[February 3rd, 2021]
It always irritated Nicholas that most students skipped class on recruitment day, or ignored his presentation if they didn't. Partially because no one else had wanted the job, he visited every public highschool in Florida every year, growing more tired of the younger generation each round.
His eyes were pulled up from his desk to a woman from the school's staff poking her head in through the door. "There's a student here to see you."
"Send them in." he said, and she laughed.
"Send -her- in, you mean. Her name is Natasha Flagg."
He nodded. In the northern part of the state, religious groups in power still denied the existence of heightened homosexuality in hosts, staging demonstrations against Urasaria's last three presidents & anyone they found to be representative of them. Little wonder was it that many lesbians grew to love the bottle that dimmed the slurs that lingered in their ears even after the protests scattered.
Little wonder was it that they were the most likely to sign up.
She opened the door for a young woman, muscular enough that he wasn't sure if he'd misheard her gender, and he nodded to her as she sat down. "Good morning." he said. "Came in to ask a few questions? - Natasha, right?"
"Um, Natasha, y-yeah. I think I want to sign up for Urasaria, um, maybe."
"Well, that's good. Can already see that you don't need any help on the fitness side of things, right?" he said. "What makes you want to sign up, though? Was my presentation that good?"
"Um, a little." she said, nervously pulling out a list from her pocket. "I - I still have a lot of questions, though, and - I kinda get nervous easily so."
'A whole lot of questions.' he thought, reading it as he took it from her. "…first question is about your grades?"
"They're pretty bad." she winced.
It was a point of insecurity for her that her first three years had gone poorly, often prioritizing her fitness over school. She felt stupider than most people, and was already falling behind this semester.
"…well." he said. "I'm sure that can be straightened out, but - yes, I can tell you right now that there's no requirement for joining Urasaria. You've definitely gone quite thorough here, though. That's good."
Natasha nodded. At the least, she was aware of her anxiety and took steps against it, planning everything out beforehand and rehearsing conversations in her head. This habit of self-reflection had served her well in lifting weights, and she had hoped everything else in life would've been as simple as a barbell.
"I'll have to go through these myself later, just to make sure that I can give you the right answers for all of these." he said, folding it in to his drawer. "But I'd like to ask you a few questions about yourself, too, if that's alright. Making sure you've thought everything through first before we go any further. What made you think of signing up for Urasaria?"
"Um, I just think it would be good for me since it's something physical, and - um, kinda simple. I-I don't really know what I want to do after highschool, so…"
He nodded, glad it wasn't the same nonsense about superpowers being cool he'd heard before. Urasaria took everyone they could, but he always privately disliked those recruits in particular, often coming out the other end of four years with no new discipline or dead. "That's something we could do for you then, yes. Give you something to do - you'll learn more in four years there than twenty years anywhere else in the world. No desire to go in to the military branch, though?"
"No."
"I don't blame you." he said, having told this to everyone. "Between you and me, I think Urasaria's the better option - but I'm not supposed to say that. Better living here at home in a nice air-conditioned house rather than out in the desert someplace - unless you've got a buddy with an ice Revenant. Still, though. Have you looked in to what you'll be doing? Type of work that entails?"
"Yes." nodded Natasha, trying to ignore the criticism of Urasaria she had read online. If she was going to make a bad decision, she would prefer it be her own. "Um, I looked at all the - the brochure you gave out, yeah. It - it sounds - it makes sense, um. Sorry, just nervous."
"That's alright. A lot of students are nervous the first time they come in here." he said. "I saw you asked about how soon you'd be living out of state, too, and… a few other questions about… you're eighteen, right?"
"Yeah. Um, I live with my dad, but…"
Recklessly he decided to check her. "How's your relationship with him?"
"Um, it's… He doesn't really like me, but - that doesn't really matter." (He paused.) "Um, it's not because I'm - gay, um - he doesn't abuse me or anything, he just - doesn't really like me."
"…sometimes that - right." he nodded. "Sometimes a little time away can do good for that. I noticed that... well." His head shook. "I saw here you were asking about - what the people are like there. I can tell you I go down there once a year and they've always been good, fine students - but most of them started just like you, too." He paused, trying not to speak left-handedly. "…lot of - lesbians there, too. Lot of them. Don't ever have to worry about - if you're - gay, don't have to worry about anyone not accepting you. Last three presidents have been gay. One of them even met her wife at Urasaria."
Natasha nodded. She was a bit of a fan of Swarm, and admittedly had fantasized about becoming the center of the school - some muscle-bound confident woman, with a Revenant that could match Worldwide's strength. One of the reasons she'd taken up lifting weights in the first place is, for whatever reason, she always held that Amazonian ideal in her head, even when how she actually acted around women was just as full of stuttering as she was now.
There were a few other lesbians she knew at her school, and she'd already ruined her chances with two of them, enough that they all now stayed away from her. It always seemed like she couldn't ever help being aside from the crowd - whether it was her stupidity or orcish appearance, there just always was -that- Natasha. So she had no future in this state - probably her situation at Urasaria would be a little better.
"But as for the rest of your questions, that's something I want to make sure you can get all the information you need." he said, pulling a form out of his drawer. "Would you be able to fill this out? Just some information so I can contact you if I have any questions myself."
"Okay." She filled it out and handed it back to him.
"Good. Let's try to schedule something a bit more thorough - maybe during one of your classes. Got any in particular you dislike?"
"Um, World History."
"I'll see what I can do." he said. "But there's something else I wanted to mention to you, too. I don't want to rush you, but there is…" He sighed. "…well. There's a Revenant that - a facility nearby got recently. It's a very good one, but they priced it a little too high. Do you know how that works?"
"To buy it?" said Natasha. "Because - um, I don't have that much money. I just have my - my dad saved up money for me to go to college, but…"
"You don't have to worry about that if you decide to sign up. Normally, it would be $10,000 for this one - now, don't ask me, I mean - it's a good, very good Revenant - but it always seems to me they price those damn things too high. What's the use of charging someone who wants to help serve their country? Makes about as much sense as if they started charging people to vote for president. But about the Revenant - it's going to end up expiring within two weeks. If you are going to sign up, it's better to have the best one you can, right?" (She nodded.) "If you do, I can pull some strings and make them give it to you for free. No one else is coming by to claim it. I'll even have them put it on reserve for you just in case."
"That - that sounds good, yeah." nodded Natasha. "Um, maybe. I just need some more time to think about this and yeah."
"Of course." he nodded. "Still. Shouldn't keep you too long. You can go now - thanks for stopping by, and I'll see you tomorrow. Think about if you've got any more questions, too, Natasha."
She left, and the other woman came in after.
"She was asking about Urasaria." he nodded to her. "Was thinking about signing up."
"Do you think she will?"
He shrugged, checking her grades on his computer. "A girl like that, I doubt she'll ever achieve anything otherwise."