Issue 1 Downtime

Regan sat outside Nailah's office, waiting for her.

Of course, the wait would probably be shorter if Regan had in any way announced herself, but Regan still saw it as a personal failing of Nailah's.

And so she probably sat around for quite a while until Nailah steps out of her office for lunch.

"Good afternoon..." Nailah says, quirking an eyebrow.

"Hey," Regan says, "I was supposed to come see you earlier. But I didn't want to."

"But then there was no one in the commons to turn on the TV so I thought, whatever."

"I'm Regan."

"Regan? Oh, Miss Rourke, is it?" Think Nailah. You've read that name. A mail from X-Corp maybe? Damnit, that tranquilizer packed some punch...

"So you decided to wait for my lunch break. Lovely. I'm professor Weaver, please excuse the current extent of my physical mutation." She holds out her hand/paw to Regan.

Regan reaches her hand right through Nailah's paw, keeping eye contact the entire time.

Nailah manages to show no surprise whatsoever, even though she obviously didn't expect this.

"Right. You're incorporeal. X-Corp mentioned they were bringing you here. Have you settled in okay?"

"I have elaborate fantasies where I tie up the other students and faculty and stuff snails in their mouths," Regan says, "Then I burn the school down."

"I can already see this is going to be a lovely day. I'm grabbing lunch. Walk with me."

"Of course," Regan says, floating alongside Nailah, "Nothing I like better than watching people eat."

"Two can play this game, Miss Rourke. You act like you don't want to be here, but there is nothing stopping you. So I can only assume you're being abrasive for the sake of it. Personally I don't care, if it makes you feel better then go ahead but I'm hungry and I'm getting lunch. Maybe you can try to prevent me from enjoying it."

"If I could spit into your food I would," Regan says, "So, why did I need to talk to you anyway?"

"Because you're pretty coherent for a ghost. Or do you prefer specter? Lost soul? Personally I would call you a ba. A soul separated from it's body and life-force. Caught between this world and the next because you cannot move on without first cutting the spiritual link to your body. Of course that's just my opinion and I'm sure if you ask around you'll hear a dozen different explanations, but the difference is, if you try to spit in my food I will get very cross with you."

"I don't have any saliva," Regan says, "Yet."

"Of course not. And judging by your attitude that's probably a good thing for everyone involved right now. Nevertheless I might be able to help you obtain some other things. If you are going to attend classes you'll need a way to take notes and do homework after all."

"Yeah, I absolutely need school supplies," Regan says, "That way I have all sorts of ways to not do my assignments."

"If you're going to fail you can do so on your own accord. If the Hounds of Tindalos eat your homework then it's up to that particular teacher to deal with you. Should you, however, manage to get bored enough to actually be productive then I'd gladly see if we can't get you some other things as well."

"How are you even planning to do all this?"

"I'm going to perform a burial for you."

"What every girl always wanted."

"I know, it's a dream come true. Nevertheless,it should allow me to give you offerings to assist you in the afterlife. Usually this would be plates, jewelry, coins, furniture, pottery. I think we can update it to bring it more up to speed though. It's a little more involved than it might sounds right now, but I think I might be able to give you a little taste." she says as they step into the dining hall.

"Could you bury me a boat?" Regan asks, "I could use a boat."

"Let's try to start a little smaller than that." she says, getting in a line that seems a little nervous to be between her and food so it doesn't take long until Nailah is carrying a tray with some roast and mashed potatoes to one of the tables.

"I was thinking maybe a chair and a desk. A bed. Pen and paper."

"How about a dog?" Regan says, "To keep me company."

"Maybe you'll get lucky and one is caught in traffic near the school." Nailah deadpans and takes out a pen from her bag. Then something that looks like a very odd sextant and a pendulum.

"Are you going to kill the pen?" Regan asks, "Is this pen murder?"

"How, pray tell, would one go about killing a pen?" she asks, beginning to draw strange symbols on the table. Well, not that strange to anyone who ever turned on the History channel. She's writing hieroglyphs, occasionally adding a circle here and there, connecting them with lines.

"I dunno, I'm not a sick pen murderer."

Nailah just rolls her eyes before closing them.

"Khesef-tu Tem uten-nef senef sai set. Un re-a, apu re-a an Shu em nut-ef tui ent baat en pet enti ap-nef. May the Gods remove the wrappings that bind these offers so they may serve in death as they did in life." she mumbles, and for a moment Regan would feel a rush of warmth, like standing next to a space heater. It only lasts for the fraction of a second, then Nailah opens her eyes again.

"Bon appetite." she says, sliding the plate over to Regan, causing a very strange effect when what her hand pushes over is like a translucent, faded copy of her meal while her actual lunch doesn't move.

Regan carefully picks the tray up and takes a deep breath in.

Then she drops it on the ground.

"I don't need to eat," Regan says, "I'm dead. And I'm not too interested in pretending I'm alive."

"Very well. I'll see about getting you set up with school supplies. You'll be expected to attend class and turn in homework just like everybody else. If you change your mind about pretending to be alive, you know where my office is."

"And if you're interested in being dead for awhile, you know where to find me," Regan says, "I'll be happy to help."

"It hurts much less in the long run if you admit that you're miserable. Believe me." Nailah says before getting up and turning around to leave.

"I actually totally believe you're miserable," Regan says, "Have a nice lunch."

((Sometime Later))

Some mystery person covered the interior walls and various surfaces of Ms. Weaver's office with ghostly post-it notes, notecards, and sheets of paper. Each one having one of a variety of insulting and profane hieroglyphics in the middle of the night.

Who it was would truly be a mystery.

Obviously she isn't able to just pick them up and thus Nailah lets out an exasperated sigh upon coming into her office the next day. She goes about her day ignoring them, since she spends most of her time in the classrooms anyway, but during her lunch-break she sets about cleaning up. Banishing every piece of paper or post-it individually. Her mood during her afternoon-classes is accordingly.

She asks Regan to come see her after class and then proceeds to wait, idly wondering if Sam would take her up on betting whether the frustrated ghost would show up or not.

Regan showed up. She was thirty-five minutes late, but she did show up.

"You wanted to see me?" Regan asks, floating through one of the windows.

"Yes. You have detention the rest of the week, starting tomorrow." she says, barely looking up from the paperwork she's been working on when Regan floated in.

"That's totally unfair," Regan says, "Anyone could have vandalized your office with the school supplies you gave me. It didn't have to be me."

"In that case you should take better care of them. Tomorrow, 3pm, detention. Don't make me drag you there."

"Fine," Regan says, "See if I ever do anything nice for you ever again."

With that, Regan floated out of the office.