From Beyond Our Reach

"This class is pointless…"

"It is not!"

"Who cares if someone knows the difference between asyndeton and alliteration?"

"I do."

"Why? What possible importance could these words have in your life?"

"I'm a teacher. It's my job."

Blinks. "So you were paid to care."

"I…guess that you could say that…"

"So…how much would it cost for you not to care?" (reaches for wallet).

Trowa and Duo were having the hardest time. Duo had once spent about six months at a missionary school, but that was a long time ago. And Trowa had no recollection of attending any school of any sort, ever.

Wufei had been raised in a temple community that educated its own, and Heero had not only infiltrated this exact school once before, but had also been posing as a normal student at a public school ever since the fighting stopped (though he refused to tell them where). Quatre was somewhat new to this, as he had only ever had private tutors, but he adjusted well.

All five of them had amazingly good grades.

None of them shirked at the idea of hard work (sometimes they enjoyed the challenge). They were familiar with reading engineering text, technology manuals, and mission parameters. And while the teachers were somewhat uneasy with the manner of speech in their written work, as soon as they began seeing research papers and essays as scouting reports and mission evaluations, they hammered out military-esque papers in record time. Lectures could be likened to mission briefings, and group work was just that, group work.

"It kinda makes sense. Most these things were designed to prepare people for the real world, so it stands to reason that if you can function in the real world, you could do most of these things." Quatre, as always (except for that little, tiny, miniscule incident with the Wing Zero) was right.

Once they had proven their knowledge of various subjects, they were able to move on to more advanced subjects. Pre Calc gave way to calculus, and then to trigonometry (which was, regrettably, the highest math class offered at this school). Physics and Chemistry gave way to Honors Physics and Chemistry, and then to advanced placement and collage credit courses (and this is how you calculate exactly how fast to launch your missiles…). No one was able to get out of Geography/World History, for even though they knew every square inch of this planet (Of course I know where the capitals and major cities of Western Europe are! I was sent here to burn them to the ground!) their knowledge of earth history was full of holes, as they had been taught mostly about various wars and strategies. All had been offered the chance to switch out of their language class, but the school offered no language that they weren't already familiar with, so they said 'to hell with it'.

PE was a joke. The instructor had a full class of cattle-children to run into the ground, and didn't have time to set up anything special for the Gundam Pilots (so far). It soon became apparent that nobody at this place knew that it was physically possible to get up before seven AM, so they continued to rise at four-thirty to stretch their legs and get some fresh air, and event that was rather insipid.

"I wish we had some of our gear to practice with." Heero always felt naked with out some sort of fire arm.

"Why'd you hand in those knuckle rings anyway? Those wouldn't be considered lethal." Trowa was questioning the wisdom of giving up absolutely everything.

"For most cases they would just be damaging, not lethal, but if you went for the throat…" Wufei let it hang, for no one needed further information.

And so they had a bottle of chloroform between them. (Which they assumed they could keep because it was non-lethal (shows what you get for assuming…)).

"C'mon, guys. It's not so bad. And as soon as I find some barbed wire, I'll show you how to do spit-shots." Quatre was trying to stay upbeat.

When in groups, their peers proved boring at best, and annoying at worst. David, Danielle, and Violette hadn't lasted a week before backing off, and they were immediately replaced by a handful of jocks, who were later replaced by another set of jocks, who were then followed by representatives of the pep squad.

Bit by bit, they were alienating the entire lunchroom.

But it was different in a classroom setting. With the lines dividing them from other people somewhat blurred, and no obvious groups performing maneuvers, the pilots were able to relax a little, and get along better. Heero had had over a year to learn how to interact one-on-one with another student, so he wasn't exactly unpopular, especially once people learned that he was naturally silent, but listened always. Trowa had a similarly quiet demeanor, but he had picked up charm at the circus, and so what he did say won him kudos. Quatre and Duo had been made into idols of Niceness and Coolness, respectively, but thus far had no more friends that any of the others, for Duo scorned the preps who were given everything and earned nothing, and Quatre didn't willingly associate with people who were so spoiled, selfish and shallow that they made him sick.

Wufei had the strangest position at the school. His belief that women were weak usually upset the fairer sex, especially the soldiers he met during the war, but in this setting, with out danger or combat, led him to treat them like glass that might break. He gained a reputation as a perfect gentleman, and was a regular heartthrob.

It was three weeks later when Duo broke the illusion. His keen eyes watched a perfectly normal tennis ball as it sailed over the school border wall, and no one took notice as he walked over picked it up, and extracted the piece of paper from the slit in the side.

He waited until they were gathered to 'study' alone in Heero and Trowa's room to tell them about it. "My friends from the sweepers got a message through to me today. They sent me my laptop weeks ago, and got worried when I didn't respond to my E-mail. Truth is, I never go the dammed thing."

"They've been stopping our messages." Trowa had reached this conclusion some time ago. He also saw no need to explain who 'they' were. "Cathy said she'd write me as soon as she got to the next site, but I haven't gotten anything yet."

"My sisters should have called or written by now. Even the ones who don't like me should be sending in reports." Quatre fretted about what state his company would be in when he returned.

"Doesn't mean they haven't tried." That was about as comforting as Wufei got.

"Wait a minute." Heero said. "If you both have families, how'd you get roped into this?"

"Cathy isn't legally old enough to take possession of me." Trowa, if he had been alone, would have fished out her picture. "And if she fought it, they'd realize she's an orphan, too, and she'd end up in some bogus school. Not to mention the fact that we're not one hundred percent sure we really are related at all."

"Most of my sisters are old enough, but that's more of a problem than a blessing. As soon as my father died, many of them began battling for custody of me. Some of them actually do want to take care of me, but none of them can agree on what's best for me. And the rest just want a bigger piece of the inheritance."

"Hmm. Too bad we don't know the motives behind stopping our mail." Said Heero.

"Actually, I do." Duo said. "The laptop bit was just explaining why they had to send a secret message instead of just hollering."

"Quatre was right about us being bought as trophies. The school made a sizeable donation to the people in charge of our areas. They didn't realize that they'd been had."

"Hmmph. Someone was using us to get their money." Wufei didn't like being used.

"It's more than that. Someone's using this as a politically correct jail for the unwanted." Duo pulled out the note. "By law, a person can only be held for a certain amount of time if there are no charges against them. But our situation is kinda unreadable. They aren't really sure weather to proclaim us heroes and saviors, or to condemn us as terrorists."

"If they're doing any sort of debate about us, then they've been real quiet about us." Said Trowa.

"Have they reached any conclusions so far?" Quatre asked.

"You mean aside from sending us here? Yeah, say's here that they've agreed to let the public decide, in some way or another. That may mean putting us on a trial by jury, or, if they want to avoid looking bad in case we are more popular than they thought…"

Duo frowned at the paper in his hands. "They filmed opening night for a reason. Looks like they want to see how the people view us, and are using the media. Plus, they're going around interviewing people who've met us, and collecting data on everyone. They even managed to dig up some notes the professors left behind. What they're doing with all this stuff is unknown, but they got a lot of it."

A knock on the door ended the talk. It was a boy from across the hall, one of the more persistent jock-types. "Hey," he said "Have you heard about football tryouts?"