Chapter Thirty-Two - Expendable in School

The school they picked for their research was called Beausoleil Elementary School, and it was about as lame as a school could be.

They didn't really pick it for its lameness though. They mostly chose that school because it was only a few blocks over from the underpass where they lived.

"Oh man, that place looks awful," Teddy said as she looked at the school. Beausoleil was an old building, made of big chunks of grey stone and with a large archway over the front doors. The blocky main part of the building was three stories tall and sat behind a pair of old trees growing in designated spots in the little parking lot out front.

The wings to either side were much newer, and looked like they'd been added onto the main building a hundred years later or something.

"So, do we just go in?" Trinity asked.

"I guess so," Teddy said. "Can't be that hard, right?"

"It's Saturday," Athena said. "It might be closed."

Someone opened the front door, and a mom and her two kids left the building.

"Okay, so maybe it's not," Athena said. "If we can just go in, then we'll have to act like we're supposed to be there."

"Easy," Trinity said. Then she whipped out one of her big canvas bags with the dollar signs on the sides so that it filled with air and expanded to its full size with a fwump. "Let's do it!"

Teddy grinned then started to step onto the street before Athena reached out and grabbed her--and the nearest Trinity--by the scruff of the neck. "Hey! What did the Boss say about crossing the street?" Athena asked.

A big moving van rumbled by. It wasn't moving all that quickly, but it was pretty big. "I'd have lived," Teddy said, but she sounded whiney even to herself.

Athena just gave her a Look. Athena was good at that. "Big Sis would cry if you died, you know."

Teddy pouted, cheeks puffing out as she broke eye contact. "Yeah, maybe, I guess," she said.

"I die all the time and she doesn't cry," Trinity said. Her smile slowly faded. "Wait, does that mean she doesn't love me as much."

"Don't be an idiot, Big Sis loves you too, even if you're more expendable."

"Woo!" Trinity cheered.

Holding hands, they looked both ways, determined that the next oncoming car wasn't moving quickly either, then they bolted across the street. The woman behind the wheel honked her horn at them and slammed on the brakes, but she didn't run any of them over, so it was okay and they made it to the other side safely.

Then it was time to enter the school proper.

Teddy craned her neck back as they approached. The building was... just an old stone building, but there was something about it. A sort of aura of old authority that stuck to it. It reminded her a bit of a jail, even if she'd never been to jail yet.

Trinity pushed the door open, and they found themselves in a lobby that went off to the right and left. The front bit had an office where a secretary-looking lady was doing something on a computer. She looked up and frowned at them. "Hello?" she said.

"We're supposed to be here," Athena said with confidence before she started walking off to the right.

Teddy nodded and followed after her, then reached back and tugged a Trinity along before she reached one of those big stands with a bunch of pamphlets.

There was a staircase to the right, so they went up the stairs and away from the lobby area. They paused on the second floor. "Now what?" Teddy asked. There were doors open here and there leading into classrooms. They were all empty.

For some reason, Teddy had expected to find them all full of boring brainwashed kids, but she guessed that even those went home on weekends.

"I don't know, this was your idea," Athena said.

"Uh," Teddy replied. "I don't know. Maybe look for signs of capitalism?"

"What would that look like?" Trinity asked.

"Fat people in suits wearing monocles and top hats," Teddy said with confidence. "Maybe smoking cigars and carrying big bags with money and gold."

"I don't think we'll find that in a school," Athena said.

Teddy shrugged. "You don't know that."

Trinity had wandered off as they talked, but she caught Teddy's attention when both of her gasped. "There's an art room!" she said before darting into the room in question.

Teddy and Athena followed, of course.

"Look at all the colours!" Trinity said as she danced across the room. Teddy paused to stare at a wall covered in big pieces of paper with stuff painted on it. They weren't very good paintings. Trinity found a handful of paint brushes and sniffed them, then stuffed them into her bag with a clatter.

The air in this room was thick with the scent of paint and clay and very strong cleaning products. Teddy wasn't sure she liked it, but Trinity seemed to be having fun.

"I'm gonna do a mural," Trinity declared.

"Really?" Teddy asked. "That sounds stupid."

"It'll be of the Boss kicking heroes in the butt, and we can all be there, and you'll be a bear eating a hero, and then the kids will come in and see it and they'll know how awesome we are," Trinity said.

Teddy changed her mind. "Okay, that sounds awesome."

Athena laughed and closed the door, then locked it. "Okay, we'll have to be quick though. Where are you gonna paint it?"

Trinity blinked. "It's a mural. On the wall." She pointed to the wall at the front of the class. Teddy supposed that a blackboard would work well as a canvas.

One Trinity pushed a chair towards the board while another ran around grabbing tubes of paint and a plastic tray thing to mix the paint on. "Teddy, can you help?" she asked.

Teddy shrugged. "Okay, but I want really big teeth."

"Okay!" Trinity agreed.

Working together, they brought a few more chairs to the front of the class so that Trinity had something to walk on that'd let her reach the top of the board, then Teddy held onto the plastic tray while Trinity squeezed some fresh paint onto it.

Athena, meanwhile, stood by the door and kept listening for adults and security guards and heroes, just in case.

Trinity worked fast. She had a big brush in hand and was painting out large blobs of different colours. Teddy had no idea what she was doing at first, though she guessed that the big brown blob was a bear.

It took a few minutes before Trinity finished with the bigger shapes, then she went back and started adding more paint on top of her first layer, this time bringing out smaller details and adding shadows and brighter splotches.

The painting came together pretty quickly. It was the Boss, in her full costume, glaring at someone while her foot stomped on the face of a hero. Athena was in the back, strangling someone, and Maple was there too, with a big toaster gun. There were a few Trinities here and there, of course, and a huge bear on the right side of the painting, its mouth open and filled with bloody hero chunks.

"Nice!" Teddy said as she took in the building image. It was starting to look great, but that was normal because Trinity was good at painting and stuff.

Then there was a hard knock on the door. "Hello?" someone said on the other side.

The handle jiggled.

"Quick!" Teddy said, "Add the last details."

Trinity nodded fast and started to move faster.

Something that sounded a lot like a key fitting into a slot sounded from the doorway, and all three of them froze. Then Athena spun and hissed at them. "Look natural!"

The door opened, and they discovered an older woman standing there. She blinked, taking the three of them in, confusion writ large across her face. Then she noticed the mural. "What in the world," she said.

"Oops," Athena said. "Is this not... outside? Our bad," she said.

"That's fresh paint... What are you three doing in here?" she asked.

"We're lost," Athena said.

"Did you paint that?"

"No," Trinity said. She was covered in droplets and splotches of paint. It wasn't very convincing.

The woman shook her head. "I can't believe this. All three of you, with me, now," She snapped. "We're going to the principal's office. When your parents find out about this, I swear."

Teddy grinned. Joke was on her, they didn't have parents!

***