Welcome to Gaia! ::

The undead boil sighed, fins drooping as Savage slammed the door. He was hoping that some of his friends would show up. While he recognized a few of the students who came in, he didn't know them that well. Oh well -- Savage was his favorite teacher, and he made an extra effort to attend her classes. The classroom felt like home, and he felt a sort of odd kinship with Savage. Nevermind the fact that she wasn't undead, a leviathan was still a leviathan after all.

Besides, who else would let him wreck a classroom as an extra lesson? Oh yes. He was the one responsible for the destruction of Savage's wooden ships. He remembered her lessons, grinning widely as she told them their lesson for the day. Merope didn't need to be told twice: his talons tore into the model kit, and gleefully he began to work.



The result? Aside from the overlarge mast, Merope liked it. Sure it tipped to one side and wouldn't fallen over if he didn't catch it, but... But it still wasn't right. Merope narrowed his eyes, holding the boat steady with one hand while drumming his talons on his exposed teeth with the other. It was a boat. He was a sea serpent, even though he was undead. What was wrong? Oh, yes.

Like a circus cat kneading a favorite pair of jeans with its claws, Merope set to work on his ship. Crunch, crunch, SNAP! There.




There. That was better. A boat was best wrecked.

It wasn't until he looked around at what the other students were doing that it occured to the boil that something was wrong. No one else was smashing their ship properly. Wait! Was he supposed to? Savage told him that boats were meant for smashing. What were they doing? Taking them to the front and seeing if they floated?

Well, duh. It wasn't a boat unless it floated. Merope quickly tried to make repairs.



It didn't last very long.

Merope stared. This wasn't right. This went against all his boat-sinking training with Savage. It went against everything he stood for as a sea monster. "Professor!" He shouted, gesturing to the bucket. "It's floating! What do I do?! It's already wrecked and everything! This shouldn't be happening, right?!"

It was okay? The undead boil took an unneeded breath that turned into a sigh of relief. Merope returned the grin to the teacher, feeling rather good about himself. Or at least he did until he spied the smashed remains of his ship in the bucket. Scooping them out would take forever.

Merope glanced up at the teacher before extending one finger. Slowly and deliberately, he began to move each piece one by one under water until the various bits finally sank. The bottom of the water was where boats belonged, after all! Not to mention out of sight meant out of mind.

With that accomplished, the undead boil spun on his heel and went back to his seat, head held high.

Christof had kept to himself mostly durring class. Usually he would gravitate to sit next to Riley or Malodore or anyone else he knew, but this time he had sat in the back, quiet and trying not to draw any attention to himself.

Just concentrate on the assignment. Not... anything that might have happened at clubs or anything. Just... do your lessons.

He gathered up his supplies and returned to the back, hunched over the few meager things he had taken to decorate his boat. He had ideas. It would float, and it would be the fastest of all of the boats. He would leave them all blown away.

Methodically, he glued a popsicle stick upright as a mast, but the piece of paper he had taken to seemingly be a sale he carefully folded before mounting it to the rear on a bent paperclip. He gave it an experimental spin. Hurm. Yes. That would work, right? Right. Alright it needed a bit more color.... everyone else had personalized their's in some way, matching their own personalities somehow. Well. Parts and pieces. Carefully, he painted little patches all over the hull- now they'd know who's it was. Perfect.

The final touch was the most important. He pulled out the rubber band, giving it an experimental stretch. This should work. It worked in his head anyway. He carefully clipped a little notch at the top of the "mast" before attaching the other end to the pin-wheel "propeller", and gave it an experimental wind-up. To his glee, the thing spun right on command.

It was perfect. It would Zoom.

But would it float?

And it promptly started to sank. She snatched it out of the water before it submerged completely, and up ended it to tip out the water, brushing a hand along the side and coming away with a red palm from the paint.

She couldn't see why it wasn't floating, she hadn't added much more than a mast and sail, and so she put it slowly back onto the water, letting go gingerly.

(( Jeez XD ))

'Stupid thing.' she grumbled under her breath, pulling it out of the water for the third time, yanking out the stick mast and then forcibly slamming it on the surface of the water.

Whereupon it popped up like a coak and drifted around, as if it was just teasing her the last few times of trying.

'Fine, float now. See if I care.' she had to laugh as she shook her head.

He watched as his boat sank below the water. "Well then," he muttered as he reached into the bucket to pull the boat out.

"Hm." He eyed his boat. Maybe if he readjusted the sticks a bit for better balance? Draven messed with his boat for a moment, then decided it was time for another attempt. Smooth as he could, he set the boat on the surface of the water.

Quietly, gingerly, Christof approached the water, setting his boat down in it with baited breath... the moment of truth.