone went off --playing "Vince the Loveable Stoner" with lots of gusto-- before Linn could respond. "Dangit. That's my mom's ring..." He dove for his phone, muttering about how he was sure he had turned it off before class. When he had sat back up, cell phone in hand, Mrs. Wu sat over him, her hand held out.

"No cellular phones in the classroom, Linn Constable. You know that." She motioned for him to hand it over.

“They cause cancer, you know. And brain tumors.” Sammy wrote, keeping his paper turned away from Mrs. Wu so she couldn’t see what he’d written. It was just because she sounded like his mom that he added that as he watched the scene playing out. Plus it took his mind off of other things. Like dreams.

Linn saw Sammy's words, and bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. "But, Mrs. Wu. It was my mom! Like, God. Who knows. She could be sick or something, yeah? Or having her baby?" Not that she was currently pregnant... or at least, she wasn't last time Linn had checked.

"Very well. Keep the phone and fail this lab." Mrs. Wu turned to walk away dismissively.

Linn stared after her with shock. Suddenly this was not his --or Sammy's-- day.

Sammy stared at Mrs. Wu’s retreating back, blinking at her rapidly, jaw somewhat unhinged as he breathed out one long breath. She was just walking away and there was the failing which he did not like to do and…crud! He wasn't going to fail, his day had already been bad and no, he didn't want it to get worse. He turned his paper over to a clean page quickly, wrote a note and slid off his stool to hurry after her and catch her arm. “…even if we did the experiments right?”

Linn read his note, then looked at Sammy. His carefree attitude sunk just lightly as he muttered, "Yeah. No way." He jumped up from his stool, causing it to squeak noisily on the linoleum, but he ignored the sound as he hurried after the teacher, grabbing ahold of her sleeve. "Ms. Wu... Wait. Come on... What about Sammy? That's not fair!"

Mrs. Wu turned to look at them both and held her hand out. “Your cell phone until the end of class, then, Mr. Constable? You’ll get it right back after.”

What amazing fortune. Linn quickly held his phone out to Mrs. Wu, saying, "Thanks Ms. Wu. I promise to be good... from now on, I swear." He spun on his heel and collapsed in his stool next to Sammy, laying his head on the table, perilously close to Mixture B's beaker. "What a witch," he muttered, so that only Sammy could hear. "I swear... if my mom's having a baby right now and I find out about it later, I'm gonna be so mad...." He grinned at Sammy though, relief spreading through his body as he realized that they still had a chance to pass the lab.

Praising their luck himself Sammy sat down again, too, clasping his hands together and shoving them towards the sky in silent thanks before he shoved his notebook on the counter, nearly hitting Linn’s head and the beaker. “Wouldn’t you know if she was pregnant? Pregnancy is a bit hard to hide, isn’t it?” At least it seemed to be – all the pregnant women he’d seen before hadn’t been able to hide the fact, plus they smelled different than normal women. Not that he went around smelling women or something, he just noticed smells and things. A lot.

"Yeah, good point," Linn said, sitting up, out of the way of Sammy's notebook. He stuck his tongue out at Sammy. "And I KNOW she's not really pregnant. But it's a damn good excuse to get mad at a teacher anyway..." He flicked one of Sammy's braids for good measure, noticing them for the first time, and thinking they looked pretty cool.

Of course. If they couldn’t play with his curls people were going to play with his braids. It was like some whacko karma or something related to that, but not exactly like it. He reached out and tugged at Linn’s pony tail in retaliation, then sat back. “Well, yeah…it would be…” He looked out of the corners of his eyes at the first beaker, then grinned widely. “Look, it’s the right color! We’re saved!”

Linn would've shoved Sammy away from his hair, if it weren't for Sammy's next comment. The same color?! Linn sat up straighter, his eyes widening with surprise. "Oh my God... you did it, Sammy!" With a wide grin, Linn threw an arm around Sammy's shoulders giving him the shortest of hugs before letting him go as he added, "thanks..."

