"Taylor!" Claire said as they headed into school. Claire had finished her morning lab period, and was joining the mass of students heading into the main building, some of them with their breakfasts still in their hands. "What are you doing here? I thought you weren't starting Arcadia until next year."
Taylor tilted her head. "Since I'm coming here next year, they're letting me attend for a day." She shrugged. "The student who was coming here had some stomach flu so they rescheduled."
"Oh," Claire said. "Well, that's good. We have an assembly today."
"Hopefully it goes better than the last one," Vicky said as she fell from the sky, coming to a halt just before she touched the ground. "Where's Jim?"
"With the cheerleaders," Claire said. "They grabbed him when we got here."
Taylor blinked. "For what?"
"Oh, you'll love this," Vicky said. "So, he's a brute, right? Can't play sports, because well, running over the other team isn't a good look. But he's a brute 6, so holding up all the cheerleaders? Yeah, he can do that. And their coach pointed out it doesn't count as a contact sport. So she ambushed Jim…"
"I can see that," Taylor said. "What do you think?"
Claire smiled. "Well, if they go with it, it'll give me lots of photos." She turned serious. "And well, after… after Leviathan, normal stuff is good. Jim's also joining the culinary club… And I wonder if that ambush by the cheerleaders was entirely unplanned. She'd heard Kyle talking about how too many people seeing Jim as just a warrior wasn't really what they needed…
And then they were in the main auditorium, as the teachers gathered in front to talk about the new students. Jim was there, waving at the cheerleaders who were giggling and blushing.
"So, did you juggle them?" Claire asked.
Jim shook his head. "Just letting them use me for a stand," he said.
Claire giggled and leaned against him. "And to think that just a year ago, you were too shy to even talk to me…"
"Yeah," Jim said. "Hi, Taylor."
"Hello," Taylor said.
Claire didn't frown, but she felt like it. Taylor in private or with friends was actually starting to smile and even joke. Among a bunch of classmates or people she didn't know? Right back to "I could find you sawing my leg off boring" Taylor.
"Students, as you know," the Vice Principle said. "In the aftermath of Leviathan's attack—" she paused. There were hisses and various gestures to avert ill fortune directed at her.
Claire also winced. Didn't she know anything? Even Claire knew that Name wasn't one you casually brought up in the Bay.
On the other hand I don't know her and she's blond and blue-eyed, maybe she's an Empire sympathizer and this is—nope, not going down that rabbit hole. Not everything has an ulterior motive. She could just be clueless.
"We'll be accepting students from New Orleans who have become full-time residents of the Bay. Now, many of those students have lost everything, including their families, so we'll be talking about establishing a mentor program to assist them. I expect that we will all be on our best behavior." Suddenly any hint of cluelessness left the woman's face. "Remember this: It was only by luck that it isn't Brockton Bay refugees in New Orleans. We will treat our new neighbors with respect and help them settle into their new home." She paused, but nobody said anything. "Good, now I have a video about some of our new projects, put together by our very own AV department and—"
Claire's phone buzzed and several students looked at her. The only way a phone worked in Arcadia was if it was using Tinkertech and that meant the PRT was sending her a message. Claire pulled it out.
Hello. I said I would meet you and you said you were always at Arcadia.
What? How can they…
How did you access this phone?
It was easy. I looked ahead to see the codes. I thought about meeting you in person, but that would cause issues with the other students.
Have you committed crimes?
I've never been charged with one.
Who are you?
I can show you, if you want.
It's school.
You, Taylor, Jim and Vicky will be here by yourselves. School will let out early.
If you're talking about threatening people…
No, but when they see me, they'll want to be elsewhere.
A Case-53?
Do you want to see me?
Sure.
"Now the AV department—" The woman paused as the Brockton Bay School District Logo fizzed out. Students catcalled and booed with one person shouting "put on Uber and Leet's stream!"
At least Ann's not here, Claire thought. She was still really pissed at Uber. Right now, she was with her mom at Kenji's hearing.
Then the screen went black. White words appeared:
ENDBRINGER TRACKING CAM 22.
Endbringer…what the hell…
And then the screen showed an image. The Simurgh, floating in space. Most of the kids in the room fell silent.
"That's a PRT feed, how the hell is our school getting a PRT shot?" Chris said, staring at the image.
Others, many of them in fact, had averted their eyes or put their hands over their eyes.
To see the Simurgh was bad luck, after all. According to urban legend, if you met her gaze, she might decide to visit your town and sing for you.
"Students, students, calm down!" The VP raised her voice. "This is simply a prank in very bad taste and I assure you that—"
"Hello, Claire."
The voice came from every cell phone and speaker in the room. Claire stood up and stared at the woman staring back at her.
"You… You're claiming to be the parahuman I met?"
"You do not trust me?" The voice was powerful, assured, but it wasn't singing.
The Simurgh has never talked before.
"I… You could have intercepted the communication or listened to me—I don't even know if you're really the Simurgh."
"That is easy to solve. This is a live feed." Moments after that, the false angel raised one hand and waved to the Camera.
There were terrified whispers in the room.
"Okay…" Jim said. "But that doesn't mean you were the one Claire spoke to."
"She saw me when she was solving Eidolon's problem with losing his powers. She met me, and my two older brothers. She saw my eighteen other siblings."
The room went absolutely quiet.
"Now, everyone else but Taylor, Jim and Vicky will need to leave. I saw that school would be canceled early."
And that was when PRT troopers burst into the auditorium and started pulling the stunned students out.