Stop Breaking Physics! (Open)

[Idalia Tsavaris]

Fury burned like a demon in Idalia’s eyes and she was so tired she could barely see through her anger. She burst into Hammel’s main office not bothering to worry about how she must look. She was bundled in a black coat with a pair of gloves in her clenched hands. Her scarf hung around her neck in an unorganized fray. Her hair was pulled back in a messy bun and several locks of hair were escaped and framed her face. A pair of bloodshot eyes snapped around and she could feel the weight of the bags under her eyes as she surveyed her prey. She stamped toward the front desk and slammed her hand on the desk as though she didn’t already have the attention of everyone in the room. “I need to speak to someone in charge. NOW!”

To understand the true level of Dr. Idalia Tsavaris’ plight one must retreat to five AM the following morning.

She gave the final briefing of the day as five PM rolled around then Meteorologist Idalia Tsavaris grabbed her coat and wrapped herself in her scarf, hat and gloves. “See you all in the AM,” she said sparing a wave to the forecasters who had just switch shift. Twenty minutes later she was home. She didn’t bother taking off her coat as she still had to walk Ike. It was freezing so they did the quick version. Six PM clicked and Idalia was cleaning dishes from her soup and after a quick shower tucked herself into bed and set her alarm for half after three AM.

Nine PM ticked. A phone blared and a hand lurched out from cocoon of blankets and fumbled to answer. She grumbled a greeting into the phone. “Ida, it’s Chris, we’ve got a little bit of a problem.” “Define problem?” Ida sat up and patted Ike’s head as he lifted his head at her movement. “We’ve got tornadic rotation showing up on radar.” “What?” Idalia yelped and now completely awake started to move out of bed, “You’re sure it’s not… like bats or something?” “Not unless bats know how to organize into a pretty good looking hook echo.” “But… but it’s January! In Vermont!” “I understand that but that means something is severely wrong with BTV’s radar.” Ida turned on the television. “Why are there no warnings? Get on it! I want it done by the time I get there!” Ida threw her contacts in her eyes and hissed in pain as her poor sleep deprived eyes protested them.

Thirty minutes later a put together Idalia ran into the station. Good thing for the forecasters on duty the warnings had gone out. “Where are my goddamn spotters!” Idalia bellowed her presence on the watch floor signaling danger. “Ida!” Chris brandished a phone at her. “NWS Chief Meteorologist Idalia Tsavaris, Burlington Forecast Office.” She listened to the frantic spotter and she slammed the phone into Chris’ chest with force. “Skata skata gamoto!” She swore in Greek, “Tornado on the ground! Tornado on the ground!” They scattered like the people in a bad natural disaster movie, only Idalia’s meteorologists were good and scattered with purpose. Idalia ran to local news station down stairs from them and told them quickly the news. They let her on air without much ado. As the NWS warning went out Idalia went on and with the radar to her back she pointed out the supercell. “Our spotters have indicated a tornado on the ground to the north of the town of Pilot Ridge. It’s tracking Eastsoutheast we project it will be in the suburbs of Burlington in twenty minutes. Stay in your homes. Get to the lowest level of your structure. Do not go outside. Do not stand by windows.”

It was another hour before the storm finally dissipated and for the next four hours Idalia spoke with, argued with and cursed at some concerned citizens who declared that she had no idea what she was doing. Honestly she had no idea how a tornado had spun up. Vermont got one tornado every ten years or so, and certainly never during a cold air outbreak! She stopped answering her phones diverting them to the other forecasters on duty. At that point it was too late to go home and so she rose from her studies and went to give a forecast. It was draining around lunch when it finally hit Idalia. She overlaid the latitude and longitude of the hook echo and found the source. Hammel. She raged then for another hour and finally set up a set of slides to explain to the public what had happened. She pointed out that the tornado was not natural in state which was why it caught them all by such surprise. She assured the public as best she could that such a situation was very rare and would not happen again. She didn’t mention meta humans or Hammel. But boy did she have a bone to pick with them.

