-January 21st of 1313

            Lena happily whistles as she heads to her classroom, (which is the dining hall in the castle.) Today will be the first day of school for the Investigation Unit and Lena can feel the familiar joy of teaching returning to her.

            School took a week to start due to time constraints. Lena’s new funds had to be counted and transported to her vault. Dolly was sent to supervise the entire orchestration, since some of the men might be tempted by the wealth.

            The men had to be sorted into departments per skills. For now, they would all be taught together but over time they would separate and be taught according to their department. It took longer than necessary since Holly and Delilah were in charge sorting the men. According to Holly some of them men were dragging their feet in order to see them more often.

            Lena wasn’t worried since Holly was a specialist in dissuading men.

            Rather Lena was worried that the new recruitments may fall into old habits. To combat the situation, Lena wanted some goody two shoes who would stick to the very letter of the book. With the aid of Dolly, they managed to recruit those that wanted to be in Lena’s employ, but did not wish to join the army.

            The new proposition appealed to many, who had not had not the courage to apply and regretted not doing so. Surprisingly this time around, there was a higher influx of women than men recruits. Which was just fine by her.

            Having a good mix of genders and species, Lena needed commanding officers. Officers wouldn’t oversee investigations rather ensured things were done properly and supervising questionable recruits. With that in mind, Lena set off to poach officers from Fort Terra.

            There were several officers who wanted to retire or those that wanted to get promoted but couldn’t. As soon as Lena offered them a chance at a promotion, they all jumped at the valuable chance and applied for a discharge, which Lena happily signed off on. It wasn’t though Captain Darrell would protest. On that note, Chief Officer Gauthier was still at the fort as her liaison, but would soon be joining her.

            Lean burst into the dining hall that resembled a lecture hall causing the doors to slam against the wall and boom throughout the room. The new recruits were sitting down in groups rather than mixing as they should have.

            Lena snickers to herself, she had prepared a seating chart just for such an event. Standing before them Lena brightly says, “Welcome to the Investigation Unit. But before we start I have a seating chart, please seat yourself accordingly starting with the first row.”

            They all stare at her with a mixture of disbelief until she calls out the first name. Sometime later everyone is seated as Lena adds fuel to the flames, “Thank you and please note, that this is your assigned seat for the time being until stated otherwise.”

            The men and women groan at her words. Lena ignores her precious students sighs and complains. After all, that’s just how students always are. They complain at the beginning until they bond.

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            “Before we start classes, we’re going to get to know each other by playing a game. The game is called, Truth or Dare. But in this case, we will ask each person if they want to answer any question truthfully or fulfill any challenge issued by another,” Lena cheerfully said as some of her student’s pale while others perk up and begin to look interested.

            “Alright, Let’s start with Barclay. Barclay, truth or dare?” Lean mischievously asked.

            Barclay groans as everyone grins at his misfortune. After some time, Barclay picks, Truth. Lena points at a student to ask him a question, after a moment Marie asks, “What is the most expensive thing you have stolen?”

            There is silence for in the room until Barclay throws his head and laughs. “That’s easy, my wife. Back then she was a noble’s daughter and let me tell you it wasn’t easy sneaking her out of the damn castle!” Barclay barked as he wiped tears of mirth from his eyes.

            At his reaction everyone joins in laughing as they being to relax and enjoy the game as it continues. The entire point of the game is to be an ice breaker. If they can laugh with each other that means they can work with each other.

            After everyone had a turn Lena says, “Now you have met and know each other. Learn each other’s faces, because these are your comrades who will put their life on the line for you. These are the people who will work with you to protect the citizens of this country.”

            Her words seem to penetrate through them as they study each other with new eyes. Lena nods with satisfaction and says, “Now let’s begin class. My first question is what is the easiest way to catch criminals?”

            They shout out various answers and so forth.

            “Catching them in the act!”

            “Setting up a trap!”

            “Finding incriminating evidence!”

             Lena patiently waits for the answers to die down, before answering, “All very good answers, but the primarily answer is finding evidence and having it go through proper channels. Most of the time we won’t find the ledger that proves the crime. On the contrary the people we investigate tie up all loose ends as much as possible by silencing those that work for them.

            But criminals tend to be caught because they spoke of their crime or someone slipped up. The reason I am saying this is because I will be unorthodox in how I want you to proceed. All of you are former criminals and know what types of people they frequent. I am sure that finding out such information will be no such trouble.

            Now having said that, I want to emphasize we must proceed with proper protocol to present proof and a reliable testimony that will not be questioned.

            For now, we will start on learning simple techniques such as fingerprinting, interrogation, collecting evidence, understanding a crime scene and so forth.

            Everyone please take your paper and quills to take notes.”

            The students grab materials that were set in front of them. Lena proceeds to lecture for the next several hours without pause.  Not wanting to overwhelm them on their first day Lena excused them for the day after lunch. Not before explaining that classes, would be every single day from morning until evening.

            There was a loud groan at her announcement as Lena ignored her students. Full of energy, Lena wandered back to prepare the next day’s lesson. It is a wonderful thing to be part of the education system filling young minds with knowledge.