You Can't Spell "Nuisance" Without "Insane" |Cade|

    It's quiet.
    Too quiet.
    The sound of each footstep bounced off the walls of the gigantic room as Aria paced around, running her fingers along the spines of every book, looking for some old poetry to bring her comfort. Something Plath-y or Hemingway-ish. Anything would do at this point, really. Being in a new magic school was so strange to Aria. Before a few months ago, she didn't even know it existed.
    I mean, I knew there was something weird about me, but I never imagined -
Brrrud dud dud dud dud
    "Sorry," she instantly apologized to the librarian as she tripped over a stool and sent it tumbling down the aisle. Cursing under her breath, she nudged it upright carefully and stepped around it this time, making sure to watch where she walked. Last thing she wanted was to knock over a shelf in this large place. The library itself was beautiful and vast, a never-ending pool of knowledge trapped between parchment and hidden amongst the shelves, and Aria was still in awe of it. Thousands of books full of magic, "How To"s, history, everything. It was magnificent.
    Her index finger stopped at one titled "Control Your Power; Don't Let it Control You!" and she sighed. How was she supposed to control her power when she didn't even have a handle on her life? Everything that took place was out of her control entirely. Being adopted, abused, living on the streets, Harrison's death, and now this. Why didn't she get a say in whether or not she would be "gifted" with such powers? Why was everything predetermined? It wasn't fair.
    Arianette had half a mind to check out the book only to destroy it. But there would be no point. Someone else might need to read it more than she needed to dispose of it. Instead, she pushed it back so it touched the wall of the shelf and disappeared between "The Elements and How To Effectively Use Them" and "Stine's Book of Werewolves", then kept walking. Thinking she was simply moving through the aisle, Aria ended up pacing quickly, searching faster for some old comforts, as though finding some might calm her down. When she couldn't, she rounded the corner and flew straight into someone. Aria backed up awkwardly and apologized for the second time, then tried to turn and speed away without seeing who it was.
    "Stop being a fool," she muttered to herself and plopped into a chair. It was no use. She was never going to find any classic poetry in this Hogwartsian library.

After hearing about how the library had been destroyed and rebuilt recently, Cade had to take a look at the new library. He remembered the way it used to be when he was a student a couple years back, he had to see the new one for the sake of reference. Back when he was a student, he couldn’t really recall any sort of destruction that was nearly as bad as what happened to the library. Then again, a lot of the students he had encountered so far seemed a bit more aggressive than the ones he had ever met. Like the one that almost pulled a gun on him. He should probably try to interact with more students before the summer was over.

He entered the revamped library feeling both familiar with it and alienated by it. It still looked a bit like how it used to, but everything was probably not arranged the same as it was before. Perhaps he could take out a book, something to get that bartender off his mind. He approached one of the aisles feeling almost like a student once more, except he didn’t do that much reading when he was younger.

As he neared the bookshelf to browse, a female student zoomed past him. Luckily he wasn’t in her way. His eyes followed the girl until she reached the seating area. He peered into the aisle staring straight at another person who looked equally as confused as Cade did. He supposed he had to play responsible teacher once again and paced himself over to where the girl had ran off to. He began to wonder what it was that caused her to do something like that, perhaps he should have asked the student she ran into; although it didn’t seem like that big of a deal.

Cade had to approach the girl carefully as he didn’t know whether the girl was livid or depressed. Either way, he had to choose his words carefully. “Having troubles finding a book?” he asked gently with a warm smile as he slyly slid himself into a chair neighboring her own. “I can’t find anything in here either.”

