The Tale of 5 Heroes

Prologue

I went into the girl's bathroom and was surprised by a ticking sound coming from the corner. I stopped dead when I saw a bomb sitting in the corner. I thought: It's probably just a prank... wait it might actually be real! I examined it, feeling the vibrations and metal innerworks. The bomb was real. What's worse, it couldn't be shut down. I panicked. There was only a minute left shown on the timer. I ran to see if there was a fire alarm, but they hadn't tested them, so they were out of order. I cursed as I remembered fire drills were no longer practiced, since disasters very rarely happened anymore. They just used the PA system if something happened. The office was locked. I ran back to the gym, the Spring Fling still in motion. I ran in panting, shouting, "Bomb! Bomb! There's a bomb in the girls bathroom, we gotta get outta here!" The voices of the crowd drowned out mine. I found my friends Aidan and Daphne lingering at the refreshment tables. "Guys, you have to listen, there's a bomb!" I grabbed their wrists and dragged them outside.

"Hurry! It's going to detonate!" I let go of my friends wrists and they ran after me, Daphne grabbing a cookie at the last second. We ran toward the nearby neighborhoods.

"Ok, so there's a bomb in the girls' bathroom and it can't be shut down. It will explode in a few seconds there's not enough time to save everyone else, so run!" Daphne shoved the cookie into her mouth and gave me a look she called "confuzzled" and then it changed to extreme alarm. Aidan looked at me as if I had just told them the president died scuba diving. Suddenly, there came a loud explosion. I pulled Daphne and Aidan behind some bushes. We covered our heads. Fire went up, and waves of heat seared the air. Debris went flying all around us. If it weren't for the cover of the bushes, we would have gotten seriously hurt.

"No!" Daphne cried, tears streaming down her face and cookie crumbs falling out of her mouth as she remembered all of her friends that were still in there. After a while, it got very silent.

"Oh......" I felt sick, "you guys ok?"

"Yeah..." Aidan wearily crawled out from behind the bushes.

Daphne just stared with her eyes wide at the disaster. Her legs wobbled and she sank to the ground sobbing. "Oh, n-no! It-it's horrible!"

Aidan fumbled out his phone and dialed 911. "There's been a bomb explosion at Advanced Technology Academy."

A few minutes later, police cars drove in. The ATF, the NIJ, Homeland Security, the FBI, reporters, and a bunch of other people interviewed us. I told them what I knew. We gave our names and said we were orphans the academy had adopted. I heard some officials discussing, the one who planted the bomb may be a student from the Academy. Then I remembered a boy, he was being bullied in the hallway. I was just rounded the corner as he yelled, "You're all gonna die!" and he ran away. The bullies just laughed and let him go. This was a couple months ago and I remembered seeing a faint bump on his head whenever I walked past him in the hallways. He was always glaring at the ground. What was his name...Ricardo? I suggested his name to the officials. I cursed myself. How could I have been so dumb? I should have done something back then. Then all of this would never happen. Officers were yelling...sirens wailing...tears blurred my sight...