LeftOvers - How to Become a SuperVillain and Take Over the World

Day - The Second

My head eased forward as I tried not to fall asleep.

I was sitting in History and Usage of Powers, a primer course that was meant to teach us ignorant louts the basics of super powers, their origins, and a few more things that most of us took for granted. I suspect the course was only mandatory because some of these students really did not know what everyone with dial-up could find out in a minute on Google.

I shook my head again and tried not to blink too much. The teacher, a weasley, thin man in an oversized jacket, paced back and forth, revelling in the obnoxious sound of his own voice. "All powers follow some basic rules, though some seem to care less about these than others. For the most part, regardless of the category, all powers fall within two main branches. Inner, or outer."

He paused to look at us and I tried to straighten in my seat. "A Bulker with the ability to make more muscle mass and to regenerate could either be an Inner, where he would make himself stronger, or an Outer could make others more powerful. An Intellect with Inner abilities could out-think a computer, but one with Outer abilities could learn to play the Hungarian Rhapsody in a few minutes time, with no prior experience."

All that was information I had gleaned from watching TV. I noticed that I was not the only student half-assing it in this class, though a few idiots were actually taking notes.

I heard a pen scratching beside me and turned. Clarence sat with pen in hand and notebook open on his desk. I needed to teach the kid to be less of a nerd..

Leaning in towards him I whispered, "Is any of this actually new to you?"

He looked between me and the teacher. The man was still droning on. "Not really, no. I have a few theories about Powers, and I think they might contradict what he's saying. I'm building an argument."

That was far more interesting. "Fair enough," I said. "I'll want to see it later." The last I said to encourage him. You have to throw the dog a bone sometime.

I sat back into my seat and tried to suppress a groan. Clarence and I had met outside my dormitory and he walked with me to our first class; gym. He had kept pace with me the whole time, keeping mostly quiet as we ran about. The kid was stuck to me harder than a leaky tube of superglue.

But he was smart, and it was amusing to pick his brain.

An idea struck me; something my father had always encouraged me to do. I reached into my blazer. The uniform apparently had more than just dress pants and polos. I has seen a few students with blazers that had the Crawford fox/coyote/jackal logo on it, and had found a shop that sold them. The thing needed tailoring and the reddish brown color was vomit-worthy but I could look past that. When I pulled my hand out of the jacket I held a small notepad and pen. I began taking notes.

My life in Crawford was not going at all as I had expected, not that I had expected much. Of the five schools in this city that I had applied to, Crawford was the only one to accept me. That had deflated my ego a little. I knew that my power would never see me topping any list of most powerful supers, but it was handy. And I had always thought myself clever enough to climb the ranks. So far, I was still on the bottom rung at the academy. My problems could be summed up as follows:

One: my dorm room sucked. Oh, it was livable, and I was alone in the two-person room until some time later that week, but it was sort of shabby. The only redeeming quality was the view of Lake Huron from my bed. I needed to find a new place to crash, ASAP.

Two: I needed to get my bearings in the campus and nearby city. I wouldn't always have Clarence to act as my two-legged GPS (The kid had actually memorized maps of the city and campus).

Three: I needed to find out more about teams. Everyone was talking about them, all the damned time. Apparently good teams were like b-rate celebrities. You could also trade members, though it was a complicated process. You were expected to have justification to do it. So far, I had met three of our four members, and one of those meetings had left me a little shaken. The other, Annabelle Clearwater, had never shown hide or hair.

I reached into my jacket and came out with my schedule for the week. My next class was something called Ethics of Heroism. It sounded awfully dull.

Four: I needed to get a grip on all these courses and ditch the time wasters. Maybe I could get Clarence to help me there.

I leaned back and looked at my page of scribbles. This could be manageable.

A grin crossed my features as I added a fifth: Take over the world.

"I'm glad you're enjoying the lesson so much, Mister Cauthon," a nasally voice said.

I snapped my head up and saw that I was now the centre of attention. Oops. The teacher was looking at me, impatiently. "Ah, I'm sorry sir, could you repeat that?"

He sighed. "I would encourage you to pay more attention in class from now on. Unless you can't take notes and listen at the same time?" A few laughs ran across the room.

I balled my fists under the desk. "No sir, it's entirely my fault for not paying attention. Please, why did you call me out?" His face softened just a little. He had reprimanded me, and I acted meekly, that was exactly what he wanted. Father had always told me that appearances were half the battle.

"We were going around the room and stating whether our abilities are Inner or Outer, Mister Cauthon."

"Ah, I see." I cursed myself for my lapse of attention. That was the sort of information that could really be useful if teams were pitted against each other. "My ability is Inner, Sir."

"Thank you, and you, Mister Harrington?" I paid attention for a little bit as he circulated around the room, but most of my mind was elsewhere.

The man droned on for a bit, going on and on about the difference between Inner and Outer abilities. It was nothing new. The standard classification system was handy at shoving labels on people and powers, but worthless beyond that. One Etherist might be able to manipulate the elements by drawing circles in the air, while another might shoot lightning from his fingertips with an incantation. They might both have the same classification, but the two abilities were worlds apart.

It was another twenty minutes before class ended. "Alright everyone, since this is your first day I won't be giving you homework assignments, but I will not always be so kind," the teacher said. "Think about the classification system tonight and how it affects all of your careers as Supers."

Once you knew how useless the system was there was no reason to stick to it. America loved its seven class system. It was Better than the six class European standard. I heard that the Japanese system was far more accurate with over ninety-eight distinct classes, each with a pile of sub-classes tacked on.

"We'll discuss it tomorrow," the teacher said "Class dismissed."

The room emptied in record time.