Fandom High School

The Danger Shop was programmed into a huge warehouse today, stuffed full with computers, fabric, cars, and--babies? "Hey, y'all, an' welcome to your final," Hardison said. "The whole point of this class was to teach y'all a few skills to take away with you, an' so all you haveta do is prove that you learned one thing in here. Once you do that, you can either head out or enjoy the pizza party I got goin' on in the other room." The other room was programmed into the Danger Shop. The pizza was real and if anyone complained about pizza at 8am, well, that was on them. "So, real quick an' easy. Pick a skill, demonstrate you know how to do it, an' you're good--though it ain't gonna count if I'm pretty sure you came into the class knowin' how to do it already. Pick somethin' you actually learned, a'ight?"

Class was in a normal classroom today, with Hardison looking sad. "Hey y'all, sorry 'bout last week. Still ain't figured out what the Danger Shop was up to, so I figured let's not take any chances with this week, right? Promised y'all a movie day an' I aim to deliver. So here's a movie that might give you some idea of what it would be like to make your own candy. An' sense it's impossible to watch this movie without wantin' some, here's plenty of leftover Easter chocolate for y'all to munch on while we watch."

Candy on a spare desk and Hardison was hitting play.

"A'ight, so let's get somethin' clear," Hardison said, standing in front of a portal. "I ain't one for the Great Outdoors. If we'd'a been meant to spend a lot of time outside, we ain't never would have invented video games an' the internet." Somewhere, Eliot was hitting his head against the wall and had no idea why. Okay, that's not true, he probably knew exactly why: somewhere, somehow, Hardison was doing something to annoy him. "But not everyone sees these logically, an' there are whole sports an' activities devoted to bein' outside. Where the bugs are."

Look, you guys were getting an outdoor class, but it was going to come with Opinions whether you liked it or not. "Fortunately, some of 'em at least use enough tech to make it easier to forget you're trampin' around in the woods, where the air smells funny, an' there are probably racist, right-wing militias waitin' around to kidnap you." Because that's what happened when you were outside! "One of those activities is Geochachin', which combines the fun of a treasure hunt with useful skills like orienteerin' an' map-readin' an...I dunno, stuff like that. Trail-blazin', maybe?"

Again, entirely not his bag. "Since this is class an' you're supposed to be learnin' stuff, we're goin' old-school today." Look at his disappointment, class. Look at it. "Rather than downloadin' coordinates to your GPS an' sendin' you out to find the exact location of the cache, we're gonna do this like it's 1986." He started handing out packs. Inside those packs were maps, along with compasses, canteens of water, binoculars, pencils and water-resistant pads, and several other moddable useful items. "There are a list of coordinates on your pad. Each coordinate can be found in the area on your map. It's up to you to figure out how to turn the coordinates into points on the map, then to read the map well enough to figure out how to get to those caches. You do it right, there's be a cache filled with goodies an' stuff for y'all to keep. Ready? Any questions?"

Once he'd answered any questions they had, it was off through the portal, which led them to Rock State Park.

No Danger Shop today, instead a portal was waiting for the class. As was a visibly-impatient Hardison, who was bouncing on his toes a bit with excitement. "So, I asked y'all what you wanted to learn about on the first day," he reminded. "Face wanted to learn more about fightin' with lightsabers an' Hanna mentioned a bit of drama. Now, I can't get access to real lightsabers or whatnot, but I did get us the next best thing--an hour-long lesson at the School of Saberfightin'!" Yes, Hardison was well and truly geeking out about this. "They train with replicas of the laserswords from Space Battles an' teach some of the more famous duels from the movies. I hear they even got a new duel based on the Film that just came out!"

Seriously. So excited here.

"So grab your stuff an' head through the portal. We're goin' to Moscow!"

It was practically killing him to be the last one through the portal, but Hardison remembered that he was technically a teacher and a responsible adult and waited until all the students were through before heading in.

Class started a little late today. Hardison'd had a little trouble getting out of bed. For reasons.

"Uhh, hey," he said, dashing into the Danger Shop, tugging on his collar. "So, y'all probably know what's up this week. You got any questions about it, you can ask me once class starts. Anyway, I ain't even gonna pretend like anyone's got the focus to try to learn nothin'. So, today?" He hit a button and the room turned into an awesome Go Kart track, with enough karts for everyone. "Just hop in an' go."

Hopefully an hour of zooming around would bleed off some of that energy. Because, damn, it was rough staying focused.

"Sup, class," Hardison waved a soda can at the students as they entered the Danger Shop. "So, hopefully everybody had fun last week, but now we're back in the classroom, 'bout to learn somethin' useful." Again, he gestured with the soda can, over to several tables with enough space for everyone to sit. At each setting were several odd items: two bobby pins, an empty soda can, a pair of scissors, a doorknob, a padlock, and a combination padlock, the type that were often found in lockers. "Today, we're learnin' two quick an' easy way to pick three different kind of locks." Looking a little embarrassed, he added, "Uhh, standard teachin' disclaimer--I'm teachin' y'all this in case it comes in handy someday, don't use it on your fellow students on the island."

