Hidden- Danny Rand (ON HOLD FOR NOW)

Chapter Eleven

This chapter is kinda based off of a chapter from Heartbeat by @KoalaCupcake11 plz go check it out! It was my main inspiration for writing this book, and it's much better written than this!

"I'm looking for finalists for the city-wide athletic achievement contest." states our new gym sub, Mr. Jager. "I want to see everything you've got in this obstacle course. Push yourselves to the limit. Don't give me less than 110%" "Yeah, that's not creepy at all." I mutter sarcastically to Danny, who snickers at my side. Mr. Jager catches the comment and glares daggers at me. "Ok Ms. Nishida, you're up first." I step up to the start line and stretch my arms. When he blows his whistle I take off, running through the obstacle course as fast as I can. I trip up slightly on the tires, but I recover quickly and finish in about 45 seconds, more or less. I look up at the teacher, who I expect to be quite happy or awestruck. In fact, he's staring at me with a sort of hunger that I recognized from Norman Osborn when we met in the alley. Walking back over to the bleachers, I sit down and grab my water bottle. Pretty sure that teachers weren't supposed to stare at their pupils like that, but maybe I'm just going crazy.

I watch the rest of the kids run the course, noticing how calm they do it. Luke gets stuck in the tire on his turn, which makes me giggle. Danny looks at me when I do, and I can see a slight smile on his face. But when Peter goes, it surprises me so much- he's probably one of the most athletic people I've ever known, yet he can't even make it up the rock wall. I can almost immediately tell he's faking, but Mr. Jager doesn't take the hint. He just shakes his head and writes something on his clipboard. When Peter comes back to his seat, he announces who won. "Rand, Osborn, Thompson, Nishida. Come back here tomorrow for the final cut." I pump my fist in the air, celebrating a silent victory. Peter and Harry high five, and Danny shoots me a thumbs up, which I happily return. Ava starts complaining about not getting in, but I just slap her on the back. "I'll bring you back my trophy." We smile at each other greedily, then break out in bursts of laughter. "I'm so coming tomorrow, just to beat you." she says snidely. I raise an eyebrow at her. "Oh, really? Challenge accepted, miss." I bow low, my short hair almost brushing the ground. Then as I stand up, I grin at her. "Can't wait to leave your ass in the dust." The boys meet up with us quick, and we go out for pizza that night. I return home full, content, and ready to kick Ava's butt the next morning. 

When the finalists arrive at school the next day, we stroll right up to the doors and walk through. It's very creepy though, since there are no lights on in the whole school. I can see a faint light coming from Principal Coulson's office, but I just assume that he's catching up on paperwork. Heading through the doors of the gym, the lights turn on full power, and we're all momentarily blinded. When the spots clear from our eyes, we take down our hands and see the gym looks exactly as it did yesterday. Except for one crucial detail- no Mr. Jager. "Where is he?" I ask to no one in particular. My foot starts unconsciously tapping, as if impatient. "He told us 11:30!"  I whip out my phone to check the time, but it's dead. That's weird, I think. It was fully charged this morning. I suddenly sense a huge gate of electricity closing in front of the school, and the doors behind us slam shut. The loud noise startles us, and we all turn around. Flash starts banging on the door uselessly, before Danny pipes up. "He's just being cautious. To leave now would be disrespect at a high level." But even he seemed uncertain. "Welcome, finalists." Mr. Jager's booming voice echoes through the gym, surprising us all. I look around for him, but can't find him anywhere. Suddenly, a figure does a backflip down from the rafters on the ceiling and lands in a crouching position. I almost call out to him when I realize that man isn't Mr. Jager. Last I checked, he didn't have a cape or metal arm warmers. When he stands up and looks at us, I yelp a bit and step back- his face was like a skeleton, only metallic.

