Chapter 5: Dinner Time

The whole, extended family had planned dinner at the ranch for the evening of the first day of school. Everyone was interested in how Sean and Megan had fared on their first full day of interaction with normal society, and school; without guidance or help from teachers, guides, or parents. The whole clan was waiting at the dinner table for their report. Sean, AJ and Scott seemed to be satisfied with the day's events. At least, they weren't glaring at anyone that would meet their eyes. It looked like Lilly and Bell were resigned to a miserable senior school year. Megan, on the other hand, looked like she wanted to take a bite out of the table.

"I think we should start with Megan," Seth said, chuckling, as he started passing food around the table. "If we don't let her get whatever is on her mind out of her system, she might start eating the plates."

Megan glared at Seth and growled, "There are students at that school that should have been smothered in their crib. Some of them are the cruelest, most uncaring, depraved individuals, I have ever met."

"Children can be very cruel," Martha agreed. "That doesn't mean they can't learn to be civil, and sometime even become nice people, as they mature."

"I don't know if you've noticed, Aunt Martha, but we aren't children," Megan snapped, angrily. "We are young adults. People our age should have already gained some maturity. What some of those girls said and did were some of the cruelest things I've ever seen."

"What happened, honey?" Liz asked, worried.

"There were a couple of girls in PE that dressed different than everyone else," Megan spat. "They wore long dresses and little hats."

"They were a couple of LDS girls," Lilly explained.

"I thought they home schooled after they hit puberty," Susan commented thoughtfully.

"I don't know," Megan said angrily. "I just know they were in class and had to dress out for PE with the rest of us."

"What did they do?" Sheila asked curiously. "The Mormons don't usually cause problems with anyone outside their church."

"They didn't do anything," Megan said angrily. "It was those bitches in the same clique that the bully from this morning belongs to."

"Oh, this just keeps getting better and better," BB chuckled.

Sheila glared at him. So did Martha, before she turned her attention back to Megan.

"Language," Martha said sharply. "I've told you often enough. Profanity is an indication of a poor vocabulary. I know you have a good vocabulary and you don't need to use profanity."

"I know, Aunt Martha, and I'm sorry," Megan replied, still sounding angry. "But sometime, proper vocabulary just can't communicate the amount of emotion that I want to express."

"Well, that may be true, but it's not your decision to make at the dinner table," Martha said sternly. Her voice softened, only slightly, when she continued. "Besides, if those girls were so bad that they would raise that level of emotion, why would you compare them to female dogs. You cried when Queen died."

Megan sat back in her seat as she remembered the female mastiff that had been a fixture on the ranch for so long. Her angry expression softened with sadness at the memory.

"I'm sorry, Aunt Martha," Megan said quietly, after taking a deep breath and letting it out. "They were very mean to those LDS girls. It's one thing when a bully hits someone or tries to intimidate another person. They weren't trying to intimidate those girls. They only wanted to hurt them, to cause them emotional pain. I felt their emotions like Sean taught me and some of them were just ... just ... they were vicious! The emotions from the LDS girls made me want to cry."

"What did they do?" Sheila asked quietly.

"They started picking on them as soon as they came into the locker room," Bell said. "They were mostly just calling them names and making fun of their clothes."

"The Mormon girls ignored them," Lilly said.

"Yeah," Megan replied, drily. "Until they started changing. They couldn't ignore them, after that."

"Why not?" Martha asked, as quietly as Sheila.

"The Mormon girls were wearing really old style underwear," Bell replied.

"The bras looked like something from the fifties and the panties were more like armor than underwear," Lilly said quietly. "The girls that were picking on them started snapping the Mormon girl's bra straps and panties."

"They touched them. That is considered assault, under the law," Pete said.

"I couldn't do anything with my talent," Megan said, her eyes bright with tears, remembering the emotions from the LDS girls. "If I had, they would have known something very unusual was happening. The only thing I could do was get between them and tell the other girls to stop it."

"I'm proud of you, honey. What happened after that?" Ben, her father, asked.

"I guess I was yelling pretty loud, and the teacher came out," Megan said.

Lilly snorted, nodded and said, "Yeah, she was yelling pretty loud. I think there was a component of air talent in the yelling,"

Megan shrugged and blushed, saying, "Maybe a little."

