Dresden Academy

Who: All of the students
What: The kids pull of a rather impressive protest/April Fool's prank
Where/When: Jillian Hulett's office. After curfew on April 1st.
Rating: NSFW

It took Luka exactly one afternoon to formulate a plan. The timing was almost perfect and after spit-balling around with Sighard he had a grand smirk on his face. The students would be ripe for rebellion by the time he activated the plan that Sighard codenamed: Hurricane Hulett.

They were going to have a party during their grounding. They were probably going to get caught. The upshot was that they'd all be there and as their headmistress said, she couldn't very well expel the entire student body. But the best part was that they were going to do it in Jillian Hulett's office.

He devised a charm with his top advisers that would allow the students to stand vertically on all of the walls and ceiling to maximize space. All they had to do was wait for the perfect day: April Fool's, and their plan was a go.

Sighard made sure he was on the ground floor of this one. Luka assured him that if anyone pointed fingers he would take the blame. Sig didn't really care about that. Let them try to expel him; he had other options. He was in this for the fun of it, the sheer joy of planning a massive rebellion and making sure that all of the upperclassmen would get involved.

He went into the risky business of setting up portkeys that would send students from their dorms directly to Hulett's office and then zoom back to the dorms for another load. He made sure each dorm had at least one, an innocuous looking bit of paper or a donated shoe for the effort. He was pleased to find that the students were as into this as he and Luka.

At the appointed hour he used the Champlain portkey and arrived in Hulett's office to find that Luka was already busy putting the final touches on the walls and ceiling. He had buckets of paint already cracked open and was wearing a white t-shirt and old jeans as he'd instructed all of the students to wear as well.

They weren't just having a party in Hulett's office. They were going to redecorate.



Bernadine had her doubts about this party, but the instructions insisted that all of the upperclassmen had to attend in order for any of them to be safe. She waited for Adelaide to take the University portkey; she could play up on the need for solidarity during the rebellion and then they could go back to 'officially' hating each other after. She had on Abby's rattiest flannel shirt and a pair of jeans with holes that were getting ready for the garbage. "Ready?" she asked the other girls who were about to grip the scrap of paper left in their shared suite.

"This is such a stupid idea," Addy muttered mournfully. She hadn't said anything on Luka's journal while the ideas snowballed because she was still keeping that awkward distance, but now she wished she had. He'd had some crazy ideas before, but this was a new level of ridiculous. Academic suicide, too. The idea was that Hulett couldn't expel them all-- but she'd punish the instigators to hell and back if she ever found out, and with the way gossip spread around Dresden, she had little doubt that would happen.

She put her finger on a corner of the paper, and the room started to spin as the others joined in. Soon they were crammed into Hulett's office, standing on the wall opposite the window overlooking the commons.

Bernadine let go of the paper and as soon as all of the hands were removed it disappeared, whizzing back to the University dorm to pick up another load. It was dark in the room, the lights hadn't been turned on yet, but when she looked down she saw the outline of glow tape in the dark room (not tape, paint, the more she looked the more she was convinced it was paint). A drop zone had already been painted on the floor and they were ushered from it by the MC of Transport, Sighard.

"Ladies," he said quite congenially. He flicked his wand carefully along the floor to the cluster of paint cans and supplies. Lumos illuminated the strip of glowing paint that lead the way and circled the cans. "If you would pick up a paintbrush and find yourself a little artistic spot. We'll get things underway as soon as we're sure everyone's here."

Addy groaned. So a forbidden party wasn't enough. They had to destroy her office, too. They were going to get themselves killed. "Whatever happened to just stuffing puffskeins under the door?"

"Not enough of a statement," Sighard replied and then returned his attention to the gathering crowd in the drop zone.

Bernadine stayed glued to Addy's side. "Stick with me," she whispered. If they were going to get crucified, at least they'd be together.

"Have you ever dealt with a room full of puffskein shit?" She argued after Sighard, but he was already gone and instructing the next group on how to vandalize the office. She pursed her lips and turned her head to the side to whisper just loud enough for Bernadine to hear, "This is going to be a total disaster."

