Quasi-Emergency Town Meeting, Town Hall, Sunday Morning

[bigdamnprincipal]

Zoe had spent most of yesterday pacing in her living room, rereading the letter from the school board, and leaving angry phone messages in clipped five-minute sections. The limitations on voicemail were just ridiculous when one had a lot on their mind.

When the day had gone by and Zoe hadn't heard from Bo, she decided to prepare for the worst - namely, that this visit was going to happen whether she wanted it to or not. She might have been powerless to stop Fandom from bureaucratic invasion, but at least she could try to warn everyone for what they might have to do. Since it wasn't just the school that was going to have to pass muster, Zoe sent out handwavey emails, as well as a message with the squirrels, to call everyone for "an important town meeting." Thankfully, the squirrels seemed to have gotten her message to the radio station, and between the broadcast and the emails, she was hoping that students and townsfolk alike would make it to the town hall. She'd tried to find the balance between urgency and not worrying people in her message, and she aimed to maintain that tone once everyone got settled down.

"Good morning, and thank you all for coming to this meeting," she said. "I know you all have a weekend to be enjoying, so I'll attempt to keep this brief. We have a bit of a...situation happening tomorrow at the school, and unfortunately, it's going to involve the town as well. The school board is coming with some important visitors and, well, I'll just let this speak for itself." Zoe straightened up a bit as she pulled out the letter from Stephen Colbert and read it to everyone. She was tempted to leave off the last two bullets, because really, the rest of the list was ridiculous enough without making the Canadians and aliens rise up in nationalistic anger too, but it seemed important to get the full scope of insanity of the message across.

"I want you all to know that if the tone of this letter makes you angry, you're not alone. We've been trying to...reason with the school board--" which was one way to put 'threatening multiple forms of violence' "--so it's entirely possible that they won't come at all. But if they do, we wanted you all to be prepared for what tomorrow might be like. We just have to pretend for a day, and then things can go back to normal - the real normal that we have here."

Hopefully, the school would still be funded when that happened.

Comments

Arrive/Complain

[bigdamnprincipal]

A meeting in the morning? On a Sunday? Surely these conditions are inhumane.

Re: Arrive/Complain

[furnaceface]

Jonothon had been planning on heading back home after his own broadcast to do some cleaning and prepare for dinner with Raven tonight, but he'd learned better than to avoid these meetings a long, long time ago.

He was standing off in a corner, as per usual, with his arms crossed over his chest and one eyebrow raised slightly. This promised to be interesting.

Re: Arrive/Complain

[steel-not-glass.livejournal.com]

Cindy could only snicker at the letter. It was so completely absurd it was impossible to take seriously.

And you know, it was laugh or shoot things. One of those.

Re: Arrive/Complain

[not_in_the_book]

This... didn't bode well. Ronan leaned against the back wall, dressed in his black leather -- and that had been a while -- but the good stuff was almost as good as actual armour.

If he was absently clicking away at a shiny little pen, well, the pen is mightier than the sword. Especially when the pen is a sword.

Re: Arrive/Complain

[stykera]

The last time there had been emergency meetings like this the world had almost ended. It seemed like a good idea to attend this one before heading to the Clinic for his shift.

He just hoped this wasn't going to be as serious as that had been.

Re: Arrive/Complain

[screwyoumarvel]

Steve was definitely concerned when he arrived for the meeting.

Then he heard the letter, and he was somewhere between offended and feeling a bizarre need to apologize to everyone present from anywhere else, on behalf of America.

Re: Arrive/Complain

[spring-lost.livejournal.com]

This being Cable's town hall, of course he was here.

Looking a little bit nonplussed, and maybe wondering if there was anything he could do about the school board's influence over half the population of the island.

Look, he felt kind of possessive about it.

Re: Arrive/Complain

[harpy-daughter.livejournal.com]

Surreal was already shrinking towards the back wall before the letter was finished, tugging out her braid and combing her hair forward, over her ears, with her fingers.

Someday, she wouldn't need to hide, and something inside her broke just a little bit that she needed to do so again, here, in a supposedly safe place. Maybe now Sadi would let her come home. If she had to hide her heritage, she might as well do it somewhere that she understood how the game was played.

Re: Arrive/Complain

[wwiii]

Oh, hey. Company over here against the freak wall. Warren glanced her way, offered her a nervous little nod, and proceeded to try to mash his wings against his back even more.

He'd been singled out specifically by one of the women on the school board. He was finding himself very thankful, all of a sudden, that he was graduating this year.

"So much for safe, huh?"

Re: Arrive/Complain

[chief-cheerio.livejournal.com]

If Quinn still made it to church regularly, she would have been even more annoyed by the timing than she was. She listened closely, hoping the student council would be able to help the students make a good impression.

How much could go wrong in one day, anyhow?

Listen to the Letter/Complain

[bigdamnprincipal]

But aqua colored fauna is a staple of any proper society!

Re: Listen to the Letter/Complain

[furnaceface]

As Zoe read the letter, Jonothon found himself frowning a little more deeply. They'd even complained about the teal deer, who, besides being completely harmless, had nothing to do with the school itself. The implications behind that set his teeth on edge a little.

"So, what does that mean for those of us with homes in town?"

The 'those of us who look like freaks' part was more or less implied, what with the way Jono was gesturing with one hand to his face, there.

Re: Listen to the Letter/Complain

[inaskinnyway.livejournal.com]

Susan listened to the letter, and Susan... wasn't complaining.