Dr. Idalia Tsavaris rolled up to Hammel her windshield wipers fighting away snowfall as she pulled to a stop. A quarter to five PM was when Idalia arrived, having left work early with the intent of talking to someone. And damned if she would be turned away. If she had to work overnight they could spare a few minutes of overtime to listen to her. She slammed into the main office like a demon. John had told her it was a bad idea but Gloria had thought differently and so Idalia stormed to the main desk. Anger was clouding her judgment and she just wanted to tear into someone for the past 48 hours. If only her power had seen this coming. She stamped toward the front desk and slammed her hand on the desk as though she didn’t already have the attention of everyone in the room. “I need to speak to someone in charge. NOW!”

[Deleted]

Brooke was a fluttery little fellow that had places to go and places to be, but when she wasn't going and being, Brooke was staying, and today she was staying in the primary offices central to the institute known as Hammel. Surprisingly, this was a common place for her to stay and be and despite her perplexing nature, her company amongst the adults was far more welcoming and comfortable than those of her peers. One of her primary duties as a desk volunteer(because of course she wasn't getting paid for any of this, nope nope nope!) was manning the desk and taking care of guests that decided to guest and visit the staff and students.

And sometimes to interfere help other inquirers such as this pretty lady who had exploded through the front doorway whist Brooke was in the middle of constructing the Eiffel Tower out of paper clips. What could she say? It was booooooring up here sometimes.

At least this new lady-person seemed like she was going to provide the bored student with something interesting(or not) to bother do for the time being. Because she looked maaaaaad!

"C'n I help ewe?" She greeted with a smile as if the woman hadn't just come storming in and demanding to speak to a person in charge.

[Idalia Tsavaris]

Idalia was short on sleep and that didn’t help her temper at all. She was just glad that she worked as closely with the Burlington NWS office as she did. It saved her from having to make several decisions and a furious Idalia could focus her efforts on getting the warning out. Not an easy task when every five seconds she was off camera she was downing the cups of coffee handed to her. She used the tricks she had to call visions and was able to give specifics about locations and future placement. Damage that was likely, but she quickly felt the strain behind her eyes and it was all she could do to keep from breaking down on air. Giving a live forecast for a tornado was something she’d never actually had to do herself and it was terrifying. Her heart was beating and she was praying that no one would get hurt.

She still couldn’t get over the fact that it was January. In Vermont. They didn’t even get tornadoes in the best of conditions, well they couldn’t count them out completely but they could very well tell that such a thing was not going to happen in the dead of winter. Which meant someone had to make it, and when someone was making weather their models meant nothing. Their radar track might change in an instant and hell there might not even be a supercell associated with the tornado. If she wasn’t the chief meteorologist she would have been left to slumber and found about it in the morning. She needed Hammel and those who could use this power to understand that what they were doing didn’t just affect them. It wasn’t just an isolated event. Tornadoes and thunderstorms required a lot of energy to form and that energy had to come from somewhere.

It should be counted as lucky that it wasn’t anything bigger that could cause widespread consequences, but it needed to stop. Idalia’s eyes flashed with fury as the girl called her attention. “Yes,” Idalia hissed, “You can tell whoever it is here who’s in charge to get their ass out here! I can’t even believe this! The nerve of some people!” Because it was someone personally screwing with her when that tornado brewed. Idalia was definitely not in a sympathetic mood and wasn’t even thinking that it might have been the result of an emotional breakdown by a student or something. “I mean this is literally the last straw!” She said taking out her frustration on the poor girl, “This has to stop!”

[Deleted]

Brooke knew very little about this tornado that this lady was upset about, actually she didn't eve know that that was what she was upset about, so she simply looked up at the furious lady with curious eyes as she drank in the sharp and tactless words. Brooke wasn't one to be upset by yelling, people yelled at her all the time and she usually just brushed it off with a laugh. The only thing that bothered Brooke about this particular interaction was that this lady-person wasn't going through the proper channels in order to arrange an audience with she-who-was-in-charge, the headmistress of Hammel Mrs. Yvette Morgenstern. And even before her, there were several others who could meet with this lady person, like that secretary over there.

