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Slam! The teacher whacked the hopeless pointer onto the chalkboard.
“Does anyone know what today is, hm? Anyone?” The teacher glanced around the room to see a student practically sleeping in her class. “Ms. Essania.”
“Huh?” She jumped as her name was called.
“What is today?”
She was still out of it. She had been up late last night working on her family’s home computer, which had caught a virus again and it had wreaked havoc on the system. She had been fighting the same virus off for nearly a month- it kept coming back with the introduction of files with the virus on it. They were essential to her mother’s work and her mother refused to let her delete them, but they didn’t have the money to take it to someone who could safely retrieve the data so she was stuck with nights like this. “Uhhh... Thursday?”
The classroom chuckled.
“Can anyone here help Ms. Essania here?” A hand that had already been raised somehow shot up again. “Yes, Evilyn?”
“Today is the anniversary of the Digital Code.”
“Excellent.” You could hear the approval in the extend draw of the word. “The Digital Code is the sacred document of the digital world. It governs all computer and cyber activity not just for our nation, but for the entire world. It tells us what documents and files we can legally create, who can claim ownership and copyright of digital media and much, much more.
She turned back to Essania. “Someone as computer literate as you should be aware of this. Now class, why do we-”
Eddie hated this class. She also hated being called by her full name. Everyone called her Eddie. Everyone. The other teachers, her friends, her bullies- E V E R Y O N E! This and other reasons was proof that the teacher, Ms. Fuzen, ultimately despised her for whatever reason. And Evilyn was her little teacher’s pet. It wouldn’t normally bug her, she had the grades despite her sometimes dozing off in class and her other teachers knew it and let her off, but she needed her teachers’ approval of completion and understanding before even being allowed to prove herself by taking the final examination and graduating.
Ultimately it was the ‘professor’s discretion’. She could pass the class with a 100 percent and she could still be held back and have to retake the course because of one teacher. She couldn’t afford such a huge set back. Especially not while competing for an internship with DigiTech. They were the leading computer/cyber specialists in the nation if not the world and they were looking for one specific intern from their area. Why they’d look in a school with people who are just learning the field was a mystery to her, but she if she didn’t try she would regret it later. It was truly a once in a lifetime shot.
She tuned out teach-zilla and started thinking about what she had to do once she was out of this nightmare. Her mother probably had corrupted all her hard work by now, they needed some milk, and Grama Annie’s pills needed to be picked up too. White wispy hair and wrinkled skin and a tan with the shape of her wristwatch still pale, Grama Annie was around 80 years old and didn’t age well. She had a stroke she was fortunate to even be alive from so she couldn’t use her left arm and leg like she used to. Her mind however was still sound as ever and she and Eddie did plenty together, despite obvious limitations.
The bell finally chimed her saving grace.
“Don’t forget your projects are due and will be presented next week to the class!” Ms. Fuzen got her last word in.
That was another thing for her to do. She had started the project, and finished it early even, but when she tried to store it on her school drive she had somehow been denied the right to write to it, which the school can revoke the privilege of the drive as they wish, but it came at a really bad time. She only had Read access to retrieve what she had already stored. When she inquired on the matter she had found out that Ms. Fuzen reported her as possibly sharing her school files with other students allowing them to cheat off of her. There was no proof behind the claim, but it was enough to deny her use until they found any or determined that she wasn’t cheating after all. Which she wasn’t.
She hated cheating with a passion. Other students had asked her to tutor them, but in those sessions she barely ever used her own files as material unless there was a picture or something from class she wanted to bring up. In the end, when it came down to assignments or tests she had a strict I’m-not-doing-your-work-for-you policy. She had enough to do on her own. She grabbed her things and next to flew out the door of the classroom as she went to her locker. She put away a couple of books and took out a couple others. With all the computer trouble at home, it was a blessing that she had her own tablet. She had won it by accident when deciding to go to a big electronics shop and dream about owning some of the high tech gear inside when it turns out they were giving out a prize to the whatever-numbered person came through the door that day. She had to sign the paper work and all the blah blah blah and then ran home as fast as she could in fear of the store calling her back to say it was all a big joke.
She swung her backpack around and on and made her way to her on-the-way-home activities. Along with going to the store she decided should stop by at the small diner where she worked at part time. Her boss might’ve scheduled her to work and forget to call again. She’d just call in herself, but he never answered nowadays in fear of his estranged wife calling him and ‘ruining his mood’ or something like that. Her mom supported them well enough, but she used her own money to buy the things her mother called ‘extras’- things they needed but were going to have to live without. She didn't make much in tips, next to nothing really, but she was saving up and she was determined.
Eddie made it to the office where she kept her board. It was just too big to fit in her locker and the school hated to see them around campus anyway. So she bought a lock box from the front office and gave it to them to look over it during the day. She left the box at school to drop whatever she wanted in it the next day. It’s a program more boarders should use in her opinion, since it was better than hiding it in a bush like everyone else. She also hid projects there instead of in her locker since those were easy to hack, if you knew how, and then all your hard work gets someone else's grade. She considered it part of her school-wide I’m-not-doing-you’re-work-for-you policy.

The school itself had several very good launch points for a board run. There were a few buildings near by one could jump to go pretty much anyway you wanted to from the campus. The school was built rather recently, the previous school had been around long enough for her grandmother’s mother to attend school there, and despite the obvious distaste for the sport it seems like they structured it as it was with boarders in mind. If there was another reason she was glad to mooch off of it nonetheless.
Eddie was on the East end of the school on top of the gymnasium, and she was setting her eye on an abandoned clothing shop. Despite the title of abandoned it was actually used all the time by the school’s less athletic populace who cut class there and came back during the bell for the class after. She had seen kids do the same even when they had gym as the last class of the day. (And almost as if to prove her point some freshman started to come out of the building.) She scoffed. They could’ve been gone over an hour ago.
Anyway, getting her head back in gear she prepped herself for her departure. Board in hand and anklet on she raced for the edge of the building. With a final leap, she brought the board under her feet at the crest and rode up the side of the building till she hit the summit. It was the tallest building around to board from and it had some old metal wiring atop it that stretched far and wide across the town. History class said that it was an old means of communication. People spoke through a banana shaped thing on one end and the other person heard it on the other banana. Weird way to talk if you asked her, the bananas were rarely even yellow, but she thanked them for their future usefulness.