Don't get her wrong. She tended to stand out as being abnormal, and she didn't understand why there would be vows of allegiance nor did she care who that president was, but it didn't seem wholly unreasonable to her. This was the price you paid for getting to go to Rio on someone else's... it was dimes here, wasn't it? Yes, this was the price you paid for going to Rio on someone else's dime.

She did wonder how this would affect work tonight, though.

Re: Listen to the Letter/Complain

[stykera]

Stark wasn't complaining as he listened to the letter. Stark was just quietly getting worried. This did not bode well.

Re: Listen to the Letter/Complain

[shagthis.livejournal.com]

Although he wasn't directly involved with the operation of the school, Jake felt a certain obligation to attend this meeting.

As Zoe read out the letter, Jake's expression became more and more disgruntled. Really, they had to throw a jab in there about Canada? Really? Ugh.

Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[bigdamnprincipal]

Whatever plan the administration had cooked up clearly hadn't worked, because shortly after the meeting, the school board arrived.

If one looked carefully, one might notice the point where Zoe started to twitch.

[Please wait for the school board members to start pinging in!]

Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[feelsitinhisgut.livejournal.com]

Stephen entered the room, flung his hands up in the air and did a victory lap to the applause that...probably wasn't coming.

Ungrateful ingrates.

"Hello, ladies and gentlemen and--" wow, this place was bizarre. "--others! We are here to save you from yourselves!" He gestured at his fellow members of the board, and waited (probably in vain) for more applause.

"If you have any questions or complaints, well, we don't care," he added. "Questioning things is unpatriotic!" He pointed to Edna Mode. "But wearing uniforms Made in the USA! That's patriotic! As is polyester, which was invented right here in America!"

Probably. It's not like he checked these things.

"So line right up to get put into your new Costumes of Freedom!"

He smiled oh-so-sincerely at them. "Or if you insist on getting my autograph first, please have a check ready made out to my SuperPAC where we work on--" here he paused to stare dramatically into the middle distance, "making a better tomorrow, tomorrow."

He then waited expectantly for the thronging masses to speak to him.

Re: Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[kentucky-darby.livejournal.com]

Darby was well-accustomed to the school board chairman's antics, and while certainly there were times that a... well, louder tactic was called for, she thought she might do just as well to be a more reasoned influence.

... Given that this was Darby Evans -- and, for that matter, Stephen Colbert -- 'more reasoned' didn't mean calm.

"No, no, no, this won't do at all. Those wings will have to be covered up, and oh, my, that full-body tattoo?" She was looking right at Jono with that, yes. "Say it with me now: cover-up. I'm sure Ms. Mode can find something to disguise that particular shade of cerulean!"

Looking around, she considered the whole crowd. "And some of you look so angry! Oh, we'll just have to yoga that out of you. I'm certain you'll all relax if you give yourselves the chance!"

Re: Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[notfrizzy.livejournal.com]

"Hi, everyone!" Lizzi chirped, about as peppy and enthusiastic as it was possible for a human being to be. "My name's Lizzi and I'm here to make sure we get right back on track! I'm looking forward to getting to know each and every one of your shining smiling faces, so make sure to stop by for a chit-chat whenever you get a chance!"

Re: Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[bigbadproducer.livejournal.com]

Gideon had no real yearning to make any big speeches to the townsfolk gathered here. He was mostly here to amuse himself, anyway, so he could leave the little pep talks to his more eager companions.

So he was, in fact, checking his phone right now. He was a busy man, you know. Clubs didn't get themselves ready by themselves even if he was off seeing about the continued funding of this school, his pet project for multiversal reasons.

At least he kept glancing up. He wasn't entirely unapproachable.

Re: Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[3men1briefcase.livejournal.com]

Near the back of the group of school board members was a bald-headed man. He was standing between two other men. Both had black moustaches, and one carried a black attaché case. The bald man didn’t have a moustache.

All three men examined the people gathered at town hall thoughtfully. The school must continue, they were there to ensure that. If anyone decided to make things difficult, well... they had ways of dealing with such problems.

Re: Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[sgtbaracus.livejournal.com]

B.A. Baracus, formerly Sergeant First Class of the United States Military. Currently member of the secret underground Soldiers of Fortune group, The A-Team, and manager of a rather large community center for underprivileged L.A. kids.

Also one of the strongest voices for the Fandom kids on the School Board. Which was why he was here. He wanted these kids to have a place to go, whether he agreed with the methods or not.

He was standing proud and ready to tackle anyone who wasn't going to help.

Questions. He was going to tackle their questions.

Re: Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[800-math-sats.livejournal.com]

Lisa had been listening closely through all the presentations, regularly scribbling notes on her steno pad. She supposed she shouldn't have been surprised by the hostility; plenty of people didn't appreciate who signed their paychecks.

She just needed to get through the next week without any flaming disasters. It might even be kind of fun, getting down with the kids and all.

"Hi," she said, when it was her turn. She was using her radio voice, serious and clear. "My name is Lisa Miller and I'm happy to be here. I want you all to know, I understand your concerns and we're willing to work with you to make these temporary inconveniences as temporary and painless as possible. If you have questions, or want my particular input on something, I'm open to talking anytime."

Re: Arrival of the School Board/Complain

[belikekleenex.livejournal.com]

A woman of her financial standing had certain...obligations, and so Mrs. White would stand off to the side, doing her best not to sniff condescendingly at the tarts in the crowd. Philanthropy looked good, or so she had been informed, and a hands-off school board position had seemed suitably charitable.

Not to mention there seemed to be a dearth of handsome (eligible) men, so the sooner they could get this over with, the better.

OOC

[bigdamnprincipal]

This OCD brought to you by the brain of sith_happened, and yours truly having to be up way too early for a weekend yesterday.