"Mrs. Hastings was mad," Lilly continued. "She's the girls PE teacher."

"She used to be a Drill Instructor in the Army," Megan said in disgust. "Instead of punishing just the bitch, ah, sorry, just the girls that were picking on the Mormon girls, she punished the whole class."

"The punishment wasn't a big deal for us, Megan," Bell pointed out.

"I know, but it was for some of the other girls," Megan replied. "The girls that were in really bad physical shape were really hurting by the end of the class.

"Making the unit pay for the mistake or transgressions of the individuals in the unit, is a common strategy in the military," Seth pointed out.

"Uncle Seth, we aren't a military unit," Megan pointed out drily. "We're a high school PE class."

"I'm just pointing out a common practice in the military," Seth explained calmly. "If your teacher is military trained, it's reasonable to expect her to fall back on her training as the first solution to a problem."

"She was a drill instructor at one time, Uncle Seth," Megan said angrily. "She' isn't a drill instructor now. She has received further training. The exercises she made us do for punishment wasn't hard for us but it wasn't that hard for the girls that were picking on the Mormon girls either. It was really hard for some of the other girls. It, it was like she was punishing the wrong people."

"And now," Bell picked up the story. "The other girls in the class blame Megan for the punishment. Some of them let Megan know how unhappy they are with her for yelling so loud."

"The girls in the clique are mad at her for interfering and the other girls are mad at her for interfering so loud," Lilly explained.

"I don't care if all of them are mad at me. It wasn't right," Megan said stubbornly.

"Being right doesn't always help solve the problems we run into," Seth said pointedly. "The question that you need to ask yourself is, do you want to solve the problem or are you more concerned with being right?"

"Personally, I'm disappointed in you," Udit said.

"What?" Megan squawked. "Why are you disappointed in me? I was right!"

She ignored Seth's statement because she didn't know how to answer it. She was also concerned about what she might find if she explored the question. Besides, Udit's question had startled her.

Lian and Cory looked at Udit curiously.

Cory mildly said, "This should be interesting."

Lian just raised her eyebrows in anticipation.

Udit slowly shook his head and met Megan's angry glare. "You were right to object to the mean girl's actions. Your reaction to correct them was ineffectual. That is why I am disappointed in you."

"What else could I do?" Megan demanded angrily.

Udit shrugged and said, "I don't know. I wasn't there. I do know that, strength for strength, Sean is stronger than you. In a battle, he is more apt to use brute strength. You, on the other hand, are more apt to use wile, and win. You are sneakier than he is. I am certain that you could have found a solution if you had stopped to think, rather than simply get angry. Your error was that you didn't think."

Udit looked at Sean and asked, "Was your day as bad as hers?"

"She was just talking about PE. I don't think the rest of her day was as bad," Sean replied with a chuckle. "I guess PE could have been as bad, but we found a way to turn the tables."

The three of them, Sean, AJ, and Scott, told the family about what happened during PE. Martha was the most concerned.

"Will Mr. Stillwell be a problem?" Martha asked.

"I don't think so," Sean replied. "No matter what he thinks, it won't be what it really is."

Scott laughed and said, "No, I don't think so, either. I mean, how many people see something strange and say, 'He must be a wizard, ' or even something close to that."

Udit returned his attention to Megan and said, "Sometime, like during an ambush, you only have time to act. All other times, think first, then act."

"Yes, sir," Megan said, quietly.

"So, how about the rest of the day?" Seth asked. "Any other major traumas from the day?"

Sean looked at Megan and she nodded back at him, indicating he should take the lead. She wasn't feeling as righteous about her anger and her actions as she was earlier.

"Well, there was a bully this morning that we had to convince that he shouldn't bother us." Sean replied. "That wasn't a big deal. There was no fighting and a minimal amount of talent was used to avoid the situation." Sean cleared his throat before continuing. "There are a couple of issues we need some advice on. Our physics and geology classes are trying to teach us wrong information."

"Actually, the geology part is pretty close to right, but just not quite. It's the geophysics that's the problem in the geology class," Megan volunteered, still speaking quietly.

Sean nodded and said, "The two issues are kind of related, really." He took a deep breath and before saying, "The physics teacher is wrong, but then, so is the text book."

