Thinking things over (Open)

[Natalie Kiana]

Walking through the courtyard, Natalie was looking around at the main parts of the Academy grounds. She had already ventured out a little further, getting herself lost in the process.... this time she decided to play it safe and stay a little bit closer to home so that there would be no further troubles of her getting lost in thought which would result in her getting lost in her location.

Natalie had been here for a little bit of time now and she found that she was actually beginning to find a pattern to her life while she was here so that she didn't have to worry as much about accidentally showing any of her..... well her weird quirks..... to the other students.

The classes seemed to be pretty decent and she was doing alright in the subject that she had decided to take, even if there were more that she happened to be curious about and thought about joining into those soon as well. It would be something to do and she certainly needed the help with her dueling and her decks so it might prove to be very useful for her after all.

With a sigh, she pulled her thoughts away from classes and tried to focus more on what was around her while she was walking. Natalie really didn't want to get too unfocused so that she would end up running into anyone or anything, that might be slightly embarrassing. So far she had been pretty good about avoiding too many people, but she doubted that her luck would stay that good forever, what she needed was to make a few friends and see what happened from there.... either things would go well or they would end up coming back around to bite her for her efforts. Natalie needed to try anyways, she had promised her family to at least try and have fun for a change.

[Masami Maeda]

The courtyard was one of Masami’s places. Of course, usually she was there without a reason to be there, or even an explanation for how she got there, but she could often be found sitting out in the open, feeling the breeze tousle her hair and nodding her head to the beat of whatever song came on her mp3 player. The large red headphones hung over her ear, tuning out the outside world completely. Her eyes drifted from open and glancing at the island scenery to closed and enjoying the religious experience of the music itself. She had loaded the best beats of a variety of world famous DJs, as she often preferred those remixes to the original songs themselves. She knew from experience that a great DJ made a world of difference.

She pulled her legs in towards her body, hugging her knees when the air got a little cooler. The afternoon sun dipped lower against the horizon, and she always thought that the picturesque the way the sun slipped down over the looming mountains on the island presented an incredible picture. In fact, she had taken many shots with her camera of the very event before, often playing with different lenses and filters in an effort to get the best high resolution shot. She had found that the infrared filter made the shot look especially impressive.

Masami had been so absorbed in the picture and the music that she hardly noticed the girl that came across her view, walking straight past her on the way through the courtyard. Of course, a lot of people crossed back and forth through the courtyard, as it was simply the quickest way back to the dorms, so she was used to tuning people out while she sat there and jived to her music and appreciated the island’s natural beauty. There were still times, of course, that she enjoyed people watching, but that was not on this occasion, and a good artist had to be an uncompromising purist, after all. Too many focal points ruined a shot.