Expulsion

It was Monday, and the start of a fresh new week for everyone in Adenna, but it was a week that held special significance to Aurast. This week was the week that he graduated. Graduating, the wonderful time that it is, still had a great deal of scheduling and busywork to it that was not at all fun, but absolutely all worth it, and it was just this fact that Christopher Andan was coming to check up on with the Dagger Sasc brother.

He strolled down this pleasant suburban district and into Aurast's apartment complex. All the districts housed different crowds, but they were all a kind people and warmly greeted so long as they caught glances by Chris or his waves. There were not many more people to come into these morning greetings with until he would be before Aurast's door, and upon reaching it, he looked a little startled to see that the door was cracked.

Chris pushed inside with the new stack of mail that awaited Aurast's tending. It was overwhelming, but such was one reason Chris had come, was to help his friend. Often times things got overwhelming, and if he knew his lazy friend, he knew that Aurast would be intimidated and defeated by this amount of work. But you never had to do things alone. An important message bearing reminding.

?Aurast? Are you in here?? closing the door back behind him so that the dogs wouldn't get out. How they hadn't was a miracle in itself. He made into the kitchen where chip bags and dirty dishes were strewn across all the counters. On the floor was an empty whiskey bottle with a sticky floor right at the bottle. A little thinking would lead you to believe it was spilled and then lapped up there by one of the dogs. Not good.

?Aurast!? Chris shouted. He was worried now.

He laid the mail down and went back to check the bathroom and two rooms: Aurast's bedroom and his game room. The man could be in any condition, and as drunk as he had come home that day from defeating the blue imp in the swords tournament; just the fact that he was willing to touch the bottle again meant he was unafraid of the consequences.

?Aurast!? Chris barged into his room.

There he sat on the bed, hunched over his bass with his headphones plugged in. He looked up at Chris and blinked several times at him. ?What?? he asked with that slightly louder voice because he could not hear it.

Chris sighed, and quickly tried to recover back to what he had initially come here over, and forget all this worry and speculation. ?Hey. Take the headphones off. Take the headphones off. Don't wear those while you're talking to me.? he said with a hand sign again and again to let him know even more he was not joking.

Aurast removed his headphones to hang around his neck.

?You know you're graduating this week?? Chris asked, looking concerned.

?Yeah, I know.?

?Then how about you start preparing for it? People you know and people you don't know are going to want to talk to you from now, up until then and past it ? guys who want to congratulate you. What the hell is this?? he picked up a shotglass on the nightstand and tossed it to the far wall, breaking it.

?Heyy. Heey.? Aurast said in defense of the glass he had custom ordered. He wanted Chris to know that he was the one being aggressive, and he on the other hand, was being cool. Oh how little that mattered in reality.

?You reek of booze. You know how lucky you are? To be as smart as you are? To be able to get to go to school, do these things you've been doing, and go onto the next thing with your head held high? ? Very lucky, Aurast.? Chris said, pointing at him.

?Hey..Chris-man.....it's not your life, okay?? He returned to thumping out a bassline to busy his fingers.

?I don't believe this...? Chris stared him down. ?You've got a ticket to your future and you're throwing it away.?

?There is no ticket! There's nothing!? Aurast interjected, bringing his bass over to slam on his bed and stand up to face Chris. ?A few handshakes and a piece of paper.? he said in a very condescending tone.

Chris stared right back, and he knew for a fact Aurast had spoken very highly of this degree. The fact that he disregarded it now spoke there had to have been something else at play. ?You know it's more than that, Aurast.?

?Just leave me alone, Chris. I'm busy.? showing him his bass very briefly.

Chris nodded. A man needed his space, and he'd give it to him. ?You know you missed jogging this morning.? backing up and then turning to leave, and leave the mail with the man. It was his own, after all.

Aurast smirked just to save face, but he hadn't actually heard what was said; or rather, he wasn't listening. He looked very sad just then, after he did finally hear it.

Lyndon ran outside into that sun, and would freely admit to you the surprise at which that breeze came to his gown.

Cars made a full space of the streets and removed the breathing space that normally came with these sidewalks. A few people still getting out of those cars called out to Lyndon playfully, easily identifying him as one of the graduates.

Now, where could Aurast be?