"We're in it together, though. I don't think the kids at my old school would have organized such a blatant rebellion and stuck together."

Addy couldn't decide if that was a lack of solidarity or just some common sense. Nothing she could lay claim to at any rate, because here she was, paintbrush in hand, ready to go down with this ship as big a sinking as it was going to be. "Know many dirty limericks?" She asked with an almost resigned sigh, starting to write on the wall about a wizard from Punt.

Bernadine laughed. "Not one for poetry," she supplied. "Maybe I'll paint some flowers." Then she remember she was supposed to be Abby not Bernadine. It was easy enough to forget in the dark. "Fucking flowers," she added to clarify. "I'll paint them in all kinds of nasty positions."

"You'd know!" Carly yelled from somewhere nearby. "Nasty positions I mean." But then she was laughing in an almost friendly way and turned back to smear a handful of melted peppermints along the window casing.

Addy shuddered and gagged loud enough for both Bernadine and Carly's benefit, and got started on the one about the witch who owned twenty ducks.

Anastas found his way toward the girls once he'd heard Carly's little outburst and bumped Bernadine's hip. "The trouble I get into for you," he teased and started adding penises and gigantic breasts to all of her flowers.

"So much for keeping him out of trouble," Addy rolled her eyes and stepped back from her wall of filthy rhymes. "I forgot how this one ends."

"And quacked they didn't give a fuck," Bernadine supplied. Then she was laughing at the silence around her and the fact that Anastas was most definitely staring at her in amazement. "I like jokes," she said and swatted him with her wet paintbrush.

Addy just raised an eyebrow. "Should I put up the one about Morse or is that crossing several lines?" She twirled the paintbrush in her hand thoughtfully. "It'd go so well next to that guy," she mused, jabbing it towards Bernadine's latest flower.

"No, but put one up about Walsh. He's bad ass enough that he'll see it as an homage!"

"I don't know a limerick about Walsh! Only the one about Morse! And I'm kind of horrified that I know it." She started writing it up anyway.

There is a professor named Morse,
Who is a student favourite of course.
Not because of his classes,
Or how he kicks asses,

Her writing became particularly hideous towards the end as she started giggling like a lunatic and covered her face with her spare hand.

Bernadine was trying to lean close enough to the wall to read it. Anastas strained over her shoulder, hands wrapping happily around her waste. "It's too fucking dark," she said, at which point a perfectly rectangular light appeared and she could finally read the last bit of Addy's chicken scratch.

But because the man's hung like a horse!

Anastas was laughing so hard, he didn't hear the chaos happening below them, but he did turn to the source of the light and found a very disapproving teacher. "We're caught," he whispered, half between desperation and horror. He squeezed Bernadine tighter to him as if he could protect her from whatever punishment this particular teacher might rain down.



Maddy wasn't going to miss this, was even a little bit excited when Anastas de Kooning sidled up near her and frowned at the abandoned shoe that was their portkey. She lost him quickly in the crush of bodies inside the office. It was too dark to find the people she wanted, so she grabbed a brush and popped up to the ceiling.

"Yo Maddy, you going to charm your dress up?" Riley stood underneath her and smacked a dab of paint onto the end of her nose.

She laughed at him and shook her brush so it would dribble paint along his side. "And give everyone a show? Baby, they haven't paid for their tickets."

"If you don't charm it up, it's going to fall down. Gravity, and all." He offered her a very innocent grin, as if he didn't mind this outcome at all.

She hadn't been thinking about gravity in three dimensions. "Oh hell," she said and then did as he suggested, charming the skirt to float by her knees no matter where she happened to be standing. "How's the view from down there?" she asked. Most of the kids near her had found a spot and were crouched on the ceiling to paint in earnest now, some of them using their wands to light the way, some of them swirling paint around in the dark without care.

He grinned. "Not as awesome as it had the potential to be five seconds ago," he teased. "We should tie paintbrushes to all the dancefags and get 'em to give us an interpretive dance commentary on what they see down here. It's art squared."

