NaNo 2008 - Chapter One - Part B
The 6K words of the first chapter was just too long for a single livejournal entry, so I had to split in half. I've given it a little bit of overlap, so you know where I'm picking up from...
Professor Stanford smiled and picked up a piece of chalk from his desk. "Let's get started, shall we?" he said. He turned to face the chalkboard.
"For the month of November, we are going to be engaging in a fantastic voyage," he said, as he wrote out the words, "National Novel Writing Month" on the board. "That gives you about two months to plan your novels. Today, we'll begin examining different possible genres that you might choose for your novel."
Elle's brow furrowed and she bit her lip as she began taking notes. She'd never written a novel before - or even a short story. How did someone even come up with an idea for a story? Where did you start?
"We'll start with the horror genre," the professor said, as he leaned back against the edge of his desk. "A horror story is one intended to elicit fear in the reader, so, we'll start with the simple question of, 'What is your greatest fear?'" He glanced around and said, "Ken."
"Evil peas," Ken said immediately. He giggled, and the three girls in the back of the room echoed the sound. When Professor Stanford crossed his arms over his chest, he said, "For real, though, my worst fear is that it's the dead of winter, and I go out to get something out of the car when it's dark. I slip and fall, and no one comes out to help me because they're watching, like, Grey's Anatomy or something."
The professor nodded. "So," he said, "let's brainstorm a bit. How could we turn that around and make a horror story out of it? Or, if not an entire story, how can we make that a scene in such a story?"
For a moment, no one said anything. Elle glanced around at her classmates. Ken shrugged. He'd given them the starting point. Hitoshi's brows were furrowed, as if he were deep in thought. Shin looked as lost as she did. Caleb was scribbling in his notebook, looking for all the world as though he wasn't paying attention to the discussion.
"Anyone?"
That was the teacher. If no one answered, he'd call on someone. Elle bit her lip. "Maybe... maybe something's out there and attacks him?" she said. Her voice came out soft and filled with uncertainty.
"That's a good start," the professor said, nodding. He walked over to the chalkboard and started writing. "Let's keep going along that vein. So, our character goes out to his car at night - it's the dead of winter and pitch black. He slips and falls. Is that when something attacks him?"
"No," Hitoshi said, "that's not scary enough." His brows furrowed even more. "Maybe he sits there a bit, like he hurt himself, and he tries to call for help."
"But his friend doesn't hear him," Caleb piped up, "'cause he's watching Grey's Anatomy." He looked up from his notebook and grinned.
"Then he hears something moving in the bushes," Shin said, leaning forward in his seat.
"That would be a good moment for a classic horror tool called a cat scare," the professor said. "The reader is expecting something to happen to him, especially with the strange noise in the bushes, so instead, a cat would run out into the open."
"Oh," Elle said, grinning, "maybe, he finally gets up - after the cat scare - and gets inside and his friend has been attacked by something!"
"Like an evil pea!" Ken said, sounding excited. He chuckled and ducked his head. "or not..."
"It came from cupboard," Caleb said, in a low ominous voice. There was scattered laughter around the room.
"That's actually a very nice twist on a classic tool," Professor Stanford said. He smiled and jotted down the notes from their brainstorming. "And the evil pea is actually not a bad idea," he said, earning scattered laughter from the class. "There have been horror movies based on the idea that produce might attack people. The question is, why are the peas attacking and how did they become animated?"
"Maybe they're possessed," Shin said. He bit his lip and said, "I read something about vampire pumpkins once. If squash can be vampiric, why not any vegetable?"
"So the peas are possessed - vampire peas," Professor Stanford said, jotting that down with the rest of the notes. "Why do they attack? What are they after? What is the form of their attack? What does our character see when he returns from his adventure with the cat?"
"Just... nothing," Hitoshi said. He straightened in his seat and said, "That'd be way scarier than a dead body or blood everywhere, 'cause his friend didn't come outside, or the other guy would have seen him."
`"Very good," Professor Stanford said. He smiled and set the chalk down. "I want all of you to take this as your starting point. Write the story as far as you can take it and try to get it to some sort of ending - happy or sad, it's up to you."
