It was earlier in the day, the sun was just up, but the blinds were closed, forcing any ray of light out. The blinds were always closed in Athena's dark chamber of a room. Without the candles she had lit and the incense she had burning, the room would have been dark as the void. Instead, the chamber had only a dull orange glow illuminating everything within.
Athena herself was already up and mostly dressed, and sat crosslegged and upright in the middle of the room. Her eyes were open but not seeing, and she was awake but unmoving. Athena had chosen to meditate this morning, with no intention of leaving for school or opening herself to the rest of the world until some revelation on her circumstance had come to her. As a firm believer in magic and the occult, she was convinced something would come to her in the end, so long as she did not lose faith.
Trinkets and wards had been placed around the room to fend off malicious influence. Tomes and spellbooks lay open where Athena had skimmed though, hoping for some insight that could help her, and found nothing. Now, she ignored them; all that was left to her now were her thoughts.
She thought about Karyn. She thought about Miss Fine. She thought about Zoe and Zelda and Susan. She thought about her own family, and her boyfriend at the occult store. She thought about leaving, about confrontation, about fighting, about hexing, about anything to do that could help her. She wondered, of all courses of action from here, which would really not be so bad?
Miss Fine was playing some game with them all now, that much was obvious, but what exactly her aim was, Athena could not fathom. She lamented the loss of the friends that had gotten themselves involved with Miss Fine, but Athena could hope that she, at least, would be safe so long as she avoided Miss Fine's office until she got a clearer idea of what she meant. The incident with Karyn had shown that was wrong; nobody wanted a session less than her, and yet yesterday Athena could not even slap sense back into her. Athena now had to assume that eventually, if not stopped, Miss Fine would have a session with her, and when she did, it would be game over. Athena would become effectively a different person, and Fine would have all the strings she could ever hope to pull right in her hand.
That absolutely would not do. From here on, Athena's sole focus needed to be on stopping Miss Fine somehow before it was too late.
Athena was not without her own advantages in this game: she had all her magic available to her, and so far she had managed to keep a rather low profile. Miss Fine might not even know Athena was afoot, if Zelda or Karyn hadn't said anything to her yet. Karyn may say something about the slap soon, or else some other thing may point her out to the counselor in time, so she must act quickly and carefully, before Fine took these as a sign to schedule a house call, or a session with her.
But what to do? Direct confrontation was out, obviously. Any attempt to expose her, Athena now realized, would fall on deaf ears; the whole school might as well be under her grip, and there was no claim about her magic she could make without sounding like a loon. Simply leaving the school and saving her own skin may be possible, but she would need her mother on board and she'd never agree. Besides, she couldn't just abandon all her friends to their fate. Violence was as likely to turn the police on her as well as corrective therapy, with guess who as a therapist.
That left magic as an option.
The room began to dim. The candles were burning down and the incense had extinguished, though the smell still permeated the air as though they were still alight.
Athena could try basic detection magic. All she could guess at now was some kind of hypnosis or mind control, nothing nearly specific enough for her to counter. If she could start at finding what magic was being used and what magic items were in the area she could get somewhere, maybe. She could try divination and prophecy, maybe to reveal something to give here an edge. Of course, there were more direct spells, curses, and hexes to put on Miss Fine, but it wouldn't be long before her old friends, the ones that visited Fine, pointed her out as the cause of them if she wasn't totally careful, and that would mean a visit to her office. It was possible Fine may have some magic of her own, on top of that, making it even riskier.
She could... Athena shuddered a little, but her meditation did not break... she could try and contact friends on the other side, so to speak. Maybe they could tell her something and do her a few favors with regards to fine, at a price. Normally she wouldn't even consider such a thing, not even as a last resort, but the situation with Fine was getting worse by the hour, she knew. If nothing else presented itself, she would have to go to them for help.
So still she meditated, until she hatched her plan.
The candles, by now, had burned out, the smell of incense was gone, and the room was black as night, only a few lights daring to peek through the cracks of the door and her drapes. Athena awoke, rose to her feet and stretched, this way and that, her muscles cramped and stiff after staying idle so long. She went to the window, grabbed at the drapes for a little peek outside, and looked. The sun by now was nearing its zenith, and at the school lunch break was probably coming to a close.
"I'm gonna be late. What a surprise, the goth witch lady is late? Maybe she'll even be called to the office for it," Athena self deprecated. "Better late than never, assholes." With that, she grabbed some trinkets she thought she'd need and her bag, walked out from her room, grabbed a quick breakfast/lunch, and walked to the second half of school.
