Perth 1884
The shadow reached out for Jack's back. Upon touch, the dark creature winced away in pain, like Jack's shadow there toxic. Dr. Facilier recoiled, he turned to Jack and said, "well, that was peculiar."
Jack Frost shrugged, "you'll get that a lot from me."
The two of them walked down the ceramic decorated hallways a rhythmic strut. Dr. Facilier almost danced as he moved, which made Jack uneasy. "So what happened to the last teacher."
"Heartless got her. Can't say I'm surprised, I'm more surprised she didn't take more students down with her."
"More?"
"It was a tamer incident, hopefully with you it won't be worse."
"You don't expect much from us, do you?"
"Its the only way a man can never be dissapointed."
Dr. Facilier stopped outside some large wooden doors. He knocked on the wood, "class 1e is a bit… Rambunctious compared to the rest. Keep in mind, most of these boys were expelled from the other classrooms before coming here."
Jack nodded, "it's nothing I can't handle."
He opened the door for Jack, "we'll see."
As soon as the doors opened, Jack faced off to a group of students cheering towards a fight. The desks were arranged into a ring, and all of the other boys cheered their fists up in chants as the two at the center were swinging at each other.
"You son of a gun!" The blonde haired boy swung a fist towards him. He was strong and athletic, but much smaller than his opponent. The black haired boy had nearly twice the muscle mass. He took the punch to the jaw, but only smiled as he rotated it back into place.
"You hit like a girl, no wonder girls like you." The boy charged back at him, and this time thrusted his head into his chest, following up with a punch to the gut. "Too bad its a man that women need."
The surrounding students cheered and winced at the boys pain. They changed their names as they fought. "Knock him down Gaston!"
"Hit him in the balls, Smith!"
John Smith fell back in pain. He looked up at Gaston who crouched over him, "you're a bastard Gaston, I saw her first!"
He grinned down at him, "not my fault I caught her fancy before you did."
Smith rose up and tackled Gaston back, but Gaston's strength overpowered Smith, and he quickly slipped Smith onto the ground. "And you fight like a girl too. Don't worry, I'm sure a man will come rescue you someday, princess."
Smith gritted his teeth. Dr. Facilier closed the door behind Jack, "they're all yours."
Jack Frost shook his head. Before Smith could get back up, Jack yelled, "everyone take your seats!"
At the sound of his voice, a gust of wind released from his body. The cold chill filled the room with frost and pushed all of the students back to the wall of the classroom. Them, the chairs, desks, and papers all winded against the wall. A thin sheet of ice covered all of them.
The students fell onto the ground, piled atop of each other crammed up against the back. Jack announced, "I'll be you teacher for 1E. Any standards you had before me, I'm raising them. If you're going to fight, it will be outside my classroom with rules in place. But games like this won't be allowed during my class. Understand?"
The students, still disarrayed across the floor, looked onto Jack in silence. One of the students asked, "hold on, you're the new teacher? You look younger than me."
Jack shook his head, "I tested out of school last year. I've taught classes in Greenland, and been assigned to Perth. I'm more than qualified to teach all of you. "
"Prove it," the same boy stood up and dusted the ice off of his clothes. He had dark skin and hair, with amber eyes and a robust body. He was only slightly bigger than Smith, and wore a green sweater vest and beret.
His arm extended outward and a bright light extruded out. The light morphed into a green keyblade with a sharp saw and green leaf tip. He raised it up and entered into a fighting poise, "surely a teacher such as yourself will have no problem putting us down if we became too rambunctious."
His name was Naveen. A prince from Maldonia, his royal status made him one of the only African students within the school. He was charming to other girls, and he used his royal status to arouse the idea of girls becoming princesses under him. But it also made him a constant target to other envious boys. It was a type of competition he seemed to thrive upon.
Jack said, "if you need a keyblade to fight, then you've already lost."
"Huh?" Naveen tilted his head. Jack's coldness brushed onto the ceiling and encapsulated the walls in ice. It grew out quickly like a growing mountain, and fell down on Naveen in fast wave. The ice covered his arms and limbs, making him immoble. His keyblade was rendered useless, trapped beneath the cold crystalline ice. With his teeth jittering cold,
The other students watched him shiver in wide eyed amazement. The frozen Naveen asked, "h-h-h-how did you do that? You need a keyblade for m-m-magic."
