39: Out in the Open
The Sapphire-Emerald students ducked in unison as another experiment exploded at the front of the class.
“AND THAT’S WHY YOU DON’T PLAY WITH GAS!” bellowed Ms James, her face the same picture of insane joy she always wore when witnessing random acts of destruction. “Not unless you want to blow things up,” she added in her quiet, almost sinister voice.
Rumour among the students had it that Ms James was somehow fuelled by the very chemicals she embraced, but Phantasia knew better. With a red tint flashing through her eyes every so often, she often wondered how Ms James kept her identity under wraps – but then all the teachers, bar Mr Smith, had potent auras. Their assault on Godhand, which Phantasia had only heard about second-hand from Mr Payne, had demonstrated that. If only their students could remember!
“Dudes, we could totally blow up this place if we wanted!” Joel whispered to the others on his table.
“WRONG!” Ms James had overheard him, turning his pale face red with embarrassment. “The Academy doesn’t run on gas, you fool! You think we’d let a place like this flow with a high explosive? ONLY WHEN I SAY SO! You want to blow this place up then you’re gonna need to get more creative than that, Mr Gibson!”
“I was just making a point,” he protested, “You know, just in case…”
“If it were so easy to level this place it would’ve been done years ago! We ain’t like that Godhand was, getting itself nuked like…” The usually loud and proud teacher slowed to a halt and grimaced. At the back of the class, huddled around a table away from everyone else, sat Astrid and her clique. Since her unexpected return Astrid’s usual haughty taunts and discrimination had been replaced with an aura almost as guarded as Dante’s. Even Ms James’s tactless mockery of her people’s destruction – and her father’s death – didn’t warrant the narrow-eyed glares or daggers of hatred that had once characterised the wannabe-Inquisitor when her father was alive and in power.
“DOYLE KENNEY!” cried Ms James, shattering the tense atmosphere by focusing all attention on the blonde boy, “Those are not designed for voyeurism!”
Doyle was gazing out of the window through John’s glasses, which somehow he’d managed to acquire. John himself looked embarrassed and ducked behind his laptop as Ms James pounced on Doyle and snatched the glasses off him. Putting them on herself she growled.
“You’ve been using these to zoom in on the girls in the swimming pool!”
“Gotta make the most of it…” mumbled Doyle.
“THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE!”
Doyle smirked. “What’re you looking at then, Miss?”
Ms James pulled off the visor and slung it across the nearest desk, her eyes now glowing with red rage as her aura flared up around her like fire.
“ARE YOU ACCUSING ME OF SOMETHING, MR KENNEDY?”
Doyle flinched, the force of his teacher’s melodramatic rage breaking through his cocky demeanour. Then the fires subsided.
“Mr Haan is too old for me,” she said, “So I hope you’re not suggesting I’m taking an interest in my own students,”
Doyle recoiled, his face screwed up in horror. “Eh, no, Miss?”
John’s multi-talented goggles hadn’t finished their journey of shenanigans though: Lysander had snatched them in the confusion.
“That’s a mighty fine zoom function!” said Lysander, “Why, if I were interested in such tomfoolery I’d be able to stare at a lady’s breasts as if they were right in front of my face!”
