Another Synonym for Happiness

[Person]

Food was what stared at Chase. Food tempted his stomach with promises of filling and his taste buds with hopes of a rush of glorious flavor that could make the sentimental cry. And food was what Chase was on the hunt for this morning. He was in line with just another black, plastic tray, waiting and savoring each moment. As he approached the sizable stack of pancakes he decided to take only a small amount (about four), but then followed up the act with yards of sausage links, and then finished it with a fountain of maple syrup cascading down upon his meal. Oh, and he grabbed his feathery friend an apple, and make sure that it didn't roll into the lake of syrup on his plate; Chase wanted to have a meal relatively free of any of Thanatos's moaning and groaning.

After grabbing a carton of orange juice and another of chocolate milk, Chase sat down to a relatively undisturbed table in the middle of a sea of students. His own movements and sounds were disguised in the music of forks clanging and people talking in the hustle and bustle of the morning rush. Soon, Chase became another trombone in the orchestra by loudly placing his tray on the deserted table and cutting his pancakes diligently. Thanatos grabbed his apple by pulling it away with his beak, and began to pick at it greedily and hungrily.

"Good, and remember, after breakfast you will begin practicing once again, Chase," the bird said in between bites.

Chase pretended not to notice the bird's thoughts of training and began to eat his meal ferociously. He shoveled down mounds of food at once with the philosophy that it was all going down to the same place. If there was only one truth in the world it would have to be: food was just another synonym for happiness.

[Ladd Russo of the Russo Family]

"Hello, friend Chase and Thanatos!" said a familiar voice cheerfully. It was the young paladin Lorien, dressed in leather leggings and a white tunic instead of the armor he wore outside. His blond hair was unbound now and came just past his shoulders, and in his hands he had his own tray. There were pancakes on there, but they were also accompanied by two baked fish and a roasted mushroom. He didn't seem to have noticed the syrup.

"Would it be well if I sat with you?" he asked when he reached his friend. He never thought he would ever meet a necromancer, but now that he had, his opinion about them had changed. Chase was a moral and upstanding person, and he was proud to have found such a companion.

[Señor Sunday Friday]

A rather short elf with an ornately decorated respirator ran into the room, snatching the mushroom from the plate, probably mistaking it for something else and he began his journey madly running from the room, laughing madly and making a few detours to run in wobbly circles before he found the door, fumbling with the doorknob before finally getting it open and running into the hallway, still laughing. The tiny elf was being followed by a flying gecko of sorts, shouting out in croaks, "MREKERKEKEKEKEKAWKERKERRRRRKIT!" He croaked, pausing a moment to apologetically nod to Lorien, "Mrawkekekekerrkekett" and then the creature was off to follow Terent whom was currently on a major shroom trip, and also was intent on picking up every object that resembled a shroom, atleast resembling a shroom to him- which was almost everything due to his current state.

[Ladd Russo of the Russo Family]

Oh... well if Master Terent really wanted his mushroom, he was welcome to have it. Lorien knew mushrooms were good for him and a healthy diet, but he was never really fond of their taste. Still, he would probably have to eat double for lunch to make up for it. "A pleasure seeing you, Master Terent and Smi'ee!" he called after them. People were so friendly and outgoing in this school; it was great to see it.

[Person]

"Yeah, sure," Chase said while he still was full of food. He had apparently never been taught manners, or he just never bothered to remember them. Thanatos cast a scolding look at Chase, but the necromancer was much too involved in the drama of the pancakes and sausage to even acknowledge it.

"Ah, good morning, Lorien. Pleasant day and what no--" Thanatos was interrupted by the bumbling antics of the high elf. Neither of the two had any true idea of what was going on, and so Chase and Thanatos sat there looking awestruck at the quickness and eccentricity of the events that had just unfolded in front of them. Chase's jaw dropped in his awestruck state, revealing a combination of half-eaten breakfast meats.

Chase swallowed his food, "If I didn't know better, I'd say he was either crazy or getting a little too much 'inspiration' from Mother Nature..." He took a swig of milk, "And who exactly was that?" he asked Lorien quite curiously. It wasn't every day that a stunt like that happened, or maybe that was a natural occurrence around the school.

[Ladd Russo of the Russo Family]

"That was my Master Teacher, Terent, and his dragon friend," Lorien replied, sitting down. The tiny flying lizard was a dragon, if a croaky one. "He seemed happier. I hope that he and his brothers settled events and are friends again," the paladin said thoughtfully. While manners were taught with the same strict policy as everything else in the monastery, Lorien was one of the ones that was repeatedly punished for it. He never tried to be deliberately rude; he was just uncommonly forgetful. Chase's, needless to say, did not bother him.

"Who is your Master Teacher, Chase? I never heard his name." The round bread slices were called 'pan cakes' for a reason. They were unusually sweet. Still, he couldn't say that he disliked them. Fish, however, was much the same wherever one went.

[Person]

Chase thought about the man from his small escapade, and wondered if he was mentally fit to be teaching anyone or anything. He dispelled the thought and responded, "Ooooh." He elongated the 'Oh' like an exhale. He thought that Thanatos would most likely be reconsidering his dislike of demons now, considering that he could have done much worse.

But, had Chase been reading Thanatos's mind, he would have been sorely disappointed. The bird's hatred of demons was strong, even to the point where he would have rather had a mushroom-addicted elf as a Master Teacher than the one that had been paired with Chase.

"His name is Ga'ap," Chase answered as he entered the final leg of his food race. For a moment, everything stopped in Chase's eyes as he spied the fish that Lorien had on his plate. "Dude...how could you be eating fish in the morning?" he asked. Chase pointed his fork at the food as if to reinforce his questioning. The young necromancer was never too into fish, and was especially not fond of fish in the morning.