Sammy grinned back as he jokingly scooted his stool away from Linn’s like he was afraid of cooties or something – though, did cooties work on the same sex, or only on the opposite sex? It was a ridiculous question that made Sammy chuckle inwardly as he watched Mrs. Wu start striding towards them again. “Not a problem. All I did was follow instructions.”

Oops. Judging by the way Sammy moved away, Linn seemed to have gotten carried away with the touching again. Stupid of him. He looked up at Mrs. Wu's nearing form, hoping she'd praise them for their success so that he could stop feeling awkward.

Mrs. Wu stopped by them and rested her hands on her hips, a slight smirk playing over her lips as she stood between them. “You both did good. Though, if you had read your instructions very closely you would have realized that it took a bit for the chemicals in Mixture A to reach the state it said.” Sammy looked behind her back at Linn, mouthing “didn’t you say that?” exaggeratedly at the other boy before sitting up straight again as she turned and arched an eyebrow at him.

Linn grinned at Sammy, amused by his behavior behind the teacher's back. To Mrs. Wu, he said, "Whatever. Can we do extra credit now?" But he gave her an angelic smile so she'd forgive his blunt response.

With a roll of her eyes Mrs. Wu muttered something that looked almost like “smartass” as she pulled a folder from under her arm and pulled out a couple of papers for each of them, setting them down on the table. “Try and be quieter and come get your phone after class.” She looked at their mixtures and nodded once more before leaving them to move on to the next pair of students.

Sammy reached for one of the papers as soon as she was gone and frowned at it, fighting the urge to roll his own eyes as he looked it over. “Are these the things with the rows of numbers?” If so, his dad did these, only they always looked worse; bigger.

"Yeah, and they're so super easy," Linn said, leaning his head closer to show Sammy the grid with a few numbers sprinkled throughout. "See? You can only put one of each number in each row, column, and box." He pointed a large hand onto the puzzle, moving it along the row. "So... the only place a three could be is right here, since there are threes in other columns or boxes," he said, stopping at a spot. He took his blue pen and scrawled a round three. "You do one."

It seemed a bit confusing to Sammy, but he looked at the puzzle and then set it down on the counter with a sigh so he could lean over it. He squinted at it, running his fingers over the rows as he tried to figure out which number could go where. Yeah, if someone was able to complete one of these they definitely deserved extra credit Sammy decided as he reached for a pencil. No way was he doing this in ink. The chemistry teacher wasn’t aiming to let them have fun, was she? She was aiming to torture them with math - or logic, whatever!

Linn watched Sammy from the corner of his eyes, and smiled. He rested an elbow on the counter and held his chin in his hand while looking at Sammy with amusement. "A pencil?" he teased. "Worried about mistakes?" It was an asinine comment. Of COURSE that was what Sammy was worried about. But Linn never was one for brilliant commentary.

The look Sammy gave him clearly broadcasted what he thought the answer(s) to Linn’s question(s) was/were obvious. Of course it was a pencil, and clearly he was worried about mistakes. He didn’t really get math and science, they really, really weren’t his forte. Still, though, he answered Linn with a smile. “Yes.” He wrote quickly in answer to both questions before he looked over at Linn. “You like these actually?” He poised his pencil over a square then looked again at Linn. “…if so…help me!”

Linn gave him a quick nodded, then scooted his stool up closer to Sammy's. "Let's see..." He leaned over the paper, and studied the boxes, noticing the ways that the numbers lined up with each other. With his rough index finger, pointed, "That's a 4. And that?" He pointed to another space. "Another 4. Next to it, a 3." He gave Sammy a bright smile. He was seriously pleased to be helping this kid. "I'd let you copy me, but she gave us different puzzles...." Heck, he'd do the puzzle FOR him, if he let him.

“Help’s good enough.” Sammy firmly stated on his notepad before looking at his puzzle paper and writing an eight where it did not belong. Yeah, help would definitely be enough, so long as he had lots of it.