Welcome to Gaia! ::

Nuk's teasing smirk gradually started to fade away as his eyes lifted from the Pricolici in front of him to the little nerdy kid he'd been contemplating tossing in the dumpster after class. The kid who was slowly turning out to be not a kid at all, but the professor. Somehow, he shouldn't have been surprised -- it was a shapeshifting class, any zombie with half a brain could put it together. But Nuk wasn't your average 'give-a-damn' student, so it was with a half startled, half annoyed look that he watched the transformation, nose crinkling a bit as he snorted. Nerdy kids shouldn't turn into cool teachers, especially not teachers whose class is one of the only ones he actually showed up to. That just wasn't right.

The skinwalker's look of annoyance only amplified when the Professor Tailor told them all to get out a sheet of paper, his groan one of the most audible of the ones that had sounded. Paper? He wanted them to write? Who brought paper to class anyway? He was about to ask Shehk for some when he spotted a discarded sheet under the desk next to him, which he quickly snatched up and slapped down on his desk. It was ripped, and only half as long as it should have been, but hey, beggars couldn't be choosers. Tugging off the cap to his blood-red pen with his teeth, he got to writing.

Quote:

First of all, I don't fear anything. Fear is for wimps and losers who can't man up, and kids who get their heads shoved into toilets and their bodies shoved in lockers.

There was a pause here, Nuk lifting his head as he thought about that, eyebrows furrowing together as the gears worked in his brain.

Quote:

Not at the same time though. Although I did hide a headless dude's head once. And a pair of Arel's underwear.

He scratched that last part out. Which was probably the most intelligent thing he'd done all day.

Quote:

But if I DID, I'd fear losing the upper hand. Because once you lose that, everything starts to fall apart, and you become the prey and not the predator. Or maybe getting stuck. Like, in a shape that you're not suppose to be. Or someone forcing you into a shape and keeping you there, like a ... turtle or something. Maybe some witch, and they keep you as a pet. Or boil you in some soup. Also, demons and their jack damned contracts kinda suck, although they're not really scary. Just a little.

But the biggest, most awful thing to fear?

Hellma Shox.

Also, fear should look like me.

I also fear this is a dumb assignment.

Smirking to himself, he crumpled up the paper and tossed it, smirking as it bounced off the top of Chuppi's head before landing in the hat, pleased with himself when it didn't miss it's target.

"Score."

While the class worked and Remi sat collecting papers in the hat, Professor Tailor took up residence at his desk -- leaning back into the faded but obviously-comfortable embrace of an ancient leather chair and rooting around for a hand mirror to consider his face: as if double checking to make sure he'd gotten it right.

He peered over the top of the mirror at the students, noting as each one dropped a paper into the hat and making a mark on his scrabbled notes, checking off that they were completed.

"If you have any questions, after you've finished your work, feel free to come up front and ask." He sounded amused. It was possible he always sounded like that.

Oh dear. Professor Tailor snapped his mirror closed in a rush, blinking up at Gargantuan like he was genuinely surprised -- even if only the sharp arch of his eyebrows showed it, his features otherwise somewhat flat and difficult to read.

"...I teach how to look scary." It was careful, his hands spreading wide in a very open, practiced sort of gesture, shoulders hiked up in his jacket. "And how to look not scary as well. Each has its place and time."

Didn't seem like that would be enough to satisfy G, but it did answer the question. He shook his head a little. "All your teachers together will show you how to be scary."

As he settled down, he caught the action of the Skinwalker, a silent hello, and reciprocated the notion, smiling wildly as they had a moment that only they would really know - a silent hello. Turning back to Remi and the mysterious paper ghost, his green eyes lit up when her attention was draw to them, her elongated words murmuring over their shared table, which made his smile stretch more, to an eerie proportion. Lifting his hand and putting it infront of Remi, he extended a warm handshake to her.

"Jack-B, is what I'm normally called, but some people call me Jack." He murmured, before his attention was swept from her to the Proffessor in the front - who had somehow appeared there since he last looked, like it was . . . magic. Eerie.

After hearing the question posed to them by the newly re-aged teacher, he was left pondering the question, pulling a piece of paper to write on, his green pen hissing ever so lullingly in his left hand, as it's swept across the paper as he started to think of how he would answer this one.

Quote:

Honestly, I think I heard once that . . . Fear may be a chemical reaction in one's brain, which would explain why some creatures just don't react to fear so easily - their brains can't handle it as easily as some. I've also hear the saying "There is nothing to fear, but fear itself." Which is a bit poppycock, if you ask me. There are plenty of things to fear . . . rationally that is.

He wrote down, as Drei sort of dribbled down his arm like a waterfall, his green eyes watching the pen run by the paper, hissing softly again in warning as the cat purred a little oddly. There was always something odd about Drei, always. Scratching the underchin of his special cat, he looked down at his paper again, setting his jaw.

Quote:

I believe the one thing I fear most is the unknown future. It bothers me a bit that I cannot foresee what stands in front of me. Having lived almost a year out on the streets, in the world and catching whatever break I could get, not knowing what tomorrow brought was always unnerving to me. Would I have enough food, could I find good shelter? Would it stop raining for ten damn minutes? But I digress. It unnerves me.

Of course, I have regular fears, I'm not a fan of deep water, (heavy tail makes for a good anchor when it's too wet,) dogs usually unnerve me a little, (but a part of me assumes that's just written into my genetics,) and I have a deep seeded fear of my fathering unit, who's an explosion waiting to happen, and I don't feel like I want to be there when it happens.

