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Darkley’s had once been a proper place for learning how best to be bad; now it was a small, half‑forgotten campus that smelled of dust, cheap polish, and a faint metallic tang you could only notice if you’d lived long enough to miss it. The headmaster was usually away from the school and trying various quick money schemes and the teachers were either hiding from the cops, in jail or off making new reasons for the cops to be after them. No one quite knew how the school was still operational.
Lloyd knew that technically, Darkley’s was a boys’ boarding school, it had a dozen students at most. All the boys wearing uniforms cobbled together and tailored by anyone decent with a needle and supplemented with clothes brought from home. It was a building where kids learned how to be bad under the indifferent eye of distant administrators.
He had been here the longest. Dropped off as a toddler by a mother he doesn’t remember anymore. He knew all the students and their stories. Half the students here had parents who didn’t realise it wasn’t a correctional institution. All of them had parents who didn’t care. Sally’s parents signed her up for boarding school and never even checked if it was boys or girls. She’d been dropped off and left in the company of children who had made Darkley’s into their own strange sort of family.
Other than Lloyd, Gene and Brad had been here the longest. They’d taken Sally under their wing because she was small, bright, and earnest. She liked rules and flash cards; they liked her company well enough. The staff had largely stopped pretending to care. Rules at Darkley’s were more like suggestions written in a language the adults weren’t interested in anymore. Lloyd didn’t mind dragging his mattress into Gene and Brad’s room so that Sally could have a room to herself.
Today was a self-study day. They called today self‑study day because the regular teacher had disappeared. Or at least didn’t care to attend class. Lloyd stood at the entrance to the classroom they had taken over for the morning. The room looked like someone had once tried to teach dangerous things and then left the props. Jars lined two worktables: dried matter, bits of bark, folded papers of smells and memories. Brad kept them arrayed with a kind of meticulous attention that made the other boys respect him even when they didn’t want to. Today he had taken over the teacher’s desk to lay out all sorts of bundles of plants and labelled jars.
Gene bent over a bench cluttered with metal, wire, and springs. He was small and skinny, hands already stained with oil from things he’d made before he could tie his shoelaces properly. He liked to make devices that hummed and surprised; whatever the lesson was, he could turn it into something that did not belong. Yesterday he’d built a curious contraption from a bedframe hinge, a loop of piano wire, and a spring.
Sally sat at a desk in front of Brad, making flash cards with tiny, careful letters. She was the only girl in a place that was supposed to be all boys, and she liked that the boys had let her in.
She made the flash cards clean and helpful. She liked knowing where things were and what they meant. It steadied her. Lloyd couldn’t help but think she really didn’t deserve to be stuck at Darkley’s.
Lloyd wandered over to the group with the tray he had liberated from the kitchen. He had managed to put together some sandwiches from the random supplies that the teachers usually forgot to restock. He’d have to ask Gene to hack into the headmaster’s computer later. It wouldn't be the first time they had to order more supplies.
“I come bearing lunch,” He interrupted happily, sliding the tray onto the teacher’s desk forcing Brad to scramble to clear space.
“Lloyd! Tell Gene he’s wrong. Poison is the best way to kill someone. Subtle and neat,” Brad grabs the closest sandwich and waves his arm in Gene’s direction.
Lloyd shrugs, “Again, I’m not entertaining this argument.” He takes one of the sandwiches and flashes it in front of Gene’s face until he puts down his latest project. Sally had already put down her pencil and started tucking into her own sandwich.
“Thank the First Master Lloyd,” She starts to explain. “You were only gone for a minute before they had started on it again.”
Lloyd chuckles as he takes his own sandwich and peels back the top before snatching one of Brad's samples. He thinks it could be Bittersweet Nightshade but could also be Honeysuckle Berries but it didn’t really matter either way.
“Hey!” Brad exclaims, dragging the rest of his samples away from Lloyd. “Respect the samples”
Lloyd pokes his tongue out at Brad and takes a bite of his newly improved sandwich. A little bitter but with a sweetness behind it. Peanut butter was boring without the extra flavour. Lloyd is beyond glad he is seemingly immune to poisons. They taste so much better.
“Was that the Bittersweet Nightshade or the Honeysuckle Berries. It has a very nice aftertaste,” he replies.
“Honeysuckle Berries”, Brad answers shortly. “We’re done with tasting today.”
“I don't know why you bother trying to stop him. You've yet to grow something that makes him even feel queasy. It's quite fascinating really,” Gene comments.
“Yeah, Brad, let me eat the fun foods.”
Before Brad can retort the intercom unit in the classroom screeches. All four of them startle and Lloyd drops his sandwich to cover his ears. For all the strengths of being whatever he was there were certainly some downfalls.
Even with his ears covered there was no mistaking the announcement, “Lloyd Garmadon to the office now.”
The four students shared a look.
“Has anyone ever been summoned to the office,” Sally queried nervously.
“Never,” Lloyd answered. “Not as long as I've been here.”
There was a pause.
“I guess I better go see what they want from me then.”