Fandom High School

"Man, it's almost the end of another semester," Aphra said by way of greeting. "Where does the time go?"

No, seriously, where did the time go?

"In any case, I hope you're all prepared for your final next week, because I know we are," Isabela lied through her teeth.

"Exactly, but in case you aren't, feel free to use today for revision." So generous, that offer.

"We've even provided some study materials!"

Best teachers.

Not for the first time, Aphra and Isabela had dipped into the class budget to organise brunch at Cafe Fina for the class.

"You're probably too distracted by the upcoming local cultural event to really be focusing on learning this week," Aphra said, sipping her mimosa. "So instead something something the real culturally significant artefacts were the friends we made along the way."

"Think of it as practice for dealing with family issues on the day," Isabela added.

"Hey, kids, who feels like a movie?"

Aphra, the answer was Aphra. The answer was always Aphra.

"It feels like too long since we've watched this."

Weeks, it'd been weeks.

Aphra had had a great class planned out for today, really she had, but then she'd turned the radio on yesterday and promptly started drowning her sorrows upon hearing about the fish.

She'd really loved that fish, guys.

Anyway, you had a hungover teacher draped over the desk full of existential angst over a fish. Have fun with that!

[No OCD, just fish angst.]

The Danger Shop was set up with a holoprojector. Again.

"So it turns out I was remiss with that educational holo," Aphra said. "Because it turns out there was more than one of them. So today we're going to watch the sequel."

Unfortunately for everyone involved, Aphra was unaware of certain, unnecessary, reboots. Sorry, kids.

Aphra's class was actually off the island this week, contain your excitement, kids.

In a surprising and not at all suspicious twist, they arrived on a stunning bay bordered by lush jungle, with a bustling town off in the distance.

"Welcome to Rishi," Aphra said cheerfully. "Now, technically, there aren't any active digsites on planet at the moment, but I'm not going to let that stop us." Mostly because the permits for visiting a planet with any actual digs were still caught up in red tape. Also she didn't have the credits for Zeltros.

"Because history is everywhere," she said. "Just waiting for you to find it. And I'll be right here while you do that. Supervising." From what looked suspicious like a deckchair.

"Welcome back!" Did Aphra seem at all fazed that she'd lost a few students? Not really. Possibly because she didn't remember how many students she'd actually had last session. "So before we get back to the good stuff, it's time for our good friend, red tape."

Spoiler, red tape was no one's friend. "Thing is, even when you're a completely legit archaeologist on a completely legit dig, sometimes, though no fault of your own, you have to be economical with the truth, and it's always a good idea to be prepared for that." Otherwise you might come up with a dumb alias like Joystick Chevron.

"So today we're going to make completely valid alternate documentation, and apply for travel permits with them."

Hey, Aphra was there at the front of class today, surprise. And class was also meeting at the Danger Shop, double surprise.

"So I was feeling nostalgic and decided to show you somewhere I always planned to do a dig when I was your age." Also she'd forgotten to organise an actual trip because she'd been tiny. Or dull of regrets about being tiny and awkward around cute girls. "It never actually panned out, because it went from being inadvisable to visit to interdicted to really, ridiculously off-limits, only the very bravest and daring and, okay, kind of dumb, need try." Not that she hadn't ended up going, just it had been less of a dig, than a grab what you can now, work out the value later.

Aphra pushed a control and not at all ominouslandscape sprang into being. "Welcome to Malachor, scenic, isn't it?" She paused to let anyone who might have a bad feeling about this get it out of their systems. "Anyway, best we can tell, a couple of thousands years ago, the Jedi and the Sith had one of their big dust-ups here, there may have been some Mandalorians involved too, it's one of those situations where there weren't really a lt of eyewitness accounts after, and it all ended about as well as you'd expect from that tidbit about the lack of witnesses.

"Pretty cool, right?"

Aphra's class was meeting in an ordinary classroom this week, possibly because Aphra had been distracted with the fish and forgotten to organise something.

She reached into her satchel and placed the fish in pride of place on the desk.

Okay, maybe not so much possibly as definitely.

"You've had a taste of proper digs and describing what you find, so you've probably noticed that it's often not very interesting. But sometimes you get hold of something really great, something that helps you unlock the mysteries of a whole ancient civilisation, or even better introduces entirely new ones, because that last can result in a career's worth of funding." No small thing in academia.

Aphra patted the fish, which obligingly spat out streamers and started blasting music again. "So pretend you just found this guy, what kind of questions might it answer, or bring up?"

Aphra had told the students to meet her out by the back of the dorms, where they'd find a marked off grid that looked a little like a sandpit. If by a little you meant a lot. There was also a table with a toolkit laid out for each student.

"Hey, kids!" Aphra definitely seemed cheerful. "If we haven't had class together before, I'm Doctor Aphra and you're going to be learning how to be proper real world archeologists, on actual digs and everything, but since I'd like to keep what my reputation intact, first you're going to learn how to properly act on a proper dig. With delicacy and care." How they were going to learn that from Aphra of all people...