Lyndon rounded the street corner that still ran along the school campus this graduation was being held at: his school. He knew these grounds well, and Aurast had been here a number of times with him when they were working on the water cannon for the Gnomish Invention Contest.

They used the room for shop class to cut the metals and do machine cuts with Kaylee's 3D files she worked on at her respective campus. He wouldn't be there. Lyndon cut off the sidewalk and ran up the concrete-colored stairs back into the empty school hall.

It was loud in the auditorium, which he was some good distance from now, but could still hear the quiet noises of a large mob of people all gathered together in one place. It wouldn't be long until the graduation ceremony started, so he had to find Aurast fast. If he was in Adenna, or Star's End, or anywhere but here, Lyndon would never find him. But Kaylee wasn't wrong. He was here.

Out of the blue, Lyndon passed the doorway to the court that ran down to the football field, and saw through one of its windows a graduate-dressed man leaning over the steel railing and looking over the garage space where school equipment was trucked in and where two drink machines also stood next to each other.

Lyndon stared so trying to understand out that window at him for a moment, but would pull the door open and go out to join him. A simple wave tested how welcome he was when Aurast caught sight of him. He didn't run or shout at him, but waved right back. This told Lyndon he was clear to approach him.

He came up beside him and leaned on the railing with him, looking out at the same sight he did in this delightful shade. ?Hey,? he said, pretending with all his might to actually care about what he was looking at. ?Nice spot.? Not even he was buying it, but Aurast, who looked at him, seemed to respect it.

?Thanks.? he said to him with a surrendered grin before deep-breathing and looking back out over the lower garage-way. A gust regularly blew down at them and waved the tassels of their caps and blew their gowns. It was nice. It was quiet.

?You know graduation's about to start,? Lyndon began. ? ? you're not planning on making me go up there alone, are you??

Aurast only laughed an exhale, but it made Lyndon smile.

?What's eating you, man?? he asked.

Aurast gripped over and again the expensive wristwatch on his hairy arm. ?I don't know, Peter...? he began, and he was by no means talkative, so his words did come with good intervals, and they came far more reserved than usual. ?Whenever people told me I'll never do anything I could just laugh right back in their faces. But now with this degree stuff, they can hold it over my head, and I won't be able to laugh, cause they'll have been right.?

?What do you mean?? Lyndon asked.

?I don't have a job or career pathway in business or anything lined up, Pete, and that's just what people are expecting of me now. I just put my mind to this and did it. That's all. I don't know how I'll be able to go in there and accept that diploma with no intention to do something in this field for a living.? Aurast looked on.

?I'm not expecting you to do anything like that either, Aurast,? Lyndon laughed. ?I just want you to be you, and do what you want to do, and I'm sure everybody else wants you to, too. A diploma doesn't have to change anything. You've got too much to do in life to be confined to just the business world. Everybody knows that.? he grinned over to him.

?I don't know what it is, Pete... maybe I'm afraid to grow up,? Aurast murmured.

Pete placed a hand on his shoulder, ?You don't have to do that either, man.?

Aurast came up to the podium with the Principal and what he thought would take minutes of tension-filled, heart-pounding agony was only a few short seconds that passed him before he knew what hit him. He grabbed the diploma and the Principal's hand and was being applauded while he smiled rather late to all this, and was still somewhat dumbfounded when he was given the podium with the Principal's stepping back. But he had his speech papers.

He situated himself before looking out to the crowd. So many kids' families were there, and even his: Seirichi, Mia, Corea, Nima, Techichi, Lilith, Nayun, Nayon, Dawn, Chris, Havelast, Robin, Nordem, Terry, Shannon, Rahea, Victor and Rijn Savorenius! All his friends, and they gave him the courage to speak. Thank the gods for speech notes.

?Hello...

?
? Ehehm!
? Thank you Principal Laird,
? Thank you to the Chairman of the Board of Trustees, David Hasterman.
? Thank you Adam Yorwick, Ernest Daly and Fred Law... for your help with Kaylee, Peter and I's little science project...?

Aurast's words were met with brief laughter.

? Thank you Kelly Gracer, William Osborne, and Catherine Holl, for your wonderful program with the school system that made my degree in business possible with an internship. It's been one of the best years of my life. And before I get started ? Havelast ? this is for you.?