Still, Brooke stood from her swivel chair, leaving her paper-clip tower for the moment and handed the lady a clip-board. "I'm sorry, but our headmistress is very busy right now and cannot take your call. If you'd like to make an appointment, I recommend filling out this form and then bringing it back here for evaluation. Then, once we've determined that you are not an alien set on taking over the world by assuming the shape of our exalted headmistress and turning the institute into a military establishment, we will then contact you at the phone number you listed here and arrange an appropriate time for a meeting." Brooke smiled like she was a customer service worker at wal-mart while she explained the procedures to Ms. Grumpy here, pointing to the different fields of the form Brooke had constructed herself, taking care to specifically point out the field where the lady must check between "human", "alien", or "other".

She sat back down and continued to work on her tower.

[Idalia Tsavaris]

It didn’t surprise Idalia that not everyone knew about the tornado, it had been at night and luckily, far away from most people. Not to mention they were going to do their best to downplay it, possibly even take some heat to call it a false alarm or claim that it was just a freak of physics and they just had no idea what happened. Making themselves look like fools to protect Hammel from the heat that would come down on it for such a thing. That was what they always did when something like this happened. Hammel didn’t seem to realize how much those meta humans in the news and government worked too keep the things that the new meta human students did from making national news and getting all eyes on Hammel.

Which was why Idalia’s eyes flashed dangerously at the girl as she gave her smart little speech. It was no appreciated and Idalia’s hands didn’t move to take the board and she loathed to take out her anger on the girl but that was what was starting to happen. She’d had about two hours of sleep over the past 48 hours and she was in a stupor unable to completely control what came from her lips. “Listen, little girl! I don’t expect you to understand the gravity of the situation, but, you have two options. Go get Yvette and tell her that I will see her now not later or I will do so myself!” She hoped the fact that she was on a first name basis with Yvette would hold some weight, she was not the headmistresses student anymore but her peer. Idalia was furious enough to start flipping tables and it was a very good thing she didn’t have a physical power for someone would actually get hurt.

When it took the girl more than two seconds to comply Idalia threw her hands up, declaring all sort of nastiness in Greek at Hammel and the girl. She knew where she was going, she had been here a million times before, usually with permission but she was not going to be turned away. Hell no! She started down the hall to the offices and was prepared to mow down anyone who tried to stop her.

[Deleted]

The intent of the lady-person who had stormed in here in a furious rage was probably to intimidate the 17-year-old girl into cowering and crying like probably most people would. But her increased fury only seemed more and more humorous to the student-desk-worker. There was certainly a reason why she was allowed this job, despite the quirks and quicks that many a teacher had warned her to cease for fear it might get her shot one day.

Okay, the teachers never actually said that, but they were probably thinking it. Especially as many of them had had first hand experience of the girl that was Brooke Llewelyn.

Brooke had no cares, not a single one, that the lady-person had dared to call the missus headmistress by her first name. In Brooke's eyes and office(because this was obviously her office), all comers and visitors were treated the same. The woman could've been the president of Zimbabwe or even the almighty deity Lendys(For Lendys!!) and Brooke still wouldn't have given a care or a blink….well, maybe for Lendys.

But clearly this woman wasn't going to be stopped by a clip-board and procedures, therefore forcing Brooke to take more extreme measures in restraining her. Not actually restraining(although she probably could) for she'd been warned about jumping on the backs of people before who don't do as she say, but once again with a verbal warning. And a slight scare. Those years of being on the softball team made her aim true even for a misshapen object like a paper-clip tower. She chucked it past the lady-person to crash on the wall at the end of the hall. "Miss!" she started in an authoritative shout. "Please settle yourself down, you are a disgrace to all maniacs everywhere! If you cannot contain yourself, calm down, and go through the proper procedures like everyone else, procedures set in place to protect our student from rampaging thunder-cunts like you, then I will be forced to call in security to have you physically removed and cited for unlawful trespassing. You must obtain a guest pass before passing through our offices. No exceptions!" Brooke stomped her foot and crossed her arms over her slim figure.