Elle nodded and began writing. She started with what they'd already decided and went from there. By the time the bell rang to tell them that class was over, her character had discovered his friend's body in the dried vegetable patch behind the house. "That was fun," she said, as she gathered her English books and put them away.
Caleb nodded. "I never thought of writing any kind of story," he said, "but I think working on the beginning together made it even better."
They looked up when Professor Stanford clapped to get their attention. "For Monday," he said, over the sound of students folding up their books, "I'd like you to finish your stories. I'm not setting a length requirement, but don't be afraid to leave the ending unknown - with room for a sequel perhaps - if you find that you're running out of time. These are supposed to be short stories, after all."
"You have science next, right?" Caleb said.
Elle bit her lip and nodded. She wasn't quite sure where the science class was. They never switched classes in her old elementary school, except for things like gym or library, where they simply couldn't have the class held in a normal room.
"I've got science too," another boy said. "I could show you the way." It was as if he'd read her mind.
He smiled when Elle turned to face him. Her cheeks warmed. He had soft blond curls and wide blue eyes. He was easily the most attractive boy she'd ever seen. "I'd appreciate it," she said, returning his smile.
"No problem," he replied. "I'm going there anyway, after all. I'm Aidan, by the way."
"Nice to meet you," she said. She grabbed her books and followed the boy out of the room. She had no idea where they were going, other than the science class, so she had to work hard not to get separated from him the crowd of students going to their own classes.
It didn't take them long before they reached a classroom that was undoubtably a science class. Display cases with rock, mineral and even plant and animal specimens lined the walls. A model of the universe hung from the ceiling, which was painted to look like the night sky.
"Whoa!" Elle said. Feeling a bit sheepish, she said, "We didn't have anything like this at my old school."
She looked around the room, searching for an empty seat. In the far corner, she saw a boy who appeared to be holding a brightly colored ball in the air, balancing it on his finger. It took her a moment to realize that the ball wasn't spinning on the tip of his finger, as she'd first thought. It was floating in the air above his finger!
"Hey," Aidan called and the boy startled. The ball dropped instantly. It bounced a few times on the floor, before the girl in front of him caught it and tossed it, without looking, back to the boy. In fact, she hadn't even looked away from the book she was reading.
"Hey, Dani," a familiar, lilting voice said. "Ya found the place."
She turned around and grinned. "Hi Darian," she said. "Aidan helped me. I probably wouldn't have found it otherwise."
"We'll have lunch together and then you can go with Jake to algebra," he said, grinning. Shrugging, he said, "I've got Spanish then."
"Your friends with the norm?"
Elle looked away, frowning. "Norm?" she said, blinking.
"That's Todd," Darian said, rolling his eyes. "He means me. Just 'cause my gifts don't express themselves in academics, he says I'm a 'norm', a person with average intelligence."
Nodding, Elle turned around. It was the same boy she'd seen spinning the ball in the air, who'd dropped it when Aidan had called out to him. "I don't know how you were making the ball float in the air, but Darian can do two things at once, which makes him at least smarter than you."
"Oo, burn," someone whispered. A few others chuckled and Elle felt her cheeks warm. She didn't normally tease people, but she wasn't going to stand back and allow him to put down her foster brother either.
"She's got you there, Todd," the girl who'd caught the ball said, still without looking up from her book.
"What do you know, Nomi?"
"Apparently, she knows more than you," Ken said. He grinned and then wrinkled his nose at Todd. "So you're Todd, huh?" he said. He shook his head. "I can't remember that. I'ma call you Frank."
"But - but my name's Todd," Frank protested.
"Not anymore," Ken said, waving a finger in front of the taller boy's face. "From now on, you're Frank."
"All right, all right," a firm, adult-sounding voice said. The students scattered and dropped into chairs around the room. Elle sat at empty desk beside Darian and then bit her lip. Would she have to introduce herself again?
The science teacher, for he couldn't have been anything else, scanned the room and then sighed. "Nomi, close the book and pay attention to me. You can't sit beside Nomi, Todd, you know that." His brows furrowed and he looked around again.