Arnaud made a noise like disapproval. "The dancefags, Riley?"

"Hey, I didn't come up with that one. He started it." He pointed to a longhaired student from the dance group, swaying away in his own little world as he painted long, semi-phosphorent curls around the light fitting on the ceiling. "Take it up with him."

"Reclaiming it, man..." the boy replied drowsily.

"Reclaiming my ass," Arnaud replied smartly and flicked some paint at both of them.

Maddy giggled. "Oooo. I should write that on the ceiling. One of the Vagina Monologues. Reclaiming Cunt." She turned to her work giddily and got to writing it out. She had the whole thing memorized, considering it was one of her favorites. "Though honestly, a proper lady would never use that word in a sentence."

"A 'proper lady' wouldn't use the subject of the monologue either," Riley pointed out. "Good thing we're past all that 'dictating how a lady should act' bullshit, right?"

"Never said I was a lady."

Arnaud snorted. "You're about the closest thing to a lady I can think of," he interjected. He didn't have Riley's problem with 'roles and etiquette.'

"How many ladies do you know?" she asked, both amused and horrified that she was his idea of a lady.

"Arnaud's a classy guy," Riley said in support of Arnaud's statement. "He knows loads of ladies. If I were a lady, I'd make him be my GBFF."

"But you are decidedly not a lady," she replied with a wink he wouldn't see in the dark.

"No, Mads, he's something else altogether," Arnaud agreed with a grin.

"I could be a lady," he started to protest, but then the door was opening and right then he was more an active participant in a destructive protest than he was anything like a lady. He reached up to the very extent of his height and snatched the paintbrush out of Maddy's hand so that at least she could argue that she didn't have any tools of vandalism on her.



Veronica was beyond the point of doubt. She had worked herself into a straight tizzy. She could end this rebellion right now and tell Jillian Hulett what the students were up to. It was part of her job, being student body president, to look out for the others and make sure they were happy with their student experience.

But they weren't very happy, were they? Despite her reservations and the certainty that this would lead to an even worse lock-down (and possibly getting her deposed from being the student body president) she picked up the Putnam portkey and arrived at the party in her least smart clothes. There were already voices all around her, some of them coming from above her. She found a spot on the wall and then realized she could walk up it. There was one corner left unoccupied and she made herself comfortable with a paintbrush that had to be dripping on someone below.

"Snacks? Snacks?" Braden was wandering around offering people items from his recent St George's Way stock-up. "Be sure to leave crumbs everywhere! I want chocolate melted into that cushion, stat!"

Veronica giggled nervously and made her way towards Braden's voice. "You have chocolate?" she asked shyly, accidentally pushing her paintbrush into his side when she couldn't quite see the outline of his body. "Oh. I'm sorry. I think I've just... You might be a bit blue around the middle."

Thorn heard this exchange from his spot near the windows, keeping lookout for any teachers. He would call the signal to douse any lit wands and push people to cover the glow tape. So far the security guards seemed content to make their rounds elsewhere on campus. "Did everyone just hear that?" he said loudly. "The student body president just BLEW Braden."

"You're not chewing that Droobles I gave you!" Braden yelled back. "The curtains aren't gonna gum themselves!" He turned back to Veronica, voice lowering and softening. "I have chocolate." He opened up a bottomless satchel he'd brought along and reached around inside of it. "Hmm... acid pops... jelly slugs... ew." He made a face and pulled his hand out of the bag, shaking something goopy and dark onto the floor. "Melted brownie."

"Probably wouldn't want to eat it then," she giggled. "Maybe I can use it to fingerpaint. I've always hated that ugly painting of her behind her desk. Unnerves me whenever I come in here."

He grinned. "Oh, no, you're safe. She's out. Probably visiting another painting." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder to point at the frame on the wall behind the headmistress' desk. Currently it showed an empty backdrop with no subject. "But you should totally get your inner artist out and paint her a new one! Go Monet on that sucker."

