Lesson Plans

"Here you go."

Scott looked up as Logan stalked into his office and tossed something down in the direction of his desk.

"What's this?" Scott watched the paper as it fluttered lightly down on top of the article he'd been reading, something scrawled across the top in sharp, black ink.

Logan crossed his arms over his chest and sighed as if the question were horribly taxing. "Might try readin' it, there, Slim."

Scott gave a cursory glance down towards the paper, which was folded in half. It had his name written on the front; at least, Scott thought that's what it was, but he wasn't entirely sure. He picked it up gingerly. The paper smelled vaguely like tobacco smoke. "From the handwriting, I'd say…Ted Bundy's last confession?"

"Funny, Summers. Learnin' those smart jokes from Emma, are you? Least she's doin' somethin' for ya, bub. Besides the obvious."

Scott ignored that and opened the paper, looking down at it incredulously. "Seriously, Logan…what the hell is this?"

"That thing you said you wanted."

Scott Summers wanted a lot of things; some he'd readily admit to, and some he wouldn't. None of them, however, included the phrase a piece of paper from Logan with his name on it. "Logan, is this a love note? Because you know I'm with someone."

Logan bared his teeth at him and made a noise that would probably frighten any small, furry creature that happened to hear it into hiding in a bush somewhere until the danger passed. Scott was neither small nor especially furry, and he had no intentions of hiding in the potted plants in the corner of the office. Which were very small, incidentally. He flipped open the paper and read the single phrase written inside, and suddenly, he had a bad feeling he knew what it was supposed to be. "No."

"You don't want me to do it?"

"Logan," Scott said, trying very hard not to let his annoyance show in his voice and completely failing. "This isn't at all what I wanted. I said I wanted your teaching plan and your goals for the upcoming semester. Not a catch phrase."

"Yup." Logan smirked at him. "S'what I gave you there. Goals. A plan."

"Logan, this is one sentence."'

"I'm the soul of brevity, Summers." At Scott's rather startled expression over Logan's word choice, Logan snorted. "Been alive a long time. Learned a lot of words. Just don't think I have to use 'em all the time."'

Scott let that one go, indulging in a brief fantasy in which he'd decided to become a professional baseball player instead of a professional superhero who taught school with the most insubordinate staff ever. "I asked for it to be turned in a week ago," Scott reminded him tightly, feeling a pressure in the back of his jaw that was probably because his teeth were pressing down very hard against each other.

"Better late than never. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth." Logan waved his hand airily. "You know. Those old sayings are usually right."

"Beware Wolverines bearing witticisms," Scott muttered ironically, then gave up. "Fine, thank you, Logan. I'm very glad your goals and aspirations for your self-defense class can be summed up in one phrase, which includes profanity, I might add. What a fine institution for the gifted we're providing here at the Xavier Institute. I'll see this gets added to the recruitment materials immediately."

"Yeah? Go right ahead. It'd look good on a t-shirt. There's more where that came from." Logan smiled his sharp, predator's smile, incisors flashing. "Just remember to give me the copyright. Wouldn't like it if you stole my idea and got rich off it."

Was Logan aware they lived in a mansion? What more did he want from being rich? Scott had a sudden image of a walk-in humidor and scantily clad women (who weren't Emma) draped all over Logan in an en-suite hot tub. Maybe Scott didn't want to know. "Thank you, Logan. This is very helpful."

Logan gave a shrug and prowled towards the door, either oblivious or uncaring of Scott's sarcasm. "Don't worry about it, Summers. Just keep it for anytime you need me to come up with some goals again. Always gonna be the same, unless you decide to start making me teach some pansy-ass class like literature."

Scott taught history, and of course, literature. "Don't worry, Wolverine. I'm pretty sure the requirements for teaching literature would be that you could at least write your name legibly. Though I did think about having you teach world history, since you've lived through so much of it."

"Funny, Summers. Though I don't remember crap. So that'd be a short class. Kids'd like it, and it'd be another short little goal sheet. So you go right ahead and do what you gotta do. Me? I'm gonna go do just what I said on that sheet. I'm committed like that."

"You really are the best at what you do, Logan," Scott said sarcastically, staring up at the skylight to the cloudy sky beyond, as if patience might fall from above along with the impending rain.

"Sure am. 'Specially when it's pissing you off. See you, Summers. Gonna go get a beer to celebrate finishin' up my homework. Was going to tell you Lockheed ate it, but I didn't think you'd believe me."

There was really nothing he could say to that, Scott thought, watching as Wolverine left his office with a more jaunty prowl than usual, rather like an animal that had just flushed out prey and was carrying it off to eat.

Scott reached out and found the single file-folder on his desk, labeled neatly with the year written in black marker across the tab. Inside were the other staff members goals and suggested lesson plan, and truly, things had only gone from bad to worse with the addition of Wolverine's.

Hank had given him the requisite typed, two-page document—complete with six pages of annotated footnotes and a suggested bibliography comprised of textbooks that may be favored by neurosurgeons and nuclear physicists. Kitty's had also been typed and was the suggested length, but Scott had no idea what half of the phrases meant.

What the hell was a MySpace, for instance, and why did the students need a lesson about one? He wasn't going to ask. He had his pride.

Piotr's had been much shorter; hand-written in his neat, precise script, and entirely in Cyrillic. He'd given a muttered explanation about not being good at writing in English, but later, Scott had heard Kitty laugh in the hallway and say, "Did Scott really buy that?"

Emma's was almost three pages, though it wasn't typed. It was hand-written on scented paper and presented to him on his pillow, tied with a white satin ribbon. Inside was a rather elaborate fantasy he'd had about Charlize Theron the other morning while he was in the shower, transcribed nearly to the letter. At the end, she'd written, Question one: What are the ethical implications of having fantasies about celebrities while your telepathic girlfriend is in the other room? Please note, any answer of "But I thought she was sleeping" will result in an immediate failing grade.

Scott added Logan's one-sentence goal to the pile and stared at it for a good two minutes. It was almost funny, if he were in the mood to be amused. At least he knew what it meant, which was more than he could say for Hank's physics goals or Kitty's strange and frightening computer class.

We're gonna learn how to kick some ass.

Scott sighed and closed the folder. It was going to be a long year.