"Hey Mr. Jamerson!""What?" The startled expression on the monkey face of the highlander History teacher was met with a brillant light. In an instant as quickly as the camera's flash, Alex was out the door and down the hall, hurrying away at top speed with the camera hanging around his neck, Alex's 'press' hat in hand, and a grin on his face. The look on Mr. Jamerson's face had been classic, and now it was caught forever in the woren's roll of film.
Alex loved taking faculty pictures for the Windian High yearbook. The staff, on the other hand, didn't find it as appealing. Alex slowed himself down to an easy walk as he rounded the corner and began making his way to the stairs that would lead him back down to the first floor of the school. With a quick flick of his wrist, Alex tossed his hat back onto his head. Alex had nicknamed this hat his 'Press Hat.' It was a black felt hat, rather simple, something that he had managed to dig up from behind the stage in the auditorium. In the hat he had stuck a little piece of paper, the word 'PRESS' scrawled out onto it in large black letters. He only wore this hat when he was off taking his pictures for the year book. The teachers were used to seeing it by now, it was how they knew not to count him tardy, or to scurry him back to class when they caught him wandering the halls during school hours. Alex was busy adjusting his hat when a noise from the auditorium down the hall caught his ears. He stopped just in front of the stairs and turned towards the sound.
"Sounds like someone's practicing." He mused to himself, absently drumming his fingers on the camera that he clutched as it dangled from the strap he had hung around his neck. The woren stood for a moment longer before finally making up his mind to investigate. "Maybe there'll be something worth taking a picture of."
* * * "How's it sound now?" Lucy's voice echoed out of the sound booth to her brother who was currently on stage, busy setting up his drum set. Both WINGS members were still in their school uniforms. Brandon paused in his work and straightened himself up, tilting his head to the side as he listened to the music flowing through the speakers.
"Nope, still sounds like something's missing." The windian went back to his work on the drums. A loud groan came from the booth as Lucy glanced over the various knobs and dials.
"I just don't get it. Everything's set, everything's on... ugh! I really wish they wouldn't let people come in here and mess with this thing! It really screws everything up!" Lucy sighed again. "Maybe it's the tape." The music stopped as the windian ejected the tape they were currently listening to, a recording of a few songs some random people had made up in the auditorium. She tossed the tape back into the box she had gotten it from and searched around for another one, finally pulling out another choice and shoving it into the cassette player. Brandon once again paused in his work to listen.
"Nope. Still not right."
"Are you sure?" Lucy made her way out of the soundbooth and over to where her brother was. "Maybe if I heard it I could tell what was wrong." She placed herself next to the taller windian and listened. With a groan and a annoyed toss of her arms, Lucy glared up at the speakers hanging above them. "I know what it is, some idiot turned that speaker off up there. Help me reach it?"
Brandon pulled the drum stole over for his sister to stand on, steadying it for her as she took a careful step up onto the seat of the stool.
"I can almost reach it..." standing on her tip-toes, Lucy stretched an arm up to the switch near the base of the stereo. With one last grunt of effort, she flicked it to on. "Got it!"
The loud music blared down at the two windian's with great force. Startled, Lucy let out a gasp and lost her balance, falling backwards off the stool. Brandon dove to catch her, knocking the stool completely over and into the drumset, which in turn sent the set to pieces as cymbals and drums crashed to the floor. Brandon tripped over one of the legs of the stand to one of the cymbals and fell face first to the stage floor, Lucy landing with a grunt on his back.
The two hardly had time to hear Alex shout 'Cheese!' before the bright flash of his camera filled the room. The last thing they saw was the tip of his striped tail as it disappeared out the door of the auditorium.
* * * Laughing loudly, Alex made his way down the hall and towards the stairs again, almost running into Janet as she made her way up to the second floor and was heading towards the auditorium.
"Hey!" Janet turned to watch the blur of gold and brown vanish down the steps. With a scold of dissaproval, she made her way down the hall.
"What happened here?" Janet glanced around bewildered at the mess of the drumset Brandon was doing his best to clean up on stage. Lucy was back in the sound booth, rubbing her lower back as she worked at the volume diales."Someone had the stereo above the drums off. When we turned it on, we found that I had forgotten to check the volume first."
