Entry #A-15: "Accomplishments" [Video]

[dead_black_eyes]

[Lazarus' number is written on a blackboard with a piece of chalk, opening a connection to the network. Dim light streams in through the high, dusty windows, falling on broken-down desks in a decrepit, once-grand lecture hall. A broom leans in the corner, along with several trash bags; Lazarus himself is wearing crummy clothes and more than a little breathless and sweaty. You would be too, if you'd been working on solo renovations for hours.]

If any of you are familiar with the building that was formerly the Willow Ridge Boarding Academy in Locke City... like back in the 1970's... it's ours now. It was briefly a linen processing facility but it wound up being foreclosed on when the company went bankrupt, so I went ahead and bought it from the bank. Under a different name, of course.

[He takes a second to shrug out of his sweater, draping it across one of the desks.]

The building's big, with a spacious basement. I want to move Project Jump as soon as possible to this new location, since both I and Espresso Yourself are too well-known at this point and I don't think it's safe for it to remain. I can rent a truck but the more discreet the move is, the better. It has to happen very soon. In the meantime... I'm going to continue to work on renovations. Security. Furnishing accommodations... on that note, if anyone has any computer monitors, servers or any other equipment they're willing to sell or donate, I'm more than interested.

[He returns to what he was doing before he opened the connection, which is, apparently, using an axe to break apart unsalvageable desks and bagging up the resulting debris to clear some space.]

Comments

[greenisthenewblack]

[It wasn't like they had much to lose, at this point. And if it kept the kids safe and out of the public eye, she wasn't going to complain. There'd been enough tragedies.]

Hey, it sure is a better option than sitting around watching daytime television. I am so over soap operas right now. There's a few kids I've been tutoring, and I could check with Randy. Not to mention the Numbered who aren't technically kids but might... not have had a formal education. [She has had a conversation with a pirate ferret since this whole mess started, after all.]

[dead_black_eyes]

[Soap operas? He blinks, seeming confused by the joke more than amused by it.]

I'm doing everything I can to make it a safe place. Our future in this city is uncertain, given the Mafia presence, so... the fewer people on the outside who know about it, the better.

You're Sheila, right? We've spoken a couple times, but never for long. I'm Lazarus.

[greenisthenewblack]

[Hey, with no work coming in and the media still waiting for her to blow something else up, Sheila doesn't have a lot of entertainment options available to her. And soap operas were better than Jerry Springer.]

You're right. This town needs a place for those of us who can't leave. Or are just too damn stubborn to. [She can't help it. The mafia telling them to make tracks - and hurting kids to do it - just makes her dig her heels in harder. She's sticking it out in Locke, come hell or high water.]

Nice to meet you, officially. Yeah, I'm Sheila. The recently infamous. I've seen you around Espresso Yourself before, too.

[dead_black_eyes]

[Back before he started getting pulses, one of L's guilty secrets is that he watched a lot of Jerry Springer. As a person whose life was spectacularly messed up, he found a perverse kind of comfort in watching people who were doing worse than he was.]

Quite simply, if they drive us out of Locke, the world will know that we're a temporary problem with enough persistence and brute force. That can't happen, no matter what.

I'm aware of the fact that there's been some slander flung around, yes. It's very unfortunate... my store hasn't been immune, but working through it seems to be the only option.

[greenisthenewblack]

I'm not sure it's slander when they have you on video. Even if the media did spin things pretty hard. [She shakes her head.] Anyway, I agree. Giving up here is going to set a bad precedent. I'm also not too keen on having a gang of thugs running around convinced they got the better of a bunch of superpowered people. Imagine the ego trip.

[dead_black_eyes]

To be fair, a lot of those thugs aren't exactly what I'd consider purely human anymore. There is nothing in this world like being tortured by a woman who is literally half-snake. I'm not saying they deserve that ego trip... I'm just saying there's not as much shame as you might think in losing a fight with one of them.

[L happens to be one of those Numbered who has no powers. A modified leopard man poses a very real threat to him.]

[greenisthenewblack]

I didn't say anything about shame. I've got blasters for hands, sure, but I'm not sure I'd be able to take one of those beefed-up goons in a fair fight. I'm still just a high school history teacher, after all. I don't have the experience and skills to handle a professional criminal.

[Yet. So far she's been lucky, and able to take advantage of the element of surprise. And she hasn't been attacked alone.]

