Reformed Regrets - Chapter 1

“I hear he has some sort of camera device in it to learn about everyone without anyone knowing they’re being taped.”
“Oh yeah? Well I hear he stuffs drugs inside it and uses them after class!”
“The both of you are insane, he obviously plans to set a deadly gas over everyone in the halls one of these days.”

Missy walked past the group of boys nonchalantly leaning against their lockers, talking loud enough for anyone within ten feet or so to hear them. Hefting her books in her arms, she made straight for her locker, nimble fingers swiftly setting her locker combination. However, just as she opened her locker, one of the boys slammed it back shut. She glanced up in annoyance at the boy as he grinned cockily at her.

“What’d’ya think Missy? You don’t really think Penguin’s gone quite clean do you?”
She said nothing for a moment, glancing around in agitation before sighing, “Whatever he’s doing, it’s none of my business, Aaron. I’d prefer to stay out of trouble this year, thanks. Can I put my things away now?”

Aaron stepped aside, but crossed his arms, grinning at her, “You have him right? I saw his name on your schedule...” He stabbed his finger at the paper sticking out of her English book, containing her class subjects and teachers.  She grunted, flinging open her locker and trying to ignore him, but all the same, tucked the sheet of paper further away from his sight. “I got to go Aaron, I’ll be late otherwise, and I don’t need to be tardy to class so early in the year.”
Stalking away, hoots of laughter and catcalls of ‘Watch out for his umbrella’ met her ears. Setting her jaw firmly, she whisked upstairs in search of her math class.



~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



Missy tapped her pen atop her desk nervously, glancing around the room a little curiously. Most of the other kids were muttering lowly to each other, taking in their surroundings. The classroom looked… well, hardly like a normal teacher’s room. The walls were plastered with many posters of birds, and the teacher’s desk had many different figurines of the species scattered about the top of it. Penguin, as her classmates liked to call him despite his supposed retirement of the criminal life, had not yet shown his appearance.

As the bell rang shrilly throughout the school, the kids in the room muttered lowly under their breath before their came a tense silence. As if on cue, a large rotund man filled the doorway, glancing sharply about the class, the flash of his monocle catching the glint of the early morning sun.
Despite Missy’s early dismissal, she couldn’t help become anxious. When her parents had found out that a former villain was going to be one of her teachers, they’d flipped out. They began calling the principal, demanding to know how he knew Penguin wouldn’t do anything rash to the kids. The principal seemingly was able to calm them with reassurances, though these assurances seemed dry to Missy… something like ‘Batman has things under control’.

Pulling her mind back to the present, she stared at Penguin until his gaze swept on her, then she quickly glanced down at her notebook scrawled with notes of last year. However, she was far from concentrating on them; her body tensed further as he slowly strode past her desk, the click of his umbrella upon the floor an ominous sound. Only until he’d made his way to the front of the class did she look up to scrutinize him fully.
He’d placed his top hat atop his desk with what seemed to be with practiced ease, and without his top hat, his usually scattered, vibrantly orange hair revealed his attempt to slick it back into a more appropriate and clean fashion. His piercing green eyes probed each and every student he glanced upon with an arrogant spark to them. The scowl on his face suggested that he didn’t choose to be a teacher on his own choice, and this, Missy mused, was probably going to get him a lot of crap from other students.
His clothes could be easily described as well tailored and clean cut, in fact, he looked more like the businessman he was than a schoolteacher. To her bemusement, she realized he’d also come styled with a briefcase, which considering who it was, looked a little comical.

Her observation was cut short however when his abrupt voice cut through the silence, “Soo, first day of school for all of us then eh?”
When he received no answer from the class, his mouth twitched downward further and he turned to heave his briefcase atop his desk. Missy watched silently as he shuffled through papers on his desk, muttering something inaudible before whisking up a few papers and striding over to the podium. “I’ll take attendance first; make sure you’re all here.” The expression he gave at this moment was hard to discern if he really cared if someone was playing hooky or not, a mix of detached interest and fierce disapproval.
Without further ado, he began calling out names, gaze scrutinizing each person who raised their hand and said here, as though telling them silently with their gaze that they’d better not be a problem to him in the future. Missy had the feeling they all got that quite clearly. That was, until he got to the boy who’d been agitating her earlier; “Aaron Balstrom?”

