As the sun rose the next day and Jasper began to wake up, people bustled from one place to another. Adults moved about the city either at the end of a night shift or the beginning of a new day shift, eager to get to where they needed to be while the students of Jasper began preparing for their next school day before the weekend. Many students at the school in Jasper walked there, though most older students had their own vehicles and would tend to drive their friends who lacked one. Alice was one of the few students without a vehicle or someone to drive her to school in the morning, so she had to wake up extra early, early enough to say goodbye to her father as he left for his first job, but far too early to be on school grounds.
Alice made herself a quick breakfast and ate it on the go as she bustled around her own home, gathering up her homework and making herself a lunch to go, trying not to take anything that would spoil in the heat. She had no time to do any tarot readings this morning or any morning that she had school, unless she woke up at five in the morning for some reason. She had a shower and got dressed as the last thing she did before school, brushing her hair out just as she had to head out the door. This was her usual routine, and she was used to it at this point. Sure, she could do it all a little slower if she woke up earlier, but if she woke up any earlier, she found that she could hardly make it through the school day, and the walk home became unbearable.
The walk to school in the morning wasn't so bad, as the desert sun hadn't heated up the cool sands from the long night without it just yet. A cool breeze still swept over Jasper in the early morning, though Alice welcomed it, knowing that it was about to become hotter throughout the day, and the school had minimal air conditioning. Alice got to school around the same time as all of the other students, sitting outside and enjoying the last of the cool breeze as she watched the various students approach the building, though she was looking for one student in particular, Jack. She wanted to know if he was okay and get a better insight into his situation and how she could help; Alice was a lot like her mother in that way.
Alice's mother had died long ago in a car accident that took her life. She had been driving late at night when some racers whizzed past her on the freeway, and one of them struck her by accident as they had all been swerving around her. It caused a massive pileup that killed several people, though her mother was the only one in that situation who wasn't racing. Alice had her license but couldn't drive without a car, and she sort of liked it that way. She had it to run errands with her father on his rare days off, but she avoided the freeway like the plague when they did. They were still nervous in the car almost a decade later.
As Jack pulled up to the school on his motorcycle, Alice got down from where she sat on the wall and approached Jack, weaving her way through the other students, but she heard something strange. It sounded like he was talking to someone, but only his motorcycle was there, she swore she heard a second voice, but as she approached, the voice was nowhere to be found. "Hey, Jack." Alice started, startling the boy as he jumped and turned to face her, chuckling a bit as he grabbed his bag and helmet off the back of the motorcycle where he had placed them temporarily. "Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to scare you." Alice laughed a bit, moving to the front of the motorcycle and admiring it for a moment. She was a careful girl, but a part of her longed for the excitement that a vehicle like this could provide. After all, she was still a reckless teenager, just in her own ways.
Jack would smile and rub his head in embarrassment, shrugging a little as he glanced at the school doors and then at his motorcycle. "Hey, Alice. How, uh, How are you?" Jack asked nervously, he had nervous energy around him again, but it wasn't as strong as before. Jack was simply worried that she might have heard him talking to Arcee.
"Could be better. Walking to school every day is a pain. It must be nice having a ride like this." Alice would say, gesturing to the motorcycle, walking to the other side of it to get a better look at it. It was definitely something nicer than he could afford with a K.O. burger paycheque. "Did your mom buy it for you or something? There's no way you could afford this working at K.O. and insurance? Maybe you could afford that." Alice laughed a little bit, trying to joke with him as she stood on the other side of his bike, crossing her arms over her chest for now as they spoke.
Jack would shrug and tuck his helmet under his left arm, leaving his right one open as his backpack was over his shoulder. "No, I uh, got it second hand. She needs some work, really." Jack would try to explain, lying the whole way through. She could see his nervous energy increasing, and she would furrow her brows, looking down.
Was his nervous energy radiating off him? She swore she saw a bit coming from the motorcycle, but she shook her head and looked back at Jack. Alice would uncross her arms and glance at the school doors. "Hey, if you're doing something on the side to get money, I'm not going to tattle on you. If anything, I just want to know what it is, you seem really on edge lately, and I'm concerned for you." Alice would say seriously, she would make an excellent counsellor one day if that were a path that she decided to go down. Alice wasn't really sure what she wanted to go and do. She was thinking about taking a year or two off to work anyway, as she didn't have the money for higher education in the first place.
