A skinny boy lay on his bed, snapping his fingers every three seconds. His black irises fixated at the ticking clock, which was hung upside down. It was 11:30 on the clock, atleast that's how it seemed from his perspective.
It was still bright outside, with some shimmering rays slipping past the curtain's barrier and consuming some darkness of the greyed room. The black haired boy shifted his gaze from the clock, snapped his fingers one last time, and with a mouth full of air, jumped out of his bed.
It was a small room with walls painted in grey, a single bed cramped at the corner, a chair and a table with some books laying atop it, a cupboard attached at one corner of the room, a window, a few motivational posters stuck to his wall, one reading as "being alone has a certain power- learn to master it." Maybe he had mastered it. And a white clock, upside down.
The boy untucked his T shirt free from his trousers and moved towards the wall. He took down the clock and readjusted it, put it back at the wall, upright.
"4 pm, I was supposed to meet him at 5:00," he took a yawn and started to ruffle his unkempt black hair. "I should take a bath."
It was a five storey dormitory with eighteen rooms per floor, and the ends of each hall consisted of bathrooms and toilets. The dorm was relatively empty, start of the fresh batch was supposed to take place from the beginning of next week. Except for the early comers, or the few who considered these dorms better...an upgrade from the rooms they used to live in, rest were not too eager to join a week prior.
Looking at the empty corridor and hearing some occasional laughs from an occupied room, he went on his way to take a bath. Freshening himself up, he changed to blue T-shirt and black pants, went back to his room, took a can of coffee from a semi-opened bag thrown at his bed and sat on the chair.
He had recently turned seventeen and the university was about to begin from next week. He was to go out with his friend for collecting the uniform and id from the university.
It was supposed to be handed over a day before university started, but being amongst the few early ones, they wanted to have an earlier access.
They had to reach the registrar's office by 5:30, post university hours, and hence, he had some time to spare.
His friend, or rather the guy he met yesterday, was most likely sleeping, so lazily he took out his phone to pass some time. It was still 4:30, ample time to spare he thought...opening the can, he took a sip of coffee, it's bitterness providing him with much needed sense of liveliness, and enjoying some small sips, he started scrolling his phone.
Although he wasn't poor, but he didn't have the leisure to freely spend his money, so he avoided spending on the modern Holographic watches. They would be given a similar watch by the university, and so it seemed like a worthless expenditure to him. He believed all that he required was already available in his phone, a couple of years old model, but worked to perfection.
For the past few days, all he did was sleep and eat on his way to the university, read some books and slept again, so, for a bit of change, he started searching for recent news.
"It still has five minutes of power left for today, when was my last charge? It should be ready for recharge by tomorrow morning." Glancing at the screen while sipping his coffee he started scrolling.
"If Kaeldia want our resources, they need to sign the free trade agreement."
"Who is Evar Sunhollow, the possible wielder of the flame shard?"
"New hg watch invented by tech islanders, to only consume half the aether"
"Frostspire island miraculously freed from everlasting ice sheet"
"Will the university also give us new watches? They should have the budget for them right."
"The Sunhollow clan hah, they even got a shard."
*beep**beep* *pffft*
"Two hours up, hmm, do i really need the new three hour variants?"
" Nah I'll make do with this one"
Tossing his phone towards the back end of the bed, he lazily laid down. After a while he glanced at the now upright clock, "4:55", putting on his shoes, he went to the adjacent door on the hall, it was a brown wooden door, the colour didn't really seem to fit too well with the greyed out walls of the corridor.
He gently knocked at the door couple of times and waited for a while, the door opened after a few seconds and a brown haired ma, in a tank top, sticking to his burly body came out. There was a contrast, amongst the door and the walls and the brown haired and black haired.
"Oh Zeill, wait a minute, let me put on a T shirt...come on in." he said in a frank tone. His room was the same, greyed walls and a single window, but it was still a different, in vibes at least, a bit more vibrant. It lacked the being alone powers, and had posters of beauties, a singer it seemed and one in bikini.
"You have some taste Matthias" glancing at the posters Zeill spoke his mind. "Matt will do" he said while trying to put a shoe on his foot, "and great men have great tastes." he winked at Zeill still half bowed to put on his shoes. "Let's go."
Stepping out of the dorm, Zeill turned back to take a good look. It felt deceptive to him, it was quite monotonous and lackluster from the inside, but the view from outside, it felt as he got teleported to a whole different dormitory. It was simply so contrasting. Is everything in life really so contrasting he glanced at the building, then at Matt and then at his slightly hanging T- shirt, I guess it is.
What appeared as a bland mixture of grey and brown inside, was indeed very pleasing to the eyes from outside. The dorm stood five storey tall in a C shape, a C laying horizontally on the ground, without curves, just made of three straight lines. It was white with greenery all around. The windows which didn't provide their rooms with much sense of finesse from insides, now appeared shimmering bright in the afternoon rays of sun.
The white looked stainless, the trees and shrubbery added on to its beautiful scenery. After having a good look, he looked away from his soon to be new residential area and started to observe the campus. What could he say, it was neat...very clean and beautiful. He could see streetlights at the edges of a stone carved street and little patches of gardens in empty areas, it was green and colourful. It's much better than I imagined he thought.
"What are you thinking of? Let's go" said Matt, already some ten steps ahead of Zeill. "Oh yess! You know the way to receptionist's office, right?"
Zeill looked at Matt with dead eyes, somehow that gaze managed to pierce Matt's soul, forcing him to give out a wry smile.
"Didn't you say you already knew?" he threw a helpless gaze towards Matt.
"The Academy... that is what I know" replied Matt hurriedly, "the places inside academy, it'll take some time" he laughed nervously.
Zeill sighed and walked on, observing the beautiful campus "Let's go then, what are you waiting for."