In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 21):

The girl glances at you, gives a half shrug, and looks back at her phone, giving you a small gesture to go ahead.

She studiously ignores you.

A woman wearing a khakis, a button down denim shirt, and a lab coat walks in just a moment before the bell rings.

"Okay.  Okay.  Settle down.  I'm Mrs. Hawthorne.  I usually teach Biology.  But this is homeroom.  Every Monday, you come here first.  That's only for this year.  Next year, you guys will be completely on your own.

"Alrightie then."  She picks up a pen and writes her name on the whiteboard.  "Few fun facts.  You should have all looked over the school map by now.  But if you aren't sure where to go for your next period, come up to my desk the last ten minutes of class and I'll give you directions.

"There's a monthly assembly for the entire grade.  Yours will be the second Monday of each month. So you go to the gym second Monday.  Not here. Got that?

"Dress code.  Lemme take a quick looksie..."  She wanders down the aisle, looking over each student in turn.  She says a few things before getting to your table.  She stops before you seat mate.  "Phone down.  Once the bell rings, the phone goes off.  Not just this class.  Every class.  Lose the brow ring.  Hey.  You knew the rules when you signed up for this school," she adds as your seatmate starts to object.

Mrs. Hawthorne doesn't even give her time to come up with a response.  She wanders down the aisle, stopping at the muscle guy.  She looks at his knuckles and sighs.  "Really?"

He sheepishly frowns and shrugs, muttering something you can't catch.  Hawthorne laughs.  "Just expect some flack."

She heads back to the front of the class.

She spends thirty minutes going over stuff from the brochure and welcome packet.  You have read it all, and there's nothing new.  Two semesters.  Each class has a midterm and final in each semester.  Expect one research project and two major writing projects.  There are two mandatory class trips in the year.  This year, one is a day trip to the zoo and an overnight camping trip in the spring to include a day at Black Creek Pioneer Village.

Mrs. Hawthorne wraps things up about fifteen minutes before the bell rings.  A few students wander to her desk for directions.

Your seatmate has been fuming the whole class.  She sat there, arms crossed, staring daggers in Hawthorne's direction.  Hawthorne pointedly ignored her.

Your seatmate glances your way, makes a small sign, and then turns, looking at the muscle head.

"Hey.  Did she give you crap about your tat?"  Most everyone is talking to their seatmate, so her speaking isn't inappropriate.  But she says it loud enough that a few heads turn her way.

Muscle guy blinks and shrugs.  "I kinda knew it'd be a problem.  I mean.  Says it in the school guide, right?  No tats.  No piercings other than the ears.  She didn' say anything about that nose stud you got, did she?"

Your seatmate frowns.  She obviously was expecting him to be a little more up in arms than he seems to be.  "I'm not wearing anything that's inappropriate."

Muscles shrugs.  "Talk to the principal.  I think she's just doing her job."

Your seatmate's eyes widen.  She really wasn't expecting this kind of attitude from him.

She turns to you.  "Am I just outta line?"

Tyler, too, looks surprised at the big guy's response, but in his case it's more about the stereotypes in his head that come crashing down. He heard the old saying, 'Never judge a book by its cover,' so many times through his childhood, but that's the moment it finally clicks.

When his seatmate speaks to him, he blinks and looks back, then looking thoughtful for a second before giving an honest answer, "Well, kinda, yeah. I mean, it's a silly, old-fashioned rule, but it's still a rule. And she didn't punish you or anything, I think she's just trying to make sure you know how far you can bend the rules, and what's too much."

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 23):

Cellphone seems to chew on that.  She sighs, and brushes back her hair.  "Fine.  I guess you're right."

She glances at you.  "I'm Brenda.  You come from one of the private schools?"

She listens to your answer then turns around, speaking back to Muscles.  "Hey Thugly!  You damn sure didn't come in through the limo gate.  How'd you get in?"