Jack would shake his head. "What? No, it's fine, really. You don't need to worry about me." Jack would try to brush off what Alice had said, but to no avail, as Alice gave him a very stern look and leaned forwards, placing her hands on his motorcycle as she did to prove a point, though she would freeze, feeling the energy coming off of his motorcycle, this was more than just a bike, and she could tell by the feel of it, it was alive. She was good at sensing energies, too good for her own safety, as her eyes would go wide with shock, and she looked down at her hands and the bike in fear. What was he riding around? "Hey, are you okay?" Jack asked, placing his hand on her shoulder as she froze up, having been looking like she was about to give him a lecture, but now saying nothing and looking scared of something.
"Jack. What is your bike? And don't say a motorcycle." Alice would say, looking up at him, though she refused to remove her hands from the bike. Jack seemed surprised as he glanced at his vehicle, not knowing what to say. Arcee prayed that he thought of something, and fast, as this girl seemed to be cluing into something, somehow.
Jack would gently lift her hands off his bike, and not wanting to cause trouble or a scene, Alice lifted her hands, still staring at Jack and waiting for an answer. "Can we talk about this after school? Classes are about to start." Jack tried to reason. Alice wanted to protest, but Jack was already walking to the doors, leaving Alice with his bike. She would look down at it and glare a little, nothing should be giving off that kind of energy aside from a living thing. Not having the answers that she needed for the moment, it seemed that Alice was just going to have to wait until after school to get them, and she tried to take her mind off it as she walked up the steps again, glancing back just before she entered, but she would shake her head and go inside to class.
Throughout the day, Alice couldn't take her mind off it. She wanted her answers. Alice decided to skip lunch, deciding that she could eat later and that this was more important. She headed outside to where Jack had parked his bike, seeing it still sitting there. She frowned a little and went to sit before it, closing her eyes as she did. She had to get a better reading on its energy to try and figure out what it was. As she did, she found that it was all distorted. It was why she couldn't be as sure of it as she was with people. It was almost, Alien. Alice would open her eyes and reach out to the front tire, gently placing her hand on it and feeling the energy running through it. "What are you?" Alice asked quietly, shaking her head. Maybe she was reading things wrong and was going crazy, but when she heard a throat clear behind her, she would see Jack as she turned her head.
"Would you mind?" Jack asked. He had been relatively nice to Alice so far, so hearing him take such a tone with her was shocking. Alice would get up and shake her head a bit, feeling like she had just been caught red-handed doing something wrong. "Just stay away from my motorcycle, okay?" Jack asked a bit aggressively, though it just made Alice wonder further about what it was. If he was getting defensive, maybe she was right about feeling its energy.
Alice would stand her ground and straighten up a little bit. "Why are you skipping class? I know this isn't your lunch block." Alice asked. Jack didn't have an answer he could give her, he was going to try and talk to Arcee about what he needed to do about this situation and didn't expect Alice to be out here. "So you're going to give me some answers, and then maybe I'll give you some. If you have questions." Alice would say sternly, holding her ground before the boy, who would simply sigh a bit. There was no way around this, it seemed.
Jack would slump his shoulders a little bit and walk over to his motorcycle, placing a hand on it as he tried one last time to look for an excuse, but he couldn't come up with one. "What kind of questions do you have?" Jack would ask, defeated. He remembered her last question before they had gone inside a few hours ago but wanted her to ask all of them, and not just a general one, if she could. He hoped that the question was different this time. That way, maybe he could lie his way out of things.
Alice glanced at the bike and then at him again, questions running rampant through her mind. "Well, what exactly is it? It's a motorcycle, sure, but I can tell that it's alive. Only living things give off that kind of energy; from what I think I was getting, only sentient things give off that sort." Alice explained though it seemed to confuse Jack. He had never heard of people sensing energies before, maybe in fantasy books when he was young, but he didn't read many of those now.
"I don't understand. How are you getting anything? She's just a motorcycle." Jack tried to lie again, was he dealing with another Alien in disguise, maybe? Jack had no idea, but he wasn't eager to get himself involved in anything else, so he just lied for now.
"She?" Alice asked, raising an eyebrow before she crossed her arms in annoyance. "Stop lying to me, Jack. Just tell me what she is." She demanded, furrowing her brows together as she tried to think of her next questions. Seeing no other way around this, Jack would sigh and take his hand off Arcee.
"Okay."