OPEN: Back to business as usual [ Classrooms – Tattoo studio – Shooting range – Gym ]

[a_shadow]

Who: Agent Texas and OPEN
When: Any time in the month of November
Where: Classrooms, tattoo studio, shooting range, gym
What: Just a catch-all for anyone who wants to interact with Tex
Warnings: Perhaps some language, shouldn't be anything else

CLASSROOMS

Now that Tex has been released from restriction by Medical, she returns to spending the mornings in the classrooms, preparing lesson plans and teaching those students who should decide to arrive during her shift. In some ways this job makes her restless, but she also enjoys it, especially interacting with the kids, who she has come to think of fondly. They're all unique and have interesting viewpoints, and she has come to see that as a valuable thing.

Whenever a student comes into the room, she ceases what she's doing and looks up, and she stands if she happens to be sitting. Most of the time she even offers a small smile, and gestures for the student to enter. "Hey," she greets them, and welcomes them to a desk.

TATTOO STUDIO

Use of the tattoo studio is strictly by appointment, of course, but she prides herself in being able to do the work, and she always makes herself available if someone contacts her wanting one. She always shows up early when she has a tattoo to give so she can sanitize everything properly and change the needles. When her client arrives, she's always ready to get started.

SHOOTING RANGE

Tex works in the shooting range daily, spending most of the afternoon there, preparing the dry-firing system that she and Ryuuzaki have devised. It means recycling parts from the scoring system, but by the end of the month she intends to have the system set up and ready. In the meantime, she also spends time each afternoon getting acquainted with her weapons again, shooting off several rounds and doing maintenance on weapons people should happen to bring in that need attention.

Unfortunately, with the scoring system out of commission, she has to score any contests manually, but that's no obstacle to her participating if someone should challenge her. And of course, she's always willing to give people a few pointers on shooting, if they ask.

GYM

Tex's major project now that she's off of medical restrictions is to regain her former strength, speed, and agility, and that means spending a good couple of hours in the gym daily. She stretches, then swims, then does the weights, and ends each session with a good spar if she can get it, or work with the heavy bags if she can't. She's still somewhat weak at the beginning of the month, but by the end of the month it's clear she's making real progress.

She's come to see each person who visits the gym in the evening when she's there as friendly competition, and she's not afgraid to challenge someone to spar if they seem to be on a similar level. She has to get used to not being the clear winner like she always used to be, though.

Comments

classrooms

[carltoaction]

It's been a while since Carl has actually seen a classroom, so when he passes by the open door, happening to see a lesson almost in session, he stops right in his tracks. Why? Because he remembers it's how he made friends once upon in his world and the other he was in before this one. A feeling in the pit of his stomach tells him there's no harm checking in on it either. His parents always valued education when it came to him, after all.

Stepping into the room cautiously, Carl eyes the woman when she turns to greet him. Her smile, he thinks, was encouraging enough. Maybe this could turn into something worthwhile for him. But he still had reservations given how life was for him anywhere. "Hey." He acknowledges her with a nod back, but makes no move to sit down at a desk. "You really teach stuff to kids in here?"

[a_shadow]

"I really do," she says, picking up one of the tablet computers and walking over to him to hand it to him. "We have a set of tablets with a full curriculum on them, so basically, you just have to pick something to learn and I go with it. Are you interested?"

[carltoaction]

He eyes her, literally eyes her, in a hesitant fashion when she approaches him seemly so open and optimistically about it. And he doesn't know what to do other than take the tablet in both his hands after a few seconds and glance down at it. Right away he see all the basic courses on it, but he doesn't know where he stands on grade level or if any of them interest him per se, so then he glances back up at her.

"Um. I don't know yet. What's your suggestion to anybody that comes in here?" He kind of doesn't feel he should admit his interest in guns and survival skills that could be useful in space. Not to someone that appears normal. To someone who wouldn't understand. Not right away, at least.

[a_shadow]

"Just pick something you're interested in," she says. "There's no school board deciding things for you, and for the most part you're more likely to retain knowledge you're interested in gaining, so I just let encourage cherry-picking from the curriculum. I have no way of knowing what will be useful in your home universe when you get back, and what's useful there is probably not what's useful here. So I sort of think that taking the effort to learn something and engage the mind is more important than learning specific things in a specific order. Does that make sense?"

It really had more to do with the fact that so many of the kids had been turned off by Alice's regimented way of teaching, going so far as to require homework and tests, which had led to a lot of truancy. Tex figured as long as kids were interested enough to show up, that was half the battle.

[carltoaction]

"Okay," he says. His thumb presses against the tablet screen to see if that will make the list move up or down. When it works, he scrolls through the options. None of the basic stuff interests him, of course, but eventually he does stop on one with a bit of curiosity in his lone eye.

"What's 'Exploration and Navigation?'"

[a_shadow]

She's pleased he seems to have found something that interests him. "It's working out where we are in space and how to get where you want to be," she replies. "That, and probably documenting what you find."

