"Alright class, settle down and take your seats."
Joan slowly lifted a bleary gaze and took in the sight of Mrs. Omen standing at the front of the biology class.
"Where's Mr. Selter?" David asked without even bothering to raise his hand.
"Mr. Selter has decided to take a leave of absence for personal reasons," Mrs. Omen explained.
"Why?" Tanya inquired.
"Well, that's none of your business," Mrs. Omen said.
Aaron turned around in his seat in the front row and looked at Joan. Joan quickly looked away and stared down at the surface of her desk. She could feel he cheeks get hot.
"I'm going to fill in for today until a more appropriate replacement can be found." The older woman flipped open a file folder and shuffled through what appeared to be Mr. Selter's lesson plans for the semester.
"So Mr. Selter's going to be gone a long time, huh?" said David.
"We're not sure how much time he needs off. But that's none of your concern." Mrs. Omen seemed to find what she was looking for and pulled the day's lesson plan out of the folder.
"I hope Ms. Troy takes over as our new biology teacher," David whispered to Tanya and Joan.
"Ms. Troy teaches drama and art, dummy. Why would she teach biology?" Tanya scoffed.
"Dunno, it doesn't seem that hard to me," David shrugged. "Isn't most teaching just reading out of the text book."
"There's a little more to it than that," Mrs. Omen said as she glared at adolescent boy sitting at the back of the class.
"Sorry, Mrs. Omen," David grinned at her apologetically. "You have very good hearing."
Mrs. Omen gave him a disapproving look before looking down at the paper in her hands.
"It's my understanding that you've been learning about viruses?"
"Yeah, like rabies," Tanya volunteered.
"Please raise you hand if you're going to answer," Mrs. Omen chastised. "Well, today, we're going to learn about phages. Can anyone tell me what phages are?"
Aaron quickly raised his hand.
"Yes," Mrs. Omen called on him.
"Bacteriophages are viruses that infect and destroy bad bacteria," Aaron replied.
"That's exactly right," Mrs. Omen approvingly replied. "If you look back at medical history, phages have been used for almost a hundred years to kill all sorts of bacteria. Very bad bacteria. Bacteria which can kill humans or make them very sick. Bacteria like dysentery and salmonella. And strains of bacteria that can cause sepsis," she listed off.
A girl near the front raised her hand. "But doctors don't use viruses nowadays, do they? I mean, now we have antibiotics."
"I can see someone didn't do their homework," Mrs. Omen shook her head and clucked her tongue. "Now more and more bacteria and becoming resistant to antibiotics. So it's becoming extremely difficult to cure certain bacterial infections. So phages play an important role in dealing with super bugs."
As the class continued, Joan's mind drifted elsewhere. She felt a fluttering in her chest as she looked at the teacher's desk situated behind where Mrs. Omen stood. She thought about what took place on that desk the day before. She felt a slight tingling between her legs as she remembered Mr. Selter's skillful mouth on her virginal womanhood.
But then as her gaze shifted over to the back of Aaron's head, she got a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach as she remembered her classmate walking in on her and her teacher. And the argument that ensued. She recalled how angry Aaron was and how ashamed Mr. Selter had been. And it had all been her fault.
But what really troubled Joan was the dream she had just experienced. That disturbing nightmare where she had the body of a raven. And she had been just about to killed a man.
And then, when she woke up, she had not been at home in her bed. She had found herself outdoors standing in front of the rectory. Apparently she had sleep walked. Something she had never done before. What on earth is going on with me, Joan wondered to herself.
"So as we can see, viruses have a bad reputation. Because some viruses do harm human beings," Mrs. Omen began to summarize. "But just remember, not all viruses are the same. These pathogens, which are technically non-living, can protect us." She looked around the classroom at her young pupils. "Sometimes another organic living organism is actually more harmful to the health of humanity. And we can use these non-living entities to kill them off, which benefits us."
