Clensing the School

Noah sat on his chair next to Alice. The class was about to start. It was his second day since they had returned to school. He was staring at Alice who was using her phone as she sat beside him.

A boy walked into class and joined a group of people circling in the front of the class.

"Guys, It's true, we have a new principle, the old one was fired!"

"No way I was just telling them that Mr Davison and Mr Philader were fired as well."

"Actually I think a lot of teachers were fired with them, my dad works in the ministry of education and he told me that the school was involved in a large scandal. Everyone related to it was sacked."

"Do you know what happened?" Another student asked.

"I think it was related to bribing or something. My dad only heard a little about it from his colleagues. The whole thing was actually kept secret and away from the public."

"You could bribe teachers? If I knew I would've paid them to change all my grades to As."

"Like anyone would believe that."

Noah listened to the conversation. What they said was true. A lot of the school's staff had been fired in a day. This was something he had a hand in.

After dealing with the counsellor, he had contacted the ministry of education in advance. They came later yesterday calling in all staff. They started a deep investigation and put many teachers on probation or had them fired.

Both the principal and vice-principal had been bribed by Philander. This was why they completely supported him and turned a blind eye to all his complaints. There was enough evidence of this and the two were immediately fired.

All the teachers Philander was close to were under investigation and were told not to come to school for now. With them, a few other teachers who knew about the extreme bullying problem in school yet did nothing, were in deep waters now. The Ministry of Education called them all up for questioning.

Naturally, all of this was done quickly and secretly, the main reason and cause was not disclose and was covered as corruption and bribing problem among staff. This was something done to protect the victims from scrutiny.

As for Philander, he was put in jail without a trial. His case had been completely hidden with no news coverage. This was something Noah had asked for. He wanted him to completely disappear, so the fewer people that knew him the better.

If Philander's family found out he was in jail, they would likely pull some strings and have him released. So he needed to make sure that he dealt with Philander Dugal before anyone could find out about it.

Alice noticed that Noah had been staring at her for a while now and turned to him and said, "Stop starring at me like that."

"Sorry, you're just so pretty," Noah flirted with a mischevious smile.

"Hmph, that's so cheesy and lame, it doesn't suit your cold image," Alice said with a snort.

"I only speak the truth."

"Sure you do."

As the two bickered a teacher walked in.

Noah recognised him as the old teacher that called him out for flirting.

"Everyone I'll be taking your substitute teacher for the day, the school is having a large change in staff so it might take some time for regular classes to start." The teacher seeing that none of the students really cared, with some even celebrating snorted internally.

One student raised his hand, "Sir if there aren't any teachers wouldn't it be a waste of time to come to school? Can't you just give us the days off?"

"Yes I thought of that as well, that's why I've had the school alter the schedule so you can have early mock exams. So your mock exams are now starting tomorrow!" The old man said with a laugh.

The students were shocked. Everyone turned quiet not being able to understand what he said. The stunt sitting in front of Noah turned to his partner.

"Did he just say mock exams start tomorrow?" The student whispered to his neighbour.

"He's probably talking about something else, we have like a month until they start." The other student answered.

Noah didn't mind the early exams, he had already studied everything. Neither did Alice, she had long stopped caring about her grades.

"Are you talking about the mock exams that were going to be held in a month?" A student asked.

"Those exams, you'll have them early."

After hearing him agree the whole class started rioting.

"You can't do this to us!"

"No change it back."

"This has to be a prank!"

Seeing the reaction he was expecting the teacher laughed satisfied, "Fine, fine, I was kidding, the date hasn't changed. The school rejected my idea... for now."

"Wait, what?"

"Okay, everyone quiet down, let's start next topic." The teacher started teaching.

Noah watched this with interest. Alice had told him about this old man. He was one of the teachers that didn't involve himself with other teachers and was unbiased to all his students. He treated Alice the same even after the rumours about her started spreading. So Noah had a good opinion of him.

Noah reached under his desk for his laptop when he noticed that he had a letter put under his desk. It was pink and had his name on it.

It reminded him of the fan mail he would get as an actor. Since he wasn't a celebrity anymore he didn't feel like opening it. He ignored the letter and simply went on with the class.

The morning classes ended it was time for lunch. Noah and Alice walked down the hall as they were making their way to the stairs that led to the roof.

Along the way, Alice stopped, "I'm going to the restroom you can go ahead."

After Alice left Noah decided to wait, he stood with his back against the windowed wall in front of the restroom. As he did, he expressionlessly looked to the side looking out the window.

A few girls passing by saw Noah standing alone, they walked up to him, "Hello, I'm a fan! Can I get an autograph?"

"Sure." Noah took the book and pen she was holding and signed it.

As Noah signed another person saw them, "Hey, can I have an autograph as well."

The boy next to him hit him on the shoulder, "He already quit acting, don't disturb him for an autograph, come on we have to hurry."

"I can milk out some favours out of people with it, he isn't losing anything."

Noah didn't mind signing. So he just agreed to it.

"I'm Mike," Mike shook hands with Noah as he scanned Noah's body and his eyes widened, "Those arm and leg muscles, you do have the body of an international athlete. Aren't you really good at fencing and martial arts? We don't have a fencing club but we do have an MMA club, it would be wonderful if you could join."

