"Crime and punishment," Professor Robinson said, setting his chalk down after carefully etching those very words on the pristine dark surface of the blackboard. "Today's topic. Everyone read the assignment, I presume."

Kim elbow-bumped Trini, just lightly, mimicking a stretch. This was going to suck.

"Crime exists in society and laws are created to contain it. It's a cyclical system because we cannot eradicate crime. We can punish the guilty, attempt to rehabilitate them and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't." The Professor paused and cast a look around the class.

Trini's hand went up lazily, the busy charm bracelet wrapped around her slender wrist jangling in the silence of the classroom.

"Yes, Ms. Kwan?" Professor Robinson nodded, perching casually on his desk, one leg crossed over the other.

"Rehabilitation is irrelevant. Until a person is ready to change, applying external factors is completely useless. Obviously, we need to punish the guilty and we can hope that punishment deters others from committing crime but unless the criminals we're trying to rehabilitate are willing to cooperate, we're just wasting our tax dollars." She leaned further back into her seat, her head tilted down just enough for the asymmetrical fringe of her hair to obscure her face.

"Should we then not be attempting rehabilitation?"

Trini raised a shoulder in a careless shrug. "We should be more careful. We know you can't really rehabilitate certain sexual offenders. Their recidivism rate is sky high. So why bother? And as for everyone else. Sure, give it a go. But we shouldn't keep pushing when it's obvious that it's not working."

"So what should we do then?" The Professor tilted his head, a genuinely curious look on his face, his arms crossed over his houndstooth sweater.

"Lock them up and throw away the key." Kim's voice was low and harsh, her body leaned forward and taut, like a string pulled across a bow, ready to loose an arrow.

"Are you implying, Ms. Hart, that regardless of the crime, if they can't be rehabilitated that criminals should be jailed permanently?"

"If it's a violent crime?" Kim said tightly, "Unless you're willing to just pop them between the eyes… yes." Her final word dropped into the air like a rock into water, sending ripples fluttering outward.

"You're kidding right?" Sandra Rios called out, bouncing her pen in sharp, rhythmic strokes. "So if a guy assaults someone and he doesn't repent, here you go, a life sentence?"

"Why not?" Trini asked calmly.

"Cause it's not fair!" Sandra retorted, the pen hitting the top of her desk hard.

"Oh and it's fair to let someone with no control over their violent tendencies out in society ready, willing and able to just keep assaulting or raping or killing or blowing up entire towns? Is that fair?" Kim shot back, body at the edge of her seat, hands clenched in her lap.

"How do you know they'll do it again?" Jai Maurice asked, words dropped slowly into the air, a thoughtful challenge.

"Oh they will," Trini said, fingers turning her charm bracelet, over and over. "You know they will. When someone bears no remorse about their actions, if they're willing to infringe on someone's right to live, to have security in their body, in their safety… they'll do it again." She turned her head, catching Kim's eyes with her own.

"But you're just punishing them for their future actions. That's not how our justice system works." Jai shook his head, his green tipped spiked locks bouncing.

"No," Kim said, her face blank, "You're punishing criminals for their inability to repent for past crimes. But more importantly, you're saving innocents from monsters."

"That is a unique perspective, Ms. Hart and Ms. Kwan," the Professor said. "But what about the financial burden of housing these criminals since you have just exponentially extended their sentences?"

As the conversation evolved in another direction, Kim swallowed against the prickly lump in her throat and let Trini take the lead as she tried to push away those old images, blood and fire and buildings toppling over like little toys, nothing but little toys to beings for whom humans were nothing more than an inconvenience, a stepping stone.

And with all that, some humans were just no better.

Lock them up and throw away the goddamn key.

Even better, pop them between the eyes.