E L E V A T I O N

[Noctis the Devious]

OOC and Sign Ups

c h a p t e r |o n e
BLACK OUT
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Ariana stood there as patiently as she could as her instructor pointed out the workings of the BPC and explained what each component did and and how it worked. The room she and the rest of her class were in was hot and stuffy from the heat the machines were throwing off and without much ventilation they were left to bake. The tinkerer tugged at her clothes in discomfort, finding it unbelievably hard to focus under such conditions. While Helsigo Academy was well known and praised for the hands on experience and unethical teaching techniques it offered its students, Ariana, for once, wished she was in a normal classroom learning all of this. "Any questions?" the man asked the gathered students, clasping his hands together and rubbing them. It was a quirk Ariana had noticed within a week under his wing and made itself known when he was eager it move on.

"Yeah, when can we get the hell out of here?" The wise cracker of the group piped up from somewhere in the back, eliciting some laughs.

Their instructor allowed himself a smirk and couldn't help but to say, "No pun intended?" He was about to say more, when the red lights suddenly cut off and the room was left in silence. The group of aspiring mechanics and engineers mumbled among themselves and their instructor called over them, "Alright, alright, settle down. In a calm manner, get out your BP lights and file out of the room. Watch the machines. They might be off, but they're still hot to the touch."

Ariana frowned and reached for the electronic device on her utility belt when everyone's walkie-talkies crackled to life all at once, "Calling all mechanics, be advised, we have a situation in the cylinders. I repeat, we have a situation in the cylinders." The class froze under the soft blue glow emitting from the BP lights everyone now held and turned to their instructor. The cylinders were what they called the public area a great number of people used to traverse the academy. They held within them E-vates, hovering platforms powered by blue plasma that utilized a duo system. By standing on one E-vate, another would activate and spin around it and the user had control over where and when the second E-vate stopped. This allowed for free mobility across the room along one singular plane.

"Copy that, over," Mr. Fulna replied before returning the walkie to its holder. "Alright, you know what to do. We'll be handling floors four to one in Charlie." As the students filed out of the engine room, the emergency lights kicked on for the basement levels. Cylinder C, or Charlie as most took to calling it, was located nearest to them and didn't take long for them to reach it; however, the cylinders didn't reach the basements and they took the emergency staircases. "Alright, I want at least one person at each panel, the sooner we can get these moving again the better," Mr. Fulna instructed. The class spread out and Ariana eventually ended up on floor four. The last three upper floors were covered by another class.

Thanks to the cylinders being made up of mostly glass, a lot of natural light escaped into the room and allowed the students to see what the were doing. Ariana flashed a smile as one the students stuck on the suspended E-vade before kneeling down and working open the panel for it. "So how's your day going?" As she tinkered with the wiring in an effort to find the Blue Plasma cell powering it, a small commotion caught her attention. She stopped and looked up with a quirked eyebrow. "What--"

"These aren't going to fall, are they?" a near by strandee demanded.

"No. E-vates have two Blue Plasma cells, one to keep them aloft and another to propel them forward. When we have situations like these, the second powers down to conserve energy while the first continues to keep the E-vate--" The E-vates she was working on wobbled once more and the stranded students and faculty began to grow concerned. "Mr. Fulna, we have 401 at E-vate 4-9. I repeat, we have a 401 at E-vate 4-9." Questions were thrown at the mechanic student and she did her best to keep everyone calm.

Finally, there was a clap from behind her. "Alright, everybody, listen up," Mr. Fulna yelled over the talking. "We're going to initiate a full evacuation. Those who can 'port I would suggest you do so now." Ladders were being brought up and slid across the large gaps between the level they were standing on and the E-vates stuck in hover. "The rest of you are going to have to walk across these lad--" The E-vate under the 401 wobbled again and light emitting from the center flickered before going out completely. Ariana acted without thought, sprinting across the ladder and diving after the falling student. Once she had a grip on their arm, she grabbed the grapple hook from her utility belt and shot it at the extended ladder. It all went by too fast yet too slow all at once as she watched the metallic claw torpedo toward the only thing it had to grab on to and bit into the wooden frame. The two snapped to a stop and for a terrifying split second, she almost lost her grip on the gun.

Down below, the E-vate continued it's decent, clattering into a newly evacuated one and causing it to buckle under the force. Both were sent crashing to the bottom. The ring was deafening. For a long moment the cylinder held its breath, Ariana shook from adrenaline, and then, "Hey, Ari, how's the weather down there?" Ariana wanted to laugh and choke their wise cracker all at the same time.

"Great, you should try it some time," she managed to quip back, a slight shake to her voice.

"Clever, how strong is your motor?" her instructor asked from his position on the fourth level.

"250 cpi."

"Great, let's bring her home, yeah?"

"Aye-aye captain." A button was pressed on the gun of her grappling hook and the two suspenders started their sluggish ascend.

 

[Vernyx]

Richter listened to the instructor, who was currently teaching a simple counter-attack. They were outside on the training field, and you could see a lot of the campus from here. "Now, I will need all students with an emotional source of 'magic' to step up." Richter moved to allow a student behind him to step up.

"Alright. To channel energy into a counter-attack on an emotional level, you must first understand the basics of counter-attacks in general. Now, A counter attack is used to throw off your opponent after they have done their attack. The opponent will be off-guard after doing their attack, which gives you a chance to strike. You will use this a lot when in a battle, which I hope you won't have to be in often."

He paused to allow the students to think about this.