Aurast holds up the diploma and tucks his lips in tightly while he looks at him as it is all he can do to not cry right there. Havelast is also seen looking emotional while the crowd applauds in support for the brief moment.

?I'm undeserving of this privilege to stand up here and send this class off into the realm to unleash their brilliance upon it. But since they all forced me up here, and I guess cause I'm so old, here I am,?

Aurast's words were met with brief laughter.

?When you set out to do something that's going to be difficult, there will always be people that say you can't, and everyone said that I couldn't get this diploma. That all changed when I signed up and actually met my business class, and my teacher, Paul Zuckerberg, who all believed in me from day one.

?It was the kind of faith you do have to give blindly, because you don't know; all you know is you have a person and he says he wants to pass your class. That's all I could give. But that was all a man like Paul Zuckerberg needed. Thank you, Paul.?

Applause for Paul Zuckerberg.

?We did eighteen weeks of bookwork and god-awful exams with no curves, and then we were thrown into the unforgiving world of making or losing money. Paul Zuckerberg had a bank account and office floor rented out for our whole class to run an actual business for the remainder of his course, and I can safely say, I've never had more fun in my life. So you all know, the business was called Huntengem International, which Paul said he just named randomly after a breed of domestic duck.?

Aurast's words were met with laughter.

?He threw this newborn company in our lap and told us we had six weeks to groom it to a 200% net worth. This put us in actual business meetings, conferences, meetings with other companies, and making real business decisions that cost real money trying to manage our company that was supposed to sell notebook PCs and a desktop line. We learned financials and market share, mergers, joint ventures and acquisitions, all first-hand. And I've never heard of any school anywhere having a course this immersing into a career field.

?Our class was the guinea pig for this type of program, so there was a lot at risk, but there was even more to gain by learning what we did. Because of this uniqueness that is credited to Paul Zuckerberg and the others, Kelly Gracer, William Osborne, and Catherine Holl, our class got on the news and sparked massive interest in the program and future ones like it that are going to try and make it onto the curriculum next year.?

Applause.

?The only other thing I did than trust in Paul's teaching was the water cannon, which I co-created with the help of the talented Kaylee Delvac and Peter Lyndon,?

Applause.

?They're both brilliant kids who are going to do great things, and without them, my cannon would have surely remained just a doodle from class. So thank you, Kaylee and Peter.?

Applause for Kaylee Delvac and Peter Lyndon.

?I guess now I'm supposed to say something encouraging and entirely predictable as you all go out and celebrate without the supervision of your parents tonight...?

Laughter.

?...And I'm sorry that I have to be predictable, but wishing you all the best... and telling you to go out into the world and make it better is the exact thing that I have been afraid of, myself. And I didn't know it until I saw what great minds are capable of... and are capable of together."

Dramatic pause as Aurast fished for words.

?I come from a sword-swinging realm, and having seen many sides of Rhydin, I can say we're not as advanced as a lot of the stuff I've seen here, like computers. We think that the strength of a sword is the strength of a man... but with this piece of paper... I respectfully disagree. This is just as much the strength of a person ? ?

Interrupting Applause.

? ? as any sword ? or muscle is. And in closing... I always say that failure stories make the best success stories. Well, that's me. I'm twenty-six, I'm lazy, I drink too much, I'm irresponsible, and I just graduated.?

Interrupting Applause.

? ? So anybody can do it! Thank you, and thanks to you, Class of 2012!? Aurast said as the goings-on on stage led into some more cheer from the audience at the sight of some sort of planned surprise. Students carried out instruments to the stage and rigged them up very quickly and premeditated.

Aurast was apart of this surprise, so he fought for one last word into the microphone as ?Pomp and Circumstance? March No. 1 in D slowly began to play. ?I know this song is really old and played at most graduation ceremonies... but this is not most graduation ceremonies, so we're not going to do that ? we're going to do it a little bit different!?

Handed his bass guitar with the strap over his head, he took to it with cameras throughout the auditorium going ablaze at the sight of him in his gown and with the large white and blue instrument. Playing with him on stage when he had accepted the guitar was his garage band, and they delivered a fresh and hard rock version of the classic Graduation March that was looking very well-received by the looks of things.

At the conclusion of the short punk band-sized performance (1-2 minutes), Aurast, the band, and the entire graduating class all bowed to the standing families, friends, and loved ones in the auditorium seats.