The panic from the temple steps had hardened into a jagged, nervous energy. Evan sat on his bed, a notepad open. The timer read [44:12:07]. He had to be strategic. Romantic? No. This was a survival puzzle. Target: Anna Chen. Objective: Elicit smile. Parameters: 48 hours.
The library. She was always there. He could "accidentally" meet her. It was a start.
He found her on the third floor, in the silent study quadrant. She wasn't alone. Two other top-tier science students, a guy and a girl, were huddled with her over a sprawling textbook and a whiteboard covered in dense equations. They were whispering, but the stress was clear.
Evan lurked behind a bookshelf labeled "Applied Thermodynamics," pretending to browse. He caught fragments.
"…the coefficient is wrong here…"
"If we can't model the friction loss, the whole proposal fails…"
"Professor Clay won't accept approximations."
Anna's voice was low, frustrated. "The data set is incomplete. We need to derive it."
This was it. A chance to help. To be useful. Evan's heart thumped. He remembered bits from a required physics class. Something about force, friction… he could try.
He took a deep breath, walked around the shelf, and approached their table. Three heads snapped up. Anna's expression tightened from focus to immediate annoyance.
"Evan." She said his name like a statement of fact, not a greeting.
"Hi. Sorry, I couldn't help but overhear. You're talking about kinetic friction models, right? For the robotics project?" He'd seen the project title on the whiteboard.
The other two students looked at him, then at Anna, confused.
"Yes," Anna said, her voice flat. "Why?"
"I just… I think the formula you're using might be for a uniform surface. If the material is composite, the decay rate isn't linear. It's logarithmic." The words fell out of his mouth, a half-remembered fact from a lecture he'd barely passed. He pointed a shaky finger at a complex equation on the board.
A beat of silence.
Anna's teammate, a guy with glasses, frowned. "That's for macro-scale atmospheric drag. Not micro-scale joint friction."
Anna didn't even look at the board. She looked at Evan. Her dark eyes were utterly still. "You're referring to the Stokes' Law derivation. It's irrelevant to solid-state mechanics at this scale. You've confused your terms." She turned back to her whiteboard. "Don't waste my time."
The dismissal was physical, like a door slamming in his face. Heat flooded Evan's cheeks. He mumbled an apology and stumbled back, the weight of his own stupidity crushing him.
[APPROACH FAILED. FAVORABILITY: ANNA CHEN -10.]
A laugh cut through the silent study area. Rich, confident, and cruel.
At a nearby table, surrounded by three well-dressed friends, sat Marcus Thorne. He was everything Evan wasn't: tall, with styled blond hair, a jawline that looked sculpted, and a smile that knew it was handsome. He wore a sweater that probably cost more than Evan's laptop.
Marcus met Evan's eyes and shook his head, still grinning. He turned to his friend and said, just loud enough to carry, "The desperation is actually kind of sad. Some guys just don't know when to quit."
His friends chuckled. Evan's hands clenched into fists at his sides. He forced himself to walk away, his spine rigid, until he was out of sight in the stairwell. He slumped against the cold concrete wall, humiliation burning in his throat.
38:15:48.
Think. Different approach. The system said 'smile.' Not 'impress.' Not 'solve her physics problem.' Smile.
Humor. Everyone smiles at a good joke.
An hour later, he tracked her to a courtyard where she was eating a solitary apple, reading on her phone. He marched up, mustering all his courage.
"Anna. Knock knock."
She looked up slowly. "What?"
"Just… go along. Knock knock."
She sighed, a short, exasperated breath. "Who's there?"
"Athena."
"Athena who?"
"Athena new joke, but you're not laughing."
He delivered it with a weak, hopeful grin.
Anna blinked. She took a deliberate bite of her apple, chewed, and swallowed. "The premise relies on a homophone misunderstanding. 'Athena' and 'I've seen a' are not phonetically identical in most dialects. The statistical likelihood of that wordplay eliciting a humorous response is negligible." She went back to her phone. "Goodbye."
Evan stood there, defeated. A new line of text pulsed softly under his timer.
[SUGGESTION: UNDERSTAND TARGET'S CORE VALUES. FAVORABILITY INCREASES THROUGH ALIGNED ACTION.]
Core values. What did Anna value? Not bad jokes. Not incorrect physics.
He spent the next two hours not chasing her, but researching her. Real research. Public records, scholarship announcements, old campus news articles.
Anna Chen. Full-ride scholarship, Meridian Award for Academic Excellence. Listed as a research assistant in the bio-lab. Also listed as a part-time data entry clerk for the university admin office, and a weekend tutor for the outreach program.
Three jobs. On a full scholarship.
A deeper dig, into a local community newsletter, found a small, blurry photo. A charity fun run for the county hospital's long-term care wing. In the background, helping at a water station, was Anna. The caption listed volunteers. Next to her name: "In honor of her mother, Li Chen."
His search for "Li Chen" led to a fundraising page. Medical expenses. Chronic pulmonary condition. The page was modest, factual, and had been quietly shared two years ago.
Anna wasn't just a genius. She was carrying the world on her shoulders. She didn't have time for jokes or clumsy flirting. She had time for survival, for work, for her mother.
Then, another discovery. A volunteer schedule posted online for "Hope's Paw Animal Shelter." Every Saturday, 9am-1pm. Volunteer: A. Chen.
A new plan, fragile but forming, took shape in his mind.
Saturday morning. The timer read [38:01:22].
Hope's Paw was a modest building on the industrial side of town. The air smelled of disinfectant and dog food. Evan pushed through the door, a fake story ready on his lips about considering adoption.
He saw her immediately.
She was in a wash area, wearing a faded volunteer t-shirt and rubber gloves. She wasn't alone. In the tub was a scrawny, shivering terrier mix, covered in suds. And Anna Chen was smiling.
It wasn't the broad, beaming smile of a movie. It was small, private, and soft. It lit up her entire face, transforming her sharp, focused features into something gentle. She was talking to the dog in a low, soothing murmur, carefully rinsing soap from its fur. "There you go. Almost done. You're so much braver than the big dogs."
Evan's breath caught. This was it. This was her value. Care. Compassion hidden under ice. A place where she didn't have to be the genius, the provider, the rock. She could just be kind.
This was his chance. He had to enter that space.
He walked toward her, his heart hammering against his ribs. The shelter manager, a kind-eyed woman with a clipboard, smiled at him. "Here to volunteer?"
"Just… looking," Evan mumbled, his eyes fixed on Anna.
He was ten feet away. He rehearsed a line in his head. 'You're really good with him.' Simple. Observant. Aligned with her value.
The dog shook itself, sending a spray of water. Anna laughed—a quiet, genuine sound Evan had never heard. His step faltered in wonder.
And his foot landed squarely in a fresh, warm pile of dog waste left by a passing kennel resident.
The squelch was audible.
Anna looked up. Her eyes moved from his face, down to his ruined sneaker, and back up. The soft light in her eyes vanished. The gentle curve of her mouth straightened into a familiar, impassive line. She saw a clumsy intruder, a disruption in the one place she found peace.
She didn't smile.
She turned back to the dog, her shoulders stiff.
The shelter manager rushed over with paper towels. "Oh, dear! I'm so sorry! Happens all the time, let me help…"
Evan stood there, the stench rising, humiliation complete. He had found the key to her smile. And he had stepped in filth on the way to using it.
[FAVORABILITY: ANNA CHEN -15.]
[TIME REMAINING: 37:48:11]