Welcome to Gaia! ::

-It was a balmy Monday morning, sun sparkling on the dew drizzled grasses, budding tree limbs just barely swaying in the warm and gentle breeze. By all means it was a beautiful spring day, the sort of day that made adults locked in their cubicals and children trapped in their desks stare whistfully out the window, drowning out the sounds they should be listening too.

Surely there were a few young eyes staring out the windows of Knightside Elementary as the clock struck 10am, oblivious to the meeting taking place on their roof.

Captian Ukenite fidgeted nervously as he waited, staring at the place a watch would have been on his wrist had it not been stripped away by his powering up. The thought of doing this in mid daylight was almost sickeningly frightening for the perpetually nervous Captain. But when their tasks had shifted from starseed theft to energy draining everything had changed. The potential for energy drains of any large size really didn't happen as often at night. Especially not with this target.. this specially chosen target....

Ukenite had often used the security of night to his advantage, as a Lt relying more on surprise and deft dodging then grand offenses. But large night time gatherings...? What did that leave... clubs? The pulsing music.. bright lights... large.. burly.. and aggressively drunk men. Ughh.. too dangerous. He needed something smaller.. something that gave him the edge.. something like children.

The largest elementary school in Destiny City was the perfect target. Whether they just targeted one classroom or the entire school surely the energy would be great. Bright and energetic like the children, atleast he could hope it would be.

But he still couldn't do it alone. Ever nervous, always the submissive follower, Ukenite had enlisted the help of a few of the more confident members of the negaverse family. Sure he'd have to share the glory of his haul, but better that then chicken out at the grand task that stood ahead. Brown hair rustled mildly in the wind as his eyes kept watch for the rest of the team.-

Alexis had been busy making sure she had all the materials needed for class when Aurora had first arrived. A grin lit up her features as she strode over to welcome the girl. "Ah, you must be the assistant. Aurora, right?"

Alexis had asked and quickly explained today's game plan. Paper mache clown heads, there were balloons sitting on what looked to be pieces of cardboard each one sat neatly at a place where a child would be seated. "Unfortunately it's going to be messy, would you like an apron?"

She offered the piece of cloth to Aurora before she started writing on the board. When the kids arrived you could see the excitement on their faces. "Now children please don't touch anything yet. There are a few rules you'll need to know! Also please, say hello to Aurora she'll be helping us today." She said in a chipper voice that carried throughout the room.

Meanwhile in another area of the school Istas Hollywell sat with her head rested on her hands trying to pay attention as her teacher went over their math lesson for today and trying to ignore Billy the bully. Specially since they had just started with Multiplication Istas wanted to know what they were doing, which was really hard when Billy was constantly jeering her. She frowned until one of the other kids beside her snapped at Billy telling him to shut up.

Butter yellow eyes grew slightly wide in alarm as she looked from the kid beside her to Billy. This probably wasn't going to end well, and sure enough the teacher turned around... 'Is there a problem?' He asked eyes narrowing.

It was the 5th grade class that had filed into the Art classroom; Samson Colt took a seat in the middle of the room next to another young boy, Max. Propping himself up onto of the stool, he laid his elbows lazily on the top and waited for the class instruction. His head was cradled in on hand, fingers lightly playing with his dark blue-grey hair. The other hand was tracing circles on the tables, anxious to get to work making shapes.

In unison with the rest of the class, Sam chimed in “Good Morning Ms. Bailey.” Then turning to see the teen, “…Hello Aurora.” Sam gave her a pleasant little smile before returning his full attention to Ms. Bailey and her instructions.

Sam watched tentatively as the teacher showed them how to shred the newspaper. Copying her moves, Sam picked up his paper and began to tear it up. He made long strips, making a messy pile as he went.

Rip…. Rip…. Rip… rip… rip…. Sam made quick work of it, until his paper was reduced to thick, stubby strips.

He raised one hand to signal that he was ready for both glue and an apron. Sam would never hear the end of it if he managed to ruin his school sweater. Despite having a lot of practice using glue at home when he made models, accidents still happened.

While he waited for Ms. Bailey or Aurora to come around to him, Sam took the red balloon that was on the table and rubbed it against his hair. He chuckled a bit as the static made his hair stand up and stick to the balloon as he pulled it away.

Ridley was one of those staring outside the window, not paying attention as well as the others when it came to math. Math was difficult and it was hard to get around the thinking process of it like she could do with other subjects, there was such a set formula to it and her brain couldn't wrap around it. This was going to be another time that her mother would have to figure out some clever way to help her out since it was a lost cause in the actual classroom.

She let out a sigh, resting her cheek on a propped arm while her mind went off to thinking about small tailless cats with adorable bells around their necks frolicking on the playground outside with more fluffy and gigantic shaped cats. All the cats were friends and they were trying to get Ridley to come out with them, but alas she was stuck in an evil building commanded by a robot overlord who was trying to bring them to their cause by teaching their ways of binary systems.

This whole fantastical daydream would have been so much better, though, if she wasn't having to hear Billy's pathetic attempts at insults every few minutes. Of course she really didn't know the girl he was making fun of, so didn't know if she deserved it or not. But all the same, they were such sad remarks and it was annoying to listen to. "God, Billy, just shut up," she told him without even turning her head, a little too loudly for classroom volumes. Several of her peers turned towards her. And it caught the attention of the teacher as well.

It was that feeling of several eyes upon her that made Ridley stop looking out the window. She turned her head to the front of the class to get that pointed look from her teacher. "Billy was being annoying and wasn't being very funny with his insults to .... her," her hand had shot out in the middle of that to point at both Billy and Istas.