"Now. The emotional level students will need to focus on their emotion. If they are sadness, they will need to focus their sadness in their strike. If the person has made you sad in the past, focus that energy into your counter-attack. If they are anger, focus your hatred into your strike. If they are happiness, don't think about your attacker. Focus on your happy emotions, and think about the future, and how much more happiness there will be. If you focus on this, you will want to keep going with life, and therefore will have more power in your attack."

Richter's instructor stopped.

"Now. Focus this energy into your counter-attack, after performing the simple force field that I taught you last week. You are first," he said, pointing at a student.

He stepped forward and readied himself. The instructor shot a small fireball at the boy, which he deflected with a force field. He then shot a beam of light at the instructor, which he deflected in the same fashion. "Very good. Next!"

He did this with each of the emotional students. He then called the physical group. Richter stood at the front of the class with about 10 other students.

"Now. The physical group must focus their energy into their outlets. That would be your fists, your feet, your knees, your elbows, and whatever else you may use to attack your opponent. You must also project the energy into your legs. That way, you may run toward your opponent quickly after said opponent attacks. If you can't do this, you may want to use this energy to avoid all further attacks while running. Then, you may strike. Richter! Ready up!"

Richter got into a fighting stance. His instructor shot a fireball his direction. Richter ran forward, channeling energy into his feet as he did so. He jumped over the fire and, upon hitting the ground, did a combat roll. He got up while still running forward. He threw a left kick at his instructor's stomach, which he jumped out of the way of. The energy blast from his foot went flying through the air.

"Uh-ohhhhhh..." Richter's eyes widened as the blast crashed into one of the cylinders. Electricity coursed through it and spread to the rest of the area.

 

[Dragon Rebellion]

Andrea's head leaned against her hands; her elbows placed squarely on her desk and mind off in another world. Mrs. Taylor was droning on yet again about the basics of forming a psychic link between two evols. Psychic links were on of the most basic types of psychic magic. And yet, this was the third time the class had to go over them this month. Every time they got to the practical trial, someone ended up in the infirmary with uncontrollable giggling or frenzied sobbing and the class was back at square one again.

Andrea decided to rest her eyes a little. After all, the teacher was just explaining the exact same thing she'd heard a hundred times all ready. It's not like she was missing anything. And the classroom had no windows to look out of, so options were limited. she let her eyelids close, relishing the few seconds of darkness.

At least, she did until someone screamed.

Wanting to know what had happened that warranted a scream. Andrea opened her eyes. Or did she? She couldn't see a thing. Andrea tried blinking a few times. Still nothing. Her eye were definitely open. There was just nothing to be seen. Everything was dark.

Mrs. Taylor was trying to calmly tell the students to leave the classroom and head to where natural light could be found. So all Andrea needed to do was navigate her way through the large maze of desks and frightened students that had become the classroom. Great.

Though it wasn't hard for her to do so (the dark was her specialty, of course), it was certainly a hassle to cast a limited omniscience spell. Sliding her headphones onto her ears, Andrea closed her eyes again and let the abstinence of light inform her of the layout of the room. She could feel every frantic student and up-turned desk. She could feel poor Mrs. Taylor trying and failing to guide the students with power sources different from Andrea's own. And, at last, she felt the door.

"Freedom at last," Andrea whispered to her self as she started making her way through the classroom labyrinth. She still felt the scrambling of other students and couldn't help but snicker a little at their fruitless efforts, especially when it was so simple for her. Finally, she reached the door. Opening it quickly sent the feeling of cold water running over her throughout her body as the light of the hallway windows washed all the traces of the spell from her being.

"Bye bye, losers. See you all next class." Andrea said, mostly to herself, as she left the rest of the class to fend for themselves, flouncing off to whatever it is she felt like doing next.

 

[Cheesecake]

Roland paced around the firing range, overseeing the training of the new security hired for the Academy. The guards knelt down on the range, aiming their rifles at the floating targets that hovered in the firing area. Shots of orange flew across the field, most missing, but a few met their mark and sent the magical targets falling with a crash. Roland kept a mental note on which guards were better at shooting, and the ones who were just goofing off. Jotting down his daily report on their progress, he made his way down to the courtyard.

Here the guards were practicing melee and hand-to-hand combat. The clang of swords on swords and thuds of young backs on the dirt were heard all across the court. Some of the trainers here were teaching would-be sellswords along with the regular guards. These children were training to become killers for coin when the day came. It wouldn't make due if they were horsing around, like the two goofballs Roland saw just standing around and chatting. Walking over, Roland put on his sternest and angriest face.

"You youngbloods done yapping?" he demanded. Youngblood was a term he got from the orcs back in his soldier days.

"U-um, yes sir!" one of the kids said, surprised when Roland appeared behind him out of nowhere. "We were just, um, uh-"

"Talking about, you know, techniques! Yeah, techniques!" his friend chimed in.

"Techniques, huh? Here's one," he said. He led the confused kids into the barracks, opening the supply closet and taking out a mop and a bucket. "The trick is to put the mop in the bucket and clean the toilets." He gave the mop to one boy and the bucket to the other. "Latrine duty for a week. Now."

The boys scurried away with their cleaning utensils as Roland made his way back to the training yard. As he was nearing the yard, he heard some commotion coming from outside the academy campus. Some students and teachers were outside, waiting for something. Making his way there, he questioned one of the teachers.

"What seems to be the problem, sir?"

"There's been a power outage," the teacher answered. "We've contacted the mechanics already, but some of the students are still inside. Some rooms have no natural light whatsoever, so those trapped there are completely in the dark."

"I'll send in guards to escort them safely outside."

Roland walked back to the barracks, readying some guards with artificial lights to pick up the students still in the school. "Alright, youngbloods. Just get in there and find the students." The guards made their way out, heading inside to find the students.