Muscles cocks an eyebrow, but doesn't rise to the bait.  He nonchalantly shrugs.  "Took the entrance exam.  How'd you get in?  Half off coupon you found at Hot Topic?"

"Ha, frickin', ha."  She groans and slumps in her seat.  "Either of you guys know any place around here that makes a decent coffee?  I'm having to hoof it in from Etibocke."

"I'm not native either.  Comin' from Scarbrough."  He looks at you to see what you'll say.

"I'm Tyler," he says with a smile, and then shakes his head. "No, just a normal one. But they gave me a scholarship after I did the exam."

He looks between the two as they talk, and then grins to Muscles, "Me too, but guess we went to different schools." However, he is perceptive, and he adds, "But I saw a Timmies just across Spadina when I was crossing from the subway station."

Timmies is the nickname of Tim Hortons, a doughnut and coffee shop that is pretty much a Canadian staple, though less popular lately due to some controversies since being bought out by Burger King. And, I hope saying Tyler is from Scarborough is okay, that seemed to be where your list of subway lines seemed to originate. :-)

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 25):

I thought that's where we decided he was from.  My bad.  But yep.  Scarbrough it is.

"The one on College?  I pass the one on University and Dundas."  He shrugs.  "I can't stop at 'em though.  End up munching on a dozen honey dips if I do.  Name's Reggie."

Brenda looks at him like he's insane.  "How could you not get an apple fritter?  Madness."  She looks at you.  "Tyler's an Old Fashioned Glazed kind of guy I'm betting."

Reggie gives you the once over.  "Nah.  I think he's a maple dip."

Don't you love it when people talk like they just looked at a website?

Brenda giggles.  "I got math after this.  And then PE.  I guess I get all my cruddy classes out of the way first.  What about you guys?"

"Physics than Latin.  I don't have gym until last period.  So I get to go home smelling funky."

Tyler giggles, and says, "Crullers, or double chocolate. Mostly I just get Timbits, usually." Not that he's ever really ordered for himself, but he's not going to mention that.

At the question of classes, he answers, "I've got physics next, and gym last period too, Reggie. But, where you've got Latin I've got math."

He looks puzzled for just a moment, and then says, "I guess boys and girls do gym separate here? At my old school that was together, at least up to grade 7. Don't know what they do in grade 8."

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 27):

They both give you a quick, curious glance.  Reggie starts to say something but he's cut short by the bell ringing.

Brenda whips our her cell.  "See you guys..." she says dreamily as she starts texting with the speed of a machine gun.

Reggie shrugs and grabs up his backpack and waits for you.  "Do you have Koma for Physics?"

You do.  Since you seem to know where you're going, he follows.

The halls fill up with students like water pouring out through flood gates of a swollen, straining dam.  Reggie is given a bit of a wide berth, so you are able to shelter in his moving harbor.

Maybe it's just him or him and everyone else, but you realize how short you are.  Even with your last growth spurt, it feels like everyone else in the hall has a good half meter on you.

"You here for the sciences?" Reggie glances down at you.  And it is just that.  A glance down.  He's like a freakin' redwood.

"They let me in cos they say I'm good at robotics.  Despite how I look.  Which science are you?"

Tyler looks around with wide eyes at all the people around them and sticks close to Reggie as if he's afraid he's going get swept away.

Still, he looks back up — way up — to Reggie with a grin, "You do robotics? Awesome! I've done some Arduino robot projects with my mom, but that's it. She's taught me a lot about electronics, though."

Then he nods quickly, and says, "Yeah, science is why I want to be here. All of it, I like finding out how things work. Well, I like reading about it, most of the classes I've had so far have been boring. I always knew everything we did in class before we did it. I hope it's different here! But why they wanted me? Kind of everything, I think. If it was just science and math, they probably would've made me wait until next year. But they wanted me right away."

His tone of voice here isn't bragging, but instead just a little sheepish.

