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Simon had asked Grace a horrible question.
A question he now can't escape.
He had asked Grace if he could tell him a little bit about Earth's history, he was just curious.
Now he was watching Grace frantically writing on the white board, his glasses no longer even on his face.
"Okay so- World War One started because the people in Bosnia didn't want to become a part of Austria-Hungary, so someone decided to kill Arch duke Franz Ferdinand." Grace rambled.
Simon had no idea what he was talking about. He just nodded slowly. Who the hell is Arch Duke Fran- nevermind he already forgot.
"The assassination caused Austria-Hungary to declare war on Serbia, since, you know, they assassinated this... really important guy." Grace paused for a second before he continued writing on the whiteboard. "Since Russia was allies with Serbia, obviously they would protect them. And Russia has, like, a crazy powerful military. And then of course Germany declared war on Russia cus they were scared their military would overpower them or something, I don't know, it was stupid."
Simon couldn't agree more.
"Anyways," Grace continues "All of that lead into the July crisis, which was basically just when all the countries militaries were scrambling to build up their military, since everyone was getting dragged into this war."
Is there any way Rocky can help Simon get out of this? Rocky help. Please.
Much to Simon's dismay, Grace kept going.
"Right after the war broke out, Germany thought it would be a good idea to invade France by going through Belgium to avoid a two front war, but going through Belgium they, of course, dragged them into the war too."
Grace pauses for a moment to continue writing his time line on the whiteboard
"Everyone is pretty much just declaring war on everyone at this point. It's really not looking good. Anyways, a lot of boring fighting happens, everyone's mad, and everyone is trying to invade everyone. Anyways, finally in 1918, the Treaty of Versailles is signed and the war ends."
Simon thought it was finally over, but Grace just kept going.
"The Treaty of Versailles wasn't really effective, like, at all. It put a lot of reparations on Germany that they really didn't like. They basically had to accept all responsibility for the war, pay financial reparations to the allied powers, give back a lot of the land that they had annexed during the war, and cut down their military to just 100,000 men."
"100,000 men sounds like a lot." Simon pointed out.
Grace scoffed. "For Germany? No way. Anyways, their Air Force and submarine fleets were completely eliminated, and the Rhineland, one of their most resource-rich territories, had to of course be permanently demilitarized. After World War One, the League of Nations was formed. They were meant to, you know, maintain world peace and whatnot. Obviously this did not work."
Is it finally over?
"So! World War Two!" Grace exclaimed in excitement.
DEAR GOD THERES MORE.
Simon let out a sigh of disappointment, even though he made sure Grace didn't hear it.
"So, years later in 1939, Germany was still pissy about the Treaty of Versailles, but it was different this time. Because this time Germany was being ruled by an absolute maniac, Adolf Hitler. The German people thought that the Treaty of Versailles had humiliated them, but it also caused economic devastation in the country, which obviously isn't good."
Grace erased everything he had previously wrote on the whiteboard, and replaced it with new information about... a new war... how exciting.
"On top of Germany's economy already being absolutely horrible, the Great Depression happened, which devastated like, all the countries economy. It was pretty bad. Anyways-"
Grace kept on writing. Simon is having trouble keeping up with all of these words...
"Then, fascism started growing in Europe, with the two fascist dictators Mussolini and Hitler, they both established very aggressive expansionist beliefs very early on. Japan also established that they wanted to expand into other nations. These three countries just wanted to invade literally everyone basically." Grace had started to pace at this point.
"Of course, since Germany was being insane, they broke like, a lot of agreements and treaties and stuff. They remilitarized, which violated the T of V-"
The wha of... oh treaty of ver- whatever.
"Germany also annexed Austria, and began to invade Czechoslovakia. Because of Germany's rapid expansion, the western democracies decided to form the Policy of Appeasement. Which basically entails 'Let's let Hitler do whatever he wants to avoid a war! That's very smart!' Spoiler alert. Didn't work. This actually only made Hitler's aggression worse, surprise surprise!" Grace said sarcastically.
How does he have all of this memorized..?
"At this point, Japan was also invading countries. They invaded Manchuria because they wanted the resources, but this lead to them eventually invading China as well. This was called 'the Second Sino-Japanese war.' This event was basically the start of World War Two in Asia. A lot of bad stuff happened during this war but we don't need to get into that.." Grace mumbled as he whipped all of the information off of the board.
Simon sighed in relief, he was finally safe.. Unless there was a third World War that he wasn't aware of...
Grace started writing on the whiteboard again. The... Spanish civil war? Oh dear God.
"Next! The Spanish Civil War! Although the history teacher at the school always called it the scdub? I don't know, he was weird. Anyways!"
Simon was holding back a groan. This is the most boring thing ever to Simon, but Grace seems to be happy while he's explaining it, so he doesn't want to make grace feel bad. But seriously where is Rocky? Why doesn't he have to sit through this too?
"So the Spanish Civil War started for many reasons. A lot of them were similar reasons for, pretty much every other war in the world. In 1931, the King of Spain stepped down, which caused Spain to become a republic. In 1936, A coalition left wing party called the popular front, wins the election, which a lot of people didn't like.. So in July of the same year, the military staged a coup, which started the war." Grace explains, writing bullet points on the whiteboard.
What the actual fuck is a coup? Whatever, Simon would figure it out later. He didn't want to ask.
"Do you know what a coup is?" Grace asked, shifting his focus away from the whiteboard for a moment. Simon slowly nodded, which Grace seemed to be happy about. Less things to explain I suppose?
"Anyways, General Franco Francisco was elected as the supreme leader of the Nationalist government. Eventually, international volunteers started to arrive to form international brigades and fight against the republic." Grace is running out of room on the whiteboard..
"Long story short, the republican armies surrendered, the war is over, blah blah blah, whatever." Grace rushes to the ending of this war, Simon assumes it's because he finds it boring?
Grace starts erasing the board. Once he's done, he writes "Revolutions" In big letters at the very top.
"Okay, I think that's enough history. Time for bed." Simon declares, standing up.
"Whattt? But I haven't even talked about the Russian revolution yet!" Grace complains. "That's too bad, we can save that one for tomorrow." Simon states, clearly very much done with this.
Grace sighs, but he gives in. "I am pretty tired.." He mumbles. "Exactly! Let's go get Rocky and go to bed." Simon says eagerly.
They find Rocky hiding from Grace and his history lesson in the plant room. Simon wonders why he hadn't thought of that before.
The extremely boring history replays in Simons head as he lays there, it sends him to sleep very quickly.