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The campus library was the essence of all that was Alma Tech and Parker Thomas' life: lots of promise, little delivery.

Not that Parker wasn't fond of libraries. Anyone who knew him, even as "that guy", associated him with stacks of books and a pencil eraser poked into the corner of his mouth. He just hadn't packed his bags and said goodbye to everything he'd ever known for a humdrum existence day in and day out. Six months into his first year away from home and he sat behind the desk as a student aide without any plans on this rainy April Friday. There was nothing to look forward to but another hour of this spacious, well-lit, yet strangely dull collection of shelves, desks, softly-humming computer monitors, and glassy-eyed students whiling away the last of the daylight hours.

If only, if only, Parker thought as he dropped his chin into his hand. The minds of his fellow students seemed to slip into daydreams on a whim, but his was always alert. Always analyzing. Always making things less fun than they could be. I belong here... it suits me.

This kind of mediocrity seemed inevitable from the day he'd turned twelve and found himself squinting at the classroom blackboard, which was the precursor to his parents sitting him down and having a long talk with him about what the doctors had told them in far less gentle terms. Twelve-year-old Parker had only known that a degenerative eye condition meant baseball was soon to become a thing of the past. Computers became his future, and they were more forgiving than anything that whizzed through the air.

Not that he had high hopes for himself, but Parker had hoped college would be the best time of his life - that's what everyone said, wasn't it? - but Parker went to Alma Tech, and nothing exciting ever happened on Alma Tech.

He wrinkled his nose as his eyes drifted from face to face. If anyone had anything interesting to say or do, it all went on behind closed doors. The library in high school had been filled with barely-contained giggles and furtive whispers, but here he heard nothing except the occasional cough or spring sniffle. One girl on the far side of the library was staring out the window as if the pounding rain held the answers her shoulder-high stack of textbooks wasn't putting out with.

No such luck, girl, he mused. Been there, done that. Maybe we could lighten things up together? I know a nice place across from the bookstore downtown. No one in their right mind ever goes there, which is exactly why it's perfect...

Parker could imagine stepping out from behind the desk, striding through the sparse crowd, and leaning one arm coolly on the desk next to her. Not for the first time, he wished he could say something like that instead of, "Sure, I can help you with your paper this Saturday. I'm not doing anything, anyway. Nothing important, I mean." She was cute, in a fussy librarian kind of way. Parker's first real crush had been one of the librarians in his small, wooded hometown who'd let him off the hook when he'd been two weeks late to return Call of the Wild.

Maybe he would talk to her, but instead of that cheesy line he'd say something a little more honest, like...

"Hey. Hey, guy!" Someone was waving a hand in front of his face.

He snapped back to reality, and a sheaf of papers was brandished in his face - blank papers. Leaning back he fought to keep a scowl off his face as the student continued.

"I can't get the printer to work."

"Have you checked the print jobs?" Parker asked, not wanting to get up.

"Huh? The what?"

"Hold on." Parker sighed. "Follow me."

For better or for worse, that printer needed his attention for the next 45 minutes. The women on campus might not have been interested, but the machines couldn't get enough of his hands on them. The rest of his shift was spent crouched over in inspection, apologizing to irate students, and making calls to the senior support members elsewhere on campus who spoke to him about as politely as they would a child with his sticky hands on their equipment. There was no time to think, not about his terrible pickup lines and not about his terrible boredom.

Some Thomas he was, he thought as he practically slammed the casing door closed. His father was an engineer at a respectable company with its headquarters in Minneapolis, and his two older brothers, Simon and Michael, had gone to out-of-state universities to major in Mathematics and Physics. Here he was, the runt of the family, playing tech support to morons and graying misers on high horses. Family gatherings typically had at least one awkward silence reserved for him.

Considering the entire family was intensely introverted, mildly neurotic, and more interested in machines and algorithms than human beings, that wasn't saying much. He hadn't wanted to be like them, not really. Despite the cries of "momma's boy", "pansy-ass", and everything else from other boys (brothers included), he'd always wanted to emulate the more humane of the two parents.

Parker had inherited his father's gem-like green eyes and untamable dark curls, but his nature and love of nature had come from his mother, however briefly she'd been there to impart it to him. She''d been a nature photographer, and after coming back from a week with her Parker had wanted to be a veterinarian, or a ranger, or a biologist - anything out where there was flora and fauna. But he was a printer jockey enrolled in a small-time culinary program, because he needed to go to school and was short on money. That was the one thing he'd managed to outperform the rest of the household at. Not that you needed to know how to cook when you were living on a $70,000 salary.

The printer chirped and whirred back to life, but Parker's satisfaction was short-lived. A small fire had sputtered into life in his chest. This fire was one of those dissatisfied, defiant aberrations that only seem to bare their teeth in response to too many of the little things. Something had to give around here, and it wasn't going to be him.

Even in his head, that sounded pathetic.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw a group of students with their hands pressed up against the tall, rain-specked glass windows of the library. There were three of them, all male, and all of them his age. Parker considered flipping them the good ol' bird when one of them smiled and his blood turned to ice in his veins. It was the feeling you got when, on the bridge of sleep during the night, you heard a sound you couldn't quite attribute to a branch scraping the window or a mouse scrabbling about in the wall. It had been a perfectly normal smile - sheepish, even - but there was something off about it. Inhuman, even.

Just as Parker was beginning to list off the myriad of ways in which that was a ridiculous thing to think, they turned and left.

Paranoia bubbled up in the pit of his stomach. Had they been staring at him? He quickly quashed it as he did all such frantic, feverish thoughts. The nearby woods were a haven for delinquents, absentees, and drunks. They were probably one if not all three of those things and had wandered back onto campus looking to chase some tail, crash someone's party, and raise hell. He was just glad they hadn't gone rampaging through the library like the last lot had.

Whatever they were up to, they weren't going to be his problem until 6 p.m. on Monday. Did anything else matter? No. No, it didn't. Parker checked his watch and confirmed that Friday night had officially begun. Students were already drifting out, and there were only a few desperate stragglers to be shooed and reassured after them before he could leave.

The doors locked with a heavenly click.

It wasn't until he passed his own reflection in a tall, dark pane of glass 10 minutes later that he noticed he was carrying less than he should be. A whole armful less of something. He locked eyes with himself and muttered, "Shit."