The wind rushed past her face with newfound vigour, bringing her past the Space Circle and the police station she tried to bring Kreig to when they first met. Smiling to herself, Erica gently recalled the first impression she’d had all those weeks back. Crime man, sure. Now that Erica thought about it, of all the people she’d ever known, Kreig might just be the least disposed to crime. Or even violence, for that matter.

If having to learn to ride a bike at his age didn’t make him resort to violence, she was pretty sure he never would. On the matter of his bike, it really was a cool thing. Pigsty. A bike that could carry a whole pigsty’s worth of swine.

Not that Kreig was a pig or anything, no, he was more of an ox. Or a stallion. Or a human male.

Very large and very, very dashing.

Flying through the city on her own bike, Erica felt her cheeks heat up just a little. Then, she passed the bend they had decided on, and there he stood. His pale eyes fell on her. She smiled and waved from her bike, trying not to fall over.

“Good morning!” Erica said to her former student, now coworker.

“Good morning,” he replied in that always-solemn, constantly-stoic way. Maybe she should tell him to smile somehow? No, he’d smile when he pleased. Otherwise it wouldn’t be a real smile.

They both got back on their bikes, Erica letting her eyes linger on Kreig’s bike for just a second. Hm. She hadn’t noticed it before, but it seemed almost like the handlebars came with moulded handles! Shaped just like Kreig’s own hands. Maybe they were custom bought? Maybe his Russian mafia boss leader bought them for him? Cool.

As they biked along the path leading out to the edges of the city, she couldn’t help but notice Kreig glancing at her every now and then. But whenever she tried to catch his gaze, he’d always returned it to the path in front of them.

Maybe he had something to say? Kreig could be pretty shy when it came to initiating conversation, so if she just said something mildly conversational, then-,

“Do you feel nervous?”

“Huh?” Erica whipped her head to the side to face Kreig, only barely getting control over her bike. “How do you mean?”

He looked down at his handlebars, not even looking ahead as he deftly dodged a pedestrian. “When I first began teaching at Painstone, I can admit I felt rather nervous myself. Uncertain. I haven’t had a formal position in many years. I was afraid that the students might dislike me, or that I may not be up to par with the expectations of my employer.” He lifted his gaze once more, meeting hers. “I can only assume that you may be feeling something similar, if not more severely.”

“Huh? Me? Nervous? No way! I’d never-,”

“To the right,” Kreig said softly, prompting Erica to glance back to the road that now took a pretty sharp turn.

Once the road straightened out again, she tried again to collect her thoughts, only to find them jumbled. “I mean… I’ve been teaching for years, Kreig. Why should I be nervous?” Realization hit her. “Unless sewer snakes put chemicals in my water… Or I’m scared that the students will be just the same as they were all those years ago and nothing has changed… Or I’ve been brain-washed by ultra-intelligent cutlery trying to get me to become their queen!”

Kreig stared at her for a few seconds. “-It could be either one.”

She nodded back. “Could be either one. I can’t be sure.” She could feel her brows pinching together. No, it couldn’t be either one. Sure, one or two were likelier than another, but… But if she looked deep inside herself and really thought about it, there was only really one option. “I won’t become their queen,” she whispered to herself. “I won’t.”

Oh, and now Kreig was looking at her oddly again.

“I’ll protect you,” he said, only barely loud enough for her to hear.

Erica glanced back at him, trying to still her beating heart. “-From the cutlery?”

He smiled; one of those genuine, slight smiles that you could tell he truly felt. “Sure. If they ever try anything, or if they make you feel bad, or if they make you think you are incapable of living up to their expectations, I swear to you that I will protect you.”

“-From the cutlery?”

His smile grew wider. “You will have nothing to fear from them but their insubordination.”

Erica grinned and did a thumbs up. “Well, if you say so!”

But for how excited she might have seemed externally, internally, she was even more so. Though it did take a slightly different form. She felt giddy and thrilled, filled up from the bottom of her toes to the tip of her head with an exhilarating joy. He’d protect her. Sure, sure, but, more than that, he cared for her. Whatever he was, whatever his background, whatever his present, he cared for her. Maybe even as much as she cared for him.

For the next fifteen minutes, she rode on a high, feeling as though she was biking on clouds.

Then Painstone reared on the horizon and all of a sudden all those bad feelings hit her again.