[Idalia Tsavaris]

Idalia honestly didn’t plan on being intimidating, honestly her only source of intimidation was that she was furious. In all honesty she was not very much of a physical threat to anyone. She wanted to make her displeasure known and then she wanted to sleep for a week. But that wouldn’t happen because she had to work tomorrow as well. Unlike those at Hammel who kept normal hours Idalia did not and all Hammel was doing right now was making her life harder. Granted after a good night’s sleep she would probably wake up with extreme regret about what she was doing right now. She would probably write a letter and apologize, but at the moment she wasn’t concerned about what ramifications her enraged visit would make.

Idalia started at the crash of something into the wall before her and she turned back, she was unsure if the girl had missed on purpose or if she just had bad aim but unfortunately for this girl Idalia had grown up with nine sister and nothing scared her much anymore. It did, however, stop her and gain her attention. But now Idalia’s rage was again fixed on this infuriating little girl. Idalia brushed off the girl and with as much power and authority as she could throw into her voice she bit back, “Doctor!” She was not a ‘Miss’ she had a Ph.D and she was not going to be treated as anything other than that. Normally Idalia would have calmly smiled and let it slide, after all she couldn’t expect anyone to know she was actually Dr. Tsavaris. But she was testy today and this girl was pushing her last nerve. She was honestly tempted to take off her shoes and chuck them at the girl.

“Oh please do!” Idalia said sweeping into a mock bow, “Because it’s not me but you out of control thunder-throwing students that are the bane of my entire existence! I honestly don’t give a damn for your procedures! Do you know how much sleep I’ve gotten because of some teenage temper tantrum? None!” Idalia was now imploring the girl to see her pain, though she was doing it terribly wrong. “Choose Vermont they said! It will be simple they said!” She muttered under her breath and tried her best to take a deep breath. She held up a hand to stall any further attack. “I’m sorry, I’m just tired and I really need to talk to Yvette. This cannot wait.” Idalia fought to keep her voice more level and civil, because this girl did have a point, she was kind of acting like a maniac. But in her defense this girl had started it. If she had to work a goddamn 48 hour shift then the headmistress could spare five minutes for Idalia to at least let her grievances be heard.

[Deleted]

Brooke completely intended on missing, and if the lady-person was scared from it(as it seemed several others in the office were, oopies! Guess that was another visit to Dr. Sean's office), then that was just an extra benefit. But her intent had been to get her attention drawn back on Brooke instead of her rampage in a direction that was likely to land her picked up by the police. And as cool as it would be to see a real person escorted of school property like that, Brooke wasn't about to embarrass this obviously proud woman like that. This "doctor".

"Whoop-dee-do!" Brooke said with a sarcastic shrug and roll of the eyes. "You could be James Earl Jones for all I care, or even Sir Elton John, and I still wouldn't let you through without a guest pass. Gotta protect our student from crazies like you, fer all I know you could be a kevorkian and out to put down our dear impressionables." Brooke sassily pointed a finger at the "doctor", her other hand smartly on her hip.

With the woman's next rant, however, at least Brooke had some insight as to why she was conducting her rampage. "Ohhhhhhhhh…." she drawled out unnecessarily, suddenly smacking her fist in her palm as if something just occurred to her. "So you're crazy 'cause you missed a few winks? No biggie. Take a few sleeping pills and tell the world to fuck off 'cause I think it's a good 72 hours 'fore you can be called clinically insane, thought better take a cab back, 'cause more than 21 hours deprived is worse than bein' drunk." Oh, Brooke was so informative.

Brooke smiled. "Lady Mistress Morgenstern will still be here once you get a good night's rest. If you'd like, we have beds in the infirmary you can rest in while we notify the headmistress of your presence and make arrangements for an audience with the exalted one." She held her hand out like a typical customer service sales-person. "But first, you must obtain a guest pass."

