I walked through the school doors with the gait of a war-torn soldier returning from the front.
My palms were scraped raw, my favorite jeans sported a gaping tear at the knee, and I had oak leaves tangled in my hair.
At our usual table in the courtyard, Aamir and Maya welcomed me with our trio’s signature compassion: mocking stares and smirked grins.
“Wow,” Maya said, sipping from an apple juice box.
“Did you get into a fight with a lawnmower, or is this your new ‘apocalypse survivor’ look?”
“Worse,” I sighed, sitting down heavily.
“A ginger cat. And a shoelace. But you guys are never going to believe me… I fell out of a tree, and guess who caught me mid-air? Nova. The real Nova. In the flesh and in costume.”
Aamir burst out laughing, nearly choking on his sandwich.
“Right on, man! And I had tea with the Mayor this morning. Seriously, if you wanted to skip first period, you could’ve just said you had a stomach flu like everyone else.”
“I swear it’s true! She even told me to be careful out there!”
Maya rolled her eyes, skeptical and annoyed.
“It’s nice to dream, Owen. Next time, ask her for an autograph before you wake up. Come on, let’s go, we’re gonna be late for Science.”
Entering the classroom, my stomach did a triple somersault.
The seat next to Sienna was empty, waiting for me like an electric chair.
I settled into it with the rigidity of a wooden plank.
Unlike yesterday, the symbiote remained quiet, probably too busy digesting my caloric reserves to care about my racing pulse.
I gathered my courage, turned my head toward the S.R.B.’s prodigy recruit, and stammered the first basic thing that crossed my mind.
“Hey… d-did you manage to keep up with yesterday’s physics lecture?”
Sienna turned her magazine-cover face toward me, her eyes shining with kindness.
“Hi, Owen! Yeah, it was a little dense, but I think I got the gist of it. Actually, if you have your notes, I’d love to compare them during break. I’m afraid I might have missed a detail.”
Okay, I know.
It didn’t mean anything.
It was just basic high school politeness.
She was nice to everyone, even the furniture.
But wow.
I was floating.
I could literally fly away (and this time, without the help of anti-gravity parasites).
But at the other end of the classroom, a sharp noise rang out.
CLICK.
The nervous pressing of a ballpoint pen.
I glanced over my shoulder.
Three rows back, Sam Kodd was glaring daggers at me, his jaw clenched.
In his Neanderthal mind, the prettiest and most popular girl in school should under no circumstances be speaking to a reject like me.
It was an anomaly in the matrix of his ego.
The bell announced the break.
I closed my notebook, my mind still up in the clouds.
I didn’t hear the heavy footsteps approaching behind my back.
A callous, massive hand slammed down on the back of my neck, gripping my hair with an iron fist.
Before I could react, a brutal force shoved me forward.
BAM.
My forehead violently struck the varnished wood of my own desk.
The impact dazed me, exploding stars behind my eyelids.
Pain radiated through my skull.
“Watch how much space you’re taking up, Frey,” Sam’s deep voice spat directly into my ear.
“You’re in the way here.”
Behind me, at the bottom of my bag, I felt the suit flinch.
The symbiote registered the assault.
It wanted out.
It wanted to tear Sam’s hand into bloody shreds, just like it had done in the alley.
No!
I screamed mentally, fighting with every ounce of my strength to hold the parasite back while absorbing the pain.
Don’t move!
The sound of the impact had silenced the students around us.
Aamir bolted from his chair, his face twisted in anger.
“Hey! Let go of him, Kodd! Are you crazy or what?!”
But it was Sienna’s reaction that froze the room.
The social media star, the girl with the usually soft and warm aura, snapped up from her seat.
The atmosphere around her seemed to drop ten degrees.
Her eyes narrowed—hard, cold, and calculating.
This was no longer a high schooler; this was a soldier trained by the S.R.B.
“Let him go. Right now.”
Her tone wasn’t loud, but it was incredibly menacing.
It carried the promise of violence.
Sam, thrown off by this unexpected attitude from the new girl, released his grip on my neck and took a step back, his goons on his heels.
“Take it easy, new girl… It was just a joke. The shorty slipped.”
I straightened up slowly, my forehead red and throbbing.
Shame washed over me—burning, suffocating.
I held the power of a dead god inside me.
I could crush this guy with a simple backhand.
But the reality was, I was just a pathetic high schooler who had just taken a humiliating beating without being able to fight back, right in front of his crush.
“It’s nothing. I just need some air.”
I grabbed my bag and fled the classroom under pitied stares, leaving Aamir and Sienna behind.
I strode through the deserted second-floor hallways, swallowing my shattered pride.
Turning the corner by the lockers, I bumped into a familiar silhouette, slumped over a radiator, playing on her phone.
Maya.
Skipping class, as usual.
She looked up at me, her gaze scanning my red forehead.
“Nice pattern,” she said with her usual cynicism.
“Let me guess: you tried to kiss your desk, but it didn’t consent?”
I let out an exhausted sigh, leaning against the cold lockers next to her.
“It’s the new trend. Exfoliation through violence. Sam Kodd doesn’t appreciate my seating choices.”
Maya smirked.
“Ah, tough love. Don’t worry, Owen. What goes around comes around. Or we’ll all die crushed by the system and it won’t matter anyway. Either option works for me.”
“Your optimism is my only reason to live, Maya.”
Suddenly, an intense vibration in my jeans pocket cut our exchange short.
Then a second one.
Then a continuous, shrill vibration, accompanied by an emergency alert ringtone that every phone in the country possessed by default.
I pulled out the device.
Maya did the same with hers.
The screen was flashing red.
A live news alert from the S.R.B. and local news networks had just popped up in capital letters.
My eyes skimmed the text.
My heart skipped a beat.
My blood instantly froze in my veins.
[BREAKING NEWS: ONGOING HOSTAGE SITUATION AT A PRIMARY SCHOOL IN THE NORTHBRIDGE SUBURBS. UNIDENTIFIED SUPER AT WORK. S.R.B. FORCES DEPLOYED.]
Below the text, a blurry aerial photo showed the school building surrounded by police cars.
I recognized the red bricks.
I recognized the playground.
My phone slipped from my hands and clattered onto the high school linoleum.
“Owen?” Maya asked, suddenly worried as she watched the color drain from my face.
“What is it?”
Holy shit.
It was Lily’s school.