She hadn’t been there in several years. At first, it had just been that she wanted to avoid anyone recognizing her and asking why she left, but then it became a habit; one that she would actively take measures to fulfil. She’d take long detours just to avoid an unwanted glance at its walls, often getting her late for appointments and meetings. So, upon seeing that dreaded building once more, she couldn’t help but feel as though her lungs were filled with swamp water.

She couldn’t tell if her heart was going faster or slower than usual; if she felt infernally hot or freezing cold.

A warm fist gently gripped her hand so softly that it felt like an angel’s wings brushing past. She looked up.

They were standing outside the gates of Painstone. He stood close to her, as though guarding her from the intrusive gazes of students passing by. His hand tenderly held hers, easily eclipsing it in his own. His other hand fell on her cheek. “It’s alright,” he said. “I’ll protect you.”

A warmness seemed to spread from his hand through her cheek, heating up her head and face, then travelling down through her neck and into her chest, purging her drowning lungs of the sewage and bile, leaving her breath easy and light. Then, it seemed to warm every edge of her body, before going out through her mouth, where it seemed to become a little laughter. She smiled at him.

“Thanks. I’ll depend on you.”

And then, in the blink of an eye, she was no longer outside the gates, but instead inside the school, standing inside a little office she would share with the math-physics teacher and the German teacher. For her own part, she would do both English and French. English especially was important for this school since it was, after all, an international school, meaning that many students spoke rudimentary English at best.

She placed her bag on her desk and unloaded a few things as she turned her thoughts over in her mind.

She’d be able to handle it. She would, right? She’d done this once before, she could do this again. In fact, she already had a first assignment all designed and ready. And she’d give them plenty of time to do it. It’d be a good way to check their collective capabilities while also giving her ample time to scope out the exceptional and the lesser. That way, she could pick and choose which students needed more or less help, as well as the ones that might want a little more than she had to give.

She drew a deep breath into her light lungs. Yeah. She could do this.

At 8 o’clock, she found herself standing outside a classroom. Even where she stood, the loudness of the class inside was all too clear.

Was it too late to back out?

She could just tell Kreig that, “Hey, they told me mean things, so I’ll go back to college, thanks!”

...But then he might try something silly, like telling them not to say mean things. Or something.

Slowly, she balled her hands into fists. She clenched her teeth. No, she could do this. This was a way to start over, to become the teacher she always wanted to be! She couldn’t turn back now, at the very last step!

Drawing herself up, she opened the door and stepped inside.

Thirty pairs of owlish eyes turned to her.

Her body froze.

One of these thirty was thinking something different than the rest. After all, one of them recognized her quite well.

Jay sat up a little straighter in her chair. His new flame, was it? Well, well, well… Wasn’t this quite the turnaround? Not that she actually cared all that much. Even if this woman had something to do with Kreig beyond the obvious, her level was only 1, so she clearly wasn’t anything to be scared of.

She also wasn’t doing anything. No, while the class slowly collected itself - sitting down, shutting up and staring straight ahead, she just kind of stood there.

Until, finally, she apparently pulled herself together. “G-, good morning!”

Yeah, her voice was about to be expected. A few different voices replied, “Good morning,” back, but it was scattered and uncertain.

“My name is Erica, and I’ll be your English teacher from here on out! From what I’ve heard, your last teacher was Mrs Cooks, right?” A few people nodded to her, alongside a general series of murmurs, one of which Annie directed at Jay herself.

“Hopefully, this one won’t be as bad as Mrs Cooks. Or that last substitute.”

“Sure,” Jay replied curtly.

“I thought today we might get to know each other better, so I was thinking that you all would each write a little story of your own!” Complete silence. “It doesn’t have to be long. It can be half a page as long as you think that it accurately reflects your skill level. Since most students like having a theme, the theme for this story will be subversed expectations! So, just make sure something surprising happens, or a situation isn’t what it seems, or the lies of a character are brought out. Though, do remember that the most important thing is that you have fun writing it!”

Jay tried in vain to suppress a groan. Oh, god. A creative writing assignment, right off the bat? Was she a sadist or something?

While the rest of the class fished out their computers, Jay tried to think of some way to bypass this whole situation. Maybe she should feign a fainting spell? Or she could say that she’s mentally ill so she can’t handle any assignments. Either way, looking at Annie, the rest of the people in here actually seemed pretty excited to get to work.

