Chapter 8: The Calm Before the Storm

Monday at School Jake and the other kids noticed their History teacher hadn't shown up yet, instead the Assistant Principal was there, when the bell rang he said, "Now students, as you've all probably heard, you're former History Teacher had a rather nasty accident and needed some vacation time…"

"Yeah, if you call waving a Chinese Broadsword around and shouting like a raving lunatic in the middle of a four-way intersection an accident." One of the students said smugly.

"Uh yes…so we had to do some employment searching, luckily we found a new History teacher for you on such short notice…I'd like you all to meet your new teacher, Mr. Aiden Blackmen."

Just then a man walked through the door, he had black hair down into a pony-tail and had a normal looking beard, he wore a white long-sleeved shirt and a brown vest, he also wore grey dress pants and black dress shoes, he adjust his glasses as he looked at all of them, "Good Morning class…I am Mr. Blackmen, I expect we'll get along the rest of the school year."

All the students looked at him with that same blank stare they usually give, "Okay…I'm going to leave now." The Assistant Principal said.

Mr. Blackmen looked over the notes of the previous History teacher and said, "Okay…okay…says here that you were supposed to read Chapter 6 which concentrated itself on the American Revolution…now can any of you give me a few reasons why the American Revolution started?"

Mr. Blackmen waited a few minutes before he said, "I'll give you a hint…it's something your parents have to pay every New Year…now can anyone tell me?"

After another minute of no response he asked, "Did anyone read the chapter?"

When he saw a few guilty faces he said, "Okay…this isn't what I expected from and Middle-School History Class for my first day of teaching…but then I guess I shouldn't have held my hopes so high, then here's your homework, you are to ready Chapter 6 and then do this worksheet I am handing out a worksheet that goes along with it, and I want the writing questions to be answered in COMPLETE sentences even though they say short answer."

For that he got a lot of hisses and groans sent his direction, "I'm sorry…but your assignment is to read the chapter and you didn't, so I believe the punishment well fits the crime."

And so began the terror that was Mr. Blackmen…but it didn't stop there, he had them doing exercises such as jumping-jacks, push-ups, and running in place at the beginning of class. And if you couldn't stay awake during one of his lectures, he'd have you run 2-3 laps around the school. Jake tried to use his magic time from time…but it never seemed to work or would back-fire upon him for no reason.

"So it's happened to you too…I know, I've been getting creepy vibes off that guy since day one." Michael told Jake at lunch almost a week later.

"Are you saying that there may be more to him than meets the eye?" Jake asked.

"At this point I'd rather not jump to conclusions…" Michael answered.

"Yo, what if he's part of these L'Épée Foncée goons." Trixie asked.

"I'm putting that into my table of possibilities, but for now let's just keep quiet about this…don't know if they'd have any other spies lurking around here." Michael told them.

Later that day Mr. Blackmen had asked Rose to come into his office after school, she came in, "Oh Rose…so glad you showed up, sit down…I'd like speak with you."

Rose sat down, Mr. Blackmen took out a file from his file cabinet, "I've been looking over your grades in History…you are earning C/C+ grades."

"That's good isn't it?" Rose asked.

"Yes, but a student such as yourself should be able to achieve higher grades than these…I'm thinking of having a Parent-Teacher Conference with your Parents—."

"I live with my uncle…my parents are dead." Rose told him sadly.

"Oh…with your uncle then, to see if he'll agree to let me assign you a tutor…if that would be alright." Mr. Blackmen suggested.

"That would be fine, thanks." Rose said as she got up to leave.

"You know…its funny, I used to know a couple who had a little girl named Rose…" Mr. Blackmen told her as she left.

"Oh really?" Rose asked.

"Yeah, nice couple in Detroit…father was a good mechanic." Mr. Blackmen told her.

"Oh…well, couldn't have been my parents, they were in New York." Rose told him.

When she left Mr. Blackmen rolled up his left sleeve to reveal a mark on his fore-arm similar to the one Rose had on her hand…only it was a bluish-black color. "Huh…so was I." Mr. Blackmen said to himself.

Later that night Jake got a call from Fu, "Hey Fu dog…what's shaking?"

"Heads up kid…I just got a call from the Oracles, they say something is going to go down tonight at midnight, something big."

"Ogre big…or L'Épée Foncée big?" Jake asked.

"Your guess is as good as mine, Michael and Christian will meet you there." Fu told him.

"Are you sure they were right, I mean their predictions do tend to be off to a degree." Jake told him.

"They said the signs were too strong to ignore."

"So was my dream." Jake thought to himself.