I'm pretty sure there was a conspiracy to keep me from writing this.
Chapter Two: Accident
Two days later, school was still in session, but Lancer's classroom was missing more students than there were sitting at their desks.
He was not surprised by the drastic loss in attendance.
The school administration might not believe that anything supernatural had floated through their classroom and terrorized his English class. The principal might not be able to shut everything down for a few days as they investigated the cracked cinder blocks in the back of the room, or the shattered window, or the fact that the thermometer was perpetually stuck as about fifteen degrees colder than the actual temperature of the classroom as confirmed by the repairmen Casper High had finally called in due to numerous complaints about the boiler throughout the week.
They might not have had a good explanation for why an otherwise set and stolid teacher suddenly went crazy spouting nonsense about something appearing out of nowhere and attacking his class in the middle of a school day. They certainly didn't have a reasonable explanation for why he felt the need to use up the contents of an entire fire extinguisher before denting it beyond repair when even he readily agreed that no one had sounded the alarm for any smoke or flames.
There was only so much they could turn a blind eye to, but honestly, the administration had no clue what to do with a situation like this. Especially since the teacher in question was also the vice principal of the school and did have the authority to go to the county level with complaints of negligence should they turn a completely blind eye and ignore his concerns.
But honestly, what could they do? He thought that there had been a ghost. A ghost!
There wasn't a course of action laid out for in case of ghostly emergencies because such entities simply did not exist. So how was the administration supposed to be expected to made preparations against them on a teacher's say so.
Perhaps launching an investigation into the purity of the drinking water would better serve the community and be a better use of time and resources. First the Fentons and now this…
Because, really, the hardest part to believe about this entire thing was that it was Lancer bringing up the claim. He had always been so dependable amidst the insanity of the high school. They could well understand how the teenagers of his class would corroborate the story. There would be no easier way of getting out of class than to have the school shut down for a week because they had been telling ghost stories. But for the teacher not only to back up this story, but to be the foremost proponent of it was something they didn't know what to do with.
Maybe Lancer was just overwhelmed and his class was taking advantage of the situation to request days off. If that was the case, they couldn't cave. Especially not to something as silly as a cry of "ghosts!" because what would the parents think of the reason their children had been deprived of a fine government funded public education for a week? Or more, at the rate the requests were flying into the office.
They decided that perhaps Lancer could be allowed to crack and lose it every once in a while. Maybe that was even a good thing, to let him let it all out in a blast of fire hydrant steam instead of having a midlife crisis and taking off for a week while they scrambled to find a substitute and a way to fix things. They could grant him that leeway of a crazy day or two. So they ignored his protestations that something had happened and something needed to be done to prevent it from happening again.
Classes were to continue as usual.
Minus, of course, the dozen or so students who had managed to stay home "sick." Lancer's classroom had more students missing than were present. It was the one time he didn't mind, though. He'd kept his eyes and ears glued to the news— radio in the car and bath, TV during dinner and as he fell asleep at night— but so far, nothing had been reported elsewhere in Amity. It seemed that being home would be safer than attending the school for now.
But it didn't keep Lancer teaching with one eye to the window and every nerve taught for the slightest suspicion that something out of the normal was about to happen, in which case, he had absolutely no compunction in dropping everything and moving the class to the back of the room or the janitor's storage closet across the hall.
They had gotten used to moving quickly. It was almost becoming a system, but no one really minded the breaks in the lesson. Not when the possibility of being thrown into the wall like the desk had been was a very real alternative. It was so hard to concentrate on the lesson when you knew that at any second you might need to evacuate that they weren't really advancing studies or preparations for tests even while they were all sitting and Lancer was still lecturing.
He would give up even that pretense entirely if that didn't mean that the class would soon descend into an undefendable chaotic mess. And who knew, perhaps they would be able to learn some basics of literary analysis before the year was out, despite everything.
But until the rest of the school administration saw sense and realized that there was actually something happening and they needed to do something about it other than turning a blind eye and sending out repairmen, the entire situation was in Lancer's hands alone. And whatever makeshift weaponry he could whip up.
He had gotten creative. Commandeering the fire extinguisher, of course. He didn't imagine that the smoke had really scared the thing away, but he had exhausted the spray and when it cleared, nothing was there anymore so the English teacher figured that it was worth another shot. Maybe the thing was just looking for easy targets and with the students concealed, it would leave them alone. So he ensured that he had unlimited access to full canisters no matter how much Ishiyama complained.
Next was the long unused pointer that had lain like a forgotten pool cue in the corner behind his desk. One of the kids from the track and field team who was pretty handy with a javelin was set in charge of that particular weapon.
He'd persuaded Tetslaff to lend a few of his students a few select items that would normally have never been allowed outside of the gymnasium. Things which she usually held under strict lock and key. Or that had been left unclaimed in the lost and found so long that their owners had probably graduated years ago and had therefore been left languishing forever. The Vice Principal's authority, however, meant that they were allowed a few things in case of emergency.
