Well, it might have seemed like only a muffin, but they were huge. There was just something about cafe sandwiches Aleksei never liked. Paninis and all that. He found fancy sandwiches to be really weird. The only gourmet kind of sandwich he could eat were the ones from those hole in the wall sandwich shops. All this special lemon pepper aioli sauce or whatever just made the sandwich taste funny.
"I died my first one, too." He sympathized, really he did. A lot of people died their first time, even if they didn't want to admit it. He had seen a lot of people who had been through this acting pretty rude towards new people who died, like they were stupid for having gotten caught by something in the maze. It happened, they all ended up dead once or twice. She said she would leave if she could, but like everyone else... there was always a reason they had to stay.
For Aleksei, he couldn't afford anything else. There was no quitting and paying a higher tuition at a different school. This was it for him, and after the first year or so he actually grew used to it and kind of liked it. "Exciting, maybe not. But an adventure, maybe? Or you know, different at least." It was different. "You can never truly be bored in this place." That was another thing, important for Aleksei. He hated being bored.
He listened to her experience in the maze, taking a sip of his latte. It was perfect, as always, though he realized he might have wanted a colder drink - his cheeks were already flushed with his nerves, and this was just making him warmer. "Oh, that part was totally hard. That was pretty far in the maze though, so you did good for the first time." He was trying to compliment her, but it sounded weird. Being good at fighting imaginary shit was sort of a backhanded compliment. "Not all the stuff that goes on here is dangerous. I mean, for most people the beer in the water was kinda funny or fun. One time everything was like a sitcom - silly entrance music and all." He said, laughing.
"It's not always really scary, it's just different. I wont say you'll get used to it, but eventually it'll just be a thing, that you have to do. Like work. Only you don't get paid for it."