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 29):

Reggie frowns, more like he's puzzled about something than angry, but then shrugs.  "Well.  If this place wanted ya, there must be something to it.  The school got me outta juvie. Is this us?"

Your physics classroom is pretty spectacular.  The room is large, larger than you would expect.  The tables are set close together in the center of the room.  Beside the white board up front is a table with various water pistols, wind up cars, crystals, and a baseball bat. Around the walls of the room are a series of pipes. The kind from old movies.  Pneumatic pipes that they used to use to deliver messages in containers.

"Someone raided Bill Nye's house. What? I like Bill Nye. C'mon.  Let's grab a table."  Reggie heads over to a nearby table.  Most of the other kids stare at him. Then they look at you.

Someone behind your table mutters, "It's like big dog an' little dog." Someone else snickers at that.

"Quiet down."  A man in a labcoat wanders in, running a hand through his thinning hair.  "I'm Dr. Zhan.  Welcome to Physics 101.  We will be wrecking stuff and such.  But first, who can tell me what Hooke's Law is?"

Tyler looks up curiously to Reggie, at the mention of juvie, but is only a curious look. Still fresh from having his stereotypes shattered, the idea doesn't scare him like it would have a couple of hours earlier. Reggie is, after all, nice. That's what matters to him, in that moment.

He looks around with wide eyes at the stuff in the room, and he says, "This is so cool!" He grins up to Reggie again, and nods quickly, "Yeah, Bill Nye is cool."

Ignoring the stares as best he can, he turns his attention to the teacher as he comes in, and pretty much immediately raises his hand to the question.

If he's called on, he says, "It's the law of elasticity, that the force needed to stretch something is linearly proportional to the distance it's being stretched." He does mispronounce 'linearly' slightly, as more like lie-near-ly. He learned the word from a book, after all, rather than hearing it pronounced.

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 31):

Everyone else, Reggie included, look at you.  Zhan nods.

"Good.  Now. If we wanted to test that law, how could we go about it?"

Everyone looks back at you.

Tyler thinks about that for just a second, biting at his lower lip, but then asks, "Maybe a spring, hook it up to different weights and see how far they stretch it?"

He is a bit less sure of his answer, this time.

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 33):

Zhan nods, "That is a start.  Good work. Now then," he says, turning to address the whole class.  "This is a hands on class.  There will be some lectures, usually on Mondays.  Tuesday through Thursday, you will be in lab.  That is you will be designing and executing experiments surrounding the material we cover in the Monday lecture.  Sometimes you will be on your own.  Sometimes you will be working in a group.  You will show me your experiments starting on Thursday at the halfway point of class, finishing up on Friday.  By the end of Friday, you have to hand in a short summary of your experiment, what you learned from it, and why you think your experiment did or did not work.

"That is correct!  I do not expect all your experiments to work.  Failure is just as important as success in science.  Your grade will be determined mostly by the analysis of the experiment results you turn in on Friday.  You also get points for working on the experiments themselves.  Here is how your grade this year will be determined."

He writes up on the white board

50% Experiment Analysis

25% Participation in Experiments

25% Final Exam

Zhan caps his marker, which must be new as you can even smell the fumes from where you're sitting.  "Any questions?"

After he deals with a few questions he writes Hooke's Law up on the board.

"So let's start with good ol' Hooke."  He rips into a quick lecture on Hooke's Law, which apparently no one was ready to take notes on.  Pens and notepads and laptops quickly come out and there's frantic typing and skritch-skratching from pens.

"Alright.  For this first experiment, you will work in groups of four.  I'll let you decide amongst yourselves this go round.  Get together, bring me a paper with your group's name, and be prepared to start work tomorrow.  Oh...and..."

He puts a hand by the 25% Participation in Experiments on the white board.

"As long as you participate, you will get some points.  If you want full points, try to design an original experiment.  I've seen all the videos on You Tube as well.  You want to impress me.  Show me you are capable of independent thought."