Annie, according to what Jay could tell, was someone who enjoyed the creation of stories pretty sharply. When people started writing lots of stories about the portals and Fighters, Jay could remember Annie reading quite a few of them, as though she was preparing to write some biography following them or whatever.

As Annie got to work writing, Jay reluctantly brought out her own computer. The empty google docs document gaped before her.

Even after ten minutes, she hadn’t been able to write a single good line. A lot of possible beginnings, but nothing concrete. Nothing worth actually pursuing.

But just as she was about to close the document to write something harsh on reddit, she heard the faint tick-tock of the woman’s heels step up behind her. Then she passed by to lean behind Annie. “Whoa, interesting!” she said in what appeared to be genuine excitement. “You wrote this? You didn’t steal it off a dead man’s corpse? Whoa…”

Then, the two of them began trading banter, with the woman telling Annie many tips and tricks, alongside hinting at possible endings and turnarounds. Well, less so “hinting” and more so that she just suggested them straight out. Either way, Annie seemed very excited to continue, so the woman soon left her, quickly turning her attention to Jay and her empty paper.

“Having trouble getting started?” she asked in the most sickly sweet voice Jay had ever heard.

“What do you care?” she sneered. “No, seriously. You don’t actually care, do you? Look, if you just leave me alone I’ll turn in some pretentious dadaistic poem by the end of this class and we don’t talk again all semester, okay?”

The woman seemed completely taken aback, freezing in a second. Jay grinned to herself, feeling a sense of victory over the tawny woman.

But then, as though pulling herself together and drawing some strength from deep within, the woman let her eyes rise again. They were as hard as diamonds. “What is your dream, Jay?”

Jay drew her arms across her chest. Something here was off. But for now, she didn’t have enough ammunition to do anything that’d really get her off her ass. “I want to be a journalist,” she answered honestly.

The woman - Erica, made no sign of backing down. “Why do you want to be a journalist?”

That was a pretty private question, miss Wiedermann. “I don’t see how that’s important.”

Then, the woman smiled softly. “I became a teacher because I wanted to make sure kids had at least one good teacher growing up. Bad teachers can do a lot of bad, but… To a kid, a really good teacher can mean everything.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Jay said dismissively. A lull in the conversation made the silence stretch between them. Jay looked back at her screen. “...I just want to expose the truth.”

“The truth?”

“Yeah. There’s plenty of secrets in the world. Lots of people with secrets who’d do anything to keep them hidden. I hate that. I want to drag them out into the light, to expose their evil to the justice of public opinion. I want-,” Jay paused, realizing what the teacher did. Her head whipped around furiously, fully expecting the woman to look at her with those dead, uncaring eyes that all teachers have whenever she tries to tell them anything about herself.

Instead, she found a pair of shining, curious eyes looking back at her. “You want?” The woman asked innocently, like a kid asking their parent to continue the bedtime story.

“I-, I want…” in her head, the answer echoed dully. “It isn’t important. It isn’t.”

The woman smiled sympathetically. “It’s okay. You can tell me when you feel more comfortable, alright?” Her words made Jay nod mechanically. “But, since you’re much more interested in journalism, how about you just write an article instead?”

“An article?” Jay echoed quietly.

“Yeah! I mean, as long as it shows your abilities, I’m really fine with whatever. You promise you’ll put your all into it, right?” The woman smiled mischievously and winked.

“Uh, sure,” Jay answered dully. Then, after giving a little wave and a wish of good luck, the woman left to go fawn on another student, leaving Jay confused and uncertain. She turned back to the empty document.

Do whatever you want, huh? Plenty of teachers had told her that in the past when she didn’t want to do the normal assignment. But then, just as she turned it in, there was always that one moment of realization where their eyes turned black as coal and they looked like they regretted ever becoming a teacher. And then they would tell her that this wasn’t exactly what they meant and they let her only barely pass. That was how it was. That was the game.

Jay frowned to herself. Yeah. This time it would surely be the same.

What is your dream?

Surely…

Jay shook her head. She placed her fingers on the keyboard. Though, maybe this time, she could do something a little more lasting. Something that was sure to hurt.

On the document, she wrote, “Some men aren’t quite what they seem to be.”