Episode 2: Button Poppers

The following week, Miss Maria Vargas strode down the corridor towards class 202 as if last week had been a fluke. People didn’t lose their clothes in the middle of class on the regular, she’d just been so fully absorbed in her lesson plan…! Such things only happened repeatedly in cheap television, not in a supplementary skills course. Besides, she’d taken the hint and listened Miss Calloway’s warning: No zippers this time. Today she wore a longer woolen skirt, light charcoal, with a column of black buttons that held the garment tight as they ran down from the waistband through a row of buttonholes. Her sweater was cream, fastened with old-fashioned clip-buttons. To match her outerwear, she’d elected to wear unexciting off-white undies underneath. Not that anybody would get the opportunity to check!

Room 202’s door was already open, and she heard voices coming from inside — Mr. Nelson’s, foremost. Maria slowed her step just short of the threshold to listen in for a moment before entering.

“…so if anyone sends you anything claiming to be footage of Miss Vargas, you don’t forward it, you delete it straight away. These mean-spirited deepfakes are getting easier and easier to make, what with AI and all that. But such slander won’t be tolerated! Am I understood?” There was a chorus of almost-convincing murmurs and yes-sirs from the class.

Maria stepped inside. “And furthermore- ah, Miss Vargas, I was just talking to your class about certain… fabricated materials circulating,” Nelson turned towards her with his walrus smile. “Generated imagery, AI nonsense. I’ve had a word with them, and they seem to understand.”

We both known it’s not true, but nice of him to lie for me, Maria thought. She nodded. “Right, yes, AI images. Indeed. Thank you Principal Nelson.”

Nelson departed, and Maria went about the business of education. She placed her purse on the desk, offered the class a polite, neutral nod, and then picked up a chalk to continue where they had left off. “Good afternoon everybody. Today we will be tackling conjugations…”