Jack crossed his arms, "we're here for more than just keyblade studies, we're here to study all the arts. A keyblade is a strong weapon, but it's just an enhancer for our latent abilities." Jack pointed to all of the students, "if your base level is weak, then there won't be anything for it to enhance. That's why you're in school, to expand our capabilities for the keyblade's sake."
Jack pulled his hands back. The ice slowly unwrapped from Naveen. It pushed away from his body and wrapped against the ice from around the classroom. It slowly returns to Jack's palm, cleansing the classroom of icing.
Jack turned to them all and asked, "anymore doubts on whether I can teach?"
They all shook their heads. They didn't notice Jack's hands trembling, which worked in his favor. After the students rearranged the desks back into place, they took their seats for role call and gave Jack the opportunity to learn all of their names and backgrounds.
The school in Perth was a precarious one. It was only a decade old, and made up of wealthy aristocrats who could afford to take their sons there. There were exceptions of course. Some of them were sponsored by a benefactor into getting enrolled, but the vast majority of the student body could be considered 'privileged' class, and Jack wondered if that would create some distance between himself and them.
After the introductions were over, he gave them all a chance to ask him personal questions Robin hood, a skinny red haired boy, asked, "you're from Greenland? Wasn't that academy attacked by heartless last year?""
"No, that isn't true. There was a training accident, but no one got hurt. There aren't a lot of telegrams up there so these rumors get thrown out of proportion."
Phoebus, a blonde boy wearing a blue leather vest, placed his feet on the table and said, "I'm not buying it. They wouldn't let us know if it were true."
Jack replied, "one, if I were lying, then I'm lying for a reason. And two, no one cares if you buy it or not." That got some chuckles from the class, Peter decided to drop the subject.
A student named Hiccup, a scrawny boy with a leather vest asked, "is it true there are pure bred dragons in Greenland? I heard they went extinct after the Napoleonic wars."
Jack nodded, "it depends on what you mean by 'extinct.' Yeah, they went extinct after the war, but some scientists managed to clone pure breeds back to life. Right now only the aboriginals there tame them, the other nations use chimera dragons instead."
One more student raised up their hand. Arthur, an adopted royal from the English crown. He asked aloud, "are there going to be hollows in our classroom this year?"
Jack tensed up at the question. Hollows were a touchy subject. Historically, keyblade masters had long been at war with hollows. Keyblades originated from the light in children's hearts, with those of the strongest wills conjuring weapons to combat the darkness.
Hollows were another topic altogether. Hollows were beings born of tragedy. Traumatic experiences forced these people to have powers, and it undoubtedly made them unruly and uncontrollable as a result. Since hollows were made out of tragedy, hollows were especially susceptible to the darkness within their hearts. And it only took a slight push to turn them into heartless.
Hollow heartless were especially powerful. Their powers fused with the dark elements, creating monsters capable of massive destruction. It was why the academies were created in the first place. So that keyblade masters could know how to control them, and so that hollows could understand how to resist darkness.
Jack answered, "whether there will be hollows in this classroom, I don't know. But hollow students will begin to arrive starting this week. I expect all of you to treat them all with the utmost respect, none of these people deserve any mistreatment from us."
Gaston bolsted out a smile, "perhaps there will be pretty damsels among them!"
Robin turned to him and said, "hollows can rip you to shreds, and you'd want to date one?"
Phoebus said, "to be fair, there aren't enough ladies in the colony. This was an all boys school until the gold rush."
Arthur asked, "is it true that they're all monsters? And that they need to be treated like dogs?"
John said, "it shouldn't be a problem. There's no animal I've never tamed."
Jack let his frown show. With a sigh he said, "they're not animals, John. And they're not here for fraternizing either. When the hollow come, be polite. Otherwise it will spill over to disaster for all of us."
Jack pointed to the classroom door, "it's time for supper. You're all dismissed. Tomorrow, we'll discuss elemental magic."
The students cleared out of the classroom quickly. Jack took his time cleaning up the chalkboard. Tendrils of darkness fluttered near his fingernails, but he calmed his hand so that they wouldn't show.
Dr. Facilier leaned at the door side and asked, "you really are Peculiar, Jack Frost."
"It comes natural."
"What ever happened to Pitch? He was a colleague of mine, you know."
Facilier's shadow swiped across the chalkboard, cleaning against the chalk effortlessly. Jack stepped back and asked, "you here to ask me that?"
He shook his head. "I'm here to summon you. Headmistress Maleficent requests you."