[carltoaction]

"So, like mapping the constellations? Big dipper and little dipper or whatever ones are out there now." He asks. Fortunately, he's read up on the subject recently enough to have an idea of what he is talking about already. He's definitely interested if that is the case, too.

[a_shadow]

"It's a bit different from constellations since you're moving among the stars rather than all on the same planet," she says. "There's no true north in space." She pauses, taking in how he's holding the tablet, how he's investigating the info on the screen. "What do you think of that?"

[carltoaction]

Hm, so then he had figured wrong. That doesn't change his mind though. "Oh," he says. "So what do we document? The planets?"

His eye drops back down to the tablet to go over and puzzle out what the class does again. The description doesn't really help him just like before, but he shows he has a level of understanding to quickly use the functions of the tablet and explore on the class by clicking on this or that button. She doesn't even need to answer all his questions before he finds the enrolment button and stops tentatively just sort of clicking it.

[a_shadow]

"Yes. Any place we explore or stop at." She notices him reaching for that button and waits to see what he will end up doing. His account in the system is already set up, bound to the information from his MID.

[carltoaction]

"And is that a class thing or an individual thing?" His finger subconsciously rests on top of the bottom he needs to press, not yet removing it so it'll click just yet. He's almost decided though.

[a_shadow]

"The way I teach, everything is individual. I like you all to have something that'll interest you going on, and that's not necessarily going to be what's interesting to your classmates." It seems he's decided, despite all his questions, though.

[carltoaction]

The way she says that makes him smile a little at the corners and look back up to her. "You sound like you're trying to sell it to me, but okay, I'm in." And he means he is. He's convinced she would be interesting enough to try this out, anyway. It's what his dad would want and it's something maybe to help him pass the time.

And she's right about that. The finger he held on the button lifts up and his name enters into the system. He hands her back the tablet after briefly glancing to look at his success.

shooting range

[ventifact]

Rey knows she can shoot a gun--her issue is shooting a gun well. She knows that her lightsaber and staff aren't always the most practical weapons, and it isn't like she doesn't have the time on her hands to train with a ranged weapon. So she might as well, right?

The shooting range is a foreign place to her, and she treads lightly. The gunfire is loud, much louder than the blasters she's used to, but she does her best to ignore it and not flinch. She isn't exactly sure where to start, so it's a huge relief when she sees a familiar face. Rey wastes no time in approaching Tex. "Hey."

[a_shadow]

Tex is cleaning a gun on the table at the end of the room and she looks up when Rey approaches. "Hey there," she says. "I haven't seen you here before."

[ventifact]

Hazel eyes fall on the gun, and she raises an eyebrow. It looks very... primitive to be on a starship. But beggars can't be choosers, and it at least looks as if Tex knows what she's doing. "That's because I've never been. But I think it's time I expand my horizons when it comes to weaponry."

[a_shadow]

"That's good. We have some guns I bought on the minicolony when we were there. Would you like to check any of those out?" Rey wouldn't know much about what she was looking at, probably, but there are several models to try. She's sure to find something that appeals to her and that will fit well in her hand.

[ventifact]

That's as good an idea as any, she decides, and nods. "Show me what you've got." She's no connoisseur of any kind of weapon, but there's bound to be something she can work with, right? The odds of her being completely out of luck are pretty low.

[a_shadow]

She selects a weapon, a slim semi-automatic rifle, and turns to hand it to Rey. "This one is easy to control, not much kick-back. It's a smaller caliber than the ones I use, though."

[ventifact]

After a few lessons, Rey might be concerned with what Tex uses. But for the time being, something that's easy sounds good to her. She takes the weapon, testing its weight and giving it an almost incredulous look. "It's so..." She tries to find the right descriptor, and can only come up with one word: "... mechanical."

[a_shadow]

Tex suppresses a smirk. "Guns have been made along the same principles, where I'm from, for a few hundred years. I guess no one thought they ought to improve on what they had."

She starts showing Rey the controls—how to fire it, how to drop the clip, how to turn on the safety.

"You want to load the clip up with bullets yourself?" she asks when they're done.

[ventifact]

Learning the parts won't be a problem--Rey has always been a quick study, even with technology considered nearly obsolete. She'd refurbished her AT-AT home, after all, and had worked with more than a few ships older than the Empire itself. No, her problem will be with the actual operation of the gun; she's used to having simulators, where messing up doesn't run the risk of actually killing someone. But if there's anybody she'd trust to teach her, it's Tex. So she takes a deep breath, and nods. Yes, she can load a clip with bullets. Even if she's never seen a bullet in her life, she understands their purpose and how they work. "Sure. It's no power pack, but I'm sure I can handle it."

[a_shadow]

She hands over the clip and holds the box of bullets out so that Rey can take them, one at a time, and place them in its spring-loaded chamber. She believes in letting people handle their own equipment, get familiar with that particular weapon's quirks and such. So she'll just wait patiently while Rey explores the feel of the thing, the whole process.