Chapter 17

Mat smiled at his classmate leaving him to stand before the school gate. His name was Thomas and he was very, very positive. Always filled with energy, smiling, cracking jokes, and such. For some reason, he was the one that dominated Mats's social contact today as he was always talking with him. So nobody else could easily butt in. Since he did not talk about the planet it was actually pretty good.

"Mat?" a tall skinny girl with long bright red hair with white ends waved at him.

"Yeah! Suzan?" she nodded.

"There is a small coffee shop we can talk to, follow me!" she said.

"Oh show me..." Mat responded. After few seconds of the silent walk, she smiles.

"You are not that talkative,"

"Yeah, we will talk a lot during the interview,"

"Please, you completely trashed my questions,"

"I don't like surprises..."

"Ironic,"

"Sure,"

"If you want I will send you the copy of the interview before I publish it,"

"That would be lovely,"

"I guess you already done this before,"

"Too many times..." he says and enters the small coffee shop, already filled with students.

"Don't worry I reserved a private room upstairs," she said but Mat quickly noticed that she sponged all the attention from the students. Sure, her hair was bright and her appearance above average, but still he felt like there was more to it.

"Order what you want, I pay," she said when they sat down.

"Simple hot chocolate please..." Mat ordered.

"I guess you want to start right away," she asked and pulled out her WW to record him.

"Go for it," he said without batting an eye.

"Well my first question is simply about you, tell me your hobbies..." Mat was glad to talk with her about pre-prepared questions and she did not pry deep at all. While he got experiences and advice from Lucas about how to act during interviews, he was still not perfect. Sometimes he was overly cautious and responded vaguely. Still, the talk was quick and even raised his mood.

"Thank you for the talk,"

"No problem!" Mat smiled and she turned off the WW.

"God...you really are used to it,"

"What do you mean?"

"I feel more nervous than you!" she laughed.

"How long have you been doing this?"

"This is my first one..."

"Really? Well, no wonder I couldn't find information about you,"

"You tried to research me?"

"Of course!"

"Shameless..."

"Hey! You did the same thing!"

"It is literary my job!"

"Well..." Mat looked at the tablet computer.

"Wait! Let's order another drink! We can still talk!"

"About what?"

"Tss...you are so cautious! Trust me, it is off the record!" she said.¨

"Riiight...what do you want to know...off record?"

"Join my club!"

"No!"

"So quick! Why?"

"I found nothing about you but found your club...I am sorry,"

"Why are you pity me! We are maybe new and small, but we are a great club!"

"Sure you are, but journalism is simply not for me,"

"Then why...ugh! What club are you planning to join?"

"I am not sure between the Macro-Economic club, the Managing club, or the Financial club,"

"Ohhhh...why not the Alien Research club, or the Inter-stellar travel club?"

"One is too focused on military and another is too theoretical, all of them are C tier,"

"C tier?"

"I put all the clubs in a spreadsheet and divided them into groups,"

"By the way where is my club?"

"E tier,"

"And the lowest is?"

"F,"

"Why are we lower them some nerds??"

"Cause you have no achievements, you are too close to politics and you might be disbanded this year,"

"You were much more pleasant in the interview!" she said angrily.

"Sorry,"

"Hmm...The idea of ranking clubs is interesting, sounds like something we could do for fun in the article! Especially now when the club presentation starts!" she thought out loud.

"You better not mention me anyway near that,"

"Ah, don't worry we would make it a poll and structure it less...well paranoid," she said, but Mat ignored her jab and drunk his newly arrived drink.

"Well anyway let me join your WW so you can ask about the favor," she asked to connect to his system but smiled.

"There is no need for that I already know what I want. I would like you to send every article which could be even slightly interpreted to be about me or a lottery or a planet owning. I would like to give you feed..."

"Paranoid indeed,"

"Is this a problem?" he asked but she smiled and shook her WW.

"It is fine if you accept my request!" she said but Mat hesitated.

"Your WW is being watched?"

"What?"

"It is fairly obvious, just connect with me," she laughed. Mat did not expect such a reaction so he did connect with her. Then he received a warning that her WW is also being watched.

"You too? Oh my god, why did I connect us?" he said while his face was getting pale.

"Calm down it is no problem, I am not a criminal. It is normal for a daughter of the municipality governor to have her WW watched. That also goes with a government celebrity. It is fine,"

"Oh ok...is this the reason why I couldn't really find any info about you?"

"If you look on the net like an amateur then yes, also are you feeling well? You look sick,"

"Sorry, I just got..." he could not say he got scared, but she understood.

"If you want help with that just ask, I might not have any real power or anything, but I know few people," she said with an honest smile.

"T-thank you I will think about it..."

"Also If you are so stressed you should probably pick another club, something more fun which is not really connected with the need for money,"

"Yeah, but there is no club like that,"

"Don't look at just the club, look at the people as well,"

"What do you mean? I don't know anybody in the school,"

"Yeah and for that, there is the club presentation. It is not just about clubs explaining with a hologram what they do, but also who they are. Before you pick a club go look there,"

"I will keep it in mind," Mat looked at the empty drink and she laughed.

"It is okay, I am not going to keep you here against your will! Thanks for the interview!"

"Thank you," Mat said back and somewhat quickly left the coffee.