Veronica, maybe feeling impulsive from the dark or the giddy rush of being horribly bad, leaned up on tiptoe and planted on a kiss approximately on his cheek. "That's a great idea!" she said and pushed her way through the crowd to the empty painting to work her magic.

Braden beamed after her, and shoved a handful of leftover suckers from Valentine's Day at the nearest student. "Suck on these and stick them to everything."

Marina laughed at Braden. "Honey, I don't just put any old thing in my mouth to suck."

He offered her the suckers again. "Please suck on these and stick them to everything?"

"Just so long as you don't tell everyone I put things in my mouth at your request," she teased and took a handful of the lollipops. She took a tentative lick and smiled at him. "Hey, this isn't so bad." Then she giggled, an entirely insidious sound. "You're not so bad, Braden. When did you get so cute?"

Oh right. He forgot that the Valentine's candy had a secondary effect. "Oh, you know. Ladykiller." He laughed an dug around inside the manbag for a different type of hard candy to stick places. Finding some honey pots, he offered her those. "Trade you back for the hearts?"

"Oh my shit, Braden Croft!" She slapped him lightly, cheerily almost. "Did you try to seduce me with love potion pops?" She pushed them back into his hands and took the offered honey pots. "Give these to someone else, Casanova!" Then she was off on her way, dropping honey pots wherever she bumped into a piece of furniture and giggling all the while.

He took back the heart pops and absentmindedly put one in his mouth. "Wait. Marina! Come back!" He trailed after her like a lovestruck puppy.

Tina popped her head up from behind Hulett's desk at the mention of Marina's name, and laughed to herself as she saw Braden practically floating along behind her friend. She shook her head and returned to pouring treacle fudge into the keyhole of the lock on the desk drawer.

"Oh my goddess," Marina said when she finally noticed, only because Braden had bumped into her backside when she stopped suddenly. "Take that thing out of your mouth! Right the fuck now," she added when he continued to look at her like a mooning fool.

He pulled it out from between his lips obediently. "Anything for you," he promised dreamily, the effects of the mild potion still lingering. He didn't even notice the door opening because he was too mesmerised by her face.



Luka waited for the first few waves of students before he started his masterpiece on Hulett's desk. He was scrawling out a manifesto, the statement of purpose for this little gathering in her office.

You've shit on the study body for the last time. We will not be disrespected. We will not be treated like your children. We're not here for your amusement. We're not here to enjoy your dictatorship. We're here to learn and grow. To struggle and find our own way. You've effectively blocked that off. And yeah, we're terrible. We're awful. We've been in a few messes this year. But we're figuring it out and we're making it work. You're just standing in our way. Do us a favor and step out of it.

Yours,
Dresden Academy.

He grinned, crossed his arms over his chest and made a circuit around the room making sure the students had chucked their reservations aside and were now simply enjoying the chaos. In the dark they could be anonymous, one mass working together to send a very pointed message. All together they had safety, at least until it started to shake apart and they turned on each other like they tended to do.

At the moment, Luka didn't care. It was the first time in his life like he felt he was accomplishing something even a little worthwhile. He leaned found a spot near the landing zone and sent Sighard on his way to make a little chaos of his own. From this vantage he could enjoy the bits of art that had been drawn in glowing paint. Most of the paint wasn't light reactive, but some of the students had found it and from what little he could see in the darkness this was going to be spectacular.

Cinna arrived late, cradling a big sack of... something. "I GOT IT," she bellowed, and then remembering that she was supposed to be undercover, looked embarrassed and squeezed the burlap bag. "It's sleeping," she told Luka with a grin, peeling it open slightly to reveal a mass of long, twitching tendrils. "We'll leave it in the bag until we're ready to leave, and then put it out and go. She comes in and turns the light on... it'll go nuts."

Luka grabbed a hold of Cinna and kissed her cheek happily. "You're a genius!" he said gladly. Their rebellion was very well near the end. They'd have to get out of here soon or risk getting caught. He was just about to find Sighard when a rectangle of light appeared as the office door opened. "What the fuck?" he said, thinking it was an idiot student checking out and heading into the hallway. Sig had a whole stable of return portkeys ready to go.

