Nightcrawler lurked stealthily above Mr. Miller's chair as the teacher combed finely through the details of the students' portfolios, scouring for errors. Then, as Mr. Miller paused to take a sip from his coffee, the mutant's tail lashed around the man's neck and jerked backward. The coffee cup crashed to the ground and Mr. Miller wheeled around to take a wild punch- only to realize the assailant was on the ceiling. Nightcrawler leaped down, both feet crashing squarely into the English teacher's chest. Mr. Miller cursed profusely as he struck the floor hard, but Nightcrawler silenced him with a horizontal dagger slash across the lower end of the thoracic cavity that ripped through the teacher's diaphragm and esophagus. Blood splashed out of the wound while also surging out with vomit from the dying man's mouth. Nearby students screamed hysterically and ran in consternation, the history test all forgotten, while Nightcrawler took a wild leap. It crashed down on the table of a girl named Connie Huang, knocking her test and cover sheet askew, and baring his fangs viciously. She screamed and fell backward out of her chair, inciting a nearby male student, Ben Le, to charge forth, swinging a chair. Nightcrawler's tail snared Ben's belt with gecko-tongue speed, and hurled the boy against the wall while seizing the chair with its blue front limbs. Then Nightcrawler tossed the chair to its tail and wielded it like a club. But by this time, Connie had scurried under her desk and quickly toppled it from below, knocking the creature helter-skelter to the floor. Nightcrawler howled and hissed ferally, before surging back to its feet. Mr. Struck, the history teacher and Mr. Miller's teaching partner, had witnessed all this and hurled the five-pound AP US History textbook (informally known as "the Brick"), which slammed into Nightcrawler, nearly pinning the monster's tail to the floor. It howled and shot through the legs of several desks and out the room, confident it could not endure another such blow.