Scene #5631: Squire Day

Owner	Pose
Eryl Fairfax	The Paladins are only just over a year old at this point, and Squire Day is already an institution. Never underestimate their PR prowess. People are brought aboard the Ad Coelum to be given the grand tour by Grandmaster Fairfax himself. Adults and children alike get to see the grand spaceship that protects them all from the evils that lurk beneath and beyond society. But this is not the focus of today, as it is mostly insipid an uneventful. Today we look to the Elites dispatched to institutes of academia all over the Multiverse. The ones who stand before grade-schoolers, high-schoolers, freshmen and postgrads alike to sell them on the Paladins, to convince them of the rightousness of their cause, and dangle the offer of internships and scholarships before the elder attendees. However, this is a foe few have yet faced. Smart-aleck children with mischief in their eyes. Apathetic teens who care about the esteem of their peers above all else. Burnt-out tertiary students who can't see beyond the next assessment anymore. How can Paladins inspire those who don't understand lofty ideals, try their best to pretend not to care, or are probably half asleep? We go now to St. Dominica School, an escalator school covering preschool to high school. It is a bit of a fixture in the Multiverse, as it offers several outreach programs to help the youth of other worlds acclimatize to other worlds. It's not uncommon to see all manner of races walking its halls. As of now, they have all gathered in the massive auditorium for this presentation. On-stage is an odd pair of Paladins-Ainsley, a lizardly mystic, and Chevalier, a technological knight in shining armor. They certainly represent the diversity of the Paladins, but the students in attendance aren't too impressed. Most are chatting for now, as the call for quiet has yet to be issued. In a place so rooted in Multiversal exposure, it'll take more than appearance to wow this lot.
Rarity	While she has kept out of major affairs of the factions after the factional shifts to focus more on her business ventures and the occasional endeavors of the Inspiration Trust, Rarity knows it is still important for others to know of the other operations of defense and justice out there in the Multiverse. And that is why the outreach presentation has three young Ponies sitting where they have a good view of the stage while Rarity speaks to them. "Now I expect you three to be on your best behavoir. We are here so you can learn about something more than our own world that may one day be very important. No shenanigans. Is that clear?" "Yes Rarity," Sweetie Belle, the cream and pink maned unicorn, answers obediently to her older sister. "Yes ma'am." Applebloom the red maned yellow pony chimes in, though she'd probably be crossing fingers behind her back if she had fingers. "What's a shenanigan?" Scootaloo chirps, the orange pegasus mostly just looking confused at the big word. "Shenanigans. Noun. Silly or mischevious behavoir attempted in misdirec--" "Not a dictionary time, Sweetie." Rarity just rolls her eyes faintly as she moves to take a seat behind them, where theoretically she can keep a better eye on them. But this is the Cutie Mark Crusaders we're talking about here. So heavy on the 'theoretical'.
Ice King	Flying through the air high above is some blue guy in a robe. He's wearing a backpack full of steel cord, a ski mask, leather gloves, tie restraints, and other wholesome goods, and is busily listing off what else he needs to himself as he reads looks at a notepad. "Blowtorch, night vision googles, taser, bear traps..." He scribbles on the notepad as he talks. The pages are all covered in doodles of Ice King and princesses and a dog and human boy (the latter two with cartoonish stink lines wavering up from them). "Uh-huh. Uhhh-huh. Gotta' get a new notepad." he mutters and writes that down at the bottom of the page. Then there's noise from below him. "Huh?" he lets out as he looks up and around, and then down at the... Actual source of the sound. He squints. "Whassat? Saint... Dominica..." He waggles his eyebrows a bit. "Whooaahh-hoh! Dom-IN-ica, eh? I like that sound of that! I wonder what kinds of lessons she teaches." He then flaps his beard and flies all the way down to the school below. The sound of chattering children has Ice King pressed to the windows of the auditorium, high above, looking around to see what's going on. Seeing all the excitement and talking and how everyone is all gathered together, Ice King mutters to himself, "Hey, this looks like fun. Maybe I can join in somehow." He turns away, taking off his backpack and dropping it with a crash to the ground below, folding his arms and tapping his chin in thought while he hovers there. "But it's a bunch of kids. I've got to have a good disguise and find a way to blend in somehow." He props his hands on his hips and puffs out his cheeks. "Gotta' be reallllly smooth. Reallllly smart. Gotta' be..." He lifts his hands and spreads them through the air in front of him as though seeing the word up in lights on Broadway or something. "...Inconspicuous!" 14.3 Seconds Later: Suddenly, the auditorium doors burst open and some strangely tall and hairy blue kid with a long nose barges in. He has a very odd hoodie on, seemingly made of hair, with two little 'ears' protruding from the top. Also an ice backpack, and some kind of... Bandage shorts? And a blue robe tied off to act as a shirt? It's all probably very normal fashion for kids these days. "Hey, guys! Sorry to keep you waiting!" he calls out, looks around expectantly, and then makes his way over to some bleachers. He asks one of the kids, "Mind if I sit here?" and then seats himself when he just gets stared at in response. The children on either side scoot away from him as he sits unfazed with his hands on his bare knees.