My point is that if they get us out of the way... there's no one else who really can stand between them and whatever they want. Short of the government really cracking down, or other superpowered groups popping up like in a bad comic book. I don't know who's stronger than who, as it stands now. But buckling to their pressure would just be giving them carte blanche to do as they pleased, just the same as losing this fight against them would.

I'm not prepared to do either. It's good to have people around who feel the same.

[dead_black_eyes]

"Professional criminal" sounds so much more reputable than "thug" or "crony." I definitely preferred that title when I was posing as one a few months ago.

I think we'll find out who's stronger, eventually, because push will come to shove whether we like it or not.

[greenisthenewblack]

Thug and crony have their place when you're talking about people who kill children. It's harder Whatever you call them, they've got way more experience than most of us. In fighting, but also in maneuvering around the law, and working as a cohesive organization, and scare tactics, and putting on pressure. Even if they were normal humans, we'd be in trouble if we assumed we could handle them because we've got a few people with superstrength and heat vision.

Tangent aside. We've got a chance if we play this smart. And having a safehouse is definitely smart. As for dealing with the mafia long-term... at least I'm not the only one kick some teeth in. I have to keep reminding myself that assault is bad. [Sheila... has her own reasons for trying to stick as close to the straight and narrow as she can.]

[dead_black_eyes]

We've got more than a chance. Other people have their relationships, their work, their religion, and I have this. I'll do anything to succeed, providing it doesn't hurt any more of ours. That's the most important thing.

I've been told that assault in self-defense doesn't need to be bad...

[greenisthenewblack]

The most important, but I'm worried it'll also be the most difficult. We've got the network, but we're not exactly organized. Maybe with what you've proposed, we'll be better able to teach people to defend themselves. And provide a more physically present support network when things go wrong.

But there's lots of risks. And the Numbered kids are... kids.

I won't hesitate to give the mafia a taste of their own medicine when they attack me. I won't regret it, either. [Maybe a tiny lie. She doesn't think too hard about the goon Harry fried.] If I could get my hands on the guys who killed Anthony, though. Or Danny's family. Or kidnapped Robyn.

[dead_black_eyes]

When things get difficult, you can either give up or try harder, right? It's... surprising, sometimes, when you think you can't go on, and then you're still going, and going.

It's really... I can't stress how good it is to know that someone else cares. We need that support network, we have to protect the kids, and if we manage it then we know we're doing our best.

[A troubled pause at her mention of her attackers, the attackers of others.]

I know. I think about it a lot, too.

[greenisthenewblack]

Let's hope this project can redirect our energies to more... productive things. [As cathartic as revenge fantasies were, she knew she shouldn't indulge them.]

And it might surprise some of my former students to hear it, but yeah. I do care. A lot. I can be a bit of a hardass, but I wouldn't have gone into teaching if my students didn't matter to me. I sure as hell didn't do it for the money.

[dead_black_eyes]

That's what I'm relying on.

If your students knew you in any meaningful way, I'm sure the fact that you care so strongly wasn't overlooked. As a former delinquent I can tell you that a hardass who won't give up on troubled kids is worth a lot more than someone who says nothing and looks the other way.

[greenisthenewblack]

I'd like to think they know. Or knew. [Sheila winces a bit. She hadn't spent much time talking with Anthony, and now-]

I know sometimes kids need a bit of maturity and perspective to actually appreciate someone who makes them work hard. So... thank you. It's good to hear.

[dead_black_eyes]

Are you kidding? It's kind of cathartic. I wish I could tell the people who gave up on me what they should have been more like.

[greenisthenewblack]

Well, I won't pretend I did everything right for every student. Any teacher who claims that is naive... or a dirty, rotten liar. But I never liked the idea of letting students get away with doing less than their best work, simply because trying to motivate them was "too hard."

So I at least try. I like the challenge.

[dead_black_eyes]

I've grown to really detest liars. For what it's worth, I think your students were lucky to have someone so caring and honest, and anyone who can't recognize what they lost by firing you is very foolish.

Anything that's not a challenge probably isn't worth the effort.

[greenisthenewblack]

[Honest... maybe she had been, before this year. Her grin falters, and she looks briefly uneasy.]

Yes, well. I don't need to be put on a pedestal or anything. Things aren't really cut and dry, these days. I make mistakes as much as anyone.

...I just get to have them publicized on the nightly news.

[dead_black_eyes]

We'll get it sorted out, Sheila. The smear campaign is hurting all of us while it lasts and regardless of how one is being affected directly, it's in every Numbered's best interest to shut it down quickly. Hopefully while getting some good, and true smears against Albero while we're at it.