fandomhigh | Chemistry for Anarchists, Thursday, Period 4

Class was in the Danger Shop again, and the room looked like a city street under the stark light of the moon. It was lined with identical low-rise tan office buildings, set on lots surrounded by high chain-link fences. Tyler waited outside one such building, arms folded around himself as he waited for the students to assemble.

"First things," he began without preamble. "If you know me at all, you know I don't like to apologize. But I will say last week's class was a mistake. I should've done a straight session on fertilizer bombs, not gotten into ... the rest of it. Anyhow, if you have something to say to me about it, I'll be around after class and my office hours are still Mondays."

"Though it does kind of lead into what we're doing this class. Because this week, for our final, you can bring a building down." He paused, watching the students for any reaction. When it was quiet once more, he went on.

"Right, so this is the deal. Each of these buildings represents the HQ for the most evil scum you can imagine. They eat babies, they pollute, they support Barry Manilow's recording career, whatever. And your job is to take them out. You have two choices: Big boom or sneak attack."

"If you go for a big boom, you get into the lot and detonate a fertilizer bomb or nitroglycerin around the building. It goes up, you run, the evildoers can't recover. Done. You just need to hope your evacuation order went through, 'cause if anyone was in there, they aren't coming out."

"But that's not the only choice. You can also go for sneak attack. If you go that way, you use small bombs like C4 and Molotov cocktails to break into the property, steal a folder of crucial information in the main conference room, and sneak out, blowing up however much you want to on the way. Problem is, a, there's no proof anybody will believe what's in the folder, and b, you could get caught before you do anything. But do this right and there's no chance of collateral damage. Then once the building's down -- or not-down, however you're doing it -- you get to tell me what you did and why."

"You're paired for this, and there's one group of three. I know the idea of a lone wolf is all romantic, but in the real world, you'd probably have to work with other people to get anything done. Or not sleep." Which was Tyler's favored approach. "Anyhow, the bomb-making supplies are in that workshop area. Questions? Ask me or Miss Hammond."

"And you have all been a fantastic class. Thank you."

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...

Ino frowned about midway through the lecture and raised her hand. "If it's filled with 'the most evil scum ever'... why would we hope the building is evacuated?"

"Because this is a class on explosions, not mass murder," Tyler pointed out. "And because the guy who sweeps the floors or sorts mail or answers the phone might not have all that much say over what his bosses do."

"And on a practical level, you're a lot more likely to get caught if you go when it's crowded. That's why the simulation is set in the middle of the night."

[OOC: Now from the right account.]

"Then what's the point?" Ino asked, honestly frustrated. "No point in blowing up the building 'cause then we're not 'taking them out' like you told us to. If you don't get rid of them, then they'll just find another building."

Tyler tilted his chin up. He really hadn't expected anyone in class to advocate blowing things up with people inside.

"Blow up the building, you're getting rid of all their computer data, all their equipment, all their paper records," he said. "They have to put all their energy and all their money into finding a new building and buying new stuff and reconstructing the paperwork, and you've sent a message that there are people who will go to pretty extreme lengths to get rid of them."

"It's all a lot for them to chew on before they go back to clubbing baby seals."

"If they're smart then they'll have all that stuff backed up elsewhere," Ino said, frowning. "And it's not that strong a message 'cause you're still showing that, yeah, gasp-shock you can blow up a building, but that you won't blow them up when they'd blow you up."

~~The nineteenth rule of Fight Club is, you do not talk about data backups.~~

This was starting to be annoying. "How about this, Ino? Just for this class, pretend you aren't okay with killing a bunch of people because they happen to be in a building. If you go home and do this for real and do it your way, I don't wanna hear about it."

It wasn't the time to fix broken moral compasses, after all. He wasn't teaching ethics.

Ino had taken ethics and hadn't really learned anything from it.

"I'm just saying," she muttered rebelliously. "Why bother saying it's a hideout when we're blowing it up but don't want to hurt anyone? That's just stupid."

Tyler hadn't really either, but he'd taken it from Darth Vader.

"Stupid or not, this is still my class and you still aren't pretending to kill people," Tyler told her cheerfully. "If you want to argue about this some more, you can do it in detention."

Ino sat back in her chair and scowled.

"Whatever."

"Whatever," Tyler agreed, still cheerful. "Thank you for playing along."

"Freakin' useless," Ino muttered mutinously, crossing her arms and resolutely not looking at him.

"And that's detention," Tyler told her, looking right at her. "Congratulations."

He jerked his chin up and addressed the students as a whole. "This is a simulation. The tools you use in the simulation, the stuff we've learned in the last two months? That, you can use however you want in the real world. I don't think you need to blow people up, but obviously -" and here there was a glare at Ino "- opinions differ."

Chemistry for Anarchists, Thursday, Period 4

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