Work Text:
~Written by Aux.
The first student to enter his class was Jenna. “Mr. Brisk, did you hear what happened in Israel?”
“The aliens?” He asked, and turned from the board to face her.
“They attacked them at 11 am,” Jenna started. “It was broad daylight. And they crushed the Israeli military. That Iron Dome you told us about, it was destroyed.”
“Has Israel lost?” Charlie Brisk set his expo marker on the ledge along the white board. Gracie and Liana walked in next, and both set their things on their desk while half paying attention to Mr. Brisk and Jenna.
“Israel declared a formal surrender earlier. The aliens moved into Egypt, Gaza, and Lebanon too.”
“Mr. Brisk, you’re not gonna believe this!” Gracie McQueen surged past Dominic and thrust her phone in Mr. Brisk’s face. “The aliens just had the Israelis set them up on a broadcast.” Mr. Brisk watched the phone for a few more minutes, his face all screwed up, and he squinted without his classes. Most the rest of the class came in in three or four big chunks, including Darci Steven, who was half lebanese on her mothers side.
“Darci, is your family okay?” Toa, her silver chains clinking against each other, offered Darci a cookie she’d made in her first period cooking class.
Darci didn’t say anything, she just shook her head no. Mr. Brisk turned around and made a beeline for his computer. “I’m gonna put that up,” he told Gracie. “Where’d you find it?”
“All the mainstream guys had it going earlier.” Gracie set her green binder on her desk and dropped her backpack in her chair. Hoang looked up from his Pokemon battle a little indigent. The bell rang and everyone, except Gracie and Mr. Brisk, sat down. Mr. Brisk and Gracie kept whispering for another moment, then Gracie retreated to her seat.
By then, everyone knew what had been happening in Israel. The obligatory draft jokes were already being thrown around, by both sexes. Mr. Brisk got the broadcast Gracie had mentioned up, and the whole room turned to watch.
The man who appeared on the podium was human, and looked suspiciously like Cristopher Lee.
“It's Count Dooku!” Jenna shouted. “The aliens are from star wars!”
“Shut up!” Grace Moran snapped. Jenna gave her a dirty look, but watched the broadcast anyway.
“Citizens of this planet, I am Count Dooku, a representative of the Confederacy of Independent Systems.” Dooku spoke cordially, and he otherwise seemed fairly detached. “Our droid forces have taken the place you call Israel, and much of your blood has been spilt.” Darci scowled. Jenna and Gracie shot each other a look, and when Gracie looked over at Mr. Brisk, who seemed to watch the video in rapture. He was much paler than normal. “It is a shame, and more bloodshed is not what I, and by extension the Confederacy, want. So, we are offering our hand in peace. We will meet with your leader and come to some terms of surrender.”
The whole class shifted in their seats. No one took their eyes off the screen. “However, if you refuse, we will employ more…” Suddenly, a man, who appeared to be some sort of politician, was shoved into frame. He was blind folded, and the collar of his white shirt was blood and sweat stained, “...persuasive tactics.” Dooku smirked evilly, and his voice dripped with sinister ambitions and malice.
Suddenly, he grasped the back of the mans shirt, and brought up with his other hand a small silver tude, barely longer than the palm of his hand. He pressed something on it, and a blade of red light sprang from it.
“Oh my god!” Jenna screamed and threw her head down so hard she banged it against the desk. Tao and a few others looked away quickly, but the rest witnessed the gruesome, albeit quick, beheading of the Israeli financial minister. A few people screamed.
There was a heavy *thunk* as the man’s head hit the floor, and some general outcry by those who were behind the camera and who had just witnessed the live summary execution. Mr. Brisk paused the broadcast as the talking head came in to try and explain himself. The classroom erupted. “Mr. Brisk, what’re they gonna do!?” “Does that mean we’re gonna surrender, or are we gonna fight?” “What do you think these aliens want with us?”
“Will everyone shut up!” Mr. Brisk raised his voice, but didn’t yell. The class quited down, and only a few people whispered amongst themselves. He stood up, and turned off the projector, then stepped around in front of the white board, while the retractable screen rolled up. “Guys, I’m sorry you had to see that,” he said. “I had no idea he was going to… kill a man; but, that doesn’t make it right.”
“To answer your questions, I don’t know what we’re going to do. President Trump could send troops to aid some of the nations that will, and are currently, under attack from the Confederacy. He could also keep those troops here in case we need to fight.”
“Does that mean they’re gonna come here?” Nolan asked. It was the first time he’d spoken all semester.
Mr. Brisk exhaled nervously. “I don’t know. I mean… look guys, I’m gonna be realistic with you.” Mr. Brisk had been pacing between his podium and his desk, but he stopped just then. “We could be attacked. Now, not us specifically,” he worked to fell the questions that might arise from his statement, “but it is possible that this Count Dooku guy could send his people to attack us.”
“But since when did Star Wars become real?” Sarah Johnson asked.
“I don’t think this is…”
“It’s Star Wars,” Jenna interrupted Mr. Brisk, and kept on trucking. “Count Dooku, played by the late and great Sir Cristopher Lee, just showed up on a televised broadcast from Israel. He had a real lightsaber, activated it on camera, and used it to decapitate a man. Not only,” Jenna began to tremble, and her words seemed to as well, “was that lightsaber the same design as Dooku’s in canon, but so is the Confederacy of Independent Systems. They’re the bad guys in episodes two and kinda three, but also in the Clone Wars movie and tv show. Plus, that was Sir Cristopher Lee, who’s been dead for like, a decade. So either he’s got an evil doppelganger with top tier editing skills, or that’s the real Count Dooku, and Earth’s just been attacked by the Separatists.”
“That’s not what I wanna know,” Darci glowered at Jenna. “What I wanna know is what’s gonna happen to us?”
Mr. Brisk shook his head and crossed his arms over his chest. “Guys, to be one hundred percent honest… I don’t know. I just don’t.”
“No, what’s gonna happen to us?” Darci repeated the question with even more harsh insistence. “What’s most likely gonna happen?”
“Darci, I just don’t know,” Mr. Brisk began to sound annoyed. “I’m sorry, I really wish I did.”
“Mr. Brisk was my favorite history teacher ever,” Gracie said, with traces of sentimentality laced within her voice. “He ended up dying during the Republic's invasion. He was shot on sight by the droids when they made their escape.”
“My math teacher had the same talk with us,” Jerome said softly. The chorus of war sang all around them. There were missiles off somewhere to their east, and the train that was carrying them to their next location clanked like nobody’s business. “Mrs. Gree’s still alive, to my knowledge, but she was pretty old, so the Tinnie’s mighta killed ‘er too.”
“That first few minutes are like, permanently scared in my brain,” Gracie confessed. “Darci’s voice keeps asking me ‘What’s gonna happen to us? What’s gonna happen to us?’ That’s all I can think about sometimes.”
“Still no good answers.” Jerome muttered.
“Hell no,” Gracie shot back playfully. She was quiet for a second, before continuing in a whisper. “But god, I sure wish we could get some answers.”