Chevalier	This sort of thing is one of Chevalier's duties he's filled over the past twenty years or so. He's been a Protectorate cape for a long time, and he's a Face Cape. Ironic considering his helm doesn't show the slightest bit of his actual face, but nonetheless. It's the sort of thing that involves having a clean image, a certain degree of charisma, and a powerset that doesn't cross any lines towards the malevolent or morally-ambiguous. Chevalier may be a Destroyer in spirit, but it's tempered by a great deal of training in the social aspect of his job. He comes to this meeting specially-prepared with a cannonblade that's slightly more kid-friendly. Oh it's still a devastating weapon, but this one relies on mass more than on keen-edged cutting and there's a complex safety built into the firing mechanism so the weapon can't be accidentally fired by a wide-eyed kid either accidentally or mischeviously playing around. It's still apparently a few hundred pounds of steel, a foot wide and six feet long, looking like something of a cross between the blades made famous in two different Final Fantasy RPGs. And it's still something he slings across one shoulder like it's got the weight of an aluminum bat. Which, for the moment, is actually the truth. When he strides up to the podium, Chevalier has his armor's mass ramped up somewhat. He still moves in it with ease, but his footsteps ring against the ground and may even give the impression of a ground-shaking giant rather than a figure roughly man-sized. The ground won't actually shake of course. He's not going to risk the engineering of the school's auditorium for a simple presence-enhancing trick. But the echo of his footsteps should itself be a cue that something's changing. That something momentous is about to occur, and perhaps as a cue to pay attention. His voice is amplified, presumably wired into the auditorium's announcement system. As medieval as he appears, he's well equipped with technological conveniences. He begins to speak as he comes to stand at the podium, and as the echoes of his footsteps first fade. "Good morning." he says in an only slightly-enhanced voice. He pauses, waiting for the students to become at least somewhat quiet. "I am Chevalier, and my companion today is Ainsley. We are from the Paladins, and are here for Squire Day, to speak to you about our organization. Most of you already know of us, of course. Some of you may even be considering joining the Paladins, and want to know more about what we do. There will be chances for questions, so I ask for your patience so as not to disrupt the presentations." Small chance of all the students being patient, but that's okay. The troublemakers and malcontents will speak out first, and rudely, and they can be dealt with so that those more interested in order can have their say later.
Ainsley	What has she gotten herself into? Ainsley is not even remotely equipped for public speaking. She feels her memories flash back to her living out in a desert because she was a black sheep among an almost robotic cult of anti-personality, and she remembers all of her struggle to talk to people even after that. She has chosen not to be the first one to speak to the students here just so she can try to collect herself. She had hoped Chevalier would take the reins for this and her hopes were well-founded when she feels the vibration of his footsteps through the stage. She turns her head to watch him approach the podium, and then steps up to stand off to the side where she's easily viewed, her white-gloved hands clasped before her. She smiles and lifts her hand to give a demure little finger-wave to the student body when she's introduced by her fellow Paladin. She smiles a little more enthusiastically when Chevalier describes why they're here, which sets the expectations a bit better than she could've managed on her own. She looks around the crowd with a silent curiosity for who is showing the most interest... and who isn't paying attention at all. A dusty instinct wells up in the core of her soul. The instinct of a teacher with that sadistic glee at calling the most unprepared troublemaker to address the speaker at the podium directly. She is quite handily distracted from this, though, when she spots something very strange. Is... is that person wearing a backpack made of ice? Ainsley stares in Ice King's direction perhaps a few seconds too long, but decides to just roll with his presence. If he's not disrupting this then it isn't her job to expel him from the building.
