Liability

Chapter 5 - Dmitri

The nondescript envelope is waiting on the desk in his office when Dmitri gets home that afternoon. He should feel pumped up and energetic, ready to take over the world. Instead he feels worn out and ready to fall into bed, but he can't because he has over fifty tests to correct.

And now this.

Dropping his bag on the floor next to his leg, he picks up the envelope and opens it. Inside there is the customary picture and mission details. The man looks vaguely familiar, probably from one of the functions he had to attend, but otherwise doesn't strike Dmitri as someone who really should be on his hit list. Then again, pictures often lie. And if the man's sins are just half as bad as the preliminary report says, he won't be missed in the slightest. And at least this time he has a full week to finish the job, which will come pretty handy with the amount of work he has given himself.

"And the kids think their lives are hard," he scoffs to himself.

He puts the picture and sheet of paper back into the envelope. He briefly wonders where Carmen or his grandmother is, but has learned not to stick his nose into businesses it had no reason to be in. It is really better for everyone involved. When they're ready, someone will come blasting his door open anyway, so maybe he shouldn't look the gift horse in the mouth and use the next however long to be productive and start on the tests.

They can't be that bad, right?

Wrong.

Maybe he shouldn't have started with his own class, but he wanted to prove himself that his kids aren't as bad as they tried their worst to show, but after the fifth test that has barely anything more than illegible gibberish and threats against his life, Dmitri is ready to flip the desk and then hunt down each and every little cretin and wring their necks. Unfortunately, he can't do that. Which leaves working his way through the travesty his class thought was a funny prank. Well, they will be able to enjoy all the failing marks the next day that's for sure.

His first promising test feels like a drop of much needed water in a desert. He can recall the name Ryley easily. He's the boy Mark Goodman had a fight with. Well, Ryley Johnson obviously has more brains than Mark Goodman has shown in his answers. It's not perfect, but certainly enough for a 'B' and Dmitri almost wants to frame it to remember what being taken seriously looks like. Then his hope plummets deeper and deeper with the tests that follow Ryley's. The cartoonish drawings that decorate the questions instead of words would be funny in any other situation, but this is Dmitri's job. It's something he slaved for six years, and these idiots treat his hard work like it means nothing.

He nearly carves another zero on the paper in front of him, taking vindictive joy from the knowledge that he will get to announce everyone's grades in front of the entire class the next day. And also tell the probably smugly laughing douchepools that everyone with a zero will have to retake the test next week and if they get another zero, they will fail winter term for sure. To think that he originally didn't want to grade the tests. Maybe he will also tell the little dickwads this as well, so just they know what they brought on their own heads.

Grinning viciously, he pulls the last test of the stack before him, ready to draw a giant zero in the right upper corner of it when he realizes that it's actually filled out with actual, elaborate answers. He skims the answers Rhys Martinez gave to his questions, and within a minute, he is enraptured by the intelligent, thought inspiring sentences laid out before him. He cannot find a fault in Martinez's reasoning. His theoretical knowledge is amazing and makes Dmitri engage the boy, whoever he is, in hours upon hours of conversation about composition theory and the social background of the early 19th century America. Hell, the boy even answered the extra credit question. It's really a dream come true, except based on the boy's level of knowledge, he should be in AP English and Composition, instead of rotting his brain in regular English class with the other morons.