The first few seconds were chaos. Principal Dean moved like lightning across the gym and snatched the mic from the DJ, telling everyone to exit in an orderly fashion, but that wasn’t happening. After all, there was a fifteen-hundred pound grizzly bear padding its way into the gym, snarling and snorting at everyone in its path.

“Holy hell,” said Andrew. “We’ve gotta run.”

“The girls,” said Seth.

“Yeah. They’re out back. Come on.”

Andrew and Seth took off at full tilt through one of the side doors of the gym, their dress shoes nearly losing traction at the corners in the hallways. Three more turns and they burst out behind the school, where Sam and Jess sat on a small ledge, both stoned and laughing.

“Hey!” Said Seth, his voice rising. “We have to go. Now.”

Claire blinked at him. “What’s going on-”

To their right, coming from around the corner about a hundred feet away, they heard a deep, throaty roar. Claire and Jess’ eyes bulged as a large, mangy black bear moved around the corner, blocking one of two exits from the little alcove behind the school. “Get behind me,” said Seth, in a low, quiet voice. Claire and Jess didn’t question him. Andrew moved parallel with him and Seth leaned over to him. “I’m the one they want here-”

Another bear, this one a Kodiak brown, followed the second around the corner. The two bears slowly padded in their direction. “I’m the one they want. Get the girls to the car. If I’m not there in five minutes or a bear shows up first, fucking drive.”

Andrew shook his head. “Nah, man, you’re coming with.”

The bears had eighty feet to reach them now.

“Go!” Seth shoved Andrew back. “I mean it!”

Andrew stared at him for a hard moment.

“Don’t let the girls get hurt!” Shouted Seth.

Andrew drew in a shaky breath and nodded. “Don’t you get hurt, either.”

Seth shook his head. “I won’t. Go!”

Andrew and the girls booked it to the left and Seth turned to stare down the bears.

We expected nothing less. A good warrior protects his tribe.

Seth looked around. The alcove had two exits, and a brick wall blocking his run out to the forests behind the school. The bears were shoulder-to-shoulder in the direction he needed to run. He pulled his right foot back. Fifty feet away. Much further and he wouldn’t have the start he needed.

There are more of us. We will overwhelm you with numbers. Make this easy.

Seth reached down deep, accessing all the anger the void had spat out today and letting it tense his limbs and run fire through his veins. Seth sprinted straight at the bears. He heard a laugh fill his head, but at the last second, he cut left toward the wall and jumped, feet flailing. His augmented leg planted, the robotic ankle joint flexing hard and digging into the brick. He drove up and forward, planting his other leg, then his augment, then his other. Seth felt air rush past his hip as the Kodiak roared and swiped, missing him by inches. Seth planted with his augment again and pushed off, hitting the ground and rolling forward to his feet to continue running.

You’re only making this worse!

He heard the beasts lurch into motion. Seth swallowed, suddenly having cause to remember watching Animal Planet as a kid… Couldn’t bears run like thirty miles per hour? Seth rounded the corner, pumping his legs as fast as he could, the wall of the far side of the school streaking past him. He could hear the snorts and growls right behind him.

Fabric ripped as something tore his shirt. This was it. A second later, Seth felt shallow cuts along his back. Pain lanced through his spine as blood began to leak, but he kept running. That was only a glancing blow, the next one would be bad. Seth stuck out his right arm to the wall and swung hard around the corner, struggling to keep a grip with his loafers.

The bears lost him for a second. They were faster, but not nearly as agile as him. Seth took in the parking lot with horror. The grizzly that had entered the gym stood in front of the main entrance, pacing back and forth. Because of that, the only students Seth spotted out here were right by his car—and surrounded by bears, to include one hulking brute of a polar bear. Andrew was doing his best to shield the girls as the bears in the circle around them intermittently roared at them, blocking their way to the car. Seth continued his sprint, a good forty yards now between him and the bears, enough time to dodge into the scattering of cars and lose them. He had his metal augment, and really only one bear blocked their way to the car. It might be their only chance.

Seth burst out of the nearest line of cars, legs pumping as hard as he could. “Move! Now!”

Seth didn’t even look to see if Andrew, Jess, and Claire registered what he said. He planted his right foot right beside the back leg of the black bear in the way of the car and swung all the momentum of his sprint into a single, vicious kick.

CRACK!

Seth’s leg ripped through skin and broke bone clean in half, the bear roaring in pain and tumbling to the ground. Seth dove into his car, Jess and Claire following. Andrew was the last one, right behind them as he reached for the passenger door.

Teeth closed around Andrew’s leg and yanked back.