Eryl Fairfax	Chevalier manages to back his look with presence, making the room literally shake with every footfall. This certainly stops the chattering as every pair of eyes looks to the knight in shining armor. However, the cringing Ainsley behind him draws malicious glints from those who have no interest in playing nice. Kids are like dogs; they can smell fear. A hand goes up, to grab attention. A young kid, with a face engineered by top scientists to be utterly punchable says with a snigger, "Does she need to shed her skin or something?" A dull comparison to a lizard isn't really all that funny, but to his gang of cronies, it's the funniest thing they've ever heard. However, one of those insightful sorts that Chevalier was hoping to hear from interjects.A high-school girl in glasses and wearing a lapel pin that identifies her as 'Editor' says. "Chevalier Chevalier. Molly Hudson, Dominica School Paper. How do you respond to accusations that Squire Day is an indoctrination tool by the elite to breed the impressionable into subservient masses?" No such allegations have been made outside of the lunatic fringes, so it's clear that she herself is making that accusation right now. Meanwhile, in the crowd, the ponies draw a lot of eyes. The quadrapeds aren't exactly unknown at this school, but kids are nothing if not obnoxious. Rarity may find her attention distracted to glare at those who reach out to pet her wards out of nowhere. As for the Ice King... he gets space. A LOT of space. Those kids next to him scoot as far to the side as they can, almost not sitting at all. On the sides, the teachers monitoring things produce lists of who should be here and start looking through them, eyebrows raised.
Rarity	As one would expect there is immeadiately distractions to test even the most patient attempts at focusing on her charges. The fashionista's tastes are just too strong for Rarity to not stare at the blue and bandage clad fellow, not sure if he's dressed so awkwardly because he comes from a less than capable family, or because he's one of, ah, 'those' unfortunate students that's older than one should really still be in school at. And has a voice that sounds vagely familiar... But then we have snarky remarks to distract her from thinking too hard about it. And someone trying to touch her without asking gets the unicorn's attention as she turns and lightly swats at the offending hand. "Take a picture, it will last longer... and get my better side." True to form as soon as her attention is diverted somewhere else the trio don't waste a moment. "Well ain't that an unusual name." Sweetie Belle sighs as Applebloom scratchs her head. "I don't think that's his full name. Chevalier is a type of knight, thus why he's in so much armor. I think." "For once you being a nerd pays off." Scootaloo is the one to actually jump on the moment. "Hey shiny knight guy! How come your name is so redun.. redic.. re--" "Reundant?" Sweetie Belle provides. "Yeah what she said."
Ice King	Paladins? Squires? "What's all this about?" He rustles around behind him and then pulls out a banana on a keychain. "Alexia, what's a paladin?" When there is, predictably, no response, he tchs and mutters, "Dang it. Must have reached my data limit. Gotta' spring for an upgrade one of these days." He puts the banana away, looks around at everyone else, includinghe guesses some horses or something (nothing weird here, there are talking horses in Ooo as well. Cows too for that matter!) and raises a hand after waiting for the school paper to finish grilling the government agent with the spooky footsteps. "Yeah, hi, I've got a question too. You said 'Squire Day'. So paladins are like, knights or something, right? They get a horse--" he turns to the ponies, "--no offense--" and then back to Chevalier and Ainsley. "--and a sword and a castle and they kidnap princesses?" He pauses for several very long seconds as though he is done speaking. Then he tacks on, "I mean rescue. Rescue princesses. Who were kidnapped. By someone else." After another awkward pause, he grins and double finger-gun points. "Because that's totally my thing! I'm like, half-way to being a knight already!" Has castle. 'Rescues' princesses. Yep, that's two out of four of the things he said. Definitely knight/Paladin material.
Ainsley	The answer Ainsley gives is immediately honest and spoken with a loud and plain tone. She doesn't need a speaker or anything to speak up loud enough to be heard, having quite some lung power. Her voice contrasts her appearance completely... she 'sounds' more like an ordinary woman than an anthro lizard. "No more than any of you do," she answers, "Plenty of the dust you clean off of your shelves is old skin or shed hair. They do teach you that in biology, right?" She looks over toward the teachers as if searching for their confirmation. Then she addresses Ice King, immediately, "We have no connection to knighthood traditions, but we do rescue princesses if we are able to. As we are a very different kind of organization from the medieval conventions, it really comes down to a cool name that evokes a feeling of nobility and a duty to law and government." Then she warms her smile at Ice King. She leaves the accusation to Chevalier. That one makes her want to sweat and she's not even physiologically capable of sweating.
