The Starling Vigilante [Watty's 2015 Award Winner]

Chapter 6

After a jam packed Freshers week, my second week at uni and my first lecture came by as quick as anything. And trust me, it was the most boring lecture I had experienced in my life.

Many hung over and tired students slowly filled the observatory, the overall mood of the group very low compared to the high excitement of the last few days. I think I was the only one in the room still enthusiastic since I arrived, and that was coming from someone who had been abducted.

To say we were in one of the country's best observatories, let's just say the lecture itself was too dull to be even called mediocre.

As I entered the observatory, my expectations of how amazing the lecture would be soon started flooding into my mind. And as I left my opinions would be the complete opposite. I just didn't know what would happen until it did.

Looking for a spare seat, I spotted Isaac, a space left next to him. It seemed that he spotted me too, as he waved me over with a smile. We both had seemed to turn up to the same events, Isaac, Ethan, Harper and I, all last week, and had gotten on well. We had all met in Manchester's many bars, but the only difference between us all was that I was usually the only sober one. That's probably why I was the only one in the lecture wide awake.

'Did you catch up on some sleep?' I asked Isaac knowingly. Although he had been the one who could hold his drink, the alcohol had clearly took its toll on him when morning approached. But today he seemed switched on.

'Yeah, thanks,' he replied. 'I managed to get an early night last night.'

'So that's why you weren't at Ethan's last night,' I assumed.

'You look excited about something,' Isaac commented.

'Its just, this dream, my dream, has finally come true,' I exclaimed.

'What, go to a lecture?' Isaac joked. I playfully rolled my eyes.

'Isn't this your dream too?' I asked.

'Well, yeah, but I just hate lectures,' he explained. 'My father liked to take us to as many as possible so my brother and I would be ready for uni. Didn't really work, just made me despise them.'

'Its my first one actually,' I said in contrast. 'Lectures, that is.'

Isaac just grinned at me. 'You're in for a treat.'

As the lecturer moaned on about how astrophysics was so 'exciting', I started to yawn and put my mind to other things. And the first thing that popped into my head was obviously the abduction. What else?

The problem was though, I had been scared of thinking about it. The whole thing just gave me flashbacks. I hadn't been thinking about it all week because the only time I could contemplate was in my room, and that's where all the danger started. I just didn't understand why I was abducted, who by, and how. Yes, I know I was taken to be recruited for something by someone Harper knew and by drinking something. But what equally annoyed me and made me more curious was that I didn't have solid, complete answers. Being stubborn, I wanted more. And I wasn't going to give up that easily. I mean, how did someone manage to break into the university, unseen? Ethan and Isaac had witnessed me faint. Unless they had something to do with it...

'Aria?' I heard Isaac faintly and a shooting pain in my left shin. Back to reality, I realised I had dosed off, partially asleep. And Isaac had kicked me to wake me up.

Rubbing my shin to ease the pain, I smiled in thanks, not wanting the lecturer to see that I was uninterested. I couldn't hurt someone's feelings like that, even if they were a lecturer I may never see again.

'Still awake?' Isaac whispered.

'Just about,' I whispered back and sat back, waiting for the never ending lecture to end.

---

My life at university was much different than I first expected. The course wasn't as based around the observatory as I had hoped, but the lessons were still very interesting. Luckily, Isaac had been by my side every step, his knowledge of basic physics aiding me in my work and my knowledge of space and deduction aiding him.

Our astrophysics teacher was also very different to the first lecturer. He led dynamic and thought-provoking lessons helped me a great deal and inspired me to find great things.

That was until, two months in, my life changed, forever.