Scenery and Sarcasm

Arabella pouted as she stalked down the halls towards the art rooms. You should be getting more involved, she could just hear her mother saying, as memories from her old school were drawn up from the depths of her mind. Join a club. Play a sport. Take an art or music or dance class. Be like other normal teenage girls. She shook her head. Clearly Ara was the farthest thing from normal, and her mom had certainly known it- she wouldn’t have ended up here at the Academy otherwise…

Still, she felt this need deep inside her gut to finally honor her mother’s request and actually do something with her time other than “playing with her knives all day,” as she had constantly reprimanded Ara for doing. Honestly, though, she wasn’t gonna get better if she didn’t practice- Mamma had never seemed to understand that…She fingered one of those said knives restlessly, flipping it back and forth in her hand with ease. She truly missed her mom- but she would never allow anyone to see that. Ever.

So, she continued walking briskly down the halls, searching desperately for one room in particular. Out of all the elective courses the academy had to offer, scenic and prop painting seemed like one of the most interesting. It was something that she had always been casually into- she’d seen a few shows on Broadway here and there, and often been more entertained by the set designs than the actual actors themselves. It was certainly outside of her usual areas of expertise- those being murder, gore, and manipulation. Plus, she figured, it’d be an easy A. Win-win-win situation.

She finally made it to the classroom, situated well into the art wing. The door was slightly ajar, so she peered her head in.

“Hello?” she said, looking into the classroom- which was, apparently, nearly empty. “I’m…looking for a Mr…Mallengiz?” She really hoped she was pronouncing his name right- though, honestly, at the moment she should have been hoping she was, in fact, in the right place. There were zero other students in the classroom…how could this be right?

Arabella cocked her head for a moment. The hell was he on about? Inside the armor? This guy would have to be mad to stick himself up in there... Then she listened more closely to his tone, and looked into his eyes, and it clicked. Everything about this man screamed sarcasm- even his aura. She smirked, chuckling slightly at his last comment. Well this got surprisingly interesting. This could be fun.

She assumed the man now lounging before her was none other than the teacher himself- though, he appeared to think that no one would be interested enough in his course to poke their head in. In this case, he was mistaken, as Ara took his remark as an invitation and entered the room.

“Oh, is that so?” she said, the sarcasm in her voice matching if not surpassing that in his own. She walked over to the suit of armor, her hands laced innocently behind her back, and looked up at him, rocking on her heels a bit as she spoke. “Good afternooooon, sir!” she said, uncharacteristically cheerful- and she was sure the man could tell just how uncharacteristic it was. “My name is Arabella Pugnale. I’m here for your painting class- and ever so eager to learn~!” If her words were not all in jest, she would be making herself want to vomit. That was the underlying beauty in irony, the sheer joy embedded within a truly mocking tone- speaking literally, she would have despised the mere sound of herself, while on the other hand, speaking sarcastically, she felt a sense of power in a shared, yet hidden, joke.

She jerked her head over at the cigar, acknowledging the ‘supervisor.’ “You don’t have to worry about me with that,” she said. “I don’t mind the smoke. And I won’t breathe a word of it to anyone who shouldn’t know.” She was perhaps a bit too proud of that pun- but hey, she was in a good mood. She wasn’t certain if teachers were allowed to smoke in front of students or not; personally, she couldn’t care less. In her family, she had consumed enough secondhand smoke that the smell of tobacco made her feel rather nostalgic.

Ara couldn’t contain her surprise as the suit of armor began to move on its own. She smiled, watching it open up the window, to return and poof into its miniature figurine form. The spectacles of Manta Carlos, she mused to herself, never cease to amaze me. Indeed, beneath her rough exterior, there was something of an amusement and a vivid sense of curiosity in the more magical capabilities of her fellow inhabitants of the school. But of course, she wouldn’t let anyone know that…

She grinned. Odin. Yes, that certainly suited the young teacher much better than a Mister or Professor might have. His demeanor was far too cool for surnames and formal titles. Which, beneficially enough, so was hers.

She concluded that they’d get along juuuuuuuuuuuust fine.

The rules of the classroom seemed straightforward enough. He thankfully didn’t bullshit his students with the same routine that they had heard over and over again, from every teacher they had ever had- “Treat others the way you want to be treated, don’t talk when someone else is talking, come to class ready to learn, show respect to your classmates and yourself.” How does one not “respect themselves” in a classroom? What the hell was that even supposed to mean? She had always despised the teachers at her old schools and their unbearably cheery first-day-of-class spiels. Thank God, this was a complete change of pace.

She nodded at Odin. “I think I can manage. Probably. 95% guaranteed. No promises, though.” She smirked. “Though, call me Ara, please, if we’re doing away with formalities.”

Breathing in the last remnants of the smoke he exhaled before it fled out the open window, Ara moved over to the table and sat down beside him, eyeing the models curiously. She reached over to touch one of them. “Do they all transform like that one?” she asked, referring to the now-shrunken armor-clad figurine that had just a minute ago stood before her.