It was the final school period of the day, and to think Nevil had come so close this time!

All he wanted was to make it through a school day without being roped into some or other overhyped, existential crisis that threatened the livelihood of himself and the apparent existence of the universe. But, as his luck had it, this countryside quack-hive was stuffed to the brim with some of the most interesting characters he’d seen in his life. And as a result, there was never a dull moment.

It was as if the Education Department was itself a neglectful mother, forced to birth one too many unwanted babies that were the schools of Pretoria: While some were cheaply favored with love and care, and others treated like the middle children of the education system, Greengrass High was more like the sickly old porch-poodle that the whole family hated but nobody had the heart to put down. And for all its fleas and stank and probable tetanus, this school was one sickly mut that simply refused to die.

Yet, even with all that was counted against them, the school’s teachers— slightly off as they were—kept themselves proud and sincere in their constant efforts at damage control and upholding a standard.

After having narrowly avoided another escapade in English and surviving Maths without any mortal injuries, Nevil had just still needed to make it through Technical Drawings class, the final period of the day.

But of course, only minutes before the day ended, his name had been called by their teacher, as if it were a summons to the underworld.

“Nevelius,” Mrs. Gukenstein called out again from her desk at the front of the class. “Dearest, would you be so kind as to do me a favor?”

“Nobody calls me that,” Nevil mumbled to himself for the hundredth time. He looked up from the sketch on his Technical Drawings board and found himself re-immersed in the bigger world around him, one he tried to avoid whenever possible:

The EGD-classes were less like well-constructed buildings -suited for the education of school children, and more like abandoned chicken coups -suited for the enslavement of any fowl creature that didn’t have a love for life. It was cold, uncomfortable and probably contaminated with asbestos.

And then there was its teacher, the Keeper of the Beast.

Mrs. Gukenstein was an interesting character herself. Reaching retirement age and being one of the only females battle-hardened enough to survive it in the school, she herself had to be a little bit…strange.

As Technical Drawings was a predominantly male subject, it was rumored this old lady had once learnt her ‘skills’ while being secretary to the very architect who designed Greengrass High. Of course, it was to the great distraction of the draughtsman as their ‘learning sessions’ had been rumored to be quite…intimate…which explains why the poor twit had been so distracted when he so incompetently drew up the plans for the entire premises:

Firstly, the school’s only fire hose reel had been mounted inside the main building, at the end of a very long and secluded passageway that lay between two brick walls. This meant that every time some of the pupils secretly tried to catch a smoke during carpentry class, the hose would need to be run through an enormous maze of classrooms to reach the outside shed where the only fires were known to start.

Of course, the teachers themselves were so unfamiliar with the terrain that they could never navigate through the building quickly enough. More often than not, they would unintentionally trap themselves in the web of hosepipes that looped around the classrooms, offices and supply rooms, eventually cutting short from reaching the shed before it burned down.

Every few months, these fire damages had been one of the school’s largest expenses and none of the staff had an answer for it.

Secondly, by some manner of idiocy or persuasion, the architect had succeeded in convincing the education board to build a bunker directly under the school pool, saying it was their best chance at surviving a tactical missile strike. Not only had the pool already been built when they approved construction, but it was so poorly built that it eventually started leaking water into the reinforced concrete basement.

This proved itself to be very…unfortunate…for the school’s IT department when they had moved all their computer equipment and back-up systems thereunder for apparent ‘safekeeping’. As a result, all the school’s digital filing and correspondence had been destroyed by water damage and, understandably, the school had lost all funding from the education department, leaving them all but deserted on the fringes of civilized society. Consequently, they were forced to work exclusively with analogue technology as a cheaper alternative and use any manner of animal or child labor to get work done around the premises.

And finally, there were the toilets…

Similar to contemporary architecture from other schools, all Stupendous High’s privies had ventilation pipes that were mounted to run straight up the outside walls. Except for this particular design, these pipes terminated on the second floor, just under the classroom windows, where the foul odors could eventually escape. This meant that every time some poor soul had excused himself to the loo, the entire upper floor would be fumigated with the pungent smell, like breathing in death itself and, naturally, curse them for it.   

Everyone rued the day that someone might get diarrhea and so it remained an unspoken fear among the students…

And to think that for all the years this old lady had been at the school, Mrs. Gukenstein remained blissfully unaware of all the misery and suffering she had been responsible for. It only took the seduction of one half-attractive teacher and the incompetence of one half-wit architect to create so much discomfort, unease that would traumatize generations to come.

Yet for all that, Stupendous High still endured.

“Nevelius,” she repeated with less patience. “Dearest, I need you to make another secret delivery to another one of my colleagues.”

Nevil sighed to himself. It’s not very secret if you say it in front of the whole class, he thought but kept his voice polite. “The cigarettes again, Ma’am?”

