Radiant - By Christina Daley Page 0,35

said. "You'd think something we call 'Sci-Tech' would be shiny and have lots of windows and stuff. But all the money went to building the new football stadium."

"Which isn't even complete, because the money ran out," her friend said. "The fine arts building is garbage, too."

"Well, thanks for your help," Mary said, and she left them.

The inside of Sci-Tech was about as ugly as the outside, with cracking linoleum floors and snot yellow walls. The halls were narrow, the ceilings low, and the fluorescent lights hummed. Sci-Tech was also a maze. There were no helpful signs anywhere, and Mary wondered about aimlessly for a while. As she was meandering down a hall, she heard singing. She followed the voice until she happened on a janitor emptying out a trash bin.

"Excuse me?" she asked. "Can you help me?"

The janitor stopped singing and looked at her. "I can try. What do you need?"

Mary studied him for a moment—his tied back hair, his cleaning uniform, and the red athletic wristbands on his hands. For some reason, he seemed familiar. "Have I seen you before?" she asked.

He chuckled. "Probably. I'm around this place a lot."

"No, I mean I'm not a student here. I'm actually looking for someone. I just had this weird thought that…" She was sure she'd never met him until now. But there was just something about him. She just couldn't put her finger on it. "Sorry. I'm not making any sense."

He chuckled again. "It's all right. I have that kind of face. Anyway, who were you looking for? Student or teacher?"

"I don't know," she said, taking out a piece of paper from her pocket and reading the note she had written on it. "His name is Drew, and I think he works in the astronomy department."

"I know where that is. It's on the second floor. I'm on my way up there, so you can follow me." He finished with the trash bin and began pushing his cleaning cart down the hall. "I'm Josh, by the way."

"Mary," she said.

"Nice to meet you. Do you go to another college?"

She shook her head. "Not yet. I'm still in high school."

"I see," he said. "An artsy type, aren't you?"

"How did you know?" she asked.

"You've got a creative air about you," he said. "And some paint on your arm."

Mary twisted her elbow around and saw that she had a little blue and white paint on it. "Oh, thanks." She licked her hand and tried to rub it off.

"Here, this works better." Josh sprayed her arm with some window cleaner and gave her a towel to wipe it off.

They boarded the ancient elevator. It made some loud creaks and groans, and Mary questioned for a moment whether it would make it safely. Fortunately it did, and she followed Josh and his cart out. They passed through another maze of hallways before coming to an unimpressive door marked "Astronomy."

"Here you are," Josh said. "Anything else?"

Mary shook her head. "Thanks for your help."

"My pleasure. Take care," he said and moved on down the hall.

The Astronomy door led into a room stuffed with equipment. A few people sat at various stations, focused intently on their work.

"Um, is there someone named Drew here?" she asked.

A pimply guy, with a shirt that screamed "BAZINGA" on the front, looked up at her. "I'm Drew. What's up?"

Mary walked over to him. "I wanted to ask you about alien possessions."

The other people in the room raised their eyebrows.

Drew stared at her for a moment before laughing uneasily. "I don't think I can tell you much. This is a university lab. We don't do that kind of stuff here."

Mary looked at the piece of paper with her notes. "Aren't you JediMasterDrew89 on some of the online forums about aliens and—"

"Ooookay," he said quickly. "I think you and I need to step into the office for a minute." Drew got up from his station and ushered her into a cramped little room that looked like it was being used mostly for storage. "Are you crazy?" he hissed. "How did you find me?"

"I saw your posts on some forums," she said. "You got into some flame wars, and you said once that you were a scientist at the university, so you should know what you were talking about. You had an old profile link to your undergrad page. That's how I found you."

Drew sighed. "I thought I'd deleted all those links. Guess there was still one out there."

"Are you a scientist?" she asked.

"Sorta," he said. "I'm a grad