Steveguns Beat Rayguns

“Rayguns, have you heard of those?” The teacher asked, looking around at the blank faces. “Rayguns are what old people called laser weapons, mostly because an American president called Ronald Raegan wanted to have loads of them in space. Sadly, that never happened and we got a bunch of half-baked star wars films instead.”

            “Rogue one was really good sir,” said a pimply boy who raised his hand after talking.

            “True,”Steven Gunn admitted, nodding. “But only because they had the nerve to kill everyone. Try doing that with a three-film deal and more inevitably after.

            What was I saying?” He clicked his fingers. “Ah.

            Laser weapons. The stuff of science fiction, right?” He looked around the room again. Muted mumbling and nods replied. “WRONG!” His bark made one boy fall of his seat. The girl next to him accidently broke up with her boyfriend due to a twitch of the finger and autocorrect. She would forever be thankful for the incident, eventually.

            “First world nations have been chasing laser weaponry since the idea originated in the nineteen-forties. The big problems were cooling a high temperature laser and battery capacity.

            Thanks to the smart phone half of you are using to ignore me.” Mr Gunn pinged an elastic band at a boy who was watching animated porn. “Research into battery capacity was supercharged by huge businesses with far better funding than government laser weaponry departments.”

            No one was listening. Mr Gunn pulled his first prototype from the drawer in his desk, aimed at the nearest phone and fired. The blast cut right through the phone and hit the porn enthusiast’s hand. The hand did several things at once.

            Some of it vapourised.

            Some of it turned to ash instantaneously.

            Due to the water content of the boy’s hand and the temperature of the laser, the rest exploded.

            Superheated remains covered the students around the boy before he had collapsed to the ground.

            “Let me be very clear nose pickers and pencil lickers. This is a school for assassins. I am your teacher. I am a psychopath. Ignore me and I will kill you. DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION?”

            Mumbled agreement was drowned out by the sounds of students in the splash zone screaming.

            “You signed the non-disclosure agreement. We take that very seriously here. Go to the nurse and some of you might survive. Go. Now. The rest of you pay attention.”

            “That was amazing sir,” said one girl leaning forward in her seat at the back of the class.

            “Thank you.”

            “You’re a maniac sir,” she said. Her black lipstick spread to reveal a murderous grin.

            “My mother used to say that,” said Steven.

            “She changed her mind sir?”

            “No. She died.”

            “That must have been hard for you,” said a boy at the end of the front row with blood on his blazer.

            “Yes. She put up a hell of a fight.”

Steven Gunn held up his weapon.

            “This is the most advanced weapon on the planet. It uses technology stolen from three different government research projects from around the world. This is the Stevegun.”

            “The Stevegun?” Asked a girl with pigtails, sounding entirely unimpressed.

            “Yes. The Stevegun. Not the Raygun. My name is not Ray. I invented this. I get to name it. It’s the Stevegun.”

            “Why not the Steveray? Then it sounds like stingray and its-”

            “I have already named and branded it. Dammit that’s better though. Where were you when I made the stickers?” Steven thumped the desk. “Don’t distract me. I have ADHD and a laser weapon. You’ve seen the results.”

            Everyone looked at what was left of the pornography addict in the front row.

            “Magic teachers are going to tell you that’s there’s nothing better for assassination than magic because it can kill from miles away without leaving fingerprints and DNA and all that bullshit. Wrong.

            This weapon.” He aimed around the class. The children slammed their faces into their desks to be out of shot. “Will change everything. The range of a laser is enormous. There is no need to account for wind or recoil.”

            “What about the curvature of the earth sir?” Asked the girl with pigtails and a pink skull tattoo below her eye.

            “What about it?” Steven asked, frustrated.

            “It would limit the range of the weapon, whereas magic can operate at any distance with the right ingredients.”

            “Ingredients?” The teacher scoffed. “Get out of my class if you’re going to talk about ingredients. I’m not here to talk about baking cakes.” He put the gun down on his desk. All the students sighed with relief. He wiped smears off the lenses of his glasses and picked up the gun again.

            “Now I want cake, fucking hell.” He reached into his drawer and ran fingers lovingly over shuriken and throwing knives. Picking a shuriken that was shaped like the petals of a flower he threw it absent minded at the poster of a soldier on the far wall. The already mutilated head of the paper soldier received another deadly papercut but held firm to his paper and ink rifle.

            “Or doughnuts. With strawberry jam. They put blackcurrant jam in some of them now and it’s not the same, you know?” He scratched his brown hair with the cold metal of the gun.

            “Anyway. Curvature or no curvature, a Stevegun kicks ass and I’m going to teach you how to use them over the next few weeks. Now that you’ve put your phones away, I can get to the basics. Come to the desk so that I can demonstrate how to replace the battery.

            Skirting fluids that were still steaming and releasing a vomitus stench, the kids eagerly rushed to the front of the class.

            “Open a window,” he pointed at a boy whose acne scars were a perfect map of the constellations above Barcelona. “This place stinks of deep-fried moron.

            The basic advantages of Steveguns are simple. They can be charged using renewable sources of energy, so they’re good for the environment. I’m all for killing people but we’ve only got one planet, right?

            Two, in daylight the beam of a Stevegun is virtually invisible until the target explodes.

            Four, range. If you can see it, you can hit it. If it’s a misty day and it’s out there, you can hit it anyway. Just don’t use it in a multistorey car park unless you’re certain where you parked. That’s just embarrassing.”

            “What was number three sir?” Asked the constellation boy.

            “Excuse me?” Steven looked at the teen, tugging at his jeans with his free hand.

            “You jumped from two to four in your list.”

            “Did I?” Steven aimed the gun at the boy’s forehead and looked around the class.

            “No sir, I just remembered what you said for number three.”

            “Tell me then. I’ve forgotten myself.”

            “Steveguns are awesome,” said the boy in an ‘I’ve wet myself’ tone.

            “Correct. Well done. Go to the toilet or home, whatever. Get out.” The boy ran from the room. “Who wants to see the aurora Australis?”

            Hands rose timidly.

            He smiled.

            They were afraid of him.

            Steven liked that.

            “Look outside class.” He shot the light switch. The wiring caught fire, but he ignored it. That’s what the sprinklers were for.

            Outside the window were dancing lights of unequalled natural beauty.

            “It happens because of light from the sun hitting the magnetosphere. I think.” He aimed his gun out of the window and fired into the sky. The red beam was visible for miles up. “Pew, pew.

            Next order of business is you paying your one hundred thousand dollars for your own Stevegun.”

            “Can we still divide it between students that were injured?” Asked the girl with the pink skull tattoo.

            “That wasn’t the price for the whole class little girl. That was the price per person. I have crippling debts to pay off. Stealing from governments does not come cheap. Don’t worry. It’ll be worth it when you’re incinerating your targets from miles away.”

            His students muttered about the exorbitant cost, both physical and fiscal of his class. He wasn’t listening.

            “Pew pew.” Red lines shot across the sky, drilling holes in the moon and the knights that marched across it.