“No,” she scoffed, looking more like a miserable child upset to be caught in the act of some naughty scheme. “I just need you to secretly return a pacer pencil to the desk of a certain teacher. I used it yesterday when he wasn’t there and am looking to quietly give it back, you know, because I have integrity or something like that…”

He focused his gaze and saw the pacer she held in her hand: It was one of those technical drawing pencils that fed a thin rod of lead through the nozzle when you pushed a button at the back.

Immediately, Nevil felt suspicious. “Why do I feel there’s more to this story than that, Ma’am?”

Mrs. Gukenstein snorted and swung the pen in the air, as if it were a wand. “Allegedly, they say the security cameras caught an ‘old, gremlin-looking lady’ crawling in through one of the building windows and stealing some stationery.”

“Seems like quite an intricate operation,” Nevil said, playing along. “How did nobody notice you?”

“Allegedly…” Mrs. Gukenstein added carefully. “This particular lady snuck in while the teacher was out extinguishing another one of those shed fires…”

You might be old as evil itself, Nevil thought, but you’re clearly still as eager as ever for petty opportunities of theft and shadiness, aren’t you?

…Though that also wasn’t a motive enough, Nevil thought. He couldn’t help but wonder why someone so elderly would put herself through such great stress to secretly obtain such a small thing.

Then again, he reminded himself, this old gremlin probably lives her life in two simultaneous realities: one– where every stupid and outlandish escapade is justified and ultimately serves ‘the greater good’, and the other one– where the rest of society has to suffer because of it.

Nonetheless, she continued, resuming the air of a loving old lady, only having made an innocent mistake. “I mean, why do people bother over something so small? Why can’t we all just be generous and kind and non-judgmental of others?”

 “So were you then intent on returning the pacer you took, Ma’am?” Nevil asked, already knowing the answer.

“Of course not,” she barked. “That greedy bastard had it coming!”

Nevil shook his head, but by now nothing of the sort could faze him anymore. He really didn’t have the time or energy to be caught up in yet another teacher’s rivalries. He simply wanted to focus on passing his subject and moving on with distinction, an objective Mrs. Gukenstein made nearly impossible.

He tried to hide his irritation and lifted his sketch paper so that it dangled before him. “I really need to be finishing the project, Ma’am. You said so yourself.”

“Nonsense, dearest,” she said, squinting her eyes at his drawing with a look of apparent disgust. “With my knowledge and considerate involvement as your teacher, you’ll do just fine with that…whatever that is.”

“You had said my work ‘smells of an abomination’…”

“…smells of determination,” she corrected him politely. “And I was right, dearest: Someone as grossly incompetent as you needs to be ‘determined’ to skim through with a pass…”

Or not smother you with a pillow, he thought and noticed that she looked more and more unsettled as the time went on.

“Now just go drop off this one little pencil before the dearest Mr. Hickinbottom makes it to his office, please…”

“You stole a pen from the principal’s office?”

“Borrowed without permission!” she yelled. “And he had it coming!” She threw the pen so that it flew across the room, nearly missing Nevil as he dodged it. “Now go!”

“But Ma’am,” Nevil protested, frantically shaking his paper. “I’ll miss the project deadline and fail this term.”

“Well,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “Isn’t that a shame…Now go!”

Nevil found himself suddenly riled up by her apparent hastiness and jumped up from his chair, pen in hand. He bolted to the doors, hoping to complete the job and rush back in time, but stopped at the threshold. “But Ma’am,” he said, turning back. “Isn’t the principal still in his office?”

She shook her head. “He’s at the loo…”

Confused, Nevil struggled for the words. “How could you possibly know that?”

Mrs. Gukenstein pointed to the second-floor classrooms. “Everyone knows when Mr. Hickinbottom has the runs!”

Nevil turned back, filled with horror at what he might see, and looked in the distance to the upper classrooms.

Sure enough, a far-off commotion had begun in those dreaded halls, one he had been all too familiar with, one that usually left the upper floor traumatized for days…

Dozens of students stormed to the outside windows, like helpless mice caught in a cage, choking on the foul stench that Mr. Hickinbottom sent up the ventilation pipes. They scrambled among themselves, clawing for the latches that sealed the rooms, but to no avail.

 Nevil looked up in despair. “We have to do something!”

“There’s nothing you can do for them!” Mrs. Gukenstein screamed, “…but you can do something for me!”

“They’re my friends!”

“Well,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “Isn’t that a shame…”

He turned away from the massacre of his fellow pupils, frowning at her with disbelief, but she persisted.

“The needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many.”

That’s not how the saying goes, you old kook! he thought in hasty panic.

She waved him away, like commanding a dog to run after some old stick. “Now go! Go, I tell you! Save my skin, little one!”