[Ladd Russo of the Russo Family]

Lorien looked at his fish, which was good if oddly spiced, and shrugged. "Meat is an important part of breakfast, at least if I want to last until dinner. Besides, fish is delicious," he responded with a smile. "What are you eating there?" He pointed to the sausages curiously. At first he thought they were some dark fishmeat, but after his friend's comment he doubted it. Maybe alligator?

Lorien's diet had mainly been what one could find in the swamp or river. Every now and then traders would offer something from the ocean or fields, but he never had the money for that. So basically: fish, frogs, mushrooms, roots, rice, beans, and sometimes alligator or beaver.

[Person]

"This, good sir, is the meat of kings. It is what champions eat in the morning besides Wheaties," Chase said as he stuck a link of sausage with his fork. "This is a sausage, and its glorious breakfast taste perfectly compliments the pancake, which you seem to already have on your plate. So try the sausage," he said as he placed a single sausage atop Lorien's pile of pancakes. He had a reassuring tone on his face that only added to the level of knowledge one gets from constantly watching 'Food Network' and Bobby Flay's masterful cooking skills.

The raven rolled his eyes at Chase's dramatic description of the rather simple breakfast meat. "Lorien, I trust you also keep in mind Chase is exaggerating a large amount about the food," he said.

Chase responded eloquently and with a thought that could take the normal human years to conceive: "Am not."

[Ladd Russo of the Russo Family]

Lorien put the odd little piece of dead burnt animal (a human tradition!) into his mouth and chewed it, savoring the flavors. It was very good, though the closest he had ever had to it was a pig once on Yearnight's dinner. He felt indeed that the greasiness would go well with the pan cake's sweetness. "It is very good," he agreed to Thanatos and Chase. "But what animal is a sausage?"

[Person]

"A sausage is from a pig," Chase responded.

"And also from a medley of other meats," Thanatos added.

"Yeah, thanks, I got this," he responded to Thanatos. "See, I told you it would be good." Chase moved his tray back a notch to guard his own 'Meat of Champions' from Lorien. "If you want anymore, though, you'll have to go up to the line and get it, because I'm going to eat the rest of mine."

There was hardly anything left on his plate compared to when he began eating, and Chase continued on finishing the rest of his food with a gluttonous appetite. It was a wonder how the boy could eat so much food: possibly the amount of exercising he did, or maybe it was a naturally fast metabolism. Either way, he certainly liked to eat.

[Ladd Russo of the Russo Family]

"Perhaps tonight," Lorien said. He was comfortable, and he didn't want to be too full and get a stomachache. Even so, his plate was soon clean down to the last crumb. By then, his curiosity was on hyper drive, and he couldn't resist asking at least one question. "Chase, what is it like being a necromancer? How did you become one? Do you like it? Could you change? Does a necromancer die? How do you plan to use your skills when you leave here?" he asked earnestly, not realizing that was probably more than one question. He did remember his manners, however, and hastily added, "If you don't mind me asking."

[Person]

Chase was taken off guard by the sudden onslaught of questioning, and so there was a momentary awkward pause between the questioning and his answering. The time was filled the same way as his mouth: with plenty of eating of the pancakes until his plate was clean, except for the lake of maple syrup. He felt almost like a Hollywood superstar with the questioning, that, or some kind of spy caught in the enemies' interrogation room.

"Well...I resurrect dead stuff...guess you already knew that, though. How I became one? Well, I was just kind of born into it...dad's Death--and a lawyer. Believe me, there's a lot of paperwork," Chase said as he flexed his right wrist in memory of his internship there. "I don't really like it that much. There's a bit too much work involved for my taste. I would much rather have been left in the dark about this whole subject. Do Necromancers die? Huh, I've never asked myself that question before." Chase turned to Thanatos and stared at the bird for quite sometime before the raven caught the hint.

"The human ones do of natural causes. Most of those in Chase's lineage are still living in the world, and Death is replaced when he feels that he no longer can do the job and feels that his son is ready to take the torch," Thanatos, the policy expert on the subject, responded. He had seen many of Deaths pass through the halls of the house in Baltimore, and even more back in Europe. Thanatos may have seemed like a middle-aged prude, but his memory would date back much farther than that.

"And for the last question...well, I guess Thanatos answered that one already. Eventually, I'm supposed to take my father's place. Not my personal choice of work, though. Kind of being pressured into it," he said with a shrug and a rebellious tone in his voice.

[Ladd Russo of the Russo Family]

Chase's father's name was Death? Lorien didn't think he could ever name a child something so depressing, but maybe it was a necromancer tradition. After all, Chase was an unusual name as well. Chase Death? Lorien smothered a laugh, though it was a fairly intimidating name.

"Well, at least by Thanatos, you would not have to do your father's job forever. I think it would be reassuring, to have someone be able to assist you in your work. Your father would probably have experience in almost any problem you could face. I know that I can always return to the monastery, but it's far away now. I find myself making choices that I never thought I would have before..." Lorien shook his head, shrugging. He never knew his parents, but he was sure they were good people once. Chase's father was probably no different from Chase himself, just with years of wisdom.

[Person]

"Oh, I know that I won't have to do it forever, but he's been doing it for a long time. He still tells me he has hand cramps from WWII," Chase said as he rocked back on his chair, despite everything every adult has told him in his life. He had no real drive to do any of the work described in the employee manual, and really no drive to be an employee of mortal death at all. Unless he was a greeter: Hi. Welcome to the Afterlife. Suicides on the left, Homicides on the right, and Naturals in the middle. He could clearly envision the most likely black vest that he would wear in the Transcendental Target, and the small name tag that would read: "Hi! My name is: Chase."

"Well, that's good. Nobody likes it when you're constantly being told what do," he said while in his precarious position of leaning back, "Freedom is good."