School (2 of 8)

The Skoot Kids go to School

"School! What's that?" cried Tommy Typhoon.

Harry Hexagon and Sonia Sfera had been talking about the Skoot Kids
having to go to school. They felt that the kids must go if they were to
make the most of living like normal children.

"You have to go to school, because all children do. You will learn a
lot of new things and meet some real children, and maybe make some new
friends," explained Harry.

The Skoot Kids thought that the idea sounded good and began asking
where the school was, when they had to go, and what the other children
would be like.

"How far away is the school, Harry?" asked Lucy Liberty.

"Do we have to go every day?" asked Sally Skipper, hoping they wouldn't
have to go every day.

"Are there other children like us?" Alice Zip added, being a bit
nervous about meeting other children different from them.

Harry answered all their questions, and soon they were all looking
forward to going to school when the new year started in just a few days
time.

Sonia stayed away from the kids, not wanting to let them know that she
was becoming very ill. She couldn't hide her coughing from them, but
she was leaking everywhere, and it was becoming harder and harder to
get herself going each day. Because she was an old model, there were
not the parts available to fix her, or even any donors.

She and Harry had heard about St. Michael's school which was in the
centre of town. Not only was it their closest school, but it had a
reputation for welcoming children from all over the world, and those
with other problems. They had also found out that the school had been
given a grant to build a new classroom for an experimental way of
teaching, where children of different ages were to be taught
together.

"Scooters!" exclaimed the lady from the Education Office, "do you think
we are going to let you have this grant to teach a group of
scooters?"

Mr. Laird, the Headteacher of St. Michael's then began a long
explanation of why it would be a good idea to include the Skoot
Kids. He told the meeting that they had already met some of the
school's pupils and had actually been asked by some of them if the
Scooteria Kids could be at school with them.

Harry had also been at this meeting, appealing for the Skoot Kids
to be allowed into the school. He was told they would have to wait a
few days until the decision was made.

"Yes! Yes!" shouted Harry, jumping about, after opening the letter,
"they're going to let you start at St. Michael's school in their new
special classroom!"

The Skoot Kids also began jumping around and were cheering at the
tops of their voices.

Emma T4 thought about Sonia and went into the garage to see her.

"Sonia, where are you?"

She found Sonia in the darkest corner of the garage, shivering and
coughing.

"Emma, they won't be able to fix me now, so I'll probably be gone soon.
I hope all the cheering was because they've let you into St.
Michael's."

"Yes, they have," Emma replied, holding back the tears.

"Promise me you'll be good at school and look after your sisters and
the others. Don't forget to enjoy yourselves though, everyone will want
to play with the Skoot Kids!"

"I promise, Sonia," said Emma, struggling to get her words out.

"You go back and play with the others and send Harry out to see me,
please."

Those were the last words Emma heard from Sonia. She was soon gone.
Emma's sisters were Lucy, Alice and Rebecca Runner. They had arrived
from Italy with the rest of the Skoot Kids gang, Tommy, PX Peter,
Emily T2, and Sally, and went to stay with Harry and Sonia.

Although they had only been in their new town for a couple of weeks,
the Skoot Kids were excited as they left for St. Michael's on the
first day of term, because they had already met some children from the
school who lived in their road.

On their way they heard a familiar shout. It was Daisy, walking with
Kirsty and Kelly.

"Hop on!" said Lucy.

By the time they reached school, they had also picked up Sophie,
Georgia, Crystal and others who they didn't even know yet. The
Skoot Kids arrived at school carrying two friends each!

They soon settled in on their first day. After all, it was different
for the other children as well, because they had never been in a class
with all ages before.

At break-time the Skoot Kids just stood and stared with envy at the
other children playing football - it looked such fun! But without legs
it would be very difficult to play!

"I've got an idea," said Emma, and she went over to speak to Mr. Avery,
the sports teacher.

Mr. Avery blew his whistle and cleared the playground.

"Boys and girls, who wants to volunteer for SkootBall?" he
called.

"What's that?" replied someone.

"It's an idea of Emma T4's, one of the Skoot Kids."

"I'll try!" shouted Charlotte, one of the best at sport in the whole
school.

"Jump on! Charlotte," said Emma, "and try to kick the ball as we go
round the playground! It'll be just like football, but with you riding
around on me as you play!"

Before long, everyone wanted to play, and were pleading with Mr. Avery
to let them. But there were only 8 Skoot Kids, so Mr. Avery said
that it would have to be 4-a-side with lots of substitutes!

The Skoot Kids were now even more popular at school as all the
children wanted to play this new game, even those who hadn't before
been keen on sport.

Back in class, the teachers found that the Skoot Kids were very
helpful. Not only did they want to learn, they were also helping teach
the other children Italian, the Skoot Kids natural language. The
boys in the class wanted to learn how the scooters worked, and used the
science lessons to find out. The Skoot Kids didn't like being
tickled when their engines were being played with, especially Alice and
Rebecca, the two youngest.

By half-term, the Skoot Kids had been accepted by everybody at
school and felt really at home there. One day, they arrived home from
school to find Harry was not there - he had left for Italy.