"He's not Todd anymore, Professor Murray," Ken said, interrupting the professor before he could start speaking again. "He's Frank now."
"Right, then," Professor Murray said. He adjusted his glasses and made a note in the folder he was holding. "Frank, sit in front of my desk here, where I can keep an eye on you."
Elle shook her head in amazement. Frank had been making a ball spin in the air above his head. Ken had changed his name from Todd and everyone just accepted it. Not only that, she couldn't think of him, now, as anything except Frank. What kind of school was this? What kind of people went there?
Professor Murray read off their names from a sheet, making note of any nicknames that weren't already written down. "I take attendance daily, so there are no assigned seats. This is a laboratory-lecture class. Most of it will be lectures, but I'll have some demonstrations and experiments that we'll do to illustrate some of our lessons."
"For today, we'll start with a basic run down of laboratory rules and procedures," Professor Murray said. "Then we'll go through an introduction to weights and measures." He handed out a packet of papers, then he began going over the rules that were written out on them.
Elle listened to the lecture with interest. She couldn't wait to actually start doing experiments. Soon Professor Murray finished explaining everything and broke them into pairs. That was when the real fun began. She worked with Darian and, together, they went through the worksheet the professor had given them. Finally, class was dismissed and the students were sent off to lunch.
"I just... be careful of Aidan," Darian said, as they headed into the hallway. He's not a bad kid, but he's... well, no one here is normal, but he's weird 'en most."
Elle's brows furrowed and she nodded. "All right," she said. She couldn't tell why, but it was clear that Darian was worried.
"Elle," a soft, familiar voice said.
She blinked and looked up at him. He was probably the last person she'd expected to see. "Hello, Professor Stanford. What are you here for? Is there something wrong?" Elle said, as she stopped in the hallway, allowing other students to hurry off around them.
"I'll see you later," Darian whispered. At her nod, he headed off down the hall, following the general flow of students. All of the fifth grade had lunch then, so she was pretty sure she'd be able to find the cafeteria, even if Professor Stanford delayed her for more than a few minutes.
The professor smiled gently. "First off, let me make it perfectly clear that you're not in any trouble, Elle," he said, "It's just that there are a couple things I need to explain to you."
Elle smiled faintly. She remembered Hitoshi saying something about her not having been "read in" yet. At the time, Professor Stanford had said she would be. Apparently, he was keeping his promise. "Is this about the pandas and kids making balls float in the air?" she said, tilting her head to one side. She wouldn't be surprised if Ollie was in a similar meeting at that exact moment.
He chuckled and nodded. She followed Professor Stanford back towards the homeroom. As they made their way through the hall, he spoke. "You've obviously noticed that no one here is what most people would consider normal." He glanced at her and added, "Beyond your intellectual gifts, you, for example, have psionic ones - the ability to summon ice and snow, to be exact."
Elle's eyes widened. "Yeah," she said. Her cheeks warmed and she ducked her head. She'd known about that power for a few years now, but she kept it secret from everyone except her brother, who had similar power over fire. How had her teacher known about it?
"We call it cryokinesis and I possess that ability as well," Professor Stanford said. He smiled when she looked up at him in surprise. "It's true," he said. He looked away. "In fact, I'll probably be the one assigned to teach you how best to use your gift."
"That explains the floating, spinning balls," Elle said, nodding. To say nothing of Ken's ability to change people's name on a whim. She decided then, not to give him any reason to change her name. Who knew what people would end up calling her if he did.
"Frank has telekinesis - what we call the gift to move objects in a controlled manner," the professor said, nodding.
Elle grinned. Even Professor Stanford, who hadn't even been in the room, was using the boy's new name.
He grimaced and said, "Ken, for that matter, as a form of suggestive telepathy that allows him to actually change how those around him perceive things." He shook his head. "I'll have to speak with the headmaster about what he's done to, um... Frank."
Elle chuckled softly. Then her brows furrowed as another question occurred to her. "What exactly are psionic gifts, though?"
"Psionics refers to the use of gifts where the energy comes from within the person using them," he said. "Doing it too much can tire you. Some people have other side effects as well, but physical tiredness is the most common."
