Lulu didn’t know what to do with herself. People were moving frantically around her. More and more students emerged from Arcana, climbing out of windows, taking every fire escape, every door possible. Students poured out onto the lawns, many running and fine while others toted friends with an arm slung over a shoulder, some completely in the arms of others. Staff began to emerge but no one that Lulu was familiar with. Not one of the teachers she knew showed their face. Fact, few students she knew arrived in the growing crowd. Alli was nowhere in sight. Aldous wasn’t there. Neither was Jaysin, Killian, Emmaline, or Eden. The few friends she had were obviously not there. Panic began to seize in her chest as most glaringly Drake and Jackson were also out of sight.
As students began to hobble out, Lulu forced herself to start moving, to stop waiting for them. They would all come out, she knew they would. She felt energized and level headed. Seeing through the panic she felt wasn’t impossible. When a limping girl was carried out by one of her friends, Lulu rushed to meet her, throwing the girl’s free arm over her shoulder, not saying a word as she began to help her over to where any students with injuries were being clustered. Where was Amy? Where was Leo?
As she moved back to help the next people come through she suddenly saw Drake run through one of the doors, am arm shielding his face from debris. Behind him Jackson stumbled. Lulu felt complete elation at the sight of them both, her heart racing as he ran up to her. She saw the relief in his eyes too and that in and of itself meant so much to her. Someone was actually pleased to see her. Someone actually was looking for her in the crowd. She threw her arms around his neck, the frustration she had felt with him that morning melting away. When she pulled back from her hug, Drake kissed her. Lulu’s body reacted with complete joy at the motion. She kissed him back as best she could before he pulled away to draw a hand across her cheek.
“You have no idea how happy I am to see that you’re okay,” he breathed slowly. “Ditto,” she beamed, leaning her cheek into his hand and allowing herself to draw a thumb along his jaw. She wanted to memorize this moment and savor it but she couldn’t as suddenly the Whiskey induced clouds that had rendered her memory from the night before so fuzzy cleared. It all came back to her. The laughing, the teasing, the toying around and taunting gestures made by him, his proud display of how easy it was for him to remove a girl’s underwear without doing anything more. Nothing else had happened. They hadn’t slept together. She’d fallen asleep in the common room and she’d woken up with him so happily at first. She couldn’t help but feel fortunate to have been in that state with him.
Before she could say anything she felt her hands grow warm where they touched him. Drake moved away from her, his eyes set on the very set of doors he had come through seconds before. “Oh my God you psycho no!” Lulu shrieked, trying to pull on his arm to keep him from running back into the school. She knew what he was going to do as he launched himself into the doorway without a second though. Drake Quellen wanted to get more people out.
Lulu tilted her head back then, her heart racing with dread as he headed back into the death trap of a school. She closed her eyes, breathing deeply, feeling the emotions swirl together, the panic, the concern, the admiration. Everything was maxed out but the power of her fear, of the threat of the school coming down on Drake and everyone else still inside, it hit her hard. And suddenly her hands were lifting from her sides a second time and it happened again, a wave of white energy suddenly radiating out of her and rippling through the entire lawn and building, hitting everyone like a gust of wind. “Luck be with you Drake,” she murmured lowly, turning to set her eyes on the building, her irises suddenly an odd white purple in color.
Katia groaned, her head splitting with pain as she tried to move. Hazily she blinked, shifting her hands to push at a weight compressing her chest. Every time she tried to focus on where she was, on what was hurting her, the ache of her head exploded. Her back seized and her legs were numb beneath her. As he reyes fought to regain clarity, the dance instructor realized that she was still in Leo’s office, laying on the couch he had up against the wall. The room was shaking however, and on top of her, she suddenly realized, was a monstrous Gothic bookcase. As she winced and tried to pull it away from her, she began to panic. It was took heavy for her to handle on her own. Her fingers slapped up against it in futility. She felt herself beginning to cry out as she tried to wiggle herself underneath it, to catch her breath. But it was constricting and her head, she realized was bleeding quite heavily from where it had slammed into her temple. Worse, she had no momentum to pull herself out from underneath it. Her legs were completely trapped. When she tried to move her toes her nerves fired dangerously. It became obvious to her that the shelf was not only pinning her down but compressing her fractured disk dangerously.
She slammed her head back into the couch and tried again to use her arms to lift the thing, clenching her teeth and trying to muster up all the strength that she had. It was no use. So she did the only thing she could think of doing. She screamed.