Istas almost crawled under her desk. Her face red with embarrassment. Everyone's attention had shifted from the orange haired girl to her. Even Billy's... more so than ever.

"Now, look what you did Curly ears." He scoffed staring at her.

Oh this was bad, this was very bad. The teacher didn't seem impressed either... His arms crossed, there came the lecture that Istas wished wouldn't happen specially in front of the whole class. "Stop interrupting my class, I've told everyone a million times and yet for some reason there always seems to be incidents with you two." This was directed at the three of them.

Apparently even being associated with someone doing something wrong got you in trouble too. "I... didn't say anything." She whimpered trying not to slide out of her seat and onto the floor to hide.

Billy rolled his eyes he'd heard Istas or somewhat heard her because he retorted the whisper, "Yeah you did, you're a dumb girl that brings toys to school just like that other kid." Obviously he hadn't had a chance to come up with a nickname for Ainsley... yet... His arms were crossed, "You two are disrupting the class if you ask me."

"THATS ENOUGH!" Their teacher yelled. He looked even more crossed. His lesson plan had been brought to a halt yet again by Billy and his bullying. However, it was never just Billy that got into trouble. "Billy. Princpal's office. Now." He snapped, pulling out worksheets from his desk after giving Billy a pink slip. Handing them out to the class, "I want you to work in groups together." Since there was a weird number of students he broke up a few tables to fix that. "Ridley work with Istas, Ainsely, and Ashely please."

"Tom, will you move to Billy's seat and work with that group?" He paused and looked around assigning a few other students to different tables so each had four, "Mary over here please."

Istas looked at the work sheet, it was a multiplication table search. Her face was still tinged with embarrassment, and she wished this stuff didn't happen.

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Meanwhile

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"Oh," Alexis had noticed that Aurora grabbed a bottle of paste, "I'm sorry, I forgot to tell you it needs to be in a bowl so they can brush it on dear."

She giggled, "How silly of me." She went over and picked up a bowl and a brush and traded Sam for the bottle. "This'll work better."

George did as he did everyday, at least everyday there was school. George was one of the janitors of the largest elementary school in the city, and this was something he was proud of. It wasn't just that he worked at the largest elementary school in the city, but it was how clean he and his fellow janitors kept the school.

It was no easy task to keep a school clean, especially one filled with younger children. The messes some got in to, not to mention how parents could send there child in sick. Only for that child to wind up even sicker in school, resulting in a call to the janitors office to clean up the results of the childs sickness.

But they managed to keep the school clean, and every day at the start of the day, it was as clean as could be. This was why George was proud of his job, he was proud of the work which went in to it.

This morning he was working on cleaning the stairwell. It wasn't that there was any out of the ordinary mess, it was just the usual mud, dist, sand and other things that were on children shoes as they came into the school every morning. And he felt it best to clean it, before it got tracked all about the school.

xxxxxMs. Lily's bright blue eyes reflected the sun from her classroom's window. She had just finished taking roll, and happy, excited eyes looked up at her expectantly. She was preparing the day's lesson plan on water pollution for all the grade schoolers, while the children chatted excitedly in their seats. She smiled at them as she pulled out the ingredients she needed: a fish tank, completed with sand and fake seaweed. Colorful fake seagrass littered the bottom of the tank, and there was even a tiny plastic castle. Poor bubbles- he had been Ms. Lily's pet fish. At least his tank was going to a good purpose.

xxxxxShe turned the water on and the children watched expectantly, as if a school of fish was going to pop out of the water. They were all talking excitedly with little "ooh that's so cool" and "wow!"'s escaping their lips. She giggled a little and pulled her black ponytail a bit tighter. She brushed a few bangs out of her face and pulled down on her green shirt. It seemed like a lovely day for science.

xxxxxAs the tank water began to reach the top, she stopped the water and looked out at her class. An overly excited boy said, "Ms. Lily, where are the fish!" A few more studies quietly agreed with him, and she laughed.

xxxxx"This, students, is the ocean!" she exclaimed excitedly. She looked down in the drawer to pick up the bottle of paint she also had gathered for the "experiment."

xxxxxDisbelieving stares greeted her odd response, and a girl piped up in the front, saying, "But Ms. Lily, I've been to the ocean, and that's not it at all!" Again, more students whispered quietly agreeing with each other.

xxxxxMs. Lily laughed her sing-song laugh and the said, "Oh Amber, you caught me. This isn't actually the ocean, but it's going to represent the ocean for our experiment." As she dug through the drawer, she realized her paint was no where to be found. Perhaps another teacher had borrowed it? Or maybe she had just left it at home. Luckily, her classroom was located right next to the art room. She turned to the student teacher and said quietly, "Can you watch them for a minute? I need to go grab a jar of paint." He nodded rather lazily and returned to grading their adorable little one page "essays" about themselves.

xxxxxTurning back to the class she announced, "Okay class! While I go grab us some more supplies, I want you to all talk about why this tank is like the ocean, and then think of reasons why it's not like the ocean!" With that she skittered out of the room and into the art room.

xxxxxShe noticed the teacher explaining an art project to the students about paper mache. She coughed a bit to get her attention and said, "Ah, I hate to interrupt, but could I just borrow this bottle of paint?" She gestured to a bright pink bottle of paint sitting on one of their desks. She smiled, but was secretly a little bummed that she didn't get to use the purple sparkly paint she had bought at the store. C'est la vie.