He frowned and said, "Those who use energy from outside of themselves are said to be using magic, but you don't really need to know about that."
She nodded, although she decided that she'd need to ask Darian and Jake about magic later. Instead of pressing the matter with her teacher, she said, "And the pandas?"
"What we call team leaders," he said, shoving open the door to the homeroom. He waited as she stepped over and sat down at one of the desks. Then he said, "Do you recall the personality test you took as part of your entry exams?"
"Yeah," she said. Her brows furrowed. "What's that got to do with team leaders? What kind of teams are they leading?"
"I'll get to that," Professor Stanford assured her. He ran a hand through his hair and said, "That test was engineered to figure out what field to best use your talents in."
"Field?"
"To put it simply," the professor said, "all the students here are learning to be agents with an organization known as Sanctuary. The goal is to protect people with powers such as ours from people who might exploit them. The student teams are part of that."
"What kind of teams?"
"There are field agents," the professor said, looking thoughtful. "There are also those who have a gift for creating interesting and useful inventions. Another team tests those inventions. A third employs their use and coordinates the efforts of our field agents."
He paused and smiled at her. "With your attention to detail and tenacity, you were determined to be best suited for our Junior Crime Scene Analyst program. You'd be what we call a hamster."
Elle grinned. "A Crime Scene Analyst? Like on television?" She loved shows like that. Her favorite one had a very handsome Texan who specialized in analyzing hair and fiber.
"Sort of, but not quite," he said. He grinned. "Your lessons with your powers will start this afternoon, they're on your schedule as Enrichment Class. You have your Hamster Class tomorrow. I'm sure you were wondering what that meant."
"I hadn't noticed it yet, actually," Elle admitted. She grinned and shook her head. "Everything is so new. I figured it'd be easier to take each day as it came."
"Well enough," Professor Stanford said. He stood then and said, "You have any questions?" When she shook her head, he grinned and said, "Then you can head off to lunch now. See you this afternoon."
"Bye Professor Stanford," Elle called, as she hurried out the door. She could hardly wait to see Ollie and ask him what special training he'd be getting. She also wondered what powers Darian and Jake had. "Guess I'll just have to ask!"
Professor Stanford smiled and picked up a piece of chalk from his desk. "Let's get started, shall we?" he said. He turned to face the chalkboard.
"For the month of November, we are going to be engaging in a fantastic voyage," he said, as he wrote out the words, "National Novel Writing Month" on the board. "That gives you about two months to plan your novels. Today, we'll begin examining different possible genres that you might choose for your novel."
Elle's brow furrowed and she bit her lip as she began taking notes. She'd never written a novel before - or even a short story. How did someone even come up with an idea for a story? Where did you start?
"We'll start with the horror genre," the professor said, as he leaned back against the edge of his desk. "A horror story is one intended to elicit fear in the reader, so, we'll start with the simple question of, 'What is your greatest fear?'" He glanced around and said, "Ken."
"Evil peas," Ken said immediately. He giggled, and the three girls in the back of the room echoed the sound. When Professor Stanford crossed his arms over his chest, he said, "For real, though, my worst fear is that it's the dead of winter, and I go out to get something out of the car when it's dark. I slip and fall, and no one comes out to help me because they're watching, like, Grey's Anatomy or something."
The professor nodded. "So," he said, "let's brainstorm a bit. How could we turn that around and make a horror story out of it? Or, if not an entire story, how can we make that a scene in such a story?"
For a moment, no one said anything. Elle glanced around at her classmates. Ken shrugged. He'd given them the starting point. Hitoshi's brows were furrowed, as if he were deep in thought. Shin looked as lost as she did. Caleb was scribbling in his notebook, looking for all the world as though he wasn't paying attention to the discussion.
"Anyone?"
That was the teacher. If no one answered, he'd call on someone. Elle bit her lip. "Maybe... maybe something's out there and attacks him?" she said. Her voice came out soft and filled with uncertainty.
"That's a good start," the professor said, nodding. He walked over to the chalkboard and started writing. "Let's keep going along that vein. So, our character goes out to his car at night - it's the dead of winter and pitch black. He slips and falls. Is that when something attacks him?"
