fandomhigh | Practical Crisis Problem Solving - Danger Shop, Tuesday, Period 3 (11am-12pm)

Upon walking through the doors of the Danger Shop, it was completely understandable if the fine students of Practical Crisis Problem Solving (which the Doctor preferred to call "Staying Out of Trouble Badly") were very confused. They were in the park. Yes, the park, the one in Fandom just outside and down the road. Fandom all around them looked normal, at least as far as the beach. Then the water and everything beyond it was all hazy. The sky was an odd shade of red too.

"Hello!" the Doctor said, looking very smart in his tweed jacket and bow tie. There were other clothes too (including pants), but those were the two articles worth mentioning. "I'm the Doctor. You are all in Staying Out of Trouble Badly." See, with the calling the class the wrong name. "Which might be on your little schedule spreadsheets as something to do with problem solving. If you're not supposed to be here," he added with a smile, "stay anyway. Have some fun. Today we're going to get the creative juices flowing." He frowned. "No, I don't like the sound of that. It sounds too...moist. Doesn't matter." He switched back on track. "You might be wondering why the sky is red. Or orange. Burnt sienna? Would we call it that? Maybe Sinopia instead. The colour, not the planet. I had a point somewhere.

The sky. Yes. The sky is red because the entire island," he turned around in a circle and pointed in every direction for emphasis, "is surrounded by a shield. You can't penetrate it and you can't transport out of it, sorry if that's your thing. The reason for this a species called the Atraxi have tracked a criminal here to the very pretty Fandom Island. Prisoner Zero is its name. If Prisoner Zero doesn't give itself up in an hour, the Atraxi are going to incinerate everything and everyone inside the shield. They don't do things by halves.

I don't expect you to find Prisoner Zero today, but before the hour is up, each of you is to come up with a plan. Brainstorm. That's what we're here for today. Brainstorm a plan. Talk to me. Talk to each other. Let's get some ideas on how to find Prisoner Zero, stop the Atraxi from burning us all to a crisp and save Fandom. Your name might be useful too, if you don't mind telling me it. Oh, and if you do have higher brain function and can understand what I'm saying, please raise your hand so I can identify anyone who doesn't and can't."

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"I don't know, is it? Can you? Anything's worth a try. The only alternative is death and that's not much of a choice. What do you want to do? Get in touch with the Atraxi? Try to talk you way out of it or just ask them some questions?"

Jenny pressed her lips together in thought for a moment, then admitted, "I worded that poorly. I meant that you can never tell with aliens and we might be looking for a plant or a stray cat or one of the bloody news squirrels, not a humanoid. And yes. I would like to contact the Atraxi. I'm not suggesting begging for our lives because that never actually helps and it makes you look weak, but it might be worth it to try reason," she sounded reluctant to admit it, though, "and at the very least we can find out more about who the bloody hell we're supposed to be looking for. I am probably not the best person to make contact as I will wind up swearing at them, so if anyone else wants to volunteer?"

"Someone diplomatic," the Doctor suggested. "Or loud. Loud or diplomatic, depends which way you want to go. And a means of communicating."

"Well, I do qualify as loud," Jenny admitted. "But definitely not diplomatic. And not him--" she jerked her thumb toward Hiccup, "because he'll get them to zap us all faster. How did they contact us to give their bleeding ultimatum and can we use that to contact them?"

The Doctor smiled. "Asking all the right questions today," he remarked. "They used everything. All of the phones, the televisions, the radios, all forms of electronic communication. The forms that are two-way could reasonably be used to communicate with them with the right equipment."

"Broadcasting across all known frequencies," Jenny murmured. She hated it when people used her own tricks against her. "What about the shield?" She tapped her fingers on the desk thoughtfully. "Would a power surge, say, equivalent to the island's power grid be enough to disable it? Because I can do that, but I'll be wiped for the rest of our hour, so I'd like to avoid it if it definitely won't work."

"The power source is on the outside, so any brunt electrical attack from inside would probably only be absorbed. That's not to say you couldn't disable it somehow."

Practical Crisis Problem Solving - Danger Shop, Tuesday, Period 3 (11am-12pm)

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