    Arianette glanced up and shrugged, the corners of her mouth turned up into a tiny grin. She gestured around and sighed exasperatedly.
    "I can't seem to find any good poetry. Like, classic American poets. I arrived here a few months ago and I've learned nothing, made no friends, don't have a clue how to cope with my friend's death, and to top it all off, I can't seem to shake these vibes I get from everyone I pass anywhere AND I see ghosts and demons who either want me to help them pass on or try to harm me."
    She raised her palms up and dropped them, signifying giving up.
    "I can't go back home. Ever. I don't even think I even had one to begin with."
Sneaking another look at the professor, she shook her head and leaned back into the chair. She began to feel gentle yet on-edge moods radiating from the professor and tried to ease up a little bit. He was only trying to help, not hear her entire life story in one go.
    "I apologize for dumping all this onto you right away. I just - I don't know how to deal with this. Every person in this room, I know what they're feeling. I had a good handle on it before, but ever since Harrison passed, I've lost total and complete control over it. I'm not used to that, being a pawn in my own life. It just feels like I never had a choice to begin with. Nobody asked me if I wanted this. I was simply stuck with it."
Aria covered up her face in a mixture of shame and embarrassment and moaned quietly.
    "I'm Arianette, by the way," she mentioned through her fingers, refusing to unveil herself until she could breathe calmly and quiet the rattle of emotions she was experiencing.

Cade grew a bit of a cringe on his face as he heard the summary of the child’s life in mere seconds. Her story reminded him far too much of himself. He took this job to teach mathematics, not be every other student’s psychiatrist. Besides, he didn’t even have his own life figured out; he wasn’t sure how helpful he could be with someone else’s. Though being that he was a teacher he had to at least attempt, though being that the girl led on that she had the ability to sense emotions he hoped that she couldn’t sense his anxiety in the matter.

His brain went into overdrive as he tried to come up with the best advice he could come up with in the little amount of time he was given. “No, no its fine. Everyone has their way of coping with things, it’s sometimes better to get things out then keep them in” he replied sounding as assuring as he possibly could. “I’m Mr. Lemaire, but you could call me Cade if you’d like.” He didn’t really grow up with an ability that hindered his way of life, in fact his improved it. Though, he should have known that dealing with situations like this was part of the job description.

“Well, nobody can really choose how they end up in this world can they?” he spoke as he pulled a deck of cards out of his back pocket. He used to be a street magician, so he tended to carry a deck of cards wherever he went even when they weren’t needed. He began to shuffle the deck and drew five cards as he continued to speak “Some are dealt good hands, others not so much” he said as he showed his five cards being no higher than nine. “But, if you interchange some of the cards in your hand for new ones…” he then switched out half his cards and pulled back the same amount from the deck. “…You end up with something much better” he said as he displayed his new hand, showing that he now had a straight(in poker terms).He hoped that his lesson didn’t get lost in translation.

    "Nice to meet you, Mr. Lemaire."
Aria relaxed and dropped her hands to pay attention to the card trick. It was rather impressive, though she'd been taught by her friend Harrison how to perform simple card tricks the whole time she lived with him.
    "Yeah, I guess you're right. I just wish I could regain control over my power. I used to be able to project emotions as well as feel them, but I have no idea what happened to it." She shrugged and rested her head on her right palm, which was propped up on the arm of the chair.
    "I'd love to have a more active power." Aria glanced at him to watch for his reaction.
    Of course he has one, he's a teacher, she reasoned. Besides using reason, she had an intuitive feeling he did. And she was about to test him on it.
    Part of being an empath, I suppose, is having the longer stick metaphorically.
    "Although, I can pretty much tell you have some sort of upper hand on me power-wise, not simply because you're a teacher albeit that promotes intelligence as well as experience, but also you are older, which could mean nothing at all and simultaneously everything. Your power most likely revolves around something active and useful, while mine are simply, a majority of the time, a hassle."
    Relaxing her pose, Aria folded her arms over her chest and waited for his response to her deduction. It was only a matter of time before he proved to be nothing more than a simple apprentice to the rumored great and powerful teachers this school has armed itself with. She hadn't been here long and already Aria had noticed several of the students were involved in rather trivial and frivolous activities while none too serious about enhancing their abilities. As such, the teachers seemed to resemble them, though only vaguely.
    Working on her power was something of an immediate project, and Aria would take every opportunity to develop them. She exuded confidence in order to promote it, while perhaps overdoing it a bit. But anything to aid a young teacher in his confidence with dealing with students could only be seen as helpful.
    In hindsight, though, it could also negatively affect him and he'll become more complacent and possibly anxious about my disposition and sudden change of character. Only time will tell how he responds.