"This here is your dig site, which I've seeded with valuable cultural artifacts." It was mostly bottle caps and assorted knick-knacks, they'd need a couple of centuries to become valuable cultural artifacts. "Your job is to find something, then introduce yourself to the class and explain what you've found. Remember, if you don't know what something actually is, the words 'ritual object' are your friend."

The Danger Shop looked a lot blanker than usual today.

"We're doing something a bit different today," Aphra told them cheerfully. "Often the best loot whether in terms of cultural or monetary value is in, with, or by a monument, but sometimes it can be hard to recognise them after a few years, so you're going to learn valuable monument recognition skills by building your own." Yes, that was totally how that worked. Did any of you have a doctorate?

"Now as to subjects, usually they're of power, heroic figures, the kind of people who'd save an island from strange and unusual weather by flying frozen sharks into hurricanes at great risk to themselves."

Aphra. You were going to construct giant statues of Aphra.

"Good help is hard to find," Aphra announced to the class. "Which is a problem because you're gonna need it, since even someone as awesome as myself needs back up from time to time, and since you want to be the helpee instead of the helper, because, trust me, the latter is never a good idea, you're going to need to learn to recognise that good help when you see it."

"So, mock interviews, I've assembled a short list of candidates and you get to pick the best one." Or least worst. Because that was more likely.

Aphra had the movie theatre sim up and a bucket of popcorn.

"I had to come up with two classes last week because of Jedi hair emergencies." She was never going to let up with that, Anakin. "So, holo about how archaeology is a serious profession."

This was a lie. But it was a fun movie anyway.

Today the Danger Shop resembled a small testing chamber with a panel consisting of several very humourless looking sentients at the front of the room.

"So archaeology is all about paperwork and death-traps, which hopefully you've noticed by now." What with all the paperwork and death-traps that Aphra had included in this class so far. "Sometimes you even combine the two in what some people, mostly boring ones, call a 'project review'. So you get to explain your work to these fine gentlebeings."

Aphra grinned at them and flashed a thumbs up. "Break a leg!"

Aphra had managed to dig up the movie theatre sim from the depths of the Danger Shop's memory banks, and was stilling sprawled in a seat with a bucket of popcorn. "So I thought about having a discussion of xenoanthropology, ethics, and how deciding people who consider strapping themselves to the top of several tons of explosives a necessary part of scientific development are just cute primitives is probably going to end badly for you today, but that'd be kind of boring unless actual explosives were involved, so we're going to watch a holo about archaeology instead."

Aphra’s class were in the Danger Shop again, though last week's Massassi temple was nowhere to be seen. Instead they stood in the foyer of what had clearly once been a sleek, high-tech office-block that now looked considerably worse for wear.

Aphra held up her thumb and forefinger about a centimetre apart. “So, kids, I may have cheated a little last week with all the traps,” she said. “While you're probably going to run across all kinds of traps and security measures when exploring ruins, especially the important ones, most of the time they’re not going to be in super great condition. Well, unless things were really built to last, or someone's doing maintenance, in which case the traps are the least of your problems. Trust me on that.” Angry locals were not something they wanted to deal with.

“Basically, they're called ruins for a reason, and there's a lot of ways they become ruins, time, war, natural disasters, vacuum suckers deciding they're entitled to mess with a less advanced culture’s achievements for fun, but the big one’s the first, time. Things break down, batteries run down, no one replaces the poison darts, you get the picture. But if you think that makes them safe, you probably deserve whatever horrible accident happens next.” Aphra was great at reassurances. “Anyway, last week we went up, so today it’s down.”

Finding out about the Danger Shop had been a delightful surprise given the average level of tech about this place, but even Aphra needed time to familarise herself with entirely new hardware and software. So reluctantly she'd settled for one of the 'normal' classrooms today.

Which didn't even have holoprojecters. Honestly.

Once it looked like she had roughly the right number of students, Aphra turned the chair at the front desk around and flopped down into it backward, forearms dangling over the backrest.

"I'm Doctor Aphra and given some of the things I've been hearing I should probably assure you that I'm actually qualified to teach this subject," she began. "Which is archaeology in case some of you just dropped in because you're bored.

"But what is archaeology?" She drummed her fingers against the chair. "Well, essentially it's grave-robbing with fancier paperwork. In both cases you go somewhere people used to live, dig up the place, and take their stuff. Sometimes their corpses too. Only difference is that paperwork."

"Buuuuuuuuuuuuut..." Aphra drew out the word. "That paperwork makes all the difference. See you get the same loot, and the same dead bodies if you're into that, but archaeologists take notes and verify their finds, which means their old, dead stuff is worth a lot more." Academically and monetarily. "They become artefacts, and you can learn from those, including where to find more artefacts.

"Still, much as I love the sound of my own voice, apparently I'm supposed to do introductions this week, so we'll do that then an exercise so you can understand what being an archaeologist is all about."

Aphra pointed to a random student. "You with the face. You're first. Who are you? Why are you here? What's in your pockets?"