“Sup,” Aaron made a peace sign and gave a wide grin as he leaned back in his desk.
Penguin gave a dark scowl at the boy before marking him down with a jot of his pen and chose to ignore him from then on. This action might have worked if Aaron wasn’t so intent on ruffling his feathers.
“So, did you choose to become a teacher because Batman would never thing a guy of your intellect could be capable of the job?”
Penguin cringed and glanced back at Aaron, lip curling in a silent snarl, voice a tad lower, “Are you going to be a problem in my class Balstrom?”
“No sir, Penguin, I was just wonderin-“
Penguin seemed to snap, the flippered hand on the attendance sheet curling into a fist and slamming against the podium desktop, “I do not like your impudence Balstrom, and I already see that I’m not going to like you. Furthermore, you will address me the way you address any other teacher in this school. You will address me by Mr. Cobblepot, not that infernal nickname everyone finds so damn amusing to lay upon me.”

There was smattering of giggles at the name of Cobblepot, but the look he sent across the class instantly silenced them all. His gaze pierced Aaron’s smug grin, enough to make Aaron to at least try to look like he cared, “Do you understand me?”
“Yes sir,” The boy responded, yet his voice was still layered with amusement. Penguin, that is, Mr. Cobblepot seemed to tense, but with a gesture of impatience, he turned away and resumed the attendance.

After the rest of the attendance seemed to be going more smoothly, Missy mused that perhaps Cobblepot would only have issues over Aaron – who wouldn’t? Her relief was squandered however, when he called out her name.

“…Missy Whitaker?”

Quickly, she raised her hand slightly, “Here!” But as she glanced up, her skin prickled uneasily. Instead of continuing on, he slowly looked up from the sheet in his hands and gave her a long hard stare, scrutinizing her closely.
“Erm…?” She opened her mouth, intending to ask if he wanted something, then quickly decided against it. Instead she eyed him back a little uncertainly.
However, after a moment, he gave a slight smile at her, though it looked forced and painful, before rolling up the sheet and setting it near the computer.
“Good then, now that attendance is over with, I’ll bring on some important matters of my classroom, nothing different really, same policies as all your other teachers I’m sure, but just to jog your memory a bit…”

Missy wasn’t listening, nerves too far stretched over the awkward feeling of uncertainty. Why did he look at her like that? Did she do something; say something to him earlier that she didn’t remember? Was he silently telling her to shape herself up? Maybe she hadn’t realized he’d done it to everyone else. Yes, that must be it; he’d done it to everyone. But it had been so… creepy.

So deep in her thoughts, she was startled when chairs were suddenly scraping around her, everyone heading for the door. Her friend Ezzie tugged on her sleeve urgently as she passed by, “Come on Missy, he let us out a bit earlier than the bell. I think he wants to get rid of us… hurry up!”
Hurriedly, Missy followed her friend’s bidding, having no intention to be all alone in the room with the grumpy former villain. Her friend was decent enough to wait for her, though impatiently. But as she stuffed her books back into her bag, she felt the unnerving feeling that she was being watched. With her friend eyeing one of the bird posters near the door, Missy glanced to Penguin. He was sitting at his desk by now, but was watching her again. However, upon seeing she caught his gaze, he blinked rapidly and frowned, turning around to shuffle papers and turn on the computer.

Definitely spooked by now, Missy turned swiftly and snagged her friend’s arm, dragging her out of the room before she had to be with the man any longer. “Come on Ezzie; let’s get to our next class so we’ll get good seats.” Her friend’s annoyed response was cut off as the classroom door swung shut.

But as a minute passed by within the deserted classroom, Oswald turned back around, eyes dark with speculation, “Missy Whitaker… we meet at last.”