fandomhigh | Working Together, Monday, Period 3

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Working Together, Monday, Period 3

Class was held in the Danger Shop today, which was programmed to look like a large warehouse full of crates and boxes. After suitable time to let the students gather, the lights flickered off and the instructor's voice came over the loudspeaker. Jack herself was nowhere to be seen.

"When the lights come on, a bunch of husks are gonna show up," she intoned. "They're mean, they ain't cute, and they fall apart like wet tissue paper with a good headshot. Guns and ammo will be by the door where you came in or use whatever other powers you have. I'm watching. And I have popcorn."

"Oh, and before you wet yourselves, this is all one big sim, so don't freak that you're gonna get killed for real."

And then the lights came back on, revealing the promised husks. They groaned a bit before charging straight at the students.

Welcome to Fandom High, boys and girls. Don't worry, the teacher will explain her point later.

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After either all the husks or most of the students were "dead," Jack finally deigned to appear in front of class. She hit a couple buttons on the control panel and made the warehouse and husk goo disappear, replacing them with comfortable sofas.

"So," she said, once everyone had chosen a seat. "That is what it's like fighting more or less on your own. Sucks, right? Which is why -- not to get all sappy -- the people who have your back are so important. Over the next couple months, we're gonna work on how to work as a team, which means listening to each other and setting all the personal drama aside so you can kick some ass.

"My name is Jack. Call me Professor Nought if you want, but it's gonna take me a while to answer. I spent the last year trying to get a bunch of kids ready to fight a war, and I figure you aren't any more hopeless than the last batch. And they did good, by the way." There was some genuine pride in her tone, there.

"I heard you'd be all disappointed if I didn't make you introduce yourselves, so go for it. Names, grades, what you have to contribute to a team, plus anything you noticed while you were fighting husks." She pointed at the lucky person next to her. "You go first."

Edited 2013-09-02 03:19 (UTC)

"Theo Langstrom," he said, rubbing the back of his neck uncomfortably. "I'm a junior and I guess I can contribute -- "

Two really helpful aliens in his head? He probably didn't want to say that.

" -- quickness and endurance. I ran track back home. Cross country. And the husks seemed aggressive. Like there was no rhyme or reason to how they attacked. They just came at you."

"Hey, Theo," Jack nodded. "And you're right. They wanna kill. They don't have a tactic besides swarming until they bring something down."

"They're pretty gross looking too."

Just a small thing he'd noticed.

"They're dead people who have been converted into killing machines," Jack said, not sounding especially bothered by it. "Not how I wanna go."

"I'm Cade," Cade said. "This is my last year and I have training in shooting things that are trying to kill me. Since I'm still alive, I think I'm pretty good at not getting dead."

"Yeah, you kind of kicked ass out there," Jack said. "Ever fought anything like that before?"

"I've fought things that swarm," Cade said, "but mine were smarter than that. Is their only tactic to overwhelm with numbers?"

"Pretty much," Jack said. "They come up fast and they hit hard, so they do better with it than you'd think. But they tend to hang around with other guys way more effective than they are."

"They'd have to," Cade said with a little smirk. "They'd be extinct otherwise."

"Believe it or not, they used to be people," Jack explained. "Bad guys use tech to turn their captives into husks. So, lucky for them, they don't have to figure out how to breed."

Cade winced. "So killing them is really doing them a karking favor."

"I know it's what I would want if I ended up like that," Jack said.

"That a possibility here?" Cade asked. "Weirder things have happened..."

Jack shrugged. "Races that made and used the tech are pretty damn dead as far as we know," she said. "But like you said. Stranger things have happened."

Edited 2013-09-02 23:55 (UTC)

Gert... wasn't generally a big fan of teachers, but she kind of liked this one. Though she wasn't thrilled about the zombie splatter, that was for sure.

"I'm Gert Yorkes," she said. "Junior. And I have a psychic dinosaur that takes direction from me, so that's a useful plus, I guess. What are your thoughts about pet sidekicks in class, by the way?"

"My thoughts are they're awesome as long as they don't try to eat anybody," Jack said, missing the varren she'd lost on the Citadel. "Might make you make it wear a muzzle if it does."

"Surreal, senior, and I like to stab things," she answered, cheerfully, as she carefully cleaned off her blades, despite the goo having vanished. "I'm good at it, and I have Craft if I need to protect someone who is not as experienced as I am."

"What I noticed? They are stupid and their reflexes are shit. No coordination. They don't work together and they can barely work with themselves. They don't learn from a fight."

"Not in the least. Can't even figure out to get down if all their friends are getting shot at," Jack said, sounding amused. "But they can swarm fast. How's that work with the stabbing?"

"Fine, so long as I don't mind getting covered by their goo," she answered, and given how much goo Surreal had been covered in, that had not been a problem. "If there's too many, I can always fall back to Craft to clear a few out, but I prefer to save that for an emergency if I absolutely cannot fight my way out of it. I'd rather be underestimated and have them do something stupid than start lighting them on fire right out the gate."

"These guys are gonna do something stupid no matter what, but I like the way you think," Jack said. "Craft's like magic?"

She hadn't believed in magic a week before, but it seemed like she was just going to have to roll with it.

"Yes," Surreal replied, calling in a throwing knife and flipping back-and-forth over her fingers before vanishing it again. "Calling fire's easiest for me, but I can walk on air for a little bit, create shields, call items to myself, stuff like that."

Not mentioning passing through walls or blasts of pure Craft, because of course Surreal wasn't going to let the teacher know everything right off the bat. See above: underestimating.

"I'm Isaac, I'm a junior, and I'm pretty strong," Isaac said, not exactly want to share the whole werewolf thing to the class. "I noticed those things are ugly as hell."

"Not gonna win any beauty pageants," Jack agreed. "Does them being ugly make the fighting easier for you?"

"No, I'm equal opportunity when it comes to fighting."

"Mercy Thompson. I'm a senior. I'm fast and a good shot," Mercy said.

"You looked pretty comfortable out there," Jack nodded. "What's your background?"

"I grew up in a kind of... non-traditional environment," Mercy said carefully. "I can shift into a coyote, so I've been hunting on both four and two legs most of my life. My foster dad wanted to make sure I knew how to shoot."

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Working Together, Monday, Period 3

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