"No," Hitoshi said, "that's not scary enough." His brows furrowed even more. "Maybe he sits there a bit, like he hurt himself, and he tries to call for help."
"But his friend doesn't hear him," Caleb piped up, "'cause he's watching Grey's Anatomy." He looked up from his notebook and grinned.
"Then he hears something moving in the bushes," Shin said, leaning forward in his seat.
"That would be a good moment for a classic horror tool called a cat scare," the professor said. "The reader is expecting something to happen to him, especially with the strange noise in the bushes, so instead, a cat would run out into the open."
"Oh," Elle said, grinning, "maybe, he finally gets up - after the cat scare - and gets inside and his friend has been attacked by something!"
"Like an evil pea!" Ken said, sounding excited. He chuckled and ducked his head. "or not..."
"It came from cupboard," Caleb said, in a low ominous voice. There was scattered laughter around the room.
"That's actually a very nice twist on a classic tool," Professor Stanford said. He smiled and jotted down the notes from their brainstorming. "And the evil pea is actually not a bad idea," he said, earning scattered laughter from the class. "There have been horror movies based on the idea that produce might attack people. The question is, why are the peas attacking and how did they become animated?"
"Maybe they're possessed," Shin said. He bit his lip and said, "I read something about vampire pumpkins once. If squash can be vampiric, why not any vegetable?"
"So the peas are possessed - vampire peas," Professor Stanford said, jotting that down with the rest of the notes. "Why do they attack? What are they after? What is the form of their attack? What does our character see when he returns from his adventure with the cat?"
"Just... nothing," Hitoshi said. He straightened in his seat and said, "That'd be way scarier than a dead body or blood everywhere, 'cause his friend didn't come outside, or the other guy would have seen him."
`"Very good," Professor Stanford said. He smiled and set the chalk down. "I want all of you to take this as your starting point. Write the story as far as you can take it and try to get it to some sort of ending - happy or sad, it's up to you."
Elle nodded and began writing. She started with what they'd already decided and went from there. By the time the bell rang to tell them that class was over, her character had discovered his friend's body in the dried vegetable patch behind the house. "That was fun," she said, as she gathered her English books and put them away.
Caleb nodded. "I never thought of writing any kind of story," he said, "but I think working on the beginning together made it even better."
They looked up when Professor Stanford clapped to get their attention. "For Monday," he said, over the sound of students folding up their books, "I'd like you to finish your stories. I'm not setting a length requirement, but don't be afraid to leave the ending unknown - with room for a sequel perhaps - if you find that you're running out of time. These are supposed to be short stories, after all."
"You have science next, right?" Caleb said.
Elle bit her lip and nodded. She wasn't quite sure where the science class was. They never switched classes in her old elementary school, except for things like gym or library, where they simply couldn't have the class held in a normal room.
"I've got science too," another boy said. "I could show you the way." It was as if he'd read her mind.
He smiled when Elle turned to face him. Her cheeks warmed. He had soft blond curls and wide blue eyes. He was easily the most attractive boy she'd ever seen. "I'd appreciate it," she said, returning his smile.
"No problem," he replied. "I'm going there anyway, after all. I'm Aidan, by the way."
"Nice to meet you," she said. She grabbed her books and followed the boy out of the room. She had no idea where they were going, other than the science class, so she had to work hard not to get separated from him the crowd of students going to their own classes.
It didn't take them long before they reached a classroom that was undoubtably a science class. Display cases with rock, mineral and even plant and animal specimens lined the walls. A model of the universe hung from the ceiling, which was painted to look like the night sky.
"Whoa!" Elle said. Feeling a bit sheepish, she said, "We didn't have anything like this at my old school."
She looked around the room, searching for an empty seat. In the far corner, she saw a boy who appeared to be holding a brightly colored ball in the air, balancing it on his finger. It took her a moment to realize that the ball wasn't spinning on the tip of his finger, as she'd first thought. It was floating in the air above his finger!
"Hey," Aidan called and the boy startled. The ball dropped instantly. It bounced a few times on the floor, before the girl in front of him caught it and tossed it, without looking, back to the boy. In fact, she hadn't even looked away from the book she was reading.
