[Lucille Arbogast]

Lucille hummed a little tune to herself as she worked her way through grading a stack of homework one paper at a time. Life in Tokyo hadn't exactly been chill as of late, and the safety of her students and the people of the city constantly weighed at the back of her mind. Big, scary, horrible events had happened already and while she wasn't really on the frontlines right now, she was willing to bet that the villains weren't slowing down anytime soon. It was only a matter of time before the next big attack, so how could they best prepare their students for certain disaster?

All this thinking was giving her a headache. And right while she was grading homework too? She really had to get better at differentiating between teacher mode and hero mode. Thinking about all that stuff right now didn't help when she needed to get other work done! Letting out a sigh she pushed her chair away and spun around in it with her arms out like she was an airplane. Once she came to a stop she grabbed her cup of coffee and took a long sip. Tasted like warm, but at least the caffeine still had an effect on her.

She had messaged Mar earlier under the guise that it was something important, something work related, when in reality she just wanted a little break and someone to talk to. Still, her friend and colleague should be here any moment now. Once Mar did arrive she would answer the door to her office with a sing-songy ''Come in! ~'' Before leaping out of her chair and pulling Mar into a close hug like they hadn't seen each other for months. ''Mar Mar, how are youuu?'' She beamed, pulling away. ''Come in, come in and have a seat!'' She was already running about the room checking on this and that before arriving at her electric kettle. ''Coffee? Tea? Water?'' She asked, looking over her shoulder. Due to her lack of taste buds she was infamously bad at brewing coffee, but Mar should know better by now than to trust her with the spoon.

Mar

[Mar]

Mar sent a reply that she'd be right there and made a beeline for Lucille's office as she wondered what was up. She was still walking, but for her it was a power walk and a quicker pace than her normally lethargic strolling around when she was going somewhere. If it was important enough to ask her to come by to talk, be it a problem student or some other school issue - or maybe related to their hero work? - she didn't want to keep Lucille waiting. When she knocked on the door her usual sleepy expression was replaced by scrunched up eyebrows in concern, only to get pulled into a big hug the moment she entered.

Slow to process the usual cheeriness from Lucille with the seriousness tone of her message, Mar returned the hug with a sigh and a shake of her head as a smile settled onto her face. "I'm fine, Lu-Lu." She took a seat in a methodical and deliberate way that involved maneuvering her tail to not knock the chair over or get pinched in the process of sitting down. Bringing her hands up in a defensive little gesture at the offer, she shook her head. "Ah, no thanks... I've had a lot of caffeine today anyways." Which absolutely was true, in her defense. Not that it would stop her from downing another three cups of coffee before the day was over. "What's up? You sounded pretty serious in your message, you know."

The way she said it, punctuated by a small yawn she stifled behind the knuckles of one hand briefly coming up to her mouth, Mar was playfully in her own deadpan sort of way accusing Lucille of deceiving her.

Lucille Arbogast,

[Lucille Arbogast]

''You look fine too! You're always in tip top shape aren't you?'' Having another person in her office was already increasing her mood, but especially because it was her friend and colleague. ''You have? Has it been a tough day?'' Sometimes she envied Mar being the PE teacher since physical classes meant less written homework to assign compared to her own workload. However, she was also positive it was a lot more tiring on other days and particularly lately with everything that had been going on. ''Water it is!'' She spun and swayed as she made her way back over to Mar, putting a glass of water down in front of her without spilling a drop. ''Even I can't mess up the flavor.'' She stuck her tongue out with a smile and made a peace sign.

''It is serious!'' She returned to her seat and slammed her hands down on her desk. ''I'm boooored, Mar Mar!'' She let out a long sigh and sunk into her seat like a sack of potatoes. ''I have these papers to grade.'' She poked at the top of the stack of papers she was going through. ''But I can't concentrate, I need a break so I called you over here.'' Her eyes lit up as she looked back up at Mar. ''So, what are the latest happenings? What is your impression of our current generation of students?'' She put her hands together and smiled, eagerly awaiting Mar's response before she would contribute with her own view.

