[Feanor of the Peredhil]

"No... s'to early..." Alli spoke into her pillow, grumbling at her obnoxiously shrill alarm clock. She wasn't certain what time it was... if a night had passed, or even if she'd had more than a cursary ten minutes or so of a nap. She'd been up too late and it was looking to be a tough battle to roll out of bed.

"I'm skipping." she told herself, snuggling back into her warm blankets.

"No you aren't." came Anakron's voice from the door. She sat up swiftly and pulled her blankets high.

"I locked the door!"

"I unlocked it."

"That's REALLY creepy."

"I don't care. Get up, you're going to class."

Now fully awake, Alli made a rude gesture involving only one of her fingers toward the empty doorway as the door swung shut with a loud crash that caused muffled yells of annoyance from her dorm-mates, none of whose classes begun before noon.

She pulled on the same breeches she'd worn for several days straight, a clean shirt (though it had cost a couple trolls to use the washer the night before), and tied her messy hair away from her face. Somehow she managed to pull the just-got-out-of-bed look off and stumbled around her dorm room (not that it was large enough to truly stumble through) searching for some paper and pens. As she watched the minutes pass by in what seemed a more quick way than usual, Alli realized that she couldn't find her supplies, she was going to be late to her first class, and she'd failed to complete the pre-class assignment ("Get in touch with Illamatar. As him if money really does buy happiness.") She was annoyed about that too... of all the nights for the One to not show up and bug her, it had to be that one. The annoyance drove her to split her infinitives.

Pulling on her boots and giving up on everything she really ought to be bringing, Alli threw open the door and came face to face with a Dwarf. It wasn't Flein.

"Um... good morning?" The axe was putting her off.

"Who are you and why are you in my room?" demanded the Dwarf, fingering the axe-blade lovingly.

"Tell me your name, axe-master, and I shall tell you mine." The straps holding the axe to the belt loosened. "I mean... I'm Alli. I'm rooming here for a week."

"No you aren't."

"You bloody well better get used to the idea."

"Oh really?" The axe was in hand.

"Fine. I'll be back later to collect my stuff."

"No, you'll take it now." The axe was scary looking. Alli was pretty sure there was dried blood... but it might have been ketchup. She backed into the room and gathered her belongings, shouldering her pack. As she backed out the door, careful not to present the back of her head to this insane Dwarf, Alli muttered.

"Wonder doubleyouteeyef put this guy off." The door slammed and an odd howl came through it. If Alli had stuck around long enough, she'd have learned through the sobbing mutters that she had confused the poor girl's gender... a most embarrassing experience all around, but apparently a quite upsetting one for this lady Dwarf. She even went through extra effort to present herself as feminine... extra braids... gold metalwork in her weapon hilts to add that extra bit of bling... She cried now, but the Dwarf was for another tale.

As it was, Alli reached her class ten minutes into the lesson ("First 10 Minutes: The Secret of Life. Next 2 Hours: The Stuff You Already Know about Living and Why it's Not of Much Value."). The professor glared at her and she didn't even bother explaining.

"Do you have an excuse?"

"I was abducted by aliens." she responded with a serious look, mirroring a response her writer had given to a professor only yesterday for skipping class.

"That's not good enough."

"Then next time don't ask."

"Get out of my classroom. You fail for the day."

Alli swore and left. She had no idea where to go or what to do. Her former room was infested with an axe-happy she-Dwarf, her professor had kicked her out of class, and she didn't know where the rest of her group was. And she'd skipped breakfast.

She slumped against a wall looking a bit dejected and waited to see if anything would happen to make things a bit easier. It wasn't exactly the best first day of classes she'd ever experienced.