Page 20

Malia

I am left standing alone in the hall.

Most students are already in their rooms at this time, and I would usually be too if I hadn’t had my date.

Terra ate dinner with us as planned and she seemed to like me.

So much so that she asked me to hang out some more after dinner, so we went to one of the small indoor patios to get to know each other a little more.

I made sure to stay clear of anything Academy related and instead mostly asked questions about her or talked about interesting findings in the library. While she seemed to enjoy herself, I hate to admit that I found it kind of exhausting. I mean, she’s great, but I’m hung up over Aiden’s words and it’s hard to break a habit you’ve had for years.

By the end of the night, I was mentally exhausted, and I think she might’ve noticed how silent I grew since she told me she had fun but neither of us made the promise to seek the other out soon.

As if that wasn’t enough, now I’m standing in a deserted corridor after my confusing moment with Keahi.

I should go to bed, call it a day, but even planning to do so, my feet somehow lead me to the janitor’s closet instead.

I climb up the vent to be greeted by an explosion of bright colors. The sun is setting, painting the sun in pretty pinks and oranges. I sit in the high grass and lean back. Memories of the times I watched the sunset with my parents in Italy flood my mind, and with that, darkness surrounds me once again, quicker than I can realize.

"Malia! We found you, Malia.

Can you hear me?" It’s the male voice.

"Who are you?" I ask, my voice far away.

"We will get you soon," the voice adds hastily.

"Get me where?" I demand desperately, but the voice is gone.

I can feel its sudden absence like a cut string.

Even though I’d like to wake up, I stay in the darkness, unable to find my way back without Keahi’s voice acting like an anchor.

The sky is deep black by the time I come back to myself, and I blink up in a daze.

Stars surround me, accompanied by the moon.

It is an astonishing sight, but my heart drops.

Curfew! I quickly stand up and climb down the vent, grateful for the short distance between the closet and my room.

I move as quietly as possible, the sound of my soft footsteps only drowned out by the blood rushing in my ears.

I reach my door without being caught, but to my dismay, I find it to be locked.

Shit! I knock softly until I hear noise from inside.

The handle of the door is pushed down but the door still doesn’t budge.

"Malia?" Baia’s sleepy voice speaks from the other side of the door.

"Yes, it’s me.

Why won’t the door open?" As far as I know, we don’t have a key.

"They always lock automatically a few minutes after curfew and stay like that until the morning.

I am sorry, I can’t let you in," my roommate explains in a whisper.

I curse under my breath, briefly closing my eyes.

"Okay then, go back to sleep.

I’m sorry I woke you."

"Where will you go?"

"I’ll figure it out.

Don’t worry," I assure her before walking off.

If I stay in the hall, a teacher on patrol might find me or fellow students will in the morning, so I go back to the janitor’s closet. It’s the only place I know to be open right now.

I barely get any sleep, drifting in and out of strange dreams while I’m half awake all night.

When I finally hear voices in the hall outside the room I am in, it rouses me from my fitful doze, and I take that as my cue to leave.

I sneak into my room without any run-ins and get ready for the day.

"Where were you?" Baia asks before I can leave.

"I spent the night in some janitor’s closet," I answer nonchalantly, knowing I can’t draw any suspicion to the secret vent Keahi discovered.

"I mean, where were you before you came knocking on the door? I was really worried."

"I’m sorry.

I fell asleep in the library," I lie smoothly, and my roomie seems to buy it.

I wish her a great day before heading to the big hall for breakfast.

"Alright group, we are going outside again.

You’ll get to know another part of our surroundings today.

This one is closer to a small town, so make sure to stay out of sight. Each of you gets a different area to search for anything suspicious. That’s your assignment. I won’t give you any more hints though. Follow me now."

Kaz leads us outside and around the building, into another direction than yesterday, and I notice a part of the academy I have never seen before.

It looks similar to everything I know here but has more windows.

Windows that are low enough to see through.

"What’s that?" I ask my trainer when we walk past it.

"That’s where the members of the force live if they don’t decide to get their own place somewhere near." I’ve never even thought about where the students above the age of 18 go, but I guess this makes sense.

If the lack of windows in our part of the building is for safety reasons, it makes sense that the trained adults that know how to defend themselves against any possible intruders don’t have any need for that.

How nice it’ll be to live somewhere where you can come and go how you want. Or even just look outside all the time. Just two and a half years to go.

We walk around the building and stand in front of another part of the forest surrounding us.

I’m assigned to the space closest to the town.

Keahi gets a part in the woods behind me, and the others are scrambled around elsewhere.

Once I’m left alone in my designated area, I try to follow my orders and look for something unusual for about two minutes.

Then, my curiosity gets the best of me.

I walk to the clearing and crouch down behind some bushes, spying on the city.

I am only a few feet from the closest street, and excitement fills my bones as I see a small boy driving his little bicycle.

Stars, it’s been long since I’ve seen an outsider.

A kid that isn’t daily being prepared for war. There is a cat on the other side of the street but other than that, everything is quiet. There’s something so peaceful about the scene.

I wonder what my life would have been like if my parents hadn’t died.

Would I have finished school with my old friends? I still sometimes wonder how they are or how they’ve changed.

Would my only worries have concerned good grades and arguments with my classmates instead of whether I’ll be stuck fighting in a war that has started long before my life? Would I have ever even known about my powers? I’ve been told our powers are inherited so did my parents know? My parents...

I’m still going strong with that whole ‘not thinking about them at all instead of facing my issues’, thing but I do wonder.

Would they still be taking me to my favorite café on Saturday mornings or would I get sick of them from time to time?

I’ve heard students that have lost their parents in their teenage years say that they hadn’t appreciated them enough.

