Title: Beleagurement
Fandom: The Midnighters
Word Count: 520
Characters: Jess, Rex, Melissa
Summary: Jess seeks a way to keep up with her homework.
Content Notes: None. For the Brave New Fandom badge and Yulegoat badges.


The drag of the backpack on Jess's shoulder grew heavier with each step. Only a few weeks into the school year and already the amount of homework had grown so deep that Jess knew it would be June before she could glance at a TV again. Why had her mother insisted on her taking so many advanced classes? All the exercises and essays her teachers had assigned were too much for twenty-four--

Her step faltered at the simple truth she'd realized. Catching herself, she scrambled to the school library, where she knew she'd find the others.

Sure enough, Rex was bent over a table in the far corner, staring at a thick, old book. Melissa was hunched in the seat closest to the wall with her earphones in and her eyes closed. Dess wasn't here, but that didn't matter because Jess's question wasn't for her.

Jess dropped into the open seat, letting her backpack thunk to the floor. Her shoulder twinged at the sudden release. “Can we use the Blue Hour?” she asked.

Rex tore his attention from the book and blinked at her through his thick glasses. Jess couldn't imagine how he functioned during the day when seeing was such a challenge. “We already use it,” he answered. “We have to keep the darklings from attacking--”

She waved him off. As long as the darklings kept to the Oklahoma badlands and away from town, Jess saw no reason to dedicate herself to seeking them out. “OK, but can we use it for other things?” She glanced down at her backpack, hesitant for a moment to inquire over using such a magical time for anything mundane. “Like sleeping or...studying.”

Rex's fingers drifted across the page of his book—one that looked way too old to belong to a school library—as he considered her question. While he was hardly the boss of Jess's time, he was the one best versed in Midnighter lore, so he'd know. Whatever he was thinking even prompted Melissa to crack an eye open. “Well,” he concluded, “it won't be easy since electricity doesn't work.”

“We can't stay asleep,” Melissa supplied. Her words hung in the air for a second before she retreated back into her usual sullen silence.

An extra hour of sleep each night would be incredible, Jess thought, even as she realized that her body always woke her up before midnight; she never tried to sleep through the extra hour, and now she knew that she couldn't.

“You'd only have the moon's light to see by,” Rex continued, “which could be hard on your eyes.” His own sight worked best during the Blue Hour, so she was surprised that he would even think of that.

“Is that it?” Jess asked.

Rex considered the question for another moment, then nodded.

With sudden relief, Jess slumped back in her chair. This was the best news she'd heard since moving to Bixby. With an extra hour every day, she might just be able to keep up with her school work. Maybe being a Midnighter had some practical use in her daylight life after all.