1. First Staff Meeting

Posted on Thu Feb 9th, 2023 @ 11:08pm by Duke Drake & Anthony De Luca & Kranny Shtorm & Rebecca McMillen & Eric Mixon & Sakura Tanikawa & Astrid Lindstorm

2,532 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: 1. Year One
Location: First Floor Study Hall
Timeline: Friday PM August 28, 1992

Dr. Drake walked into the student's lounge on the first floor with his hands in his lab coat pockets, the morning meetings had been completed, and lunch was provided. Now that everyone had a chance to wonder about the facility Drake decided it would be a good time to sit everyone down and discuss expectations and goals for the coming school year. "Everyone find a seat, I promise the lounge chairs are comfortable. You may not want to sit them after those teenagers spread their germs through here next week," He teased. "I'm pretty informal for the most part, so there won't be a test after this. I'm fairly certain that one of you may have questions that haven't been asked or mentioned yet, so I'm holding an open forum as it were. I wanted to start with expectations."

He cleared his throat before continuing, and slowly looked at each person individually as he continued to speak, "We may be called a school for the gifted, but some of these kids will be runaways, neglected, abused, or just kids with rough pasts. While we will have an academic plan to follow, my goal is not to get kids good grades and then graduate them, I want you to help me prepare these kids to be good adults that will be an asset to their communities. It will take time, patience, and a little less sleep some nights, but if we want to change tomorrow we have to train them today. Think about this for a moment before I open the floor to discussion. These kids coming next week, will one day be someone's grandfather or grandmother. You can affect two generations through your work here. So our biggest goal is to help these kids. With that being said, I want each of you to know I will support you 100% come to me any time with questions or concerns and we will do our best to accommodate whatever is necessary, within reason; remember we do have a budget to work within," he said with a smile as he finished. "Now then who has the first question?"

A lavender-haired Asian woman was the first, though she didn’t speak up right away. She raised her hand and waited to be called upon.

Dr. Drake laughed, "Class hasn't started yet Miss Tanikawa, there's no need to raise your hand," he said smiling. "Please ask your question."

Sakura stood, smiled at the other teachers, and gave very small bows. “Nice to meet everyone. I’m Sakura Tanikawa, Tech Studies teacher. I wanted to ask how safe the community is. If we want or need to go into the city, or take the students somewhere, will we feel safe?” She had seen the news reports. Hysteria was growing, but it wasn’t clear — to Sakura, at least — if New Orleans was more relaxed, or if people might get rough.

"I think the city should be OK to visit for now. The majority of the protests have happened in the big cities. If there are off campus activities with the students then multiple teachers will go, especially the big guys," he said motioning towards Shtorm and Mixon. "As teachers on your private time I would ask that you use the buddy system and don't go along, I can't enforce it but I strongly recommend it. Excellent question by the way."

Sakura nodded a thank-you and returned to her seat.

Anthony stands up, taking off his sunglasses as he looked around and gives everyone a friendly nod. "I am Anthony De Luca, I'll be teaching music to whatever brave students want to be in the band kids" he smirks. "My two big questions are one, how many students are we expecting? I've not been a teacher all that long, but whenever I been in a bar on a Friday night I hear a lot of conversations about how class sizes are getting too big to manage so I guess that can be a problem to be addressed." "My other big question, if this isn't the best venue for it forgive me, what can everyone here do? It's a school for the gifted right? What are our gifts? good or bad? Me, I can manipulate sonic energy, I can also hear just about anything and oddly I can translate and spoken language. Makes for a neat party trick." He sits back down, seemingly staring at everyone at once.

Dr. Drake nodded as Anthony sat back down, "That's a lot to unpack, I'm going to try to give you the Reader's Digest condensed version," he teased. "Class sizes, we are currently not expecting more than a total of 25 - 30 students. Most of them are runaways or troubled kids, so we will have our work cut out for us. Because of that, the class sizes will be extremely small to begin with, which also allows everyone to have a period or two to mentor these children."

He took a deep breath before continuing, "Everyone here is gifted, De Luca, whether they feel comfortable enough to show or talk about their powers is their choice. I will show you mine, maybe that will help you understand a few things about me." Drake stood up and picked up a rose from the vase on a small table in front of the window. He held it up for each of the teachers to see, within a few seconds the beautiful, vibrant red rose wilted and then decayed into a handful of dust. "I can do this at will to nearly anything I touch. Because of the destruction and death my powers bring, I decided to counteract it and I became a Medical Doctor. I spent time in Emergency Rooms and as a Family Physician. In my line of work a small runaway girl was brought to my clinic. She was abandoned and shunned because of her abilities. After seeing this multiple times I decided something had to be done about it. Now I stand in the literal fulfillment of a dream that I had to help those kids who needed it the most." Drake sat back down in his chair and brushed the dust in his hand off onto the floor. "None of you have to share anything if you don't want to, but if you would like to speak up. You don't have to stand either unless you will ruin my furniture, then it will come out of your paycheck," he teased trying to lighten the mood a bit.

"I guess I'll go next." Rebecca called out, pushing against the desk she was leaning against. "So, for the record, there's going to be at least one or two of us that have gifts that are either dangerous to demonstrate, or difficult to really show off. I mean, if you tell me you're bulletproof I'm going to believe you." she said with a smile. "So, that being said, what I can do isn't dangerous it's just odd to show."

"I can talk to rats. Mice too, but not like other rodents. Not that I've seen. Or heard." she mused, "Not sure which is the right word there."

She bent her knees, and slipped off her slipper shoes to show off her ... wait, those weren't normal feet. Elongated digits, slightly longer nails. More like little claws really. They looked like rat paws more than feet.

