Buried

Headmaster Noah:

"What do you mean Commander Wayne was right," Commander Antonio asks, slamming his fist down. Hearing his desk shaking as if it were right next to me, I keep calm and turn to Commander Wayne.

Just getting back after checking the academy's shield generators, Headmistress Amaya wasted no time in preparing the emergency meeting with the other commanders and generals. When I entered the private meeting room and saw all their faces on the holographic screens, I immediately began the meeting.

"You were right," I repeat, speaking to Commander Wayne. "Something strange is happening in the Wild. Whatever it is, it's making the animals smarter, and friendly."

"Friendly," General Luthor repeats. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"I mean predators aren't attacking prey anymore. Instead, they were working together to attack my professors and me."

"That's impossible," Commander Antonio says.

Turning to Commander Antonio, I pull out my holo-display. Bringing up the pictures and camera feeds from today, I swipe my fingers and send everything to the commanders and generals. I then watch their eyes all go wide and a few of them even mutter something.

"Commander Antonio. Do you believe me now?"

For the first time since I met Commander Antonio, I saw an expression other than anger or annoyance. His eyes were narrowed, his eyebrows furrowed, and his jaw tensed. The commander is worried.

"Three different species of animals, all attacking my academy at once," I go on, "And that's not even the stranger part. Crorvid are predators. Normally, they would eat addridids and dipterics but they weren't. Also, addridids aren't found in this part of the world. They're found only in the Asia, Africa, and South America regions."

I turn to General Lunella, General Victor, and Commander Wayen.

"Am I right?"

"You are right," Commander Wayen says, nodding his head. General Lunella and General Victor agree with me too, the two of them nodding alongside Commander Wayen.

"So the big question," I say, facing all the generals and commanders. "What is causing all these strange anomalies in the animals? What is going on in the Wild?"

The generals and commanders all lower their heads thinking about what I said. However, I couldn't give them much time to think. While they are, I hold up my holo-display once again. Sending them more pictures, they all raise their heads almost simultaneously.

"What is this," General Mason asks.

"It's my academy's shield generators," I answer. "Yellow Sun has state-of-the-art shield generators, found only in government facilities or the palaces of kings or queens. These are used to protect the academy and my students from animal attacks."

"If you had these," Commander Wayen starts, "Then why didn't you use them during the attack?"

"It's because they failed."

"So much for 'state-of-the-art'," Commander Antonio whispers.

I ignore Commander Antonio and lower my holo-display.

"I said it once and I'll say it again. Check your Wild. See you next time."

I push a button and end the call between the generals, commanders, and me. As I put away my holo-display, turn around, and walk out of the room, Headmistress Amaya joins my side.

"Why didn't you tell them about someone sabotaging our shield generator," she asks.

"I still can't be sure completely it was sabotaged," I answer. "Some of the parts in the shield generators show wears and tears but according to the maintenance teams, they were testing the generators over and over before the school years started. I don't want to tell the commanders and generals anything more unless I am sure it was sabotaged. Until then, please keep this between you and me."

"Of course," Headmistress Amamya says.

"Thank you. However, if there is someone who is sabotaging the academy, I don't want you to think I won't be doing anything about it."

Walking out of the hallway and back into my office, I see a large box sitting on my desk.

"Headmaster," Headmistress Amaya says, stopping. "What is that?"

"Something that'll either prove me right," I say, walking up to my desk to grab the box. Holding it underneath one of my arms, I turn around and head back out. "Or prove me wrong. Either way, I will be buried in work for the next few hours. For now, Headmistress Amaya, please get some rest."

I nod at the Headmistress before walking away with the box.

Shocker:

"Well, this sucks," Honey says, her head dropping onto her hand as she looks over all the new assignment we're given.

"Agree," Clementine adds.

"Yup," Chadd comments.

Even I have to nod my head when I see everything in front of us.

Back in our room, after all our classes let out for the day, we spread our arms and let all our new assignments drop to the floor. The four of us have to step back as we watch the assignments spread out and cover our floor.

"There's no way we can get all of this done in one week," Honey cries, her hands going through her pink hair. "Oh no! We're going to get expel! We're going to get kick out of Yellow Sun Academy!"

Honey drops her hands to her sides and sighs.

"Oh yeah. Being here was fun while it lasted. Well, sort of. Kind of? Not really."

I wave my hand in the air, grabbing Honey's attention. Pulling out my holo-display, I start typing something in. Everyone keep their eyes on me as I type. Typing as fast as I can, I turn my holo-display over and show the message to everyone.

"Calm down," I wrote, "Yes, even I'll admit it. Being here in Yellow Sun sucks."

"Yeah," Honey says, "That's what I said. You know, said? Talk?"

I snap my fingers over and over before pointing at the screen again.

"It's not fun and game but we must have known that already. Nevertheless, we cannot give up. This isn't about 'just being at Yellow Sun Academy, the greatest fighter academy ever'. This is about us. We all want to be fighters. We all want to protect the people we cared about from the animals."

Chadd, Honey, and Clementine keep reading until they reach the end.

"That's it," Clementine asks.

I shake my head and flip my holo-display over. Erasing the first part, I write in the second part. When I'm done, I turn it over and let them read.

"Simply put, we all want to help people," Chadd says out loud. "That is why we cannot give up. There will be a lot of struggles in life. A lot of time where we will want to just give up, but we can't. We can stop for a few minutes to rest or catch our breath, but we cannot give up."

Pulling back after reading the second part, Chadd smiles and nods his head.

"Wow. You have quite a way with words."

I shake my hand and turn my holo-display around. Erasing the second part, I write in the final part. The final part is shorter than the first two so it doesn't take me long to show everyone.

"At least here," I wrote, "We can rest and catch our breath with our teammates."

This time, Clementine is smiling too.

"Yeah," Clementine says, "You're right. We can't give up. At least, not yet."

Smiling and nodding my head, all of us then slowly turn to Honey. Honey, the only one who isn't smiling, sighs and drops to the floor.

"Well," she says, looking at the three of us. "I can't do all of this by myself. It supposed for all of us anyway."

Changing from us to the pile of new homework, Honey reaches forward and grabs a sheet of paper. As she looks over the sheet, Honey lowers her head. She's trying to hide it, but I can see a small smile. Dropping to the ground in front of her, I grab another sheet and look it over. So does Chadd. So does Clementine.

While reading the assignment, I stop for a little bit to type something new into my holo-display.

"Hey," Chadd says, also stopping. "What are doing now?"

Clementine and Honey must have heard Chadd because they also stop reading and look at me. I don't answer Chadd. Instead, I show him and the others what I wrote.

"For the record, I don't regret going outside. The Headmaster and the professors may not want to admit it, but I think they did need our help."

"Yeah," Chadd says. "I mean, did you see how many animals were attacking? It wasn't just one animal that was attacking. It was like three! Three different animals! Three different swarms!"

"I know," Clementine says, joining it. "It was like nothing I've ever seen before."

"You saw what happened," a voice asks from somewhere. Chadd looks at me, I look at Honey, Honey looks at Clementine, and Clementine looks at Chadd. Turning around slowly, we all look at our bedroom's door. "Please tell me you didn't hear that?"