Janet clicked her tongue as she made her way up to the stage and watched Brandon attempt to set up the drums again. "So what was that blur that almost hit me in the hallway?"
"That was flash happy Alex out on year book patrol again." Lucy sighed as she turned to tape back on to test the sound system again.
* * * Alex was whistling to himself as he made his way through the halls on the first floor of the school. He glanced in and out of the rooms, looking for another great shot to take for the yearbook. His roll of film already contained many interesting pictures of the staff and students of the school. He had one of the cheersquade after they had messed up their student pyramid trick and had ended up in a less then gracefull pile on the floor. He had a picture of Mr. Briggs, the male PE and sports supervisor of the school, also an armored shell clansman, getting his face smeared out by a cupcake that was being held by Ms. White, the stallion clanswoman and female supervisor for PE and sports. This scene had taken place just after Mr. Briggs had said something about Ms. White's girl's volleyball team that the stallion woman had found to be much less then amusing. Alex chuckled to himself, imagining what the roll of film would be like when it was developed. "Definitaly a classic in all of my years of this job." Alex snickered to himself as he countinued down the halls. He paused as he found himself in front of the teachers lounge, his tail flicking mischeviously. Just inside the lounge, at one of the various cabnets with her back to the door, the science teacher and grassrunner clanswoman, Mrs. Wireman, was bending over and shuffling through one of the lower drawers. Alex's ears twitched as he fingered the camera around his neck. It was the perfect picture. A grin crossed the face of the woren.
Mrs. Wireman was one of the best known and most respected teachers in the school. She had a 'no nonsense' attitude about her that was hard to get past. A picture like this had been just what Alex was looking for. The started teacher barely knew what had happened after she heard the click, saw the flash that lit up behind her, and then heard the scurrying of Alex hurrying himself down the hall and away from the shocked and embarrased science teacher.
Alex was now skipping through the school as he glanced behind himself, making sure that no angry staff was busy pursuing him. He slowed himself back down to a walk, grinning to himself as he fiddled a bit with the camera around his neck. Yes, this roll would definantly be a classic, he thought to himself as he rounded a corner...
...and ran right into an rather annoyed looking Mrs. Wireman.
"Hey! Mrs. W!" Alex jumped back, startled, and rubbed the back of his neck nervously. The science teacher glared up at him.
"Mr. Brandshire, aren't you supposed to be doing your year book work during school hours?"
"Well yes, but you know, I often find I can get more done after and before school, you know, when the halls are less crowded, and I'm not missing classes, and..." Alex was fumbling about desperatly for an excuse. Mrs. Wireman wasn't buying a single one of them.
"Mr. Brandshire! I would request that you take up your work during school hours like you are assigned to! Staff and students alike are busy with other things during after school hours, and your disruptions certainly don't help them much by ways of making their time and work more effecient!"
Alex offered a nervious and apologetic smile to the teacher. "Ah well uh, I'm sorry, but you see ah..."
"Mr. Brandshire..." Mrs. Wireman held out her hand. "The camera?"
"But..."
Mrs. Wireman snapped her fingers, causing Alex to flinch. His faced redded with shame, a sheepish grin on his lips as he slid the camera up from off his neck and handed it over to the teacher in defeat. Mrs. Wireman nodded her approval.
"You can get this back tomorrow in your respective class." With that, she turned and made her way down the hall and out of sight. Alex watched her go, his ears and tail slouched in disappointment. With a sigh, he tipped his hat lightly and turned to make his way out of the school.
"Well, it certainly was a risky shot, but it was worth it." Alex grinned as he pulled the used up roll of film out of his pocket and tossed it lightly in his hands, chuckling to himself. Mrs. Wireman had been after the picture he had taken of her, but she wouldn't find it. Not while Alex had the film, and since tomorrow he'd be developing the roll for the year book staff...
Alex laughed again as he pocketed the film and made his way out of the school. "I think I'll call this roll of pictures, 'The Classics of WHS.'"
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