Chevalier	Chevalier decides to defer that first question to Ainsley herself, as there's no possible way he could answer it appropriately. She might ignore it, but then again she might not. Either way it's in her hands. He instead focusses on the 'press'. If one were to ask Chevalier for his three least favorite things, his answer may well be 'speeches', 'politics' and 'the press'. But for someone who professes to hate speeches and interviews and gladhandling, he sure does a lot of each. He even smiles slightly at the question. It's a little hardball but not unexpected, and the way it's put is cleverly done. It's not an accusation, just bringing rumors of accusations his way. He can't show anger at her because she's just asking the question, not making accusations herself. Hell, she might just be looking for a good sound byte for her news report, and there's nothing wrong with that! "Miss Hudson." Chevalier says in a carefully pleasant manner. "We're hardly here looking for subservient masses. I mean, look at the name. It's Squire Day, not Follow The Law Or Else Day!" he says, pausing to allow for any laughter. The other question is a bit more personal, and Chevalier winces inside his armor. Chevalier Chevalier. He's been mocked for that before, but at least the ... er... small horse isn't being malicious. Probably. He's not too current on pony body language. "I've been Chevalier since ... well, since I was the age of some of you students." he explains. "The Paladin rank of Chevalier is relatively recent. Perhaps I should ask for a promotion so I'm Warden Chevalier?" he asks with a smile, again hidden within the armor but not impossible to hear in his tone. With that he turns to Ainsley, gesturing, clearly inviting her to answer the other questions. It seems fair, two for each right? Though they haven't rehearsed or discussed much beyond Chevalier being willing to speak first due to his experience.
Eryl Fairfax	Rarity makes it very clear she is not to be trifled with. Being the only adult in the audience (Ice King notwithstanding) means that she has no time for juvenile nonsense. However, that does not mean that the nonsense will stop. Discretely, one of the kids she snarked at produced a highlighter from their bag and begins to fiddle with it, breaking it open and getting at all the ink, before tossing it at Rarity's white coat. That'll NEVER come off! Meanwhile, if Ice King had not had a wide bearth before, he definitely has now. Students have actually got up and gone to the teachers to complain about the... everything. They seem at an actual loss. The Paladins on stage don't seem flustered, so maybe he's supposed to be there?... One delinquent teen has had enough though, and begins kicking on the back of his chair. "Move, jackass." Molly Hudson fumes at having her question deflected with a pithy remark. She presses the point with, "Well, you're certainly not overt, but the threat is there! That ship in the sky, giving you uncontested aerial superiority over any world! Do you really expect us to believe the Ad Coelum is harmless?" Unfortunately, this is a slightly stronger point. The Ad Coelum is huge, and some kids seem to be nodding along. As for Ainsley, she counters the joke with one of her own. The kid seems befuddled, but the teachers do nod, so it's likely he wasn't paying attention. At the mention of 'rescuing princess' however, one of the younger kids at the front throws up her hand. "Have you ever rescued a princess?!" she asks. Other inquiring eyes want to know too; maybe some shared stories would break the ice.
Rarity	@emit "See I told you it's because he's a knight." Scootaloo just hmphs as she folds her forelegs. "It still sounds silly. How's he suppose to beat up lawbreakers with a silly name?" "M'be he's like Pinkie Pahe and beats 'em up because they're laughin' too hard at his redundancy-ness." "That ain't a word." Sweetie Belle reachs over to give Scootaloo a shove. "Who's being a dictionary now?.. Also, ain't also isn't a word." "Now don't you girls start something over venacular differences. This is suppose to be a learning experience." Just as it looks like the pen is going to hit her it stops mid-air enveloped in a faint blue shimmer. Which floats right back in the kid's hands, leaking broken casing and all. "You dropped this." Is that a hint of smugness in Rarity's tone? Of course not, that would be unlady-like. Hard to get the better of her with a mess she's been on the end of so many times before, mainly from the three in front of her trying to 'help' and failing miserably at the being helpful part. However Scootaloo does perk back up, save it's not at what's being said by the presentors. "They have an airship? That's so much cooler, why couldn't we go to that instead?" "Oh shure, now y'all pay attention." This time it's Applebloom that gives her a light shove. Though an Apple light shove is still enough to push Scootaloo all the way over into Sweetie Belle. Whom promptly pushes back with her shoulder. "Stop that, I'm trying to take notes for us!"} "Applebloom did it!" "Yer just usin your magic anyways." "Besides the point!