As Zhan finishes, Reggie puts a meaty hook on your shoulder.  "You're in my group."

"Yeah. I want in on that too."

"You still need a fourth right?"

A few people suddenly pounce on you.  Reggie holds up a hand, which is large enough that everyone stops talking.  "We'll take you and you."

He points to a short Asian girl and a tubby guy who's almost as tall as Reggie is.

"Hi," says the Asian girl.  "I'm Bian."

"Aldo," says the stout guy.

Reggie looks at the clock on his cell phone.  "We don't have a lotta time until the bell.  Let's all think on it tonight and talk about it first thing tomorrow.  Sound good?"

I'll give you a chance to catch up with any reactions, questions for Zhan, etc.  Then we'll move on to next period

Like pretty much everybody else, Tyler didn't think to get his notebook or pen out until just about the time the lecture starts.

Later, when it's time to pick a group, he grins up to Reggie. But then, moments later he is looking startled and a bit overwhelmed at the number of people wanting to group up. Thankfully, Reggie is there to take control of the situation. "Thanks," he says softly to Reggie.

Then, he is smiling cheerfully at Bian and Aldo, and says, "Hi, I'm Tyler." He quickly nods in agreement with Reggie's suggestion, and says, "Sounds great, yeah."

As he is walking in the hall between classes, he pulls out his phone and sends a quick text message to Levi,

I think I'm the smallest person in the school. How's grade 8?

Quick edit, just added the last paragraph since I clicked post a bit too fast.
This message was last edited by the player at 01:06, Mon 08 June 2020.

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 35):

Levi doesn't respond until you've found a seat in your math class.

Meh.  Same turds, different toilet.  U always short.  Just no one told U.  Bessie Licksmith's pregnant.  Every1's gabbing about it.

Bess Locksmith was not exactly Ms. Congeniality.  She always referred to you as the Once and Future Virgin.  Her getting knocked up isn't really all that big a shocker.

Your math class is pretty sedate.  Most everyone is too busy talking to their friends to pay you any mind.

French is pretty much the same.  The teacher hits the door sounding like Pepe Lepew.  Most everyone is too busy playing on their phone or trying to keep up to pay you any mind.

Your lunch period starts now.  The swell of students pushing their way into the cafeteria moves with the force of the Mississippi meeting the Gulf of Mexico.  You get elbowed once, feet stepped on twice.  None of them are intentional.  There's a couple of muffled apologies, although that last guy doesn't seem to have realized you were there.  It's pretty hot amidst all those people.  It's like being surrounded by a prison made of human flesh and bone.

You find a seat at the end of a table mostly filled up with a large group who all seem to know each other.  They pointedly ignore you.

Levi's texted again.  Mrs. Wyman quit.  No 1 knows Y.  No 1 cares.  Her sub is hot.  LIke 23 years old and really really blonde.  Big tits.  Its magic.  How long is it going to take U 2 get home on train?

Going to give you a chance to catch up before we move to Drama and Gym.

Tyler gives a bit of a grin at the message from Levi, and texts back.

As if nobody saw that coming.

After the amazingness that was physics, math and French are a slight disappointment. The whole thing ends up seeming a bit more boring than they might normally be for him in comparison.

The rush to the cafeteria is something entirely new to him. Though, as Levi said, he was always shorter than most of his classmates, it was never by such a margin and he's starting to feel a bit claustrophobic by the time they reach the cafeteria.

He takes a few moments to catch his breath once he's in the cafeteria, before looking for a place to sit. Ignored by his tablemates, and feeling entirely lonely, he starts absently Googling variations of 'blue man' and 'cotton' and 'storm' while he eats.

He does immediately check the messages, however, when Levi answers him, and texts back again,

Lucky. And probably about an hour. Was almost late this morning.

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 37):

Drama I meets in the Compton Annex.  It's not really an annex though.  It's just a large classroom across the hall from the school's auditorium.