None of the teenagers in his class were fooling around. The bullies were just as scared as their normal victims, because who knew what would come around the corner, or through the wall, at any moment? It was good to be prepared, even if their only weapons couldn't really be considered weapons at all: an air horn from the swim invitational they held each year, a transparent red plastic whistle, two ankle weights whose leather straps were threatening to crack in half, and a rusting dumbbell.
What they would do with such an assortment of things, Lancer did not know, but he had learned over the past two days that his class was resourceful and ready to do whatever it took to keep the ghosts at bay, no matter what anyone else thought. They were ready for anything at a moment's notice.
So when the door to the classroom opened in the middle of their lecture, there were a few gasps and squeaks of fright and nearly everyone was already out of their seat scuttling toward the back walls or reaching for their designated task before they realized that there was no need for alarm. A ghost wouldn't be opening the door anyway— it would just zoom in with only cooler temperatures for warning.
A very familiar face appeared from around the door frame, a confused look on his face as he took in the odd behavior of the class… Valerie wielding a pool stick like she knew what she was doing with it and Star fumbling with the lanyard of a whistle she had been about to blow and Nathan hiding under his desk and their teacher ignoring all of it.
Danny Fenton walked further into the room, catching sight of his two best friends in the front row. Tucker made eye contact, gave a head nod and a little wave before turning to Sam and telling her who had had just come in. He froze when he caught sight of the expression on her face, eyes wide and hand clapped over her mouth as if she had just caught herself from screaming.
That, more than anything else, unsettled the black haired teenager. After many years of friendship with Sam Manson, he knew that the three things she prided herself on most were her independence, from anyone who thought her condition warranted extra condescending assistance as well as parents who insisted that she wear brighter colors (as if she could see them), her activism, and the fact that she did not, ever, scream.
He walked into the classroom slightly dazed.
"Mr. Lancer?" he asked hesitantly as he saw for the first time how the man had grabbed onto the fire extinguisher on his desk with a death hold.
"Ah," the teacher said, releasing his grip and smoothing out his tie. "Mr. Fenton. It's… good to see you back. All well?"
"Yeah…" Danny replied, shrugging one shoulder and turning to give a better view of the arm still slung in a blue and white cast. "Just a couple bumps and bruises. Not a big deal. They said they couldn't find anything else wrong with me so they let me out and, uh, here I am."
Lancer stared at him for a moment, trying to process the rapid change of emotions he had just gone through as he realized that the boy was not a threat and that he had come out of his accident relatively unscathed and that he had come back to Casper High at possibly the worst possible moment. Not that he would wish anyone extra time in a sterile disinfected white room, but he would rather have had his student still in the hospital than come to school not knowing what had been happening in his absence and, though lack of knowledge, end up needing to go back to the hospital for something worse than whatever had happened to him before.
"Uhh…" Danny waved his good hand in front of him. "Mr. Lancer, is everything okay? I mean," he broke off to stare around the classroom. "Everyone seems… kinda… jumpy or something…"
The English teacher cleared his throat. "Please take a seat, Mr. Fenton and Mr. Foley can catch you up on the state of affairs."
Danny raised an eyebrow at the implication that the vice principal of the school would not only let him talk to his friends during class, but actually order them to do it. Everyone in the entire room stared at him as he shrugged and crossed the classroom to take his seat next to Sam and Tucker.
"Hey, guys," he whispered as he sat down.
"Hey, man, good to see you," Tucker said. "Your parents weren't giving out too many details there. We weren't sure when you were coming back."
"Yeah, well," Danny hedged, "things were weird and we didn't know how long they'd take. But I'm here now. And everything's… fine."
"Weird, how?" Sam asked, her wide eyes fixed on Danny.
"Well, nice to see you too," Danny scoffed. "Just… weird. I dunno. Never mind, so tell me what's going on here. Where is everyone? And why is everything so…" he waved his hand around at the rest of his class, "crazy?"
"Dude, you don't believe what's been going on here."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that if you had your phone on you, I would not have stopped texting you about this."
"I was in the hospital, Tuck!" Danny protested. "How could I have had my phone on me?"
"I know, I know, but… you sitting down for this?"
"Yes, Tucker, I am sitting. At my desk," Danny deadpanned.
"Okay, okay, but look, you're going to think I'm crazy…"
"Tucker, my parents believe in ghosts. Whatever you're going to say, trust me, I've heard weirder."
"Yeah, right, umm," Tucker let out a nervous chuckle.
"What is going on here?" Danny pressed when his friend started fiddling with the flap on his cargo pants instead of answering.
"Ghosts," he spit out quickly. "In the school."
Danny stared at him. "Ghosts?" he repeated slowly.
"In the school," Tucker confirmed.
Danny's face paled until he was almost white and looked like he was about to sway out of his seat. Sam grabbed his arm.
"Ghosts?" he asked weakly, looking to her for confirmation. Sam nodded, wide eyed.
"Ghosts…" he repeated again in a hoarse voice.