Zoe turned to face the direction the spitwad had come from. "Who did that?" she asked, using her best piss-off voice. Years of stares at her more visibly goth friends from older people and the higher-ups in the school's social hierarchy had honed her skills at projecting a "don't mess with me" aura, and it usually helped in getting people to leave her alone. Unfortunately, the range of possible paths for the projectile covered a pretty fair swath of the classroom, and whoever the perps were, they were doing a good job of not calling attention to themselves.
She was about to resign herself to not finding out when Harry tapped her on the shoulder, then quickly drew her hand back as she realized her finger was sinking into the slime-girl's shoulder, surprised by the sensation. Zoe turned to face her, and the oriental girl leaned in to whisper. "It's that guy on the far wall," she said. "Brandon, the one with the snake tail."
"You saw?" Zoe was a little confused - she didn't think Harry had been facing that direction at the time.
"I, uh, I just know..."
Zoe shrugged, turned, and sloshed over towards the suspect, not even bothering to keep her legs separate below the shorts she was wearing. She stood in front of the snake-boy, compressing herself a bit depth-wise to lend a little extra height. "Brandon, right?" she asked. He nodded.
Zoe suddenly leaned in at him, hovering right on the edge of his personal space. He backed away and she followed, until he was flat against the wall. She glowered at him. "Want to see what else I can digest?" she asked.
"H-hey!" he sputtered. "It was just a joke! Jeez!" His cohort, a young fellow with the ears and tail of a fox, started to laugh.
She drew back, and he let himself down with a little more visible relief than he'd have liked. Zoe's expression changed to a whimsical smirk. "Nice to meet you," she said, then turned and went back to her two companions, leaving a very baffled naga in her wake.
"You...have an interesting way with people, you know that?" Dora observed. "Seriously, he was probably just doing the 'little boy pulling on your pigtails' thing."
The slime-girl shrugged. "Eh, maybe. I didn't want to just shrug it off, but I don't really want a fight unless it's something serious. Besides, I like the expressions people get when they're confused." She looked at Harry; was that third eye really just an eye? "Thanks for the tip," she said.
"Oh," Harry replied, "it...it was nothing."
Dora eyed the Chinese girl curiously. "So," she said, "you changed gender and ethnicity? I didn't think the sun did either of those, that I'd heard."
Harry looked a little uncomfortable, and Zoe felt kind of sorry for her. "The gender thing isn't that uncommon," she said. "Both of my brothers became girls as part of their changes."
Dora looked surprised, and Harry seemed a little bit comforted. "Really?" the blue girl asked. "What were the other parts?"
"Well...my younger brother is a robot, and my older brother is a slug-girl."
"Oh!" Harry said. "I think I've seen her. Does she have bright yellow skin on the slug parts?"
Zoe nodded. "That's her. Kind of hard to miss."
Harry smiled. "Yeah, I've seen her around. I think she's in Sarah McMillan's class."
Dora frowned. "Sarah McMillan? You mean the harpy who came to school naked?"
Zoe gaped. "She did what!?"
She nodded. "Apparently they've relaxed the dress code since so many people are so different or something, I dunno. Sarah was the first to take advantage of it."
Harry looked embarassed. "I still don't understand why you'd do that..."
Zoe shrugged. "Because it's a hassle, I guess. Sarah doesn't even have any hands. Heck, my clothes are a hassle - I have to pick out light stuff to wear so it doesn't sink into my shoulders. I was considering doing the same thing, but I figured I didn't want to be expelled two days after school reopened."
Dora frowned. "Huh. I'm with Harry, but I guess I can see the logic there. ...speaking of logic, why did you expose yourself to the sun? If you don't mind my asking, that is."
The slime-girl smiled sadly. "I...it was kind of a gamble," she said. "I knew that sure, I could become something bad, but I also thought that maybe I could turn into something really cool, and I decided to take the risk in hopes of getting the reward. It just seemed like there was so much potential for something exciting..."
The blue girl nodded. "Hmm. So...what do you think of the result?"
Zoe thought for a moment, looking down at her new form. "I...I'm not sure," she said. "It's not the kind of wicked awesome thing I was hoping for, and I don't know if I really like it...but it certainly could've been a lot worse, and I think it's kind of cool in its own way...I guess I'm okay with it, at least."
"Huh." Dora didn't look like she really got it, but Zoe thought that she'd at least got her point across. "So," she said, "what do you think happened to Mr. Andrews?"
Harry looked sad. "It must have been something serious," she said. "He wouldn't have given up teaching if it wasn't..."
Dora nodded. "Well, yeah...but I don't think they were lying about his being okay. They don't really do that. Remember a couple years ago, when Ms. Dickinson died? They didn't sugar-coat that. I wonder if he'll be able to start teaching again or not..."