The first thing you notice is that the class seems to be divded up into three groups.  Against one wall, seated on the tables as opposed to the chairs, are a number of people who all seem to be wearing eye shadow.  Male or female.  They all have eye shadow on.  Well.  Not all of them.  But as a group, besides the whole sitting on top of the tables instead of on the chairs scotched up under the tables, it seems to be their defining characteristic.

The second group sits on chairs.  They also seem to like eye shadow, but whereas group one has various colors and hues, group two prefers black.  Both black eye shadow and black clothes.

The two groups are distinctly separate. They sit with their backs to each other.  They do not make eye contact, with either each other or with you.  It's like you can feel the border line running down the middle of the class room.

You apparently fall into group three.  Luckily, they find you. A girl not much shorter than you with thick glasses and a hesitant smile walks up.  "Hi!  Are you here for Drama I?  Come over here.  My name is Tanya.  Nice to meet you."

She sort of pushes you/escorts you over to a small table at the opposite end of the classroom.  There are two guys and a girl sitting down there.  The guys are identical twins with mops of red hair and freckles like constellation maps etched over their skin.  The girl  has a large smile on her kind of large face.  She must weigh as much as Reggie does.  None of them have eye shadow.

"This is Tom and Tim.  That's Sasha.  We're the techies.  Do you like lighting design?  That's what we do."

Sasha cocks her head and looks at you.  "Please tell me your name doesn't start with a 'T' as well."  Then, after you answer, she sighs.  "Sonuvabitch."

"She's just upset that's she's the only 'S' in the group," says either Tom or Tim.

"She doesn't think your mom is a bitch.  She just says that a lot," either Tim or Tom informs you.

"Sasha!"

"Sorry."  Sasha looks you over and her smile creeps back on her face.  "So nobody warned you about the Drama Club, huh?"

"Well.  It's not like anyone needs to warn you.  Just..."  Tammy sort of fidgets, twisting back and forth while standing on her tip toes and pushing the tips of her fingers together.  "...be careful around the actors.  They're kind of..."

Sasha gives her a second to come up with a term and then supplies it.  "Royal fucking bastards."

She looks at the others.  "What?  They are."

The room goes quiet as a woman who must be the teacher walks in.  She's an older lady, with long gray hair tied up in a pony tail.  She sort of bounces instead of taking steps.

"Hidey Ho everybody!  Welcome to Drama I and Drama II.  For those of you who don't know me, I'm Ms. Baskins."  She stops in the middle of the room and spins on one foot, taking in everyone while twirling.  "Let's start with introductions.  When I point to you, stand up, and tell us your name and why you signed up for Drama!  Okay...how...'bout...YOU!"

Of course she's pointing at you.  Because why wouldn't she be?

Tyler smiles to each in his group, and says, "Hi. Never done lighting design, but it sounds cool! Don't worry, I learn fast."

He nods to Sasha with just a tiny grin, "Tyler. Sorry," he adds, though not really believing she was mad at him.

A few minutes later, he's standing up again to start nervously introducing himself. "I'm Tyler Thompson," he starts, glancing to Sasha before looking back and continuing, "I signed up for drama because… Well, because I've never done it before — unless you count a single sentence in a play in grade three. I wanted to try something new. And I like stories, so it seemed like it would be fun."

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 39):

Baskins gives an excited little clap.  "Great!  I love enthusiasm!"

Eyeshadow Group and Eyeshadow Black Group just sort of stare at you.  If there were a cricket chirping at the moment, it would be perfect.

Then one of the Eyeshadow Group yawns, loudly and with exaggerated effort.  The sound of it seems to echo around the room.

"Well...everyone has to go through it once..." Sasha mutters.

Baskins coughs and twirls again, pointing at someone in the Black group.

