Midterms

There was always more paperwork. David pushed a stack of midterm essays off to the side, only half graded, and leaned back in his chair. He wanted to put his feet up on the desk, but it was His desk, so he didn't, out of respect. Dr. Cullen may have been dead and gone for, what was it, twelve years? Train of thought derailed, David blew out a long exhalation between his teeth. Twelve years.

Of course, he'd only been interim headmaster at Cullen's since Daniels had gone on extended sabbatical, so... four months. He was still teaching English to the juniors and seniors, and the added responsibilities weren't outside of his wheelhouse, there just never seemed to be enough time in the day.

David Stevenson groaned and rubbed his temples, a headache beginning to form behind his eyes. He'd been trying to quit caffeine but on the second day he always got a blistering headache that sent him back into a coffee cup. He should probably stop trying to quit - it made him feel weak willed that he kept failing. He pushed his chair back from the desk, wheels rolling smoothly until it bumped down off the back of the rug, and got to his feet. He had a meeting later that night with... he caught a glance at the clock on the wall and sighed. Time had gotten away from him again, and he'd graded through dinner.

There was a knock at the door. "Come in," he called, glad for a distraction.

The door flew open fast enough to test the antique hinges, and in rushed Professor John Rhee, with a grim face that said he wasn't here to discuss student grades.

"David, have you had the news on?" he demanded, but from the look on the headmaster's face, the answer was plain. John crossed the office to a thirty-inch flatscreen cunningly built into the antique wood paneling on the wall between a model schooner and a bust of Cicero. When the TV swelled to life, it displayed a wide angle of an enormous hospital surrounded by pavilions and emergency vehicles and belching thick, black smoke. One large wing of the building had collapsed into rubble, along with much of the surrounding land, as if a gigantic sinkhole had opened up beneath the foundations, or as if it had been smashed by the hand of God.

"We're being told now that the death toll on the ground has reached fifty, and of course rescue crews have not yet been able to enter the damaged portion of the building. And while of course they hope to find survivors down there, given the devastation from our vantage point, we have to expect that the number of casualties will continue climbing. Once again, we are looking at live images of the Empire State University Hospital in New York City, and while it's unclear whether this destruction was caused by a natural disaster, an accident, or an attack, we can confirm that the Brotherhood of Mutants has claimed responsibility."

David gaped open mouthed at John as he swept in and flipped on the TV, a hello, how are you unsaid as the other talked. His mouth stayed open as the news splashed across the wall in high definition.

"Oh my God," he said. "A hospital? But... why? What can they possibly hope to gain from such... senseless destruction and murder?" Incongruously his stomach chose that moment to growl loudly, and he shrugged apologetically at John.

John watched stonefaced as the newscast cycled through footage taken in the past hour - doctors and orderlies rushing gurney-bound patients out into the biting October air, kevlar-clad SWAT units charging in the opposite direction, and, finally, the arrival of several black Humvees, each one carrying a squad of soldiers in molded body armor and face-concealing masks. Vanguard.

"The hospital wasn't their target," he said. "It just happened to be standing over it."

His jaw tightened as two of the Vanguard troopers on screen dropped into the sinkhole and began throwing aside boulders of debris as if they were made of styrofoam. The camera walked toward them for a better vantage, but it was walled off by a black-gloved hand.

"Under it?" David's lips tightened at the sight of Vanguard's made men flinging debris around. The shot cut away to a talking head, and he met John's eyes. "The only thing they would want that might be under a hospital is..."

"...A Jericho containment facility," John confirmed.

"Shit," he said, leaning forward and putting both his elbows on the desk. David resisted the urge to put his head in his hands.