Ice King	Magic horses, huh? Didn't someone on the radio mention something about that? Ice King/Blue Kid listens to the answer from Ainsley, but how much of it he understands is up for debate. "Huh. So I guess you could say that for Paladins, being a KNIGHT isn't their DAY JOB! AAAAAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA! Haha! Ha. Haaaa..." The wizard sits quietly for a moment, then says, "Thanks, I don't have anymore questions." As his seat is kicked he lets out a surprised grunt, and then turns on the swearing kid with a sharp-toothed scowl. "Hey! You've got a potty mouth!" He looks over his shoulder at Ainsley. "...Fellow... School... Kid. Better watch out or you'll get in trouble with the teachers! Aheheheheheh!" He then turns back around, frowning and muttering under his breath. Everywhere he goes, human kids are causing him trouble!
Chevalier	The question about the Ad Coelum isn't one Chevalier can dismiss so lightly. Even if the great mothership had no guns or fighters of its own, there's plenty of firepower docked within in the form of the personal craft of any number of Paladins. He can't be too honest though, or he risks making the Paladins look bad. Best to deflect slightly, to answer a question not entirely asked. "The Ad Coelum, and the Paladins themselves, are no threat to you." he states firmly. "They're not a threat to the population at large. We're not a conquering force. We follow the laws that others make. If we did differently, we wouldn't be Paladins." he claims. He doesn't mention the Concord by name, or any other form of person who'd conquer or who'd dictate terms by force. He's not here to identify who the Paladins aren't. He's here to show what they ARE. "We're only a threat to criminals, ma'am." he adds. And their threat, he figures, is much greater than that of one mothership. Even a warship. "If your government were to no longer welcome us willingly, we'd leave." He eyes the crowd, seemingly relaxed but still a little wary. That blue guy just doesn't seem to fit in, though Chevalier hasn't decided if he's a troublemaker or not. The ponies too don't really fit in, though he's fairly sure they're not actually malicious. Troublemakers... perhaps. But not deliberately so. He'll still have to be on his guard, though likely not for hostility.
Ainsley	"Personally?" Wow, that was a quick turn. Ainsley visibly considers everything she's done, every mission she's gone to. One of her eyes close, and she seems to really dig into everything she's done. "Nope!" This answer is accompanied with her hands out at her sides. "But I suppose if I stretch the logic a little, I helped ensure the continuing safety of a few princesses by dealing with threats a little larger than your typical manhandling dragon or demon king." She gestures off to the side to Chevalier and elaborates, "I assisted in the defeat of a very large threat to Chevalier's world known as Scion, as well as in the recovery of one superhero there named Dragon. It required that I break a kind of geas on Dragon, and analyze or attempt to understand Scion before he would later become a worldwide threat. That's the kind of expertise I brought to the Paladins. As a Paladin, my work revolves around a very important task:" She pulls a contract out of her coat pocket and snaps it open with a loud THWAP of the parchment straightening out. She taps the paper, which is marked with arcane symbols. Then, she pulls out something similar. It looks like a stack of stapled papers. She holds them up for viewing for the crowd. Their differences are obvious at a glance. The way she holds them up is as if to compare them for everyone's viewing. She /was/ prepared to explain herself a bit, she's just not great at initiating. "I'm a Cursebreaker. My job is to stop people like you from being victimized by this." She waves the parchment and the paperwork. "These are replicas of magical documents that were used to abuse or outright ignore the rights of the participants. The people involved were forced, magically, into a kind of servitude that, thankfully, I could undo with a little study. My job can seem pretty boring since there's very little glory in poring over thirty pages of legalese to find where a demon screwed up his wording. But it's necessary in order to protect you from things that a knight would struggle to deal with." "I'm the kind of person that protects you from getting your souls taken, either figuratively or literally. Sometimes, saving a princess requires you to know the legal precedent for freeing them from the servitude of a dark lord. Sometimes, that's the only way to fix everything. Sometimes, we just don't have the jurisdiction to do what the Union would've. If anyone wants to take a look at these, come on up. Don't worry about them being dangerous, these are harmless." She holds out the papers, waiting for either a teacher or one of the students to retrieve them. She doesn't care if they get shredded or worse, as that's just an indication of the bad tempers of the students and misplaced teenage irreverence.