"Where is the MMA club?" Noah asked as he was curious. He didn't think of joining but he wanted to see if he could squeeze some use out of it.

"Hey don't think I'll let you poach him. I'm Larrisa, head of the drama club..." The girl who had been starring at the autograph blurted. Before she could continue a hand pressed on her face pushing her back.

"It's in the next building, building C, room 4 on the ground floor," Mike said coming in front of Larrisa.

Soon more people stopped seeing that Noah was talking with someone, they wanted to say hello.

Before he knew it the area in front of the girl's restroom was filled with people.

...

Alice walked out of the restroom wondering what all the fuss outside was for. Seeing the crowd surrounding Noah, she was surprised. Noah was casually talking and laughing with them she felt alienated. He looked so far to her. She started to feel sick being in a large crowd, she turned and started walking away to get some space and wait for Noah.

Having greeted another person, Noah saw Alice leaving.

"Sorry, I need to go now." He then pushed through the crowd and had his hand hold Alice's as he pulled her along. Getting out of the crowd the two took a turn onto the stairway and reached the roof.

Alice worked her magic and the two sat on the roof staring at the sky. Alice sat with Noah, yawned then leaned back putting her head on his lap. Just as Noah's hand was about to touch her face to move the hair covering it, Alice's head instantly turned to avoid his touch.

"Is something wrong?" Noah asked trying again, this time successfully combing her hair with his hand.

"I didn't like the lunch you made today. You put too much sauce." Alice said while looking away from Noah.

"But don't you like extra sauce on your sandwiches?"

"I used to like it. Not anymore."

"I'll make note of it. Is that why you're mad at me?" Noah his fingers run through her hair as he soothed her.

"I'm not mad."Alice huffed out.

"Really? then let me kiss you." Noah bent forward to kiss Alice. Alice startled had her hands reach out and block his mouth. She saw straight into Noah's eyes, which seemed to question why she stopped him.

Felt like she had gotten caught Alice sat up. "When did you become so expressive?" Alice asked what was on her mind. "You weren't like that before, you never smiled at anyone other than me. You normally coldly cut people down."

When she had seen him smile earlier, she felt uneasy and insecure on the inside. It reminded her of the nightmares she had of Noah falling in love with someone else. That she wasn't the recipient of his beaming smile.

"Are you talking about earlier when I was in the crowd?" Noah paused, she wasn't wrong. When he was younger, he barely showed emotions, other than Alice who filled him with happiness, he didn't care about much else.

"Did it seem genuine? Seems like all the awards I got aren't just for show." Noah said with a laugh, he wasn't lying. Only Alice could make him genuinely smile. His current friendliness was all an act. He still hadn't forgotten how they overlooked Alice's bullying.

"It was an act, I need to befriend as many people as possible to find every single person that did you wrong." He also wanted to confirm whether Alice wasn't still hiding any other injustice she had faced.

Alice grabbed Noah's head and looked him in the eye for a moment then gave him a quick kiss on the lips. "Let's go." She then immediately got up, dusting off her clothes.

Noah followed behind her as they walked back to class. While passing by the staff room, Noah remembered the about the MMA club Mike told him about.

"Wait a second, I need to go ask something." He knocked and entered the room. Yesterday, when he had come here before going to class he had been introduced to a few of the teachers, one of them was them was the teacher who handled the sports clubs.

He saw the teacher sitting where he saw him yesterday and went up to him.

"Hello Mr Garett, sorry to bother you, I want to ask about the MMA and other sports clubs."

"Not a problem at all, ask away. What do you want to know?"

"Does the school have space and gym equipment I could use? There aren't any gyms nearby so it would be convenient if I could work out in school after my classes finish."

"There is a gym in building C which all the sports clubs use. There should be a schedule stuck on the door. You can work out there. I'm sure none of the clubs would mind letting on more person in." Garett answered with a smile.

"Actually I wanted a private place…"

The teacher was put in a conundrum. He couldn't say no to Noah. The reputation and popularity he brought was something the owner of the school didn't want to lose. Having him graduate from the school would benefit them greatly. So accepting a few demands wasn't too big of a deal. However blatant favouritism, such as giving him the gym for private use whenever he wanted wasn't something he could do. After thinking about it he suddenly remembered something.

"I have a solution. You can use Building D. It's normally locked and used as a storage space throughout the year. There should be spare gym equipment you can use. Although it might be a bit old, it even has newer equipment from disbanded clubs. Will you be able to make do?"

"Yes, thank you."

The teacher nodded he opened his drawer and took out a key.

"Here is the key for building D, keep it with you from now on. Just make sure to lock it again when you leave."

Noah took the key and left. He had successfully found a place he could privately train Alice in. The gym he normally went to was his second option if he failed to get a good place to train in school.

Although Alice had grown much stronger in the Eternal Battlefield, other than horse riding she hadn't done anything else to train her body. So Noah had been wanting to train her himself in combat styles he had learned.

Back outside Alice stood waiting for him.

"What did you talk about?"

"Our new training centre," Noah said as he spun the key around his finger.

Alice looked at Noah, not understanding.

"You'll see after school." Noah then walked into class with Alice. They had half a day of classes left.