[Idalia Tsavaris]

Normally Idalia wasn’t so enraged. But she was a Greek and her temperament tended to be angrier than most when things were screwy. Like the weather recently. She was going to speak her mind and she didn’t care what the consequences were. She probably should if there was a possibility of anything getting back on the news. She was far from the personality she was on air and anyone who saw her now who knew anything about her would know something was wrong. She was honestly hoping to run into someone she knew and not some bratty teenager. She was so over the whole ‘brooding teenager whose sole purpose is to be difficult’ the joke was wearing thin. It wasn’t cute, and Idalia could name about a hundred other people just like this girl, who probably thought she was unique. Granted Idalia knew what she was doing now wasn’t ‘cute’ either. But she didn’t care.

Idalia ground her teeth and saw red. “How dare you?” Idalia demanded and swiftly approached the girl her heels snapping smartly with authority as she approached. Her hand itched to give this smart-aleck a well deserved smack. But no, children were too delicate now a’days and parents could go to jail for hitting their kids. Hell, Idalia and all of her sister’s had been hit and they would have never dreamed of speaking to an elder so, insane or not. If Idalia had been in this girl’s shoes she would have tried to stay calm, all this girl was doing now was egging her on and Idalia knew it and the girl knew it.

Idalia waved a hand indicating she wasn’t going to honor the girl’s snide comments with an answer. Ida knew herself better than anyone. She’d honestly gone longer without sleep but not because of some stupid student’s nervous breakdown. A bit of attention would be drawn from all of the shouting and Idalia honestly hoped she could talk to someone with a brain, this girl was an obvious waste of time. So she was ignored. She narrowed her eyes at the girl and gritted her teeth. “I don’t need to sleep. I need to speak to Yvette.” Idalia said hoping her sense of urgency was getting through to this girl. “You don’t understand, child. Because of someone in here, someone out there could have died!” She said waving her hand in the vague direction of out there. “I know Hammel seems like an island but what you people do here have ramifications!”

“This conversation is over.” She said and turned pacing down the hall. Guest pass or no, she would see to it Hammel knew that they needed to watch their students better. Idalia had no hard feelings against the person who had created the tornado, it wasn’t their fault, they were here to learn and accidents would happen but there were certain things that could not happen. Like a tornado. In Vermont. In January. She crossed her arms and ignored all protests and just kept walking determined to give a warning knock before giving the Hammel faculty a piece of her mind.

[Deleted]

Brooke understood that a lot of people other than her got upset and pissed off about a variety of stupid and nonsensical things, but she honestly couldn't relate to being so angry that you completely lost all and any resembling sliver of logical reasoning. That's exactly what this woman seemed like to her. Brooke herself wasn't one to get angry herself. She let most things just slide off her shoulders. If people wanted to get all pissy-pissy and let their blood-pressured launch up like a rocket to space, then they were free to discomfort themselves so. But when they started getting other people involved for no reason other than because they couldn't think of a more constructive manner in which to channel their anger, then that's when Brooke would speak up, unable to let their behavior slide.

Brooke kept her gaze fixed on the lady as she approached, practically daring the woman to strike a student in front of all these witnesses. Then Brooke would have even more reason to call security, have this lady picked up, and thrown in jail for assault and child abuse. Brooke was only trying to do her job, which was to prevent people from entering the institution without authorization.

Her remarks weren't intended to be snide, they were 100% serious, and it was too bad that this woman was too enraged to consider the legitimacy of Brooke's suggestions. "Yes. You. Do," Brooke asserted, not backing down an inch. "You are clearly enraged and not thinking straight. If you were, then you'd be capable of taking a moment to realize just how much of fool you're making of yourself, how much of a disturbance you're making, how you are carelessly taking your frustrations out on those who do not deserve it, and how incredibly close you are to being arrested and escorted off the property."

Brooke didn't need to be told that some of the things that went on in here could be considered dangerous to people out there. That's why this school existed in the first place, to prevent that sort of incident from happening all the time. "Those ramifications would be even stronger if this establishment were not here to begin with, you wrinkly old bag!"

