The Great Belligerency [Round 4: Static]

Originally posted on MSPA by Pick Yer Poison.

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As his new surroundings faded into focus, Phil found himself staring at an empty room full of one-man desks, with a larger one at the end he was standing at. It took him just under a minute to realize that he was staring at a classroom. All the desks were empty at the moment, but a lack of dust showed that this was most likely only temporary. You'd think that with enough tech to build a flying utopia, they'd rework the school system. He brushed his hand across the teacher's desk, and a holographic interface popped up; it seemed to be requesting a fingerprint scan. Phil raised an eyebrow. I stand corrected. He moved to one of the student desks and tapped the top of it lightly. Unlike the teacher's desk, it didn't ask him for any sort of identification, instead displaying an empty surface with a small box in the corner. Phil extended a pointer finger and tapped the box, causing it to release a number of icons which he assumed represented different programs. He scanned the list, but wasn't able to recognize anything except a suspiciously familiar card icon. On a hunch, he tapped it, and a Solitaire window appeared. Instead of lying flat on the desk, it was propped up at an angle. Must be so the teacher can tell if someone's playing card games in class. I personally would've just put spy programs on them, but I guess letting the kids have the illusion of freedom is important. He tapped the icon again and the window retreated.

Walking over to the window, Phil glanced out at the campus. It looked remarkably like your average perfectville college from his era. It was a warm summer day with a light breeze, and large, shady oak trees grew all over the grassy grounds. A group of muscular, almost simian jocks were chucking a football around in one of the open areas, and little clusters of people crossing the campus weaved in between them. Others littered the grounds in groups of three, pairs of two, or alone, mostly studying, sometimes chatting. He noticed a bipedal lizard-like boy shyly flirting with a just-as-shy butterfly-like girl behind an oak tree, safe from most prying eyes. Phil grinned. Life as usual. But the most important feature was a big sign on the building across from the one he had appeared in. New Shambhala University, Phil read to himself. Home of the Fighting Locanias? The hell is a locania? Phil paused to think for a moment. First order of business is to locate Reinhardt or Cole. Teaming up with Ur or Balance would be political suicide, so to speak, and Soft seems too unstable to make a good ally. Julia worries me, though. With her speed, she doesn't need my protection at all, which means that she could betray me at any point. The same goes for Reinhardt; perhaps I should warn him? Although on second though, perhaps that's not such a good idea. He certainly didn't save her from Dove before, since I saw her grab him and pull him away from the group; that special effort to recruit him may mean they're in cahoots, and tipping one off would alert the other. She must have an ulterior motive for her alliance with me, if not the one with Reinhardt as well, and I intend to find out what it is. Oh, and just in case... He turned on his rifle's safety, then cracked open the door, and cautiously slipped out.

Phil strode purposefully down one of the paths towards the building with the sign on it, hoping it would be an administrative one where he could get a map of New Shambhala, or at least one of the area surrounding the university. Unfortunately, the administration found him first.

"Excuse me, but is that a...gun?" A tall, humanoid man who resembled a lizard, with scales all over his back, arms, and legs, and with a tail coming off his end stopped Phil in his tracks. He was wearing a lab coat and had a sticker on it reading, "MATH/PHYSICS WING."

Phil shook his head. "Just a replica. I was asked to give a lecture to a history class here on soldiers in the past, since they're currently studying them. I figured the kids might find it more interesting if I looked the part, eh?"

The lizard-man nodded. "Ah, alright. Make sure you keep your visitor badge on at all times, though; the security bots are finicky about that."

Visitor badge? Uh oh. "Oh, right. I was meaning to ask someone where I could get another; I must've dropped mine at some point when I was changing into this costume, and I can't find it anywhere."

One of the scaly arms pointed in the direction of the building that Phil had already been headed towards. "That's the main entrance. Just ask around in there and I'm sure they'd be happy to oblige."

Phil nodded and resumed walking. "Thanks!" The nodded back and smiled, then continued on his own path. After a couple of minutes, Phil reached his destination. He nodded to the people there as he left the university. He spotted a rack of pamphlets and picked up one of each, then flipped through them until he had found a few with maps of both the surrounding area and New Shambhala in general. He put the rest back and walked out the wide doors, drawing a few odd stares from the passerby, but nothing else. He sat down on a bench near the entrance to New Shambhala University and pulled out the maps, trying to decide where to begin his search for the others.