Cade was sort of surprised that his card trick actually got through to her. Either that or she didn’t quite understand and just wanted to move past it, but to him it was still a success nonetheless. At least Aria was much easier to get through to than that surfing student he encountered a couple days prior. His anxiety levels quickly lowered as he placed his deck of cards back to where they once were with a bit of a glowing smile as he did. He was definitely a person who was quick to confidence.

She mentioned his powers and predetermined that his abilities were probably superior to his while mentioning that she wished she had more useful abilities. When it came to combat, Cade wished the same thing especially if he was faced against a gifted that was physically enhanced. Though he still could find some uses for his powers. As far as his ability being superior to her’s, that was entirely debatable. Empathes were very dangerous enemies to make, not so much someone with the ability to clone objects. “Upper hand? Maybe, it might be a bit corny of me to say, but every power has its strengths. Heck, there are times I wish I could manipulate people’s emotions. It would make my job easier” he replied making sure he censored himself since he was speaking with a student. “I can clone objects, but that doesn’t necessarily mean my power is any better than yours per say.” He would’ve made a comment of how she could probably be smarter than him regardless of him being a teacher since he wasn’t well educated as a child, but he didn’t want to make it seem like Foresta hired bums off the street.

As he finished his speech in reply to the girl’s statement he made himself a bit more comfortable in his seat by leaning back a bit and crossing one of his legs over the other. Perhaps playing psychiatrist wasn’t all too bad, it seemed quite simple and now he knew a trick he could probably reuse on other troubled students.

    Smirking, Aria shook her head gently and replied to Mr. Lemaire.
    "Speaking of which, how long have you been a teacher here?"
    Couldn't have been that long, she reasoned. He seems too much at ease.
The teacher now reeked of confidence. It didn't take an empath like herself to figure that one out. Arianette had the greatest urge to knock him off his high horse, but thought better of that. Really, she had better fish to fry, and frankly, he didn't seem worth the effort of pestering at great length. (Though it would certainly be easy  for a girl with her caliber of experience in schooling adults.) Since before she could remember, Aria had been brushing off any adult's attempt at helping her and teaching her the " correct way", by their standards, of dealing with issues and resolving the past. It would take a lot more than a card trick to reach Aria, and she knew it in her heart before he even sat down that this teacher would not be the one to shake her or rattle her in the slightest bit.
    But he's so sweet and innocent. So young to be a teacher.
    "Just out of curiosity, how many times have you taken a life?"
    Oh well. I can't resist.
Standing up suddenly, Aria went to the nearest shelf and scanned for the book she glimpsed earlier. Finding it with her index, she picked it up and flipped to a page.
    "I'm only asking because," she began, pacing in front of the teacher, "not everyone is cut out for the hardest things in life. Freedom is something most people will and have fought for years just to preserve. But what is said for a man who does not fight for anything?"
    Finding the paragraph, she read it aloud:
    " 'A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.' Do you know who wrote that?" Without pausing, Aria continued "John Stuart Mill. One of the greatest utilitarian philosophers of the nineteenth century. He wrote about liberty and the validation of freedom."
She stopped, reread the passage, then promptly shut the book and returned it to its place on the shelf. Then she took her seat and faced the teacher intently.
    "The one thing John forgets to mention are women and children who don't fight. I would lay down my life for another persons's in a heartbeat, and I have." Aria looked away, slightly ashamed, then leaned back in her chair and sighed, her eyes closed.
    "I've killed a man twice your size. By Mill's standards, I have a chance to be free because I fought for it. What about my mother, or my sister? They don't deserve to be kept under someone else's thumb just because they aren't capable of the fight."
    Arianette opened her eyes, but did not yet glance at Mr. Lemaire. She simply sat motionless and concentrated on her breathing.

“This upcoming school year will be my first” Cade answered to Aria. He displayed no shame of any sort in saying it. He was unsure why it would matter to her, but perhaps his young appearance seemed off putting. Her questions quickly fell deep into personal territory as her next inquiry was how many times he’s killed someone. Cade could count on two hands of how many people he’s killed and gotten away with. Rival gang members made up most of the list, to be fair though a lot of the time they were the ones who started the fights. He had seen so many deaths that he’s become slightly desensitised by it. He cringed as he thought of it and left that question unanswered as he still had a reputation to keep as a teacher.