"Hey, Dani," a familiar, lilting voice said. "Ya found the place."
She turned around and grinned. "Hi Darian," she said. "Aidan helped me. I probably wouldn't have found it otherwise."
"We'll have lunch together and then you can go with Jake to algebra," he said, grinning. Shrugging, he said, "I've got Spanish then."
"Your friends with the norm?"
Elle looked away, frowning. "Norm?" she said, blinking.
"That's Todd," Darian said, rolling his eyes. "He means me. Just 'cause my gifts don't express themselves in academics, he says I'm a 'norm', a person with average intelligence."
Nodding, Elle turned around. It was the same boy she'd seen spinning the ball in the air, who'd dropped it when Aidan had called out to him. "I don't know how you were making the ball float in the air, but Darian can do two things at once, which makes him at least smarter than you."
"Oo, burn," someone whispered. A few others chuckled and Elle felt her cheeks warm. She didn't normally tease people, but she wasn't going to stand back and allow him to put down her foster brother either.
"She's got you there, Todd," the girl who'd caught the ball said, still without looking up from her book.
"What do you know, Nomi?"
"Apparently, she knows more than you," Ken said. He grinned and then wrinkled his nose at Todd. "So you're Todd, huh?" he said. He shook his head. "I can't remember that. I'ma call you Frank."
"But - but my name's Todd," Frank protested.
"Not anymore," Ken said, waving a finger in front of the taller boy's face. "From now on, you're Frank."
"All right, all right," a firm, adult-sounding voice said. The students scattered and dropped into chairs around the room. Elle sat at empty desk beside Darian and then bit her lip. Would she have to introduce herself again?
The science teacher, for he couldn't have been anything else, scanned the room and then sighed. "Nomi, close the book and pay attention to me. You can't sit beside Nomi, Todd, you know that." His brows furrowed and he looked around again.
"He's not Todd anymore, Professor Murray," Ken said, interrupting the professor before he could start speaking again. "He's Frank now."
"Right, then," Professor Murray said. He adjusted his glasses and made a note in the folder he was holding. "Frank, sit in front of my desk here, where I can keep an eye on you."
Elle shook her head in amazement. Frank had been making a ball spin in the air above his head. Ken had changed his name from Todd and everyone just accepted it. Not only that, she couldn't think of him, now, as anything except Frank. What kind of school was this? What kind of people went there?
Professor Murray read off their names from a sheet, making note of any nicknames that weren't already written down. "I take attendance daily, so there are no assigned seats. This is a laboratory-lecture class. Most of it will be lectures, but I'll have some demonstrations and experiments that we'll do to illustrate some of our lessons."
"For today, we'll start with a basic run down of laboratory rules and procedures," Professor Murray said. "Then we'll go through an introduction to weights and measures." He handed out a packet of papers, then he began going over the rules that were written out on them.
Elle listened to the lecture with interest. She couldn't wait to actually start doing experiments. Soon Professor Murray finished explaining everything and broke them into pairs. That was when the real fun began. She worked with Darian and, together, they went through the worksheet the professor had given them. Finally, class was dismissed and the students were sent off to lunch.
"I just... be careful of Aidan," Darian said, as they headed into the hallway. He's not a bad kid, but he's... well, no one here is normal, but he's weird 'en most."
Elle's brows furrowed and she nodded. "All right," she said. She couldn't tell why, but it was clear that Darian was worried.
"Elle," a soft, familiar voice said.
She blinked and looked up at him. He was probably the last person she'd expected to see. "Hello, Professor Stanford. What are you here for? Is there something wrong?" Elle said, as she stopped in the hallway, allowing other students to hurry off around them.
"I'll see you later," Darian whispered. At her nod, he headed off down the hall, following the general flow of students. All of the fifth grade had lunch then, so she was pretty sure she'd be able to find the cafeteria, even if Professor Stanford delayed her for more than a few minutes.
The professor smiled gently. "First off, let me make it perfectly clear that you're not in any trouble, Elle," he said, "It's just that there are a couple things I need to explain to you."