Mar

[Mar]

Mar smiled at the compliment before sighing again and giving a nod. While it was true she didn't have to assign much homework, she had a lot of hands-on assisting and observing to do and that meant quite a lot of physical activity herself throughout her day. It didn't seem like much but showing students how to navigate a hazard course got exhausting when you had to do it over and over again in the span of a couple hours. Lucille handing over the water with a self aware comment and sticking her tongue out at her brought Mar's own mood right back up though, giving a laugh that showed off her sharp teeth for a moment and taking an appreciative sip of her drink.

Tail flicking along the ground beside her, the P.E. teacher gave a sympathetic glance at the paperwork before leaning back in her seat with a thoughtful look on her face.

"Overall? They're good kids. Some of them have some strange reasons for being here at UAU, and I have to call out people trying to make fun of others performances a lot, but there were kids like that when I went here too and most of them ended up as perfectly fine heroes." Taking another sip of her water and shrugging her shoulders she continued. "The hardest ones to work with are the timid ones. They're afraid of getting hurt and don't realize how tough they already are, or how useful their Quirk can be when it comes to something like making a big jump. I want to ease them into it, but if they're left at their own pace they'll never get over that hurdle... but I feel bad just throwing them into a sink-or-swim, you know? Even if I know its not really a sink-or-swim, since I'm right there to help out if I need to."

After a pause and giving another sleepy yawn, Mar turned the questions back around to Lucille: "What's your impression? Any easily bored types disturbing the peace of the classroom?"

Lucille Arbogast

[Lucille Arbogast]

Lucille lifted her cup with both hands and took a long sip of her coffee, keeping the mug there while she listened to Mar talk about the students and what she had been seeing lately. They were pretty general observations, which was to be expected. After all, nothing was too different about this current generation of students compared to how they themselves were about a decade ago. Maybe except for the expectations put on them. ''That sounds about right.'' She punctuated with a smile, putting her mug back down.

''I want to circle back to that, but for now I want to expand on what you said about the timid students.'' She stood up and went over to open a drawer and take out some student files, fetching one in particular. ''No one's disturbing the peace in my classrooms.'' She chuckled, turning back towards Mar. ''No one out of the ordinary at least. We'll always have our troublemakers.'' She sat down and slid the student file across her desk towards Mar. ''There is a student I think we have very different impressions of. It's to be expected since you help them with their physical tests while I help them with a lot of their written.'' Opening the file, Mar would find the name and picture of the student Rin Gotoh.

''Are you familiar with Rin Gotoh? She's counselor Gotoh's little sister and she just moved up a year.'' She folded her hands on the desk while she let Mar read as she continued. ''She's been putting in some impressive work in my classes. She's timid, she has a lot to work on, but she's showing a lot of promise too.'' She beamed, talking about Rin almost like she was a proud mother boasting about her own daughter. ''She's got her heart in the right place, she is articulate and polite. She just needs some encouragement and a confidence boost. That's my impression of her based on her grades and activity in my classes.'' She leaned on her hand as she cupped her own cheek. ''Does it differ from yours? How is she doing in the physical classes?''

Mar

[Mar]

Mar gave a half-wary, half-curious glance at Lucille's coffee mug. What hellish concoction was she drinking today? Burnt-to-charcoal, so sweet you'd get cavities, or maybe accidentally dumping in a bunch of salt without realizing it wasn't sugar? She had made the mistake of giving Lucille the benefit of the doubt when it came to drinks in the past, but she still found herself morbidly curious from time to time. She couldn't help it, even if she'd immediately regret it most of the time.

Putting the mystery coffee out of mind as Lucille shifted the topic to a particular student, Mar set her water aside to lean forward and take a look at the file. Squinting a bit to make out the tones of gray in the photo enough to recognize the student, she gave a nod as she listened to Lucille's assessment. "Actually, that's almost what I'd say about her too." Pursing her lips thoughtfully, trying to think of how to sum up the student in questions physical performance, her tail thumped lightly against the floor. "Its... a mixed bag, is the best way I can put it. I've seen her nail solo exercises, she goes through routines without complaint, and she'll throw herself at an obstacle over and over again until she can overcome it. She doesn't have any issues with cooperating in groups either. But the problem is, any time there's a sense of... pressure, I guess, or she knows people are watching her, she suddenly becomes one of the clumsiest people I've ever seen. I haven't checked with the counselor or anything yet, but I think its some kind of extreme performance anxiety and I'm not exactly sure what mix of poking and space-giving is best to help her out."

