Bruce Ka’aukai

Gender: Male
Allignment: Hero
Affiliation: Solo Hero
Location: Landon, Michigan
Street Level

Background

All right new guy stick close; I’m only showing you around because I have to, so I’m going to do it very quickly and I’m only going to cover the basics. At this school, there are only three rules to survival.

Rule One: Ditch the shorts. No one enforces the dress code on this side of the fence, you look like a dweeb, and I’m embarrassed to be seen with you.

Rule Two: You’re not allowed to use what the Academy considers ‘arcane abilities or malicious magics’. They don’t really define what that means, but it doesn’t matter because they don’t enforce that one either.

Rule Three: And this is the important one. The building on the other side of the fence with the rose trellis is the girl’s dormitory. Avoid that place at all costs; magical chicks are weird.

Ok. You got that? Good. You mind if we walk and talk?

Personality

Oh wait, one more, Rule Four, cliques: You’re gonna need to find one. Lycans are tolerable if you can ignore the alpha-male bro bullshit. Warlocks are either preps or pyros, demons are always starting shit that doesn’t need to be started, feys are fey, angelics are smug, and all vampires are judgmental pricks.

Me, I’m in a group that sort of sees ourselves as misfits. You can hang with us for awhile if you want. Some of the A-holes here might try to use new students as blood sacrifices if they thought they could get away with it.

All right, what else was I supposed to tell you about… Oh, clubs. Almost forgot.

Super speed, Standard: Mer Physiology I

So Rule Six is clubs. You missed club day by a few weeks, but the basics are that you need to join and actively participate in at least one student run organization if you want to graduate. Sports, drama, band, wicca, school newspaper, all the regular stuff. Then there’s this thing called the “Honor Guard”, but we’ll talk about that later.

Me, I’m on the swim team, fastest in school history too. Also top three in track this year, ahead of most of the lycans, which pisses them off to no end.

Oh, and I’m also on the student council as a ‘welcome ambassador’, so that’s why I’m showing you around the place. I don’t mind doing it, but between you and me, the only reason I’m here is that student council is a co-ed club and there was this girl. But that’s not important and I’m over all that now… But since I brought it up, let me just going to give you one word of warning…

Body, Superior: Mer Physiology II

… So the only answer I get from her friend is that I’m not her type anymore. But I haven’t changed, so how can I not be her type anymore? I’m the same guy. Plus, she literally sucked the life out of me for four weeks and apparently I’m the one who’s selfish?

Not that I really minded it. I can take it, I’m one of the few guys around here who CAN take it. But dammit, I’ve taken suckerpunches that left less bruising then her damned hickies.

Anyway, sorry to unload on you new guy… you have any questions about what I’ve said so far?

Hyper sense, Standard: Mer Physiology III, ‘Ampullae of Lorenzini’

Quiet type, aren’t you? You a golem or something? It’s all right if you are, I’m not racist or anything. Really. I only ask because my roommate Brim is a golem and he barely says anything either.

I don’t think you are though. Golems don’t have electric muscle contractions, and I can sense a low level voltage everytime you step. It’s one of the nicer features of being a Mer. But enough about me, what exactly are you? Where you from?

…

You’re making small talk a real pain in the ass, you know that new guy? Well, be that way then. Hey, wait here, I got to drop the spawn off at the pond if you know what I mean.

Slashing Weapon, Standard: Mer Physiology IV

… All right new guy, thanks for waiting. And uh, don’t mind the claws. It’s no big deal, just sometimes when I’m washing my hands I forget what I’m doing and they transform back to normal. These are nothing, my teeth are what you aught to be scared of. Anyway they’ll go back to human in a second once they dry off.

Oh wait, that brings up the next thing. This one’s important. Rule Eight, or whatever:

Transformation, Standard: Human Physiology

“While at the academy all students must retain a human visage”. That basically means no scaring the townies.

Now unlike all the other rules I’ve stated, this one actually gets enforced every now and again. It’s not that serious if you’re on the school grounds, and in my experience we almost never get caught, but you definitely can’t let any normal human see you use magic or just appear non-human. We’ve already got a reputation amongst the people around here, but if some local yokel gets video of an abomination in an academy blazer smoking a cigarette outside the gates, then everybody’s up shit creek because one guy was being careless.

For mages and vamps and some others this isn’t an issue, but the rest of us have to be careful. Some of the guys use wolfsbane or medical stuff, some cast illusions, some of ‘em even use make-up. Whatever works. I’m lucky cause I can go back at forth at will. Well, I can now; first year was tough.

Anyway you seem passable so you should be fine.

Strength, Superior: Mer Physiology V

Now, I don’t know if it’s the result of having so many different supernaturals corralled in one place, or if its just a boarding school thing, but Rule Nine is that while you’re here you will ultimately get into at least one fight over absolutely trivial bullshit. For me its about one a week.

Understand, I’m not encouraging you to start shit. As the ‘welcome ambassador’ I couldn’t do that.

Now, that said, if someone is messing with you, the generally accepted code is that once it goes beyond a certain point you are allowed, if not obligated, to respond. Usually there are a few harsh words first. Then one guy fronts up in the other one’s face, and this is the signal to everyone else. But up to this point either of them can walk away without looking like a punk. The next step is generally a shove, and the response to that determines how the rest of the encounter’s going to take place.

Once that happens, forget all about that ‘malicious magic’ rule, the other guy certainly will. If you’ve got magic, use magic, if you’ve got muscle, use muscle, if you can shoot hellfire out your navel, well then do that. I find slamming the other guy into a locker and biting through his collarbone sends a nice message of ‘do not f**k with me’.

Trust me new kid, I know what I’m talking about.

Martial arts, Standard: More then just a brawler.

Now earlier I mentioned something called Honor Roll. It’s no big deal. It’s sort of an an urban legend around here, supposedly sort of like another school club, except instead of leading cheers or putting on poorly acted productions of a Streetcar Named Desire, they save this school and occasionally the world from the forces of evil.

You see this school has a lot of “forces of evil” in one place and awhile back one of our past graduates thought it was time to do something about that. So the Honor Roll is trained to fight back against schemes to turn the locals into thralls, or to stop certain faculty members from committing the aforementioned blood sacrifices.

Supposedly at least. I can’t say I know that much about it.

All right new guy that’s it. Dormitories are at the end of the hall and classes are upstairs. Now is where I’d ask if you had any questions, but I just as well assumed you were a mute ten minutes in.

But if you do have any questions or anything, just come looking for me. I’ll be keeping an eye out for you. Hell, I’m keeping an eye out for everybody these days.