Seth’s eyes widened in horror as a smaller grizzly began dragging Andrew backwards by the calf, his friend screaming in pain as he twisted around and began raining desperate blows onto the bear’s skull. It wasn’t more than six strikes before Andrew held a hand to his chest, his wrist at an unnatural angle. He kicked with his free leg, slamming his heel into the bear’s nose. That worked. The bear let go and surged forward, panting a paw square on Andrew’s chest before raising its’ head to look Seth square in the eyes.

Seth felt lancing pain in his temple, that wasp-sting he’d felt so many times recently, and winced as he met the bears’ gaze. When he opened his eyes, the world had changed. Colors were brighter, and the full moon overhead practically shone as bright as the noonday sun. Hell of a time for a migraine. No, not a migraine. What was going on? Each bear had a third eye in the center of its skull, and a glowing spot of varying color in the center of its chest. Those colors twisted and pulsed. Seth swallowed.

“Seth, what are you doing,” hissed Jessica.

“Saving Andrew.” Seth grabbed the handle of the car door.

“Stop! Don’t be stupid.”

“I know what I’m doing.” Seth stepped out. He had lied. He held his hands up. The bear he’d maimed drug itself to a seated position and glowered at him with deep golden eyes.

“Where’s your leader?” Said Seth.

Not here.

“Let my friend go.”

Only if you come with us. You wouldn’t make the choice, so we’re making it for you.

Seth swallowed and steeled his face. “If you hurt him, I will kill you. If I’m the person you say I am, this warrior you keep talking about, maybe you should be afraid. Maybe I’ll choose the other side.”

Heh. There is only one choice if you want to save your friend. And besides, we have no intent to hurt him.

Seth glanced at the polar bear—it looked like it was about to charge, lips curled back, head down. Its third eye, large and green, stared unblinkingly at him, as did all the others, including the one with its paw on Andrew. He became conscious of the blood trickling down his back as he tried to formulate some sort of plan, some way out of this with all of them alive. He couldn’t see one.

“If I go with you, will you let him go?”

No. We have our directions.

The sound of sirens began to wail in the distance.

“Fucking run, Seth!” Shouted Andrew. “Get back in the car, and get the fuck out of here!” He started punching the bear’s leg. “Hey! Hey, fucking Winnie the Pooh, look down here, bit-” The bar placed it’s paw almost delicately on his face.

Shut up, whe- The bear roared as Andrew sank his teeth as hard as he could into there claw met flesh. The bear planted both paws beside Andrew’s head and went nose-to-nose with him, roaring again.

“Run, Seth!” Andrew headbutted the bear square on the nose—and then proceeded to grab it by the exposed tongue and yank.

Seth froze in place, torn completely. Should he run? Should he fight?

The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. What? Why now? No matter. Seth wasn’t going to let his friend-

The ground between him and Andrew went through the phases of early winter in a matter of nanoseconds. Frost coalesced on the ground, turning to snow, freezing and hardening for maybe a full second before an opaque sheet of ice jutted forth from the ground, rising easily over twenty feet high and rushing out in both directions in a lightning-fast expansion. The veritable iceberg crushed cars beneath it, setting off alarms as it formed a hundred-foot-wide wall between Seth and the bears. He heard a chorus of roars on the other side, followed by Andrew’s last shout before something cut him off. “Run!”

Seth stayed rooted for half a second longer before obeying his friend and jumping back into the car. The engine roared to life and they surged out of the parking lot, whipping out and onto the main street. Seth put it to the floor, tears forming in his eyes.

“Seth.” Jessica’s hand rested on his shoulder. “They’re said they’re not going to hurt him. You have time to figure this out.”

“They’ve already hurt him.”

“Not irreparably.” There was a new look in Jessica’s eyes, one he hadn’t seen before. It was hard as stone, weathered and refined by years of crashing and surging water. “We will figure out a way to save him.”

Claire sat forward. Seth wasn’t surprised by her relative evenness. She and him were cut from the same sheet of CFA and Grand Island cloth. Seth had handled his first true life-or-death situation well, and she seemed to be doing the same. “I don’t know what they were talking about, Seth, and I really, really, really don’t know what happened in those last few seconds… But I promise I will do whatever I can to help you.”

Seth white-knuckled the steering wheel. “The first thing we need to do… Is make a call.”

Not to Olivia though. She’d made it quite clear she was entangled on the other side of the globe. She and Ben couldn’t help. Seth swallowed as he thought about what he was going to do. Bears, right? The witches might help, and Seth planned on contacting them. But when you’re going after bears, what did you need?

Hunters. You needed Hunters.