Whether or not that statement got the woman to turn around was irrelevant. As she stormed off, Brooke immediately got on the phone and called for security to come and take care of this matter. Brooke had given her fair warning, and sleep-deprived or not, this woman had to practice what she preached. The students would take responsibility for their actions. Dr. Neville would see to that. And this woman would learn that no matter how important you think you are, you could not simply go on a rampage like a crazed maniac through an academic institution without suffering severe consequences.

[Idalia Tsavaris]

In many ways this girl was right. Idalia was not herself right now, were she in a sound mind she would have patiently waited, or come back another time for an appointment. Logical things to do, but honestly she’d lost her logic after the fourth person called her at work to tell her she had no idea what she was doing. She’d retorted with ‘well I’d like you see you try,’ and that was when one of the people coming on to the shift fresh was put on phone answering duties. It wasn’t the first time Idalia had been up for close to forty-eight hours and it most certainly wouldn’t be the last, but this was by far the most stressful she had ever endured. She was not a pleasant person without sleep and enough people knew her well enough to know that she was not to be crossed, or even paid attention to her when she was tired. Mostly they just nodded and went about what they were doing, for it was better to just stay out of her way.

That behavior might be overlooked by people who knew her normally to be a little bitchy but not without reason, people she worked with she was close to and when she came back apologizing there were no hard feelings. This girl didn’t know her, she didn’t know that Idalia wasn’t normally a crazy person, and Idalia wasn’t sure she’d be able to make amends for how she was acting at the moment. Idalia just glared as the girl echoed her own thinking. And though Idalia agreed she immediately stiffened and fought against everything the girl was saying. It was okay for Idalia to know she was acting like a crazy person, it was not okay for someone to point it out to her. Idalia just waved a hand dismissively, this girl was no longer worth her time. Apparently, Idalia did not actually believe the girl would call security.

Idalia didn’t stop and turn to the girl but she did reach her hands up to her face. How rude! She did not have wrinkles! Did she? Suddenly a male voice rang with authority from behind her demanding her to stop. She turned flames in her eyes daring whoever it was to try to stop her. She stopped and turned daring whoever it was to try to stop her by physical force. She just dared them, she was not above biting and scratching, and that was probably enough to tell her she’d lost all sense. “Ma’am, you’re going to have to come with me,” he said approaching her cautiously. She stood her ground and dared him to make her. “Don’t touch me-!” She started but as soon as she threw up her arms to defend herself he grabbed her and there was a strange rush to her head and she swooned into his arms. As asleep as a bear in January.

The security officer turned and grinned at the girl who’d called him. “Tactile sleep inducement.” He explained and lifted the slumbering meteorologist into his arms, “I’ll take care of it from here, thanks for calling.”

~~~~

Unaware of how many hours had passed Idalia woke slowly and in a strange bed. She started to panic until she recognized it as a room in the Hammel infirmary. She felt groggy and started to get up her panic renewed. It took her a moment to realize there was another person in the room. “What time is it?” She demanded, “I… I’m gonna be late, I’ve gotta go to work.” She stood unsteadily and the man in a Hammel security uniform rose and touched her arm helping to steady her. “We’ve already called your work, all you’re doing is going home and going to bed.” Idalia reached for her bag and he grabbed it before she could and added that he would be driving, as he didn’t want her to kill someone. With sleep, sanity returned and Idalia was mortified and had a terrible feeling of guilt in her stomach and so she didn’t protest.

She was glad someone else was going to drive as she was having a hard time walking without stumbling but she refused his assistance, a sense of pride still strong despite her weariness. Idalia glanced at the front desk and wondered if the girl would still be working. If she was Idalia would apologize for being a royal bitch in person, if not Idalia would send a note, for what it was worth. She would have to pursue speaking with Mrs. Morgenstern still, but in a much more diplomatic manner. That was if she was ever allowed on Hammel grounds again.