Luckily the student had walked off, so it gave him time to ponder and decide whether or not to discuss the fact he’s killed people before. She brought over a book written by some philosopher he’d only recognise by name and nothing else. He listened with general interest, but nothing more than that. He began to put together his thoughts as the woman went back to sit down in her chair once more. His face a bit perplexed by what he had just heard. He leaned in forward as he began his spiel “Mill’s standard means absolutely nothing. There is no textbook definition of freedom, it is what people want it to be. Mill might’ve been an incredibly intelligent man, but everyone has their own unique thought pattern and upbringing. To follow another person’s path to freedom is an oxymoron in itself. Your mother and sister don’t have to fight in the same sense that you had to fight. There is more than one way to move around an obstacle. Not everything has to play out in the way that some philosopher says it will.”

Cade return to lean against the back of the chair once more feeling relieved to finish what he had said. “My card trick is only a mere suggestion, heck for all I know you’ll probably leave unaffected by what I have said. Cycles in life tend to repeat and I know by the time I was around your age I didn’t care for people trying to help me out either. I was a shut out, I didn’t trust other people especially after I found out that my ‘father’ had kidnapped me from my true parents when I was no older than a year. Or maybe I’m wrong and you agree with me, I don’t know, I’m no empath” he explained quite nonchalantly.

    Arianette inhaled deeply when she felt it, though it was something she couldn't quite put her finger on. This feeling was somewhat new to her, though she had felt it before. After she killed that man, that is. At this new revelation, she grinned.
    Finally, something I can work with.
"Frankly, I don't think it's something to hide or be inwardly ashamed of. That shows strength beyond measure and means that you had something that meant so much to you, you were willing to lay down your life for it."
Aria got up again, restless and agitated by the emotions coursing through her, though most of them weren't hers. Well, except for feeling livid. That was purely hers alone, and it was revolving through her torso like a windmill. Aria couldn't stand still, but forced herself to stay in the vicinity of this teacher until she, at the very least, could understand why he reacted to her the way he did.
    He's impossibly infuriating. I can't get a single clear read on him.
    "I never said I made my decisions based upon a single philosopher's quote. In fact, I dare say I validate my actions with such quotes, rather than live by them. Besides, who's to know what's right and what isn't anymore?"
    Arianette felt ridiculous, explaining all this to someone who was at least 5 years her senior.
    "I never said it didn't affect me. Quite the opposite, it did. However insignificantly, though, it did impact me positively."
She sat back down hesitantly, and slumped in her seat.
    "You're too much. I don't know how your students put up with your apathy." Shaking her head, she sighed and glanced at him, waiting for a response.

Cade watched the girl curiously as she wandered around the seating area. It was quite strange to him to listen to this girl while she was pacing, but he could still follow what she had said. He made an inward laugh as Aria sat back down on her seat. “I thought that a lack of emotion would ease the stress on your brain. I’ve yet to teach a class, so I’m not sure how they would react to my lack of emotion” he spoke with a grin. His lack of emotion was actually not intentional, he supposed that he inadvertently lost his emotions when trying to act serious. Perhaps he was trying a bit too hard.

“Trust me, I have no shame for anything I’ve done in the past. What I’ve done is done and there’s nothing I can change about that, but since I am within my work building I won’t blatantly admit to anything that could potentially get me fired. Though, that doesn’t quite display strength of any sort. For all you know I could say that it was a complete accident because I fumbled around with a gun.” He leaned forward as he continued still displaying a bit of a grin, though it looked like more of a smirk. “Hypotheticals are interesting, aren’t they?”

“You may not be doing something because of a quote, but you seek a quote in order to make yourself feel better for your actions. Why have someone else tell you that what you did was valid when you should be finding your own reasons as to why what you did was valid.” Cade began to think that he was probably forcing too much of his own opinion into what he was saying, but didn’t feel he should tone it down. He probably shouldn’t be trying to influence himself too much on the teenager.