"Are you sure about that?" Martha asked, puzzled. "The text books are usually thoroughly cross checked and students have believed the teachers are wrong since men started having classes."

"Oh, we're sure, Momma," Sean said. "In physics, the problem is their conception of energy. I understand energy. I can feel it when energy is stored and when it's released. I can release energy from water by severing the bonds between the hydrogen and oxygen. Mr. Mallory, he's the physics teacher, is close ... but he still isn't right."

Megan nodded and said, "I even understood that he wasn't right because Sean taught me how to draw energy from water. I had to understand the energy before I could break the bonds to get to the energy."

"Okay, how about the geology class?" Martha asked. "What's wrong with that class?"

Sean shook his head and said, "Megan tried to explain it but I still didn't understand the geology part of it. I understood what was wrong with the geophysics part of it because of the work we needed to do to create our staffs."

Lian shook her head as if she were trying to clear it after being stunned. "Wait a minute," she said. "I was with you and helped you figure out how to design your staffs. I don't remember anything about geophysics. Explain that please."

"Let Megan," Sean said, chuckling. "She understands it a lot better than I do."

"Remember how we had to study electricity and generators before we started designing our staffs?" Megan asked, her tone of voice and manner reverting to the teaching mannerisms she had adopted from Martha.

Lian and Cory nodded. Everyone else around the table looked lost so Megan decided to go into more detail.

"A generator generates electricity by repeatedly passing a conductor, the stator, through a magnetic field," Megan explained.

Lian and Cory nodded. The rest of the family looked somewhat relieved that Megan was saying something they understood.

"The staff interacts with the energy field of the Wizard in the same way the stator does with the magnetic field. In the case of the generator, electricity is produced, which is simply pulses of magnetism focused and guided by a conductor, the wire. In the case of the staff, the Wizard's energy is focused and amplified by the staff. Think of the staff as the collector, like the stator. It's also the guide, like the wire. The staff is different from the generator in the sense that it's also an amplifier, which is a separate circuit in the case of electricity." Megan continued. "Okay?" she asked, testing to see that she hadn't lost anyone. She didn't see any glazed eyes so felt confident that everyone was keeping up.

"Okay," Martha said. "But, I still don't understand how that relates to geology or geophysics.

"It only relates to the geophysics part of the problem we're having with the class," Megan explained patiently.

The teenager always more patience when lecturing. Or, maybe it was a female thing.

"In class, part of the subject is gravity," Megan continued. "Mr. Rosella said that gravity was one of the weak forces of nature and gave several theories for the source of gravity. The most accurate theory that explains gravity mathematically is Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. But, Mr. Rosella was wrong, sort of, when he tried to explain the source of gravity," Megan concluded.

"Oh, really?" Martha asked. She had looked over their text books, so she understood what Megan was talking about. She was curious about Megan's claim that the book was wrong.

Megan nodded and said, "We know what causes gravity, but we're not sure how to prove it."

"Worry about proving it later," Martha said drily. "Why don't you try to explain it first. Please use little words so I'll understand."

Megan recognized the sarcasm, but didn't let it bother her. She was in full lecture mode now.

She nodded and said, "The earth, um, picture the earth as a stator and it goes around the sun, continually passing through the gravitational field of the sun. The amount of gravity generated is based on the mass of the planet."

"Okay," Martha retorted, thinking she saw the hole in Megan's theory. "Where does the sun's gravity come from?"

"They've proven that there is a black hole at the center of the galaxy," Megan answered. "It's gravity is so strong that light can't even escape. The sun and all the suns in our galaxy are passing through the gravity well of that black hole. And, before you ask, I don't know where the black hole get's it's gravity. It could be caused by our galaxy going around something in the center of the universe that is even bigger. Or, maybe something remains at the center of the universe that's left over from the big bang. It could be because the black hole is connected to something else entirely that is causing its massive pull. No one knows what's on the other side of a black hole," Megan concluded triumphantly.

The family exchanged looks and, after a few moments, Seth cleared his throat.

"Assuming that you're both correct, and I'm not disputing you at all, what is your question for us?" Seth asked.

"We need to figure out if we should simply sit out the class and memorize the answers they want to hear, or try to correct them," Sean said. "The first solution feels wrong but I don't know how to successfully accomplish the second solution."