I lose my train of thought when the scene in front of me changes.

A dark van with tinted windows rolls up next to the boy and a tall man gets out of it.

Something is wrong. The man approaches the little boy, who seems oblivious to the intruder, and all my internal alarm bells go off.

I get out of my hiding place and start walking toward the two people, unable to help it.

They are only a couple of hundred feet away.

The man speaks to the boy, who stops riding his bike before the stranger grabs one of his little arms roughly. I break out into a sprint.

"Let go of him!" I yell as the boy cries out.

They both turn, and the man’s face twists into a grimace of annoyance.

Of course. How rude of me to interrupt. I run past the car and stop in front of them, ready to do what exactly, I don’t know.

I’m not allowed to use my powers in front of mundane people, well, I’m strictly speaking not even allowed to be out here, but if worse comes to worst, I can knock him out and he’ll never know what happened.

Before I resort to that, I’ll try to be a little more diplomatic about it though.

"I said, let go!"

"This has nothing to do with you, little girl."

He tightens his grip on the innocent child, and my blood starts boiling, a fierce protectiveness taking hold of me at the sight of his teary eyes.

I turn my attention away from him and glare at the man instead.

Sure, he might be towering over me and must weigh at least four times my weight, but he doesn’t scare me.

I’m a trained fighter, after all.

The consequences I might be facing for my interference, I’m a little more concerned about.

"You will leave now if you know what’s good for you," I warn him.

The man grins.

"Now I’m scared!" he mocks me, his voice wobbly.

While he puts on that show, I start scanning my surroundings for any advantages to use.

Creating my own water would be against the code of secrecy, but there is a small fountain behind him.

I manipulate the water into a whip and yank his free arm behind his shoulder without gracing him with any more words. The man cries out in pain and lets go of the boy, who comes running toward me, hugging my middle and burying his face in my side. Unexpected emotions rush through me, and my mind whirrs harder.

"Where are your parents? Do you know someone who lives close by?" I realize I have no idea how to deal with little children.

The boy cries and doesn’t answer.

I try to calm him down when a sharp pain in my cheek takes my attention away from him.

Son of a- did he just hit me? The tall guy is standing next to me, looking pissed.

He swings his fist at me again, but I dodge. “How on earth did you do that back there?” he grits, quaking with anger now.

I ignore the man and shove the boy out of the way.

"Run home!"

He obeys, his short legs only slowly carrying him away, and the stranger turns to go after him.

I pull him back with a hand on his beefy wrist, forcing him to fight me and leave the child.

He whirls to me and glares menacingly like I’m robbing him of his last nerve. “Listen here, you little bitch. I don’t know who you think you are, but you are messing with the wrong crowd. Either walk away nice and quietly now or I’ll teach you a lesson about minding your own business.”

“Maybe I’ll teach you a lesson or two about not abducting children, you dirtbag,” I spit back.

I shouldn’t bait him, and I know it.

This isn’t the academy where I know what I’m up against, and I should be cautious and stay focused. Still, seeing that deep burgundy color paint his ugly face is a true delight, and the adrenaline cursing through my veins is making me bold.

He lunches at me with his fist pulled back, ready to strike, but he’s coming at me like an uncoordinated ogre, relying on his strength rather than agility, and I roll to the side without a problem.

A sliver of surprise crosses his eyes as he punches thin air, but then they narrow on me.

“Who the fuck are you?” In the time it takes him to articulate his question, I get back to my feet and ready myself for another attack.

When I sidestep his right hook, I retaliate by kicking out his knee.

The man screams in agony and grips the dislocated bone.

He punches it back in place, then wheezes, "Ale!"

There’s a sound behind me but I don’t have time to turn around since my opponent is already launching himself at me again.

Surprised by his resilience despite the pain he must be in, I’m too slow to dodge him.

He lands a hit in my stomach and the air is sucked straight out of my lungs. I stagger back, straighten up, and drag in a painful breath through my nose. In the distance, I still see the boy, so I can’t leave yet.

I scream at the top of my lungs, startling the man, and then sucker punch him in the throat hard enough to split my knuckles.

Scratching up last bit of my strength, I use his momentarily incapacitation and whip his heavy body over my shoulder.

My back groans at moving such a heavy weight, and my knees nearly buckle beneath me in the second he’s on top of me. When I shift my weight to drop him on the hard pavement, I’m left hunching over his wheezing form.

"Now!" he croaks out.

Before I can ask what he means, there’s an earsplitting sound.

A gunshot. I flinch at the bang but don’t immediately feel anything amiss.

For a split second, I think whoever shot at me missed, but then the first drop of blood splatters onto the clean pavement near my feet, clearly suggesting otherwise.

I reach for the left side of my lower stomach just as pain blazes up the spot, throwing me off guard.

I stare at my hand as my blood starts coating it, dumbfounded and growing dizzier by the second.

I tear my gaze away, the urgency of the situation dawning on me as the flaming pain intensifies brutally.

Down the street, I see the small boy turn around to look at me.

No! I want to yell at him to keep running but no sound leaves my dry throat.

In my peripheral vision, I see the strange man walking toward me.

Run.

My instincts are screaming, and I try to follow them. My adrenaline at its all-time high, my legs start propelling me in the direction of the woods. As I pass the car, I briefly see another person standing there.

I don’t think they’re following me but don’t dare slow down even after I’ve reentered the woods.

I stumble through the bushes and over broken twigs on the ground, my vision going in and out of focus as I try to call out for someone.

When I finally see a figure clad in a familiar black uniform in the far, my body automatically starts to slow down, the adrenaline ebbing away and the dots clouding my vision growing drastically bigger.

Stars, I’m not feeling so good.