"Shut that!" Cinna squealed. "You're going to wake the--"

It was too late by then, the bright shaft of light fell upon the open sack which contained the Spider Weed. The long, spider-leg-like vines started thrashing and flailing around, knocking students over left right and centre as it tried to escape the bag and find a nice dark place to hide.

Robin Fortin had a tendency to wander around the interior buildings at night with a bottle of fire whiskey and a dime bag in his back pocket. The security guards rarely bothered him and he stayed away from the student dorms. One of his favored spots of late was Hulett's office.

She had a comfortable chair, quick internet, and a computer with a very impressive monitor for watching porn. He was just ducking in for his nightly entertainments and was stopped short by... He couldn't tell exactly what. There was a press of bodies, too many bodies, some of them in places they shouldn't physically be allowed to be. There was the smell of snack food, as if a candy shop had exploded inside the office and something beneath it, something distinctly chemical. It was the smell of paint, he realized as the light fell on a group of students writing obscenities on the wall.

He was torn between extreme amusement and extreme anger. If anybody would be asked to clean this mess up, it would surely be him. Then again, hadn't the students given that uppity bitch her comeuppance? "The fuck are you kids doing?" he asked and flicked on the light much to their horror.

"Exercising our first amendment rights," Luka replied boldly.

"Exercise your fifth amendment rights," Addy hissed at him from over by the limerick wall.

Shell looked over from the window she and Carly were smearing with melted, messy candies. "The right to bear arms?"

Weeds was amused, the darling idiots were going to get themselves hanged if they were caught. And he certainly wasn't going to watch porn in here, not surrounded by the mess they made. "How about we say I didn't see anything and you all go back to your dorms and climb into bed like the good little hooligans you are?"

This was a perfectly reasonable and completely beautiful proposal. The majority of the students held their breath while Weeds slowly backed out of the door and closed it behind him.

"Time to execute Operation Get the Fuck Out of Dodge," Sig called and opened his bag of return portkeys. "Get 'em while their hot. I've got a Hudson group leaving the station at... Right the fuck now." He held up a rather beaten up frisbee with a pair of tongs and waited for the closest Hudson kids to line up and put their hands on it.

Bernadine pushed Stas off the wall before he could protest. "Go on, get out of here." She hazarded a very quick kiss and watched as he disappeared into the crowd and hopefully back to his dorm.

"I got a new favourite faculty member, I swear," Addy breathed, heart still pounding from the utter panic of being caught. "Taxi! Can I get a ride to University Girls, please!"

"Coming right up ladies," Sig called and pulled out a red mitten with a hole in the thumb.

Carly wasn't missing her ride and sidled up beside them. "Ladies first," she said and started reaching her hand out.

Bernadine laughed so loudly that for a moment she forgot the sheer panic they were all in to get out of the office. "I believe you meant bitches first, and by all means, don't let us stop you." But then they were all touching the mitten and the office chaos disappeared to be replaced by the familiar surroundings of the dorm.

"Next up, Putnam people in the house," Sig called and so on down the list, alternating dorms and portkeys as he did. They were down to the last two keys, the master for himself and Luka. He was surprised to find that Arnaud had hung back, though he could have evac-ed several portkeys ago.

"You didn't have to stay," Luka said quietly. He wasn't willing himself to get caught, but he fully intended to be the last man out. If anyone was taking the blame he was going to step up to it.

"I've got your back," Arnaud replied with a silent idiot implied.

"Come on gentlemen. Let's hit the road and save the congratulations for the particularly brilliant shade of red Hulett's going to be tomorrow. She'll match her house!"

Sig tossed them the Clemons portkey with the tongs and took a hold of his own with a big grin, disappearing just as they caught the old, misshapen, half-deflated soccer ball between them.

The office was dark and empty once more, save the slowly calming Spider Weed settling down under Headmistress Hulett's desk.