Tipping her head as a thought came to her, she added. "Does she do well on tests in your class?"

There were other students that Mar now found herself curious about comparing their impressions of, but there was plenty of time to go over those later. Knowing Lucille she'd need a nice long chat to recharge her battery so to speak, and Mar was happy to oblige.

Lucille Arbogast,

[Lucille Arbogast]

''Really? Please, do tell.'' She listened intently as Mar gave her valuable information. The greatest pain of teaching was the inability to be in multiple places at once and observe your students at multiple lectures, which meant she would often have to rely on the observations her colleagues made too, particularly when their subjects differed. ''I see! So there seems to be a pattern to what we're dealing with here.'' She smiled, giving a casual shrug. ''She doesn't exactly do well on tests, but on her weekly homework she could compete with the geniuses of the class.'' She held up two fingers. ''Your observation and mine, it could indeed suggest that she has some kind of performance anxiety.'' Then again, as far as she was aware Rin had also improved on that since her first year, so chances were that the girl was going to grow out of it.

''As for other notables... Ylva Riis, she's the student that transferred from Shiketsu.'' She handed Mar the corresponding file. ''She's hard to read, she's usually quiet in my classes. The most animated I have ever seen her was during the Sports Festival. Have you noticed whether she has gotten better at working alongside others? From my observations, Riis-san is highly capable, maybe even to her own detriment, as she seems to try to solve problems without her group, rather than with them.''

Going down the line she went onto the next file once Mar had shared her perspective. ''Mafdet Khepri. They often zone out in the middle of class, not in the way they did earlier in the year, but like something is going on with them. I know they are seeing counselor Sadako and last I spoke with her they appeared to be making progress. What is your impression of Khepri on the field?''

She put her hands together and smiled apologetically. ''Sorry, I know this is a lot to spring on you, but there's one last student I want to bring up, but she's not in your classes. Masao Ando from the support course, I spoke briefly to Ando-san after she failed her Provisional License Exam. She seemed a little distraught, but last time I saw her it appears Lawbringer-san has been able to cheer her back up again. I bring her up because she actually had a request for you.'' She handed Mar the file. ''She wants to take more PE classes.''

Mar

[Mar]

It was good to hear the younger Gotoh was doing well in the more academic side of things too, even if she still floundered a bit on tests. Maybe it was just an awkward phase? Or maybe she'd have to try talking to Sadako for ideas. She was the school counselor after all, and also the older Gotoh sibling and all that. She should definitely be able to give some kind of insight on what would help her best.

Ylva Rias on the other hand, was almost the opposite as far as she could tell. "Rias is hardworking, capable, but not a team player. Well, I suppose she's also not very fast but I don't think that's necessarily a problem long-term as long as she's aware of it. The teamwork thing is a bit more... Here's hoping she grows out of it?" Mar shrugged her shoulders with a sigh. She'd have to think up ways to try to coax Rias into getting along with others a bit better down the road too. "Khepri got the right spirit I think, she means well and she has a lot of energy. She gets side tracked with questions really easily though, and sometimes ones I have no idea how to answer because they don't seem to have anything to do with the class or an exercise... and admittedly I've looked up some answers I ended up curious about later. That's not really an issue either as long as she can focus when it counts, but I'll have to keep an eye out for any of that zoning out you've mentioned."

Accepting the last file, Mar glanced through it with a curious tilt of her head and a thump of her tail against the floor. "I see. That's pretty rough. I assume it was a training issue, not anything wrong with her decision making or personality?" That was Mar's best guess anyways, since the file didn't seem like it'd belong to a trouble maker or anything like that. Either way though, if a student wanted more P.E. time then more P.E. time they would get. "I'll get in touch with her, but if you see her first let her know I'm more than happy to schedule some extra classes for her, or maybe some specialized training to help her problem areas..."

