Just as I walked out, knowing that Michael would get what he needed done, I ran into Jamie.
"Was that you?" She asked directly, and I couldn't help but cock an eyebrow at her question. Obviously. Who else would curtain the school in flame? "Holy shit..." She muttered to herself, "And that's the director that you're... telekinetically hovering?"
I looked beside me, where Justin cried silently with empty eyes in the air. "Yes," I held a soft smile that had nothing to do with Justin. "I wouldn't underestimate Michael, if I were you."
"Duly noted," Jamie said, "So what is the plan?"
"We need to secure the school, now." I said as I started walking down the stairs. This wasn't the time to second guess the plan that Michael and I had haphazardly put together. "Get teachers out now."
Jamie nodded, "I'll start on the East wing, collect fighters on the way."
"All teachers and admin staff need to be isolated, not killed." I said, not wanting to had a massacre on my hands. "Obviously don't die a pacifist but all teachers are being told to leave."
Jamie rolled her eyes but nodded and ran off. I let her go, running first towards my dorm. I needed to find Christine and Margie, and that's where we had agreed to meet. I did my best to wade through the crowd, but seeing a group of kids that were at most 14 years old I couldn't move on.
"Hey!" I called for their attention. "You need to get into your dorms, now."
"What is happening?" A panicked boy asked, terror obvious in his features.
"We're kicking the teachers out of the school," I said, knowing that they deserved an explanation. I placed Justin on the floor right by my feet, if he tired to move I would notice it. "There's a whole lot of us that're going to stop the teachers from hurting you but-"
A high pitched scream from a little kid, no older than 8, called my attention away from the kids. I looked over to see Mr. Walton holding a gun and wearing a vest that I supposed he thought would protect him.
"KIDS!" I yelled, "GET TO YOUR DORMS NOW!"
The timber in my voice seemed to shock them into submission while I ran towards Mr. Walton. He hadn't had a target in sight until he saw me. A disturbed smile graced his features and he pointed the gun at me. I had no idea how guns worked but when I heard a small click and his finger rested on the obvious trigger I knew I wasn't in a good position. Dragon or not I wasn't immune to bullets.
"Put your hands up!" He yelled and I complied, not wanting to be shot. "I've been waiting for this," He spoke harshly, the rune I had placed on him was still slightly effective. I could tell that it hurt to talk at all, and yet he continued. His eyes were crazed, making him look manic. "You kids are all the same. Who's the strong one now?"
"Probably me," I said, hoping that my nervous banter would give people time to get away.
"Hah! I'm the one with the gun," He exclaimed, waving the gun around and making me flinch. He grinned when he noticed that, glad that he was making me afraid. "Not so cocky when I've got a weapon."
Out of the corner of my eye I noticed that all of the children that had once been in the halls were in the dorms. I doubted they were all from these dorms but it seemed that they didn't care which dorm they went to. I grinned, checking to ensure that Director was still by my feet. I closed my eyes for just a minute to pull up an invisible barrier around us. His bullets weren't going to shoot a kid on accident, or on purpose.
"Don't close your eyes!" He yelled as if enraged that I dared to close them.
I opened my eyes on his command, not surprised when he immediately looked terrified. My pupils always grew when I used any power related to the harold abilities I had and it was scary to everyone who knew what a harold was. I had a feeling he did.
"N-now, what are you doing?" He stuttered. He started to back away until he ran into the back of my force-field around us. I didn't know why he hadn't shot me yet, but I wasn't going to question good luck too much. "D-don't get cl-closer!" He yelled. His shaking hands still held the gun pointed at me.
The shot had been coming, I knew it, and I just barely dodged to the left of it. He was only about 7 feet away from me and from the look in his eyes I shouldn't have been able to get out of the way.
"Fuck," I cursed. I had dodged and saved my chest from the bullet but it had still hit my left bicep. It hurt. The blood splatter alone was enough to make me panic but I couldn't do that. I should be fine but I was going to bleed out at this rate. I put my right hand over the wound while Mr. Walton watched in terror. At first my heat did nothing to my naturally flame retardant skin but eventually it seemed to realize what I was trying to do and the wound was cauterized enough that I didn't have to worry about bleeding out just yet.
Mr. Walton let 'out a shriek of terror and I grinned, "Do you get it now?" I asked, walking closer to him. Thankfully he was frozen in fear, allowing me to get close enough to grab his gun away from him without him shooting me again. "You had a weapon, but I am a weapon. I told you not to threaten the students of this school."
I pointed to Director Justin, who was still laying on the floor behind me. "You see that? That wasn't even me, every single one of the kids here is stronger than you could possibly imagine. If you humans were so afraid of us you should have just killed us when you could because now we are pissed."
He was sobbing by the time I finished. I dropped the force-field, the effort from that coupled with the effort I'd put into cauterizing the bullet wound was too much. If I wasn't careful I'd exhaust myself before we were safe.
"Alenia!" Margie yelled from down the hall, Christine beside her. Based on where they were it was obvious that they had been in the dorm waiting for me. They ran down the hall quickly, by my side in moments.
"I see you've been bullying the school staff," Christine said. Mr. Walton looked up at her as if to say yes! but her immediate glare informed him that she was being sarcastic. I rolled my eyes.
"Change in plans, we're kicking the teachers out of the school and waiting for reinforcements." I said quickly, ignoring the obvious looks of concern on their faces when they noticed all of the blood on my arm. "Christine, you're working with Michael protecting the kids, Jamie has already started clearing out the teachers. Margie, you're with me. We're starting here and working down to get the teachers out of the school."
Christine nodded, "Where is Mike?"
"He's on the roof," I ignored their obvious eye rolls. I didn't have time to defend our mutual love of the roof. Mr. Walton got up then, thinking I was too distracted to notice, and began to try running away. "I wouldn't do that, if I were you."
I made the quick chase after him and grabbed the back of his shirt and whipped him around to see me. After that I immediately punched his nose and broke it. His eyes shut and his head lulled, apparently I had hit him harder than I meant to. I drug him over to where Christine and Margie were watching. Christine seemed almost amused but Margie looked panicked.
"Oh god," She said, nervous. I felt for her but didn't know what to say, this is where we were now.
"Anyway, he's on the roof but he has a lot to do. We need more people focusing on the kids now, can you start with that?" Christine made it clear that that was the obvious course of action and turned away, heading upstairs. We weren't quite on the top floor and I had a feeling that she was going to work top down to calm children and get them into their dorms.
"Okay, Margie," I said, calling her attention from Director Justin. "I'm sorry, I know this is scary. I didn't mean to pull you in."
Margie shook her head, "No, I'm fine, I'm just not brave like you but I want to be here. What did you do to the director?"
"No idea, it was Michael," I said. I grabbed the gun that I'd tossed on the floor and slipped it into the waistband of my jeans, not wanting the wrong person to find it. "We need to get going, I have no idea how many teachers have guns." Margie took a deep breath and nodded, clearly terrified. "Marge, thank you."
Margie laughed, walking with me as I carried Mr. Walton over my shoulder and continued to levitate Justin beside me. "Believe it or not, I actually want to break free from this place too. I'm scared but I'm also excited. I have been since I saw your flame, and I think so has everyone else. This is terrifying, but I'd rather be terrified and free than complainant and contained."