Eryl Fairfax	Rarity is rewarded by the hissing curse of the student behind her before they suddenly get up and run from the auditorium. Sounds like some of that ink got on their hand and uniform. Meanwhile, the ruckus that the CMC are making is drawing Looks from the teachers aimed at Rarity. The implication is clear; you are guests, but please keep them quiet. As ice King gets up, the unruly teen smirks cockily, before kicking the chair again. Now that he's not on it, that drives the lip of the seat at the elderly man's knees. "Stop what?" he asks in an infuriating tone before putting his feet up on the back of the chair. Now Ice King can't sit down if he wanted to! Molly glowers up at Chevalier for a long moment. He would be able to see her eyes flicking around behind her glasses as she searched for something to rebutt with, another angle to attack from. But she seems defeated, and asks another question. This one comes out much more subdued. "The Union and Confederacy were destroyed by an as-yet unknown disaster. What makes you think that the Paladins, a much smaller organization, could cope with another one of those?" Ainsley's talk about her work actually resonantes in a way she might not respect. The idea of how scary a 'magic contract' is flies right over the heads of the younger students, like the one who made the lizard skin comment. But the older ones, on the cusp of adulthood, suddenly have to worry about things like that. And school has never been the best about teaching things like that. How to understand common terms, how to figure interest and costs, your rights as signer... a lot of them seem to be paying attention now. One raises his hand and asks, "What's the worst one you've dealt with?"
Rarity	Both Applebloom and Scootaloo look bored at Ainsley's explaination of her job. "Great, dragon girl's an egghead. Scootaloo quips, using Rainbow Dash's affectionate nickname for Twilight's bookwormness. The two keep pushing back and forth before Rarity leans forward and seperates them with her forehooves "That's enough you two. Don't make me time out you both in front of this entire audience." That, for the moment at least, gets them to calm down for a few moments.
Ice King	Ice King clenches his fists and growls in frustration. Then he has an idea, lifting up the front of the seat too, and zapping a couple of extra inches of ice onto the bottoms of the legs out of the tip of his finger. Now the kid is supporting the back of the chair as Ice King puts his weight onto it again and folds his arms behind his head, and one of his legs over the other and smugly says as he glances back at the punk, "Thanks for the boost, buddy! I prefer the view from up here better!" He focuses on the two Elites again. "Hope your leg doesn't get tired!" Absorbed in the petty rivalry of one-upmanship between a 1000-plus year-old ice wizard and a schoolyard brat, he misses a lot of the discussion, though he tunes in towards the end for the Union and Confederacy talk. Hmmm. That sounds familiar somehow. He just can't put his finger on it. Aren't those... ...The two sides in Card Wars? Or was that Blue and Red? They're so easy to mix up! Getting into the act now, he waves a hand casually and calls out, "Yo, teach! Yo, sensei! ...Senpai? Sensei? Senpai." He scratches his beard-swathed cheek in thought and looks askance. Then just repeats, "Teach! If these two sides got blown the jazz up, and the Paladins replaced 'em, who's your evil opposite now?" He just assumes that if there's a big bunch of good guys then there's a big bunch of bad guys too. Perhaps not without reason, though likely without much logic.
Chevalier	Ah it does Chevy's heart good to see a reporter grinding their teeth, metaphorically at least. He does his best to remain bland and faceless, letting his gleaming armor do what it does best: deflect. "I don't know what destroyed the headquarters of both the Union and the Confederacy." Chevalier states. That much is probably safe to say. "But we don't deal with the same sort of things they do. We're a fighting force, whether we fight nonmaterial threats like Chevalier Ainsley does or whether we're fighting with steel." He hefts his weapon as he says this last, swinging it in a slow and careful motion that's far more a dynamic pose than an attack. "If such a threat comes for us, I don't know how we'll be able to beat it." Chevalier claims, his tone grave, allowing the importance of his words to hopefully ring true. "But if it does, I intend to be there on the front line with my fellow Paladins, as I was against Scion with Ainsley and many other heroes. Better to fight than to wait quietly in fear." he adds, not intending any actual slight on the reporter. No, his words are directed to all the students now. To those who may be touched somehow by heroism, and to counter fear in those who might otherwise feel it and despair.