Mar trailed off in thought, propping her elbow up and resting her head in her hand as she gave a low humming sound to herself. She was so busy thinking that she didn't notice when she drifted off for a second, or maybe a minute or two.

Lucille Arbogast,

[Lucille Arbogast]

''I'm sure she will.'' She smiled, having as much faith in Ylva to grow and improve as she did all her other students. ''I don't know for sure since I'm not close with Mafdet-san, but my hunches are usually never entirely wrong.'' She gave a thumbs up at Mar as she mentioned Masao. ''Her decision making is fine, she was a little stiff addressing the civilians, but it's nothing out of the ordinary for students who haven't been out in the field before. The biggest issue was her quirk.'' She clarified a little further, ''as a manufacturer, Ando-san is practically ready to go professional already, but she doesn't just want to be a manufacturer. She wants to be out there saving lives directly. However, her quirk and her mastery of her powers is not up to code. It is not at a place where we can trust that Ando-san would be able to help up to the standards that are expected of licensed students.'' She let out a small sigh. ''That's why I'm kind of relieved they assigned her Lawbringer-san. He's an old head, but he's wise and will be able to teach her a lot. I suspect she wanted extra PE classes with you too because she's serious about improving.''

She leaned forward to gather the files again and stack them all neatly. ''This brings me to the final point I wanted to talk about. I'm going to organize a big lesson for all the years in the USJ. It'll be a bomb-seeking exercise, something nice and easy to kick-off this fall semester. I asked you to come meet me here because I wanted to request your help observing them.'' She smiled, but it faded just as quickly.

''Remember where our conversation started? The students are flawed, but they're eager to learn and to work for the betterment of society. In other words, nothing much has changed since our time in hero school.'' She stood up and walked over to look out her window. ''But hasn't there been a big change? The Elementalist, the Tokyo Bay attacks, the Dream World incident...'' She looked back at Mar. ''I believe the biggest difference is that a lot is being expected of hero students today. A lot more than the world asked of us. It is our job not only to protect them, but to get them ready for the world that awaits outside of campus. That's why following the bomb-seeking exercise, I will be putting together some more serious training measures.'' She put her hands on her hips and smiled over at her colleague. ''For serious training measures I'll be needing your serious attitude too. You have a way with getting the students to pay attention to you with just your presence alone.'' She giggled.

When Mar started to show signs of sleepiness Lucille fetched a pillow and a blanket that she kept in her office for just this occasion. ''Feel free to get some rest, Mar Mar.'' She said softly as she sat back down and put her reading glasses on, picking up where she left off on the homework she was grading.

Mar

[Mar]

Mar trusted Lucille's hunches, since like she said they usually weren't wrong. Something probably was up, even if it might end up being something that wasn't as concerning as it sounded. She made a little "Ohh" of understanding as Lucille explained in more detail what went wrong with Ando's provisional license exam. It wasn't a super common issue as far as Mar was aware, but only because most of the manufacturing students didn't also want to be heroes themselves. At a glance though it would probably look like Ando had failed where most wouldn't, so she'd have to make sure to keep an eye out for any signs of that bothering her - it was easy to misunderstand statistics and things like that. Knowing that it was Quirk training that she needed too gave her some ideas on how to help train her up physically and quirk-ally at the same time.

"Yeah, of course." Mar agreed to help observe in the upcoming bomb run, frowning at the mention of how serious things had gotten in the past few months. She wasn't entirely sure if it was going to be that way long term or if it was just a chaotic patch in history they were currently in, but either way Lucille was right about the students having a lot more on their plate. "Hey, I'm a-ahhh-lways serious." She objected, her complaint falling flat thanks to the yawn in the middle of 'always' and promptly falling asleep by the time she had finished speaking.

She would actually do her best to be Serious Mode when the time came of course, and when she woke up again she'd make sure to show her appreciation for the blanket and pillow too. But for now? She needed a nice power nap.

Lucille Arbogast,

[Jinx]

☆ MISSION SUCCESS ☆

Did someone say bombs?
Great thread you two!

+ 5,000 EXP!!

Mar: 0 // 5,000
Lucille: 500 // 5,500

tag: Lucille Arbogast, Mar