. . .And the headmaster. She's pretty terrifying.

This sounded about right. Folding his sheet as neatly as he could, he placed it in the hat that sat in front of Remi, before going back to caressing the cat in front of him, his fingers idly scratching at the black fur.

Rain stared at her paper and wanted to cry. Of course, wanting and doing were entirely different things as her tear ducts have long since dried up. It seemed like most everyone else was finished or close to finishing up and she hadn't written down anything yet. She wasn't smart like them. She wasn't capable of thinking like them. Her brain didn't work like them and it frustrated her to no end. She would never be as good as the other students. Losing control of her emotions, she crumpled the paper in her hand, instantly regretting the action. She attempted to smooth it out the best she could and picked her pencil back up.



She considered erasing it but having some answer was better than having no answer. She balled her hand into a fist and hit her forehead. Think. Think. Think. What was she afraid of?



There, that wasn't so hard, was it? She sighed heavily and leaned back in her chair, relaxing momentarily before picking up the pencil again.



There. Now she really was done. She folded up her paper and went over to the hat and dropped it inside. She stopped by G's desk on the way back to her seat and patted him reassuringly on the head. "You can do it, G." She didn't wait for a response as she was worried she might get in trouble, especially with how long it took her to turn in her paper. She slid back into her seat and sighed softly to herself.

A few more checks in his book, one last look to Gargantuan, and Professor Tailor levered himself up again -- over to peer into the hat, a quick prod and tally, and then he slid up to the board to write 8 tally marks. Presumably the number of students left. He blinked around to make sure no one else had any questions.

The kelpie beamed at his friend, lowering his head to smile more in her direction than over her head. He was surrounded by so many monsters that he finally felt he was in a group, a team, a 'posse'. First day of classes and he already had a group! He KNEW people! He had FRIENDS or at least the beginnings of friendship with several other monsters. He was not only proud that he made these friends but proud that they were his.

"I'm doing great. I found this class, didn't I?" And finding the class was sometimes the hardest part. He was still new to such things as figuring out a campus map, hallways, and what door belonged to a class and what belonged to a janitor closet. "Sit by us. We can be study buddies." And made the 'cool' corner of the classroom. Yeah, because monsters in large numbers were just that great. They had to represent after all. – As for the monsters, they might not want Calder representing them at all. Not when he was swinging his legs and checking out this new contraption called a desk. SO STIFF!

As much as he liked monsters, he wasn't thrilled to see Nuk slide on over to hear on their conversation. Frowning, he looked back at Shehk, who was wearing a horrified expression that Calder assumed as because of Nuk being in the class, and continued. "Well, Shehk and I were having a conversation about a detention we were in." As in, this has nothing to do with YOU.

Ignoring him, he continued. "That witch should pay for a new shirt. She was the one that ripped it off. They seem to like doing that. My friend Belladonna doesn't care if I rip her clothes off. Just the other day –" And then he noticed that the room went quiet and that a young boy was slowly changing and addressing them all.

Turning, he looked up and watched with growing interest as the student morphed into a teacher, and then started to make it clear that he was the teacher, class was beginning, and you better have your act together because her came the first assignment. The room was filled with sighs, groans, and paper shuffling as everyone searched (or stole) pens and paper to start writing.

Calder frowned, before patting himself for the snake pen he had and then looked about. Leaning over, he asked Chuppi for a piece of paper and then went to work on his own assignment.



Calder started counting his words. Hmm. Not enough. Oh, he had that other part to write. He licked the tip of his pen but then stuck out his tongue at he remembered the snake. Wiping his mouth, he then went to address the other question.



Calder paused. Oh, that was giving away too much to a teacher who might alert the authorities to him. He scratched this out.



He looked about and tried to peek on other pages, but what he did manage to see was the deep concentration and seriousness on everyone's face. Hmm. He hunched over his page again, thinking. What did he fear?



Biting on his tongue, he frowned at leaving it end that way.



His family has stressed this point to him since he was little.



There. Much better, and either way, it was Anonymous. There was no way anyone would find out that he wrote this out. Yup. Completely safe, just like what the teacher said.

Rising from his seat, he folded his paper and popped it into the hat, trying to make out some of the answers on other pieces of paper but only managing to see cut off sentences that gave him little clue of what others were afraid of. Turning, he headed back and plopped down in his seat.

Ithilethiel watched as their teacher changed from the image of a kid to ..well a full grown professor. Her left eye twitched. She'd known something was up, but she hadn't really expected this. She listened as he began to speak, then as he explained their assignment.

It sounded easy enough. But as she tried to think of what to write down, it wasn't so easy.



It sounded too much like a definition; not truly what she felt about fear. She didn't care about bothering to erase what she'd already put though. It didn't matter if it was anonymous, right? She started again in a new paragraph.



Her opinions were coming through now, but she felt the need to clarify them.



She hated writing down what she feared. In order to draw attention away from her fear, she decided to add some sort of conclusion. She paused to look up at everyone else in the room as they were writing, some just finishing up. Other still writing away. Her gaze shifted to the professor and she eyed him for a moment, her gaze locked on him. Until the raven perched on her shoulder gave her an affection n** on the ear. She turned to Nekyia and smiled very slightly. She began to write again.



She felt that was sufficient. She quietly stood and made her way to the student holding the bowler hat. She was careful not to make eye contact with the other student as she silently placed her folded piece of paper into the hat.