"I've got really good balance. Like, really good. Balance beams, high wire, not that I've ever TRIED the high wire but, I'm really stable on thin ledges and walking a line... and finally, if everyone could just stay, well, stay back for a bit." She asked, and with a breath and a bit of internal concentration... nothing happened. At least, not at first, but then it quick became apparent that Rebecca was a lot shorter than she was just a moment ago. And then a lot shorter, and then shorter still. Rebecca was practically melting away as she got shorter, and shorter, and shorter. No, the right word was certainly not Shorter. It was Smaller. Rebecca was getting smaller.

Half as tall, then half again, then half, then half. By the time it stopped, Rebecca was no bigger than a mouse. A mere two inches in height. "So yeah..." she squeaked up, and up, and up to the rest of the room, her voice an adorable high pitched squeak. She held that posture and stature for a minute or two to just let it sink in, before she began to grow back to her normal height, a more dignified five foot eight.

"That's my gift." she announced once the cycle was over.

A large gentlemen in a tight white t-shirt, green cargo pants and large black combat boots stands up. When he speaks while understandable is in a thick Russian accent. "Privet, everyone. My name is Shtorm, no Mr. is needed. I'm just glad to meet so many like people. When I was young, I thought it was just me and I'm excited for that notion to have been proven wrong." Shtorm scratches his white beard a little looking around at all the new faces. "I guess i'll start with that I'm in charge of the SERE program. For those who don't know what that is, it stands for Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape. I'm not musically inclined or particularly good at art, and I'm certainly nowhere as well trained to get any form of doctorate, but I know the wilderness and military protocol like the back of my hand" As he looks at his hand "oh that's new" said with an ounce of fake surprise. To which he gives a small chuckle to his own joke.

" As for my powers, well, they say some have the strength of a bear, I literally do. I can also change into one but please excuse the fact that I won't turn into 1,300 pounds of fur and claws in the middle of our nice meeting." Shtorm gives a bigger laugh. "I'm an open book and there is very little I don't mind sharing so if you wanted to know anything about me just ask". Shtorm sits back down slowly giving the floor to whoever is next.

Rebecca just gave a nod for a moment, "Yes, thank you for not making us bear with." she smirked.

"Mine is more difficult to demonstrate," Sakura said, standing up once again. "But I can touch machines and know immediately how they work. I can see all the different parts, how they interact, what works well, what doesn't, and if I focus I can make them do things without usual input. It works even better with computers, especially networked ones."

Eric sat and watched and listened. He was intrigued by the diversity that there was. He rose and towered over all. I am Eric Mixon. And my powers are not hidden. I am large and steel. I see some of you can manifest your powers but can also conceal them. I can not. I lift heavy, heavy stuff and am bulletproof lol." He smiled at Rebecca due to her precious comment.

Rebecca shared the smile, but it faded slightly. "I guess there's really only one way you'd really know. I'm so sorry you had to find out."

Astrid had not been intending to share quite so much but with the trend set, that intent had to change. She stood, her appearance by all rights being unassuming. Her hair was neatly tied up in a bun, her attire being light but professional to fit the role of academia in the region.

"Well. I suppose that leaves me. My name is Astrid Lindstorm, I'll be teaching English Literature." She spoke with an English accent, even in where she would've normally pronounced her name more properly in Swedish.

"I'm not keen to get into specifics on where I'm from - perhaps best I don't unload at our first meeting. In due time, perhaps." Astrid continued, though in the back of her mind, "in due time" equated to "never if I can help it".

"However, I've evidently developed some way of projecting my grasp by thought rather than physical presence. Telekinesis, I've been led to understand is the term." She explained, and to punctuate the point, a pencil from one of the desks in the room had begun to float towards her and enter into orbit for a moment before she took it into her hand.

"There are limitations to mass and other specifics that I do and do not understand. But I suppose that is the short of it." Astrid said and took her seat.

"Thank you Astrid for sharing, and everyone. I believe this is the beginning of something great. Are there any other questions?" Dr. Drake asked the faculty. After a short pause he continued, "If there are no more questions I'd like to give you these." He pulled out envelopes with each name on them, "There is $500 here for your classroom budget for any supplies you will need, there is also a $1000 bonus for each of you for signing up to our cause. The van will be in front of the school at 0800 tomorrow, and we will be in New Orleans by 0830 as long as traffic cooperates."

Sakura gleefully took her envelope with a head nod and an "Arigatō". Between this, and the requisition form that Headmaster Drake had said was on her desk for more expensive would-be-nice acquisitions, she'd be set.

And who didn't love a shopping trip!?

Shtorm take his envelope and places it in one of his pockets with a zipper. "This should be more than enough for what I need. Thank you." Looking forward to this small trip. Shtorm has never been on a trip to get supplies that didn't end with enemy gun fire, so he very much looks forward to not having to experience that again at least for the time being.

Rebecca was the next to take an envelope. "This is... I mean, wow. This is .." Rebecca was at a loss for words as she held the envelope. She held it close, as though half expecting the envelope to be taken from her, but slowly relaxed. She was safe here.

Anthony looks at the cash. "I don't think this will be enough for an assortment of even used instruments. But we can work on that"

Shtorm turns to Anthony " I shouldn't need all of mine anyway. I would be more than happy to donate some to you to help out. This is a team effort after all."

“I don’t think we’re starting from nothing anyway,” Sakura interjected. “I’ve not seen it yet but Headmaster Drake told me there’s some computers already in my classroom. You might have some instruments already.”

"Ahh, they must be in storage then, I didn't look in there. So don't worry about it Shtorm, we'll be good"

Dr. Drake nodded in approval at the comeraderie already forming between the teachers. It was a sign of good things to come, he thought to himself, as he exited allowing the faculty to continue their discussion without his oversight.

#The End

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