Tanya smiles at you and leans over, whispering.  "The effects and costumes and stuff are more fun anyway.  We get to do monster make ups too!  You ever seen Face Off on SyFy?  Anyway, we have a lot of fun."  She glances at the other groups.  "Over here.  In our corner."

After the warning he was given about the eyeshadow groups, a yawn doesn't seem that bad. He shrugs, and sits back down, and looks back to Tanya. He grins, and whispers back, "Yeah, I used to watch it back when it was on Space — I'm always going to call it Space, renaming it CTV Sci-Fi is so boooring! Anyway, yeah, Face Off was really cool, you really do stuff like that?"

Canadianism time, so you're not totally confused by what Tyler just said. Though some people use illegal satellite dishes (or BitTorrent) to get American cable channels/shows, most of us don't have access to SyFy. We have our own channel, CTV Sci-Fi. Originally, up until about last year, as Tyler said in this post, it was called Space. Most of the people I know still call it that. :-) It has, in the past, had most of the shows from SyFy, but without the low-budget movies that I've heard people talking about. ;-)

None of this is really important at all, but just thought I should clarify and ended up rambling a bit. :-)

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 41):

No worries.  I'm actually glad you told me that.  Please give me all the Canuck flavor you can.  I mean to travel up that way sooner or later.

Tanya just about bounces up and down in her seat.  "Oh yeah!  Last year I...hold on."

The teacher has pointed at her. She stands and says.  "Tanya Simone.  Want to be a makeup artist."  She sits down without waiting for any kind of reaction.  You hear someone from somewhere laugh, but that's about it.

"Anyway, last year, I and Sasha made up two of the guys as characters who stepped out of a Pablo Picasso painting."

Sasha laughs.  "We were cutting cardboard out for days.  Ugh." She stands.  "Sasha Rutters.  You know me."

Someone makes a mooing sound.  Sasha shakes her head.  "Well you mooing does explain why you smell like cow shit."

"Sasha. We're not doing this again this year."

Sasha just frowns at Ms. Baskins and sits down.

Ms. Baskins looks back at the Just Eye Shadow group and starts saying something to them.  But Tanya is going on like nothing happened.

"Oh here.  Look at this..."  She shows you some pictures on her cell.  There's a guy decked up as the Mad Hatter.  Another picture with two girls tricked out as angels.  A last one with a guy wearing an ornate 16th century suit like he's royalty.

It's not like any of these work is movie good.  But each of the pictures has something that's kind of awesome about it.  The Mad Hatter's hat is like one of those Cat-In-The-Hat hats, but thicker around and detailed with all kinds of graffiti. The angels' wings look like they are lined with actual feathers.  And the 16th century guys costume is so good, even you can tell it's good.

Tim, or Tom, leans over.  "We do the lights and build the sets.  Hey Tanya.  You got the Christmas show set?"

Tanya thumbs through and shows you a picture of an elaborate stage set up.  It's like you're at the foot of a giant Christmas tree, with oversized presents and a teddy bear that must be 10' tall.

"We really go all out.  Hope we can count on you." says the other one.  Tom you think.  Maybe Tim.

Tyler frowns at the mooing sound, though it turns into a slight stifled giggle at the come back.

Then, he is looking back at Tanya's phone, smiling as he sees everything they've been doing. "That is awesome!" Then he nods emphatically to Tim/Tom, and says, "Yeah, you can count on me. I don't know how to do any of that stuff, but I'll learn! Hey, what about effects, do you guys do that stuff? You know, like smoke or… I don't know, I guess sound effects?"

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 43):

Tim, or Tom, shakes his head.  "Well...yeah.  But we're not terribly good at it.  If you got sound design skills, that would be somethin'."

The five of you start discussing various aspects of design, interrupted as those still not introduced to stand up and introduce themselves.

Ms. Baskins claps her hands. "Okay.  So we have a. Great! Year! Planned!"

She claps her hands, once and loudly.