Off the island, well, he'd assume the students had a reason. And as for the adults on the island...well, likely they could take care of themselves.

"Now, most doorknobs have pin an' tumbler locks, which means there are tiny pins inside that, when you push 'em to the right position, will allow the lock to open." He pulled up a giant image of the inside of a lock. "The pins are in two halves, you see?" he continued, turning one section of the pin red, the other blue with the touch of a button. "The space in the middle is called the sheer line. The way a key works is that it slides into the lock, pushin' the pins to various heights so that their sheer lines all line up, an' then with a twist of the key, the mechanism turns over an' the lock unlocks. Now, keys are nice when you got 'em, but sometimes you're workin' with what you got on hand. I gave y'all bobby pins, but safety pins work two--any slim piece of metal that you can modify into shape. A thin enough knife blade'll work if that's what you got on hand." He was trying to cover as many times as he could, assuming that not everyone would have access to bobby pins throughout history. "You're gonna need two: one to be the pick, which is what you'll use to adjust the pins, and the other to be the tensioner. That just sits in the bottom of the lock, keepin' a steady pressure on the mechanism so that once all the sheer lines are lined up, the lock'll pop." He then went into detail on how to shape the bobby pins and then use them to pick the lock. Once his explanation was over, a transparent lock appeared at each student's place. "You can practice on that one until you get the hang of it," he said. "Then y'all can move onto the door knob, where you'll be relyin' on sound an' feel."

Before they could start on that lock, Hardison moved on, picking up his soda can and the pair of scissors. "Next, I'mma show you how to use a soda can to jimmy open a combination lock an' a padlock. Don't even worry about the combination or how the lock works--this is more a brute force technique that works because of how the locks are used. Padlocks an' combination locks work by holdin' two separate pieces together. Remove the metal bar an' suddenly the individual pieces are free to open up. So you don't gotta know how to pick these kinds of locks, cause all you wanna do is get that bar outta the way. An' the trick to that is exploitin' a vulnerability in how it connects." As he was saying this, he was busily cutting off the top of the soda can and cutting out several large squares of aluminum. Once the squares were free, he modified them a little further into M-shapes. "This is a shim," he explained, holding up one of the M's. "Or, it will be when I'm done foldin' it. An' once it's properly shaped, you can use it to pop a lock like this, easy."

Once he was done with his demonstration, he nodded at the assorted items in front of them. "A'ight, you saw what I did. Now you practice. Class is over an you can leave, well, as soon as you can leave."

It was only the third week of class and already Hardison was pulling the movie day. A movie day where the Danger Shop wasn't programmed into anything more exciting than a movie theater with sofas and beanbag chairs. He felt guilty but if you kids had any idea how much of a pain in the butt it was, keeping Chaos from trying to destroy civilization with a keyboard and a neckbeard...

"So, a coupla you wanted to find out what it's like behind the scenes of a movie," Hardison said, blinking sleepily at class. "This ain't nothin' like that, but it's a funny movie from, like, a million years ago an' it's the closest I could get to tyin' it into class." He yawned. Hugely. "So, here, we gonna watch it an' next week we'll be off doin' somethin' amazin'. Promise."

And then he was flinging himself into a beanbag and nodding off.

This was a Hardison class, so they met in the Danger Shop, even though there was no real reason why a regular classroom wouldn't do. Well, other than because Hardison's love for the Danger Shop might just have rivaled the love for his crew and he'd take any opportunity to play with it.

Speaking of things he loved a great deal, the Danger Shop was programmed to mimic the bridge of the ship from Galaxy Quest. Because Age of the Geek, baby, that was why.

"Sup, class," he said, spinning the Captain's chair around to greet them. "Welcome to Jack of All Trades. Why don't y'all take a seat." he gestured to the empty work stations ringing the bridge. "As most of y'all from Earth know, there's a sayin' that goes Jack of all trades, master of none. Some of y'all not from Earth might know a similar sayin'. However, what most folks don't know is that that's not the whole of the proverb. The way it actually goes is Jack of all trades, master of none, though oftentimes better than master of none. Don't get me wrong, bein' a specialist is a good thing a lot of the times. I specialize in hackin', in fact. But sometimes it's good to be a generalist, to have other skills to fall back on. You might not always be the best at somethin', but a lot of times, knowin' just enough and how to use that knowledge effectively is way more helpful than bein' useful in one specific circumstance."

"First week is traditionally introductions an' this class is no different. So gimme your name an' class, then tell me what skill or activity you'd like to learn about this semester. Can't promise we'll get to 'em all, but I'm always open to suggestions. Sound good? A'ight, we'll start with you," he said, pointing to a student at random.