Chapter Text
Valerie Frizzle sat sadly at her desk with her pet lizard Liz one fine spring morning at Walkerville Elementary in April. The ginger hair teacher would normally be energetic and enthusiastic about her job, teaching her third-grade class about all the great things she knew across the educational curriculum, especially science with the use of the Magic School Bus. However, over the past week, things just haven’t been the same for Ms Frizzle. Liz was consoling her owner as she grieved the events that inflicted her class.
“Oh, Liz. Why did they have to die so young?!” Ms Frizzle asked as she cried loudly while the reptile frowned, clearly also missing the eight students who once brought life to the classroom. While the Jackson’s Chameleon couldn’t talk, she wished that there was some way to alter history, some way to prevent the horrible events that occurred over the past week.
Liz continued to hear the Friz mourn as she looked down at the names of the students from the class. Arnold Perlstein, Carlos Ramon, Dorothy Ann Hudson, Keesha Franklin, Phoebe Terese, Ralphie Tennelli, Tim Wright, and Wanda Li. All eight kids had their lives snatched from them without ever being allowed to grow up, graduate, attend college, work jobs, or have children of their own.
“It’s just not fair! Why can’t I go back with the bus to alter history and prevent such horrible events from taking place in the first place?!” Ms Frizzle asked herself as she bawled over the fact that there was nothing she could do to bring the students she cherished so much back. Despite the Magic School Bus being capable of time travel, Valerie herself knew that altering the space time continuum would likely be more destructive for the human race altogether than stopping her students from suffering their fates.
“Stupid time law physics! Can’t they just bend once so I can have my students back just for one more minute?!” Ms Frizzle asked herself as she missed the sights and sounds of Arnold’s complaints about going on field trips, Dorothy Ann saying, “According to my research” as she pulled a book out of her large pink book bag, Phoebe’s quips about her old school, Wanda calling others “weaselly wimps”, Tim sketching things on the dot, Ralphie’s off the wall theories, Keesha’s skepticism about everything, and Carlos’ often corny puns and jokes that would make the class groan. All those things were absent since the tragedies, and despite all the memories and fun times Valerie had with her third-grade class when they were still here, she couldn’t help but feel like she still had more to learn and teach with them.
“Liz, don’t you feel like we’re somewhat responsible for not being there to protect them?!” Ms Frizzle asked the lizard as she pondered whether they could have stopped the deaths in the first place. Liz shrugged as she figured her owner was likely going through a deep stage of depression at the moment. One’s mind was likely not going to be functioning properly while in such a slump.
“I guess you’re right, Liz. Nothing we could have done would have saved them.” The third-grade teacher suggested as she sipped on some wine she had on her desk. Valerie always stayed away from alcoholic drinks, but since the events of the last week, she had begun to drink wine on a daily basis as a way to battle her deep depression.
“Want some?” Ms Frizzle offered Liz, who politely turned down the wine, not willing to try out anything that would probably kill her.
“The last thing Valerie needs is a dead lizard on top of a dead class…” Liz thought to herself as she stared up at the alcoholic drink and the glass which contained it. She watched as Ms Frizzle drank the rest of the wine in one gulp, then put the glass down. The ginger hair teacher's eyes showed no twinkle in them like they used to as she thought about what happened over the last week.
“To think, Liz. To think each of them were all still here a little over a week ago…” Ms Frizzle began as she started to think about the events that had transpired over the past week or so.