Life at School 
A few minutes later, Akira ended taking a ride and drove towards
the Kurosawa High building. He parked in front of the main door,
shouldered the bag that he was carrying on the bike and headed
for the school's gymnasium.
He meet Kojiro Battou at the gymnasium room that doubled as dojo.
"Hi, Chiisai", he saluted. "Did I made you to wait too long?"
"Hi, Akira. Only a bit, I was late myself", answered the other
kid. "Good place. We have no building habilited as dojo at Intron,
nor I had at my old school. Thank you very much for the invitation,
Akira-kun."
"Yes it is cool, right", answered Akira heading for the changing
room. Chiisai followed him. Both kids changed clothes into gis
and hakamas and took two bokkens from the school's stores. "And
our theacher is very kind on letting us to use it the weekends.
Can't you use your school's instalations?"
"Only the open ones", said Chiisai. "The football field, the baskets...
But not the gymnasium." They started a quick warm-up, then both
kids saluted each other.
...
At this moment Akira straigthened and saluted to someone behind
Chiisai. The later turned his head and saw an old, bald man dressing
on a school's tracksuit. Chiisai bowed, too. The man returned
the bow. "Good morning, Moto. I see you keep practicing. Good.
Who's your friend?"
"He's Kojiro Battou. He's training with me", said Akira, choosing
not to say that Kojiro wasn't a Kurosawa student. It wasn't anything
wrong since he was with him, and /he/ was, but better play it
safe.
"Kojiro Battou? That name is familiar to me..." Chiisai braced
himself; after the troubles he had with other theachers on the
past, he had somewhat of a bad rep among them... "It reminds me
of an old student of me." Chiisai relaxed. "He had a nasty habit
of speaking on silly metaphors even bigger than mine own... But
I'm digressing. Never mind. All right, boys, continue your training."
He saluted, the kids bowing back, and followed to his office.
"And give my regards to the Intron sports theacher, Chiisai",
said as an afterthought.
"Yes, sir", answered the later. It took a second or two for him
to notice that they hadn't told him that he was an Intron student,
nor his nickname. "Who's him?"
"He's my sports theacher", said Akira on a proud voice. "He's
a cool man. We can use the dojo the weekends thanks to him. He
also teach us some martial arts."
"He's got a strange look, didn't he?" said Chiisai remembering
the short, bald oldman wearing a green tracksuit.
"Yes, I have to admit that he looks less than impressive, but
he seems to like that look". Akira rolled his eyes. "He's from
someplace of south China, maybe they dress that way there."
CHAPTER 6
Life at School
School is a fact of life when you are living with your parents.
Geocity is home to a great deal many high schools, odds are you
go to one of them. Of the two most famous high schools of Geocity,
Intron High is a bit more Science- orientated and Kurosawa High
is a bit more into the Humanities, but both do offer competent,
homologable levels of theaching on all matters.
The first school, Intron High, is a science oriented high school,
hosting many labs and science fairs. Students that graduate here
tend to follow careers in a technical field.
Another large high school is Kurosawa High. 25 years after his
death, Akira Kurosawa got a high school named after him. (Call it /our/ homage. The VM Crew). Kurosawas emphasis is in the humanitites and "soft" subjects.
Kurosawa High has been cited for excellence in fields such as
psychology,history, and biology (much to Introns annoyance, but
that proves that both schools offer good theaching on all areas
of education) and has a very extensive library.
Both schools share a keen competition at sports and achievement.
Despite this friendly rivalry both schools share an abiding dislike
of the Rueben Leeching Academy. Across town on the south side
of Geocity, the Leeching Academy is a private rich-kids school,
the home to the richest, stuck up snobs that you ever shook a
stick at and one major thorn in most players hides.
What's worse, is they have an offical VM club there, and are rumored
to have an 8 pod setup all their own they use for VM Development
and practice. These overblown blowhards delight in making life
miserable for the students of Intron and Kurosawa, just out of
general principals it seems. If the attitude of its students (?)
were not bad enough, the Academy has a reputation for pulling
political stunts to try to reduce the facilities and staff of
the two most prominent public high schools.
Curricula at each school is a fairly standard diet of reading,
writing and arithmatic with optional studies for sophomores and
higher. Specializations in advanced placement classes are based
on the schools strenghts - Intron has more tech classes, and Kurosawa
has the humanities. Leaching is not known for anything special.
Homework is stiff for the two public schools, but given the quality
of teachers and the workload, the requirements are not that hard.
Leechings homework requirements are lighter in terms of quantity,
but no less easier for that (but there is better help available
due to a low teacher/student ratios). Bullying (a standard in
some overseas schools) is not tolerated at the public schools,
Leaching treats that as survival of the fittest.
School hours are from 8:00 A.M. to 4:00 P.M. with detention running
to 5:30 P.M. Decent busses run through out each schools area taking
the kinds to classes. The exception is the Academy, where if you
do not have a chauferred ride to school then you most likely don't
belong there. Each school has extra-curricular activities such
as music and sports to try and keep or foster students interests
in those areas.
Staff of Intron High and Kurosawa High
Note that all these "staff" is only an example, both schools do
have more theachers, but this ones are the most likely to jump
out on a MZ game. We leave to the GM the work of finding suitable
names for them, with or without injokes :) Note that one of the
theachers is a rabid VM fan who sometimes goes to the arcade disgised
-so he thinks- :> and another is a not-less-rabid VM programmer
who doesn't play for himself.... but another one flunks instantly
anyone he knows to be a gamer!!
All theachers have at least the following, relevant info: Cool,
Emp, Int stats, Theaching skill, Relevant Theached skill, Awareness
and Interrogation.
Intron High School:
- Principal: "Animal House" - style guy with a corncob up his ars.