"This year! We're going to put on three..." She holds up a hand with three fingers raised.  "...shows! For the Great North, we're going to put on The Room by Harold Pinter!  For the Spring Showcase, we're gonna do...are you ready for this?!"

She tucks her hands up under her chin and spins around, eager for someone to answer.

Sasha finally sighs.  "Please tell us.  We're all a twitter."

"American Idiot!"

She claps her hands, once and loudly.

The room is quiet.  She grins and then continues.

"And for Halloween, we're going to do Rocky Horror Show."

"Are you high?"

"Sasha!  We're not doing this this year!" Ms. Baskins hisses in the direction of your table and then waves a hand.  "It will be a very sanitized version, yes.  But it will be fun! Now aren't we excited?!?"

She looks around.

"Yes we are!" she says after no one answers.

Then she claps her hands, once and loudly.

Discussions start amongst the various groups.

Tanya sort of bounces in her seat.  "That means we'll get to do trannie make ups!"

"That means the principal's finally gonna fire this bitch." Sasha shakes her head.  "There is no way she got Rocky Horror okay'd before now."

Tanya waves a hand dismissively.  "That's her problem.  I wanna do a trannie make up."

"We should probably watch the movie a couple of times to see what we're getting into."

Tom, or Tim, nods at his brother's suggestion.  "Can you guys make it our house this weekend?"

"Cool, I can do that," he says with all confidence, trusting in his ability to learn when he's interested in something.

The first two plays mentioned, Tyler knows nothing about, so he just glances around for reactions but, finding none, he stays quiet. The third, however, he does recognize; and he smiles, more out of the fact that he recognizes it than any particular attachment to the show.

Once they all start talking again, he looks to Sasha, "I've only ever seen the Glee version, but it didn't seem that bad. What's wrong with it?"

He hesitates just a second answering Tim/Tom, and says, "Probably! Depending on what my mom says, but she's usually cool with homework groups. I live in Scarborough, where is your place?"

I hope it's coming across okay, I'm trying to set up Tyler as a somewhat sheltered kid, a bit skittish and not used to independence. All to set up the bigger character development when he realizes he has powers and starts to make the shift from protected to protector. :-)

In reply to Tyler Thompson (msg # 45):

It's coming across great.  I love how cheerful he is.  Oh I can't wait to break him! I mean...I look forward to his development as a character.

Bwah ha ha. BWAH HA HA HA HA HA HA!

You're pretty sure it's Tim that says, "Scarbrough?  Man.  You hoof it to get over here don'tcha?  You got your phone?  I'll give you our contact info."

He not only sends you his and his brother's info, but Tanya and Sasha's as well.

"I'm so happy you're here Tyler!  I know this is gonna be a great year!"

Sasha looks at you, shrugs, but grins.

Behind you, Ms. Baskins claps her hands, once and loudly.

The buzzer rings.

---

"Gentlemen!  Welcome to hell!"

Coach Eckers strolls down the line of you, sizing each of you up.  He comes to you, gives you the steely eye, and nods.  He then looks at Reggie.

"Funny seeing you here."

Reggie just grunts at him.

Eckers chuckles and walks back up the line.  "My job is to make men outta you.  Well.  We'll do the best with what we got.  I expect you to try Gentlemen.  You can fail all you want.  You just have to try.  Alright.  Let's go over your equipment requirements..."

The 'classroom' is the boys locker room.  You're given locker 141A.  Reggie is on the next row over.

A couple of guys, each one as big as Reggie, sandwich you on each side.  One of them looks down at you.  "Aren't you kinda tiny?"

"Bren..." the one on your left says.

"What?  I'm not givin' him grief.  I'm just sayin' he's kinda small.  Jeez Branford. Stand up for the little guy when he's actually down.  'kay?"

Bren looks back at you.  "Really.  Not tryin' to give you any grief.  But...uh..I saw you talkin' to Boxer Boy before."  He nods in what you think is Reggie's direction.

"You guys friends?"