Elle smiled faintly. She remembered Hitoshi saying something about her not having been "read in" yet. At the time, Professor Stanford had said she would be. Apparently, he was keeping his promise. "Is this about the pandas and kids making balls float in the air?" she said, tilting her head to one side. She wouldn't be surprised if Ollie was in a similar meeting at that exact moment.
He chuckled and nodded. She followed Professor Stanford back towards the homeroom. As they made their way through the hall, he spoke. "You've obviously noticed that no one here is what most people would consider normal." He glanced at her and added, "Beyond your intellectual gifts, you, for example, have psionic ones - the ability to summon ice and snow, to be exact."
Elle's eyes widened. "Yeah," she said. Her cheeks warmed and she ducked her head. She'd known about that power for a few years now, but she kept it secret from everyone except her brother, who had similar power over fire. How had her teacher known about it?
"We call it cryokinesis and I possess that ability as well," Professor Stanford said. He smiled when she looked up at him in surprise. "It's true," he said. He looked away. "In fact, I'll probably be the one assigned to teach you how best to use your gift."
"That explains the floating, spinning balls," Elle said, nodding. To say nothing of Ken's ability to change people's name on a whim. She decided then, not to give him any reason to change her name. Who knew what people would end up calling her if he did.
"Frank has telekinesis - what we call the gift to move objects in a controlled manner," the professor said, nodding.
Elle grinned. Even Professor Stanford, who hadn't even been in the room, was using the boy's new name.
He grimaced and said, "Ken, for that matter, as a form of suggestive telepathy that allows him to actually change how those around him perceive things." He shook his head. "I'll have to speak with the headmaster about what he's done to, um... Frank."
Elle chuckled softly. Then her brows furrowed as another question occurred to her. "What exactly are psionic gifts, though?"
"Psionics refers to the use of gifts where the energy comes from within the person using them," he said. "Doing it too much can tire you. Some people have other side effects as well, but physical tiredness is the most common."
He frowned and said, "Those who use energy from outside of themselves are said to be using magic, but you don't really need to know about that."
She nodded, although she decided that she'd need to ask Darian and Jake about magic later. Instead of pressing the matter with her teacher, she said, "And the pandas?"
"What we call team leaders," he said, shoving open the door to the homeroom. He waited as she stepped over and sat down at one of the desks. Then he said, "Do you recall the personality test you took as part of your entry exams?"
"Yeah," she said. Her brows furrowed. "What's that got to do with team leaders? What kind of teams are they leading?"
"I'll get to that," Professor Stanford assured her. He ran a hand through his hair and said, "That test was engineered to figure out what field to best use your talents in."
"Field?"
"To put it simply," the professor said, "all the students here are learning to be agents with an organization known as Sanctuary. The goal is to protect people with powers such as ours from people who might exploit them. The student teams are part of that."
"What kind of teams?"
"There are field agents," the professor said, looking thoughtful. "There are also those who have a gift for creating interesting and useful inventions. Another team tests those inventions. A third employs their use and coordinates the efforts of our field agents."
He paused and smiled at her. "With your attention to detail and tenacity, you were determined to be best suited for our Junior Crime Scene Analyst program. You'd be what we call a hamster."
Elle grinned. "A Crime Scene Analyst? Like on television?" She loved shows like that. Her favorite one had a very handsome Texan who specialized in analyzing hair and fiber.
"Sort of, but not quite," he said. He grinned. "Your lessons with your powers will start this afternoon, they're on your schedule as Enrichment Class. You have your Hamster Class tomorrow. I'm sure you were wondering what that meant."
"I hadn't noticed it yet, actually," Elle admitted. She grinned and shook her head. "Everything is so new. I figured it'd be easier to take each day as it came."
"Well enough," Professor Stanford said. He stood then and said, "You have any questions?" When she shook her head, he grinned and said, "Then you can head off to lunch now. See you this afternoon."
"Bye Professor Stanford," Elle called, as she hurried out the door. She could hardly wait to see Ollie and ask him what special training he'd be getting. She also wondered what powers Darian and Jake had. "Guess I'll just have to ask!"