- No stats needed but for Interrogation: stat 5, skill 6
- Vice-principal: The man who actually runs the school and to whom the kids look
up when they have any trouble.
- Stats: Cool 5, Emp 7, Int 6.
- Skills: Interrogation 5, Theaching 5, Expert: Chemistry 6, Biology 5, Phisics 4, Awareness 4
- Maths: Einstein-like-haired old man. He's a fair theacher and a very
good mathematician, but he never, ever, allows less than perfection
on his tests (he's a "first class or flunk" man).
- Stats: Cool 5, Emp 5, Int 6
- Skills: Interrogation 2, Theaching 6, Expert: Maths 9, Awareness 1
- History: Tall, blonde, round glasses, she's the only female theacher
at Intron. Most male kids have at least a sligth crush on her.
She's also a competent theacher who would deviate from his path
in order of helping a pupil, even coning the principal into not
to expel them if they blew it out.
- Stats: Cool 8, Emp 7, Int 6, Attr 8.
- Skills: Interrogation 6, Theaching 7, Expert: History 7, Awareness 4, Persuasion & Fast Talk 10 (at least).
- Language (Japanese): This guy thinks VM gaming is a stupid way of losing time and
intelectual capabilities. He's a stiffy, dry, pompous man who
flunks instantly anyone he knows is playing VM. Fortunately, he
never, ever, goes near the hated arcade... doesn't he?
- Stats: Cool 6, Emp 1 (!), Int 4.
- Skills: Interrogation 6, Theaching 2, Language: Japanese 9, Awareness
2
- Foreign language (English): This one is /actually/ a rabid VM player! He goes to the mall
disguised (his VM is the Madagef), but everyone know who he is. Of course, nobody tell him that
they knows his secret!
- Stats: Cool 5, Emp 5, Int 5, Ref 6.
- Skills: Interrogation 3, Theaching 6, Known Language: English 7, Awareness 5, VM pilot 4, all other VM combat skills 3
- Science: the Vice-Principal doubles as Science theacher
- Physical instructor: A big man with a big hearth and big hands he has to use too frequently
to get the Japanese and English theachers outta each other's trhoats.
- Stats: Bod 9, Cool 5, Emp 5, Int 4, Ref 6.
- Skills: Interrogation 9, Intimidate 8, Hand-to-hand 8, Dodge & Escape 7, Athletics 7, Theaching 7, Awareness 2
- Computers: A timid and little talkative man with glasses and affable manners.
Some schoolgirls think he's kawaii!. He may or may not be that,
but he's a competent theacher who takes interest on his pupils.
- Stats: Cool 7, Emp 7, Int 6, Attr 7, Tech 7.
- Skills: Interrogation 2, Theaching 7, Programming 7, VM Design and Tech 5 (his little secret), Awareness 3.
- Principal: "The Principal" - style theacher who not only tries to help
his pupils, but even actually places itself sometimes into trouble
to keep the boys out of them.
- Stats: Cool 7, Emp 6, Int 8, Bod 7.
- Skills: Interrogation 5, Human Perception 4, Theaching 8, Hystory 8, Awareness 5, Leadership (Emp-based) 4, Intimidate 9, Baseball Bat 6 (I said that he was like the guy of "The Principal", right?)
- Maths: He's ugly. He's got a loud voice. He tends to bang his head
against the wall if a pupil gives a too stupid answer. He's well
liked by all of his pupils that he managed not to scare.
- Stats: Cool 8, Emp 3, Int 8.
- Skills: Interrogation 4, Theaching 6, Expert: Maths 7, Awareness 4, Scare Kids 9
- History: The Principal doubles as History theacher.
- Language (Japanese): A small, tiny, grey man nobody knows much about except than he
got his Oriental Languages grade at Cambridge, England.
- Stats: Bod 8, Ref 10, Cool 7, Emp 4, Int 8, Tech 8
- Skills: Interrogation 6, Intimidate 6, Resist torture 10, Streetwise 8, Acting 5, Human perception 6, Leadership (Cool-based) 4, Theaching 6, Known Languages: Japanese, English, German, Russian, Spanish, French 6, Awareness 9, Expert: Demolitions 4, Heavy Weapons 4, Shadowing/Avoid Pursuit 6, Survival 7, all combat skills 7, Aircraft Pilot 9, Athletics 8, Stealth 10, Basic Repair & jury Rig 5, Medical 2, First Aids 5, Pick Locks & Pick Pockets 6. (**)
- Foreign language (English): The Language theacher doubles as English theacher.
- Science: He's a hard theacher, not liked at all, and not too god a his
work.
- Stats: Cool 4, Emp 4, Int 4.
- Skills: Interrogation 3, Theaching 5, Science 5, Awareness 2.
- Physical instructor: Picture the Master Po. What "$&/&*? is doing a Shaolin Master
at a Japanese High School???? Evidently, to be a prop for the
kids to learn from!
- Stats and skills: none needed, at all. He does what the GM states he does!
- Computers: This man is as rabid of a VM fan as his Intron English language
counterpart. This one doesn't play, he builds VMs instead. He
will "raise the hand" a bit (that half-points, tends to round
up...) on the tests to any kid who he knows that had little study
time because he vas programming a good VM, because he thinks that
practice is the best theacher, but he vill NOT give free tests
for any reason.
- Stats: Cool 5, Emp 6, Int 7, Tech 8.
- Skills: Interrogation 3, Theaching 7, Programing 7, VM Tech and Design 9, Awareness 6
(**) C'mon, really you didn't recognice him yet? Well, if you need
even more hints, he could be some 60-70 years old or more, got
a rather cynical sense of humor, and applied for his current job,
coming from some obscure work at an import and export company,
when his liver almost exploded from too many martini-vodka...