Ainsley	The worst she's had to deal with. Ainsley hesitates when she's asked that. Her smile falters, and her job bubbles up under her attempt at a friendly demeanor. She addresses something else first. She indicates Molly Hudson, with an informative lift of an index finger. "That is precisely one of the reasons Ad Coleum can move about. We are meant to bring aid during terrible disasters, bringing a world ship's resources to hard-to-access regions, to provide a level of humanitarian aid that exceeds most methods in the greater Multiverse. But we are neither invincible nor omnipresent, and so if another event like that upheaval would happen and take our ship in the process, we would find a way to recover like anyone else so we could get right back to trying to help others survive and thrive." "We do what we can. That's the most that anyone can do, right?" Then she answers the question of the 'worst case scenario,' by pointing to the one who raised their hand. "Respectfully, I'll keep the greater details of this one minimal. At one point there existed an alien being that would lure girls into contracts for magical power by manipulating their emotions and desires by offering them a single wish. It was, in fact, one of my inspirations for finding ways to fight that kind of predation, very early in my experiences with the Multiverse. It was a driving motivator, and still is." "These cases are rare," she adds, noticing the worry in their faces. "And what you find in the Multiverse may differ wildly from what I have seen." She does a mock-aside-whisper posture, and she 'conspiratorially' says, "Tell me about all the weird things you find, okay? Some of it's pretty neat." She looks over at Ice King and answers with a point to him, politely waiting for him to pick a good word for Teacher. "That kind of black and white thinking doesn't quite fit anymore. We aren't the Union, and I doubt there'll ever be a time where it feels like we are. That time has passed. I have former colleagues and allies that work within the Watch and the Concord that still benefit the Multiverse at large. They're still my friends, even now. They just had a different idea of how to approach what they believe is right. Do you have any friends like that? Anyone that thinks differently than you that you still hang out with?" Ainsley has been to Ooo, and she's starting to recognize who this is. This is explicitly the Ice King. She's trying to keep him properly engaged so he doesn't start freezing students into harmless blocks of ice.
Eryl Fairfax	With the CMC quieting down, the teachers go back to watching. Rarity hears the student who was trying to bother return to their seat, muttering darkly about 'stupid pastel horses.' Meanwhile, the bully finds himself supporting the weight of a rather corpulant wizard! He can't push him back, because the ice is to firm. He's actually stuck, and seems flabbergasted. The students murmur in response to Chevalier. These generations are those tired of meaningless platitudes. Those raised on feel-good 'do your best and you'll succeed!' messages from media targetted at them. A vow that the Paladins will fight, not because they'll win, but it's better than giving up, that they'll do their best because that's the best they can do, speaks to them a lot more. Even the more rumbustious ones settle down. Sadly, a lot of teen girls like the idea of becoming magical girls, so it's fortunate that the creature in question is no longer about. The lizard's next question draws some muttering from the crowd, people discussing what she asked them. At that moment, the bell rings, bringing the presentation to an end. What would follow is a trip to the fair set up outside, one that would show off Paladin technology like the drop pods, their farming machines, their production lines. Chevalier would get a visit from Molly, who tersely says, "Thank you for the interview," before stomping off. At least she has that much manners, but she is for-sure going to be one of Those Reports later on. He also gets a lot of questions from the boys, asking about his armor, asking if they could see his gunblade up close. Ainsley gets questions from those fishing for more information about the case she mentioned, Others just seem interested in a lizard person. Ultimately, legalese is only interesting to a few students, so only a few questions about her job. Rarity and the CMC are very popular with the younger girls for some reason. The former finally gets to see who was bothering her, a boy who now has a bright streak of yellow down his uniform. Something she could certainly treat if she wanted. Ice King is actually very popular! Turns out that boy he trapped was a notorious bully, and they all enjoyed seeing him get his comeuppance. Even though he's weird, and probably smelly, he gets a lot of waves from the stu-his 'fellow kids.'
Rarity	For some reason. Not that the trio is going to object to the attention. The three fillies and the younger kids do share things in common, like not knowing for sure what they're going to do in the great big world yet. Just don't let that many young children, regardless of race, out of your sight for very long together. As annoyed as she was, Rarity isn't cruel enough to leave the kid to suffer the ridicule of going around with a messy uniform for the day. "Mayhaps you will think better of harassing a visitor simply for being unusual," she remarks to the boy, even as she uses her magic to remove the ink blotch.