Online, part 1

[So, a bit of a disclaimer. I'm currently working on NANOWRIMO, so the stuff I post here is going to be...a little less polished, a little less intense than usual. I'm saving the intensity for Nano and the polish just...takes time. Which isn't really an excuse. But. This is going to be a two-or-three-part-er, since I've already been infected by the Epic Fiction Bug. AND. It has a plot, guys!]
Margot was bored – and not just bored, but bored.
There was a distinct difference, she assured herself, as she updated her Twitter feed and sat back to watch the responses pour in.

Three seconds. Refresh.
Three minutes. Refresh
Five minutes. Refresh
Seven minutes.

She pushed herself away from her desk with a huff and glared at the empty yellowish-green walls of her new apartment. Three hours after moving in, her bed set up, her dishes unpacked, her books and clothing in various states of chaos, her fridge stocked by intervention of some family member or other, her bookcases lying in pieces on the floor and her internet connection as new as a kitten who hadn’t yet opened its eyes (she’d need one of those, she suddenly decided: a kitten would definitely help with the boredom)...three hours after moving in, and there was nothing to do.

She rejected the notion of unpacking anymore – hadn’t she just finished putting all that stuff into the boxes the night before? As for bookcase building, that was going to have to wait until some well-meaning friends brought her a screwdriver or at the very least an Alan key – she wasn’t going to call her dad and tell him that she’d forgotten them when he’d very specifically reminded her at least a dozen times. The kitchen wasn’t dirty yet, and she didn’t even have to cook herself anything to eat – the remains of a pizza were sitting in their box on the counter next to a four-pack of her favourite beer and a thermos of something she suspected was probably originally coffee.

Refresh. Still nothing. Where was everyone? It was early December, so everyone was either out of school or procrastinating heavily, and either way, she reasoned, they should be at least checking for her updates. What kind of friends were they? she grumbled to herself as she logged onto her favourite MMORPG and began to go through the agonizing process of deciding which character to play.

--

Lily was bored – and not just bored, but bored.
Not there was much difference, she sighed as she polished her crystal ball for the fiftieth time in two hours and sent out a mass prod into the network.

Three seconds. Rattle.
Three minutes. Rattle
Five minutes. Rattle
Seven minutes.

The damn thing was probably broken again, she reasoned, and stalked away from the stand to slump on her throne and stare at the new colour scheme that her idiot interior decorator had assured her was all the rage in Necropolis. She was secretly positive that the moss was a little overdone and kitschy-earthy, aside from being the most horrendous shade of puke green that anyone could fathom – and it clashed terribly with the amethyst of her throne. Perhaps, she mused, she should have taken the decorator’s idea to have the throne redone as well before throwing her from the tower in a fit of (entirely righteous) anger. She sank a little lower into the cushions. The moss really was hideous.

There was absolutely nothing to do, except possibly supervise her minions, and she wasn’t exactly going to do that, not on the day of their annual bath. So many wet, squirming, naked minions in one place was something she could just not handle. She briefly considered whipping up a new batch of poison, but thought better of it – the last one had somehow burned a hole in the bottom of her second-best cauldron, and the best one was really only for show and cracked under any significant heat. There was, she mused, the concept of running through catalogues for a new lizard of some sort, but that was really a little beyond her, what with Morris being only three weeks dead and the fact that she desperately wanted a fire-orange one and it would clash terribly with the new colours.

She stomped back to the crystal ball, still pulsating purpley at her, and shook it again. Still nothing. Where was everyone? Probably, she pondered darkly, at one of Sarah’s terrible séances, spooking nine year old girls in some godforsaken corner of Antarctica or something. What kind of friends were they? She grumbled to herself as she pulled out her wand and transported herself into a battlefield site near the Green portal.