The man bows and introduces himself. "I am Taskmaster." Harry and Flash back up slowly towards the door. "Who are you?" Harry shouts. "Where's Mr. Jager?" I can tell that the face smiled faintly. "He's not here today. I'm gonna be your teacher." None of us relax, me and Danny were both in fighting positions. "And as your teacher, I'll make it easy to ace this class- just answer one question." Flash seems to relax a bit, as if he thinks it's gonna be easy. Rookie mistake, meathead. "Which one of you is Spider-Man?" At those words everyone freezes and looks at him in confusion. "What?!" I ask him. He nods solemnly. "Answer my question and you can go. You were all invited here because you have the same potential as Spider-Man, and the same build." I look down at myself. I can feel all the others looking at me, too. "I'm a girl, dumbass!" I yell at Taskmaster. He chuckles slightly, clearly hinting at my flat chest. "Like I said, same build." Ohoho, so he wants to die. Now that my emotions are more focused, I can feel a malfunction in the door security. If I had more time, I could maybe unlock it... "I've met him before," I say, trying to stall. Danny's head whips towards me and Taskmaster smiles cruelly. "Do you know who he is?" I shrug. "Yeah, I guess." He starts to walk towards me, and I use that moment to shoot the lights out and unlock the doors. I turn around and push the boys through them, who start running as fast as they can. Danny stays back and makes sure that none of us get left behind.

Running around a corner, I sense energy on the floor so I jump over it, but Harry and Flash trip the laser and a wall starts to fall in front of us. Danny pushes us under it, staying back to fight Taskmaster. I think he's gone absolutely crazy, but I manage to catch the wall with my powers. I can see under it that Danny is fighting Taskmaster alone, yet he isn't doing very well. I turn around to look for Harry and Flash, except they were smart and got the hell out of Dodge. Looking back at the fight, I see Danny's hand start to glow, and I gasp. He looks at me when I do, and in that split second, Taskmaster throws a hard punch that knocks him out cold. When he makes sure that Danny's out, he starts to look my way, but I've already let the wall shut and am running towards the doors. Dammit Zu! I chide myself. If you hadn't been there, he wouldn't be on the ground! You gotta go back and help him! Groaning slightly, I turn around and start to run back. But there's another way to that hall, so I go that way instead of the dead end. At the end of the hall, I run right into Taskmaster, who pushes me away as if I'm not worth it. "You're definitely not him." Growling, I reach for a knife and swing it at him, cutting off part of his cape and scratching his face. He looks shocked, then smiles and kicks at me. I easily block it, and throw punch after punch at him, only to have them blocked.

Finally, I tap into my power, and the lights go out to his surprise. Taking the opportunity, I use that moment of confusion to shock him from behind and shoot him forward into the lockers. I hear Harry calling for me, and I turn to call back, but Taskmaster punches me in the face, making me collapse on the floor. The knife flies out of my hand and I stay on the floor holding my jaw, waiting for him to move on. After looking at me for a minute or two, he finally does, running towards Harry's voice. Groaning, I stand up and continue to run back in Danny's direction. When I make it there, he's still out cold, so I kneel next to him and gently tap his cheek. He wakes up slowly, and looks up at me with his emerald green eyes. I smile and resist the strange urge to hug him. Instead, I stand up and reach my hand out to him, and he gladly takes it. When he's standing, we start to run towards the others but stop when he sees the bruise forming on my jaw. "What happened?" he asks, rubbing his fingers over the bruise. My skin starts to tingle wherever he touches, but that might just be the pain. "Oh, nothing," I say, waving away the question. "Tried to take down Taskmaster. It didn't work very well, clearly." He chuckles and looks me in my eyes. I choke back a gasp as he grabs my hand, gentler this time. "Next time, maybe don't do that." My mouth falls open in mock anger. "Ex-cuse me! It was only cuz Harry distracted me, and I had almost beaten him too." A pout comes over my features, and he laughs loudly. We lock eyes again, and I feel something inside of me... but some screams from the front of the school make us stop daydreaming and focus again. He lets go of my hand and runs ahead, which makes me kinda sad. I liked when he held my hand.