Our power may be to bend and even break reality, but it does not come without price. Never do anything in front of others that they would consider impossible, that is unless you must for it is then that reality strikes back against us. -Antonio Ranvos

Adrian

Bryan nods and runs back into one of the class rooms. Shortly after some students start dragging desks into the hall. The desks are older ones, steel and oak. Less comfortable to sit in but they’ll make decent barriers.

Mr. Gibbons has abandoned miss counselor to her terror and is helping get the desks lined up and interlocked to form a short wall. He also has some students looking for anything to be made into a weapon.

Miss counselor at this point gets back up off the ground and walks over to me. I have sat down and pulled a box of ammunition from my bookbag and am reloading the magazines I emptied.

“You are in big trouble, bringing a gun to school. I’m going to confiscate that and when this is over you are going to be expelled, and sent to prison.” She puts her hand out in front of me, expecting me to give her the gun.

“Not happening.”

“You have to, it’s the rules.”

“I don’t care. Green midgets are killing students and teachers, I’m keeping my gun.”

“I’m in charge, give me the gun.”

“Says the woman who doesn’t want us to fight or defend ourselves?”

Mr. Gibbons interrupts “leave Adrian alone. Complain about rules after this crisis is resolved.”

“But the school handbook clearly says to confiscate any weapons students bring to school!”

Having reloaded the magazines, I load one into the pistol, the other I drop into my open bookbag. Walking towards the students setting up a wall of desk I say “how about you confiscate the green midget’s weapons instead of mine?”

“They won’t hand them over.”

“Exactly, I’m just defending myself.”, I turn towards the baseball player who I arrived with. “So, what is your name? I don’t think we have met.”

“Jason, any chance I can stick near you till this is over?”

“Sure, just follow mine and Bryan’s orders.”

Bryan and Tomas walk over to me at this point. They both are holding a spear and a piece of a broken chair, probably to be used as a shield. Bryan speaks up.

“So, that wall of desks will be ready soon. How should we manage our group?”

Tomas responds “Like we do in DnD; Adrian will be our party leader, you're second in command. You two always end up making better choices than the rest of those we play with.”

“That’s a poor parallel to this situation, but sure. Any can suggest additions to the party, during non-emergencies we will vote on our actions.” I point to Jason “he is Jason, he will be joining us.”

“How can you all be so calm? And how can a nerd be such a good shot?” interjects Jason.

“Easy, we had a campaign adventure that started similar to this once. Adrian was party leader, we survived in that and that was against orcs. They are more dangerous than goblinoids.” answers Tomas, ignoring the fact that I am a decent shot.

“Since I am the only one with a ranged weapon, I’ll do range support and preventative strikes. You will have to all be front line till we get more weapons. By their weapon quality, they may have bows, though they won’t have much range.”

Bryan and Tomas nod, they know what to do as fighters. Jason looks confused for a bit but nods afterwards. Bryan speaks up at this point “Abagail is in one of the classrooms, I want to add her.”

Tomas and me nod, she won’t be much help in a fight but she is nice enough to help if we need it. I turn back towards the class rooms and notice a few of the jocks talking to each other and pointing at me, or specifically my gun. Which is now tucked into my belt. Bryan and Tomas leave to get Abagail, Jason mutters something and walks towards the water fountain.

I turn and begin to walk toward the bathroom, I should at least try to get some of this blood off me. Three of the jock start walking toward the bathroom as I enter it.

Three sinks line the wall on my right connected by a single counter, while my left has a few urinals and a pair of stalls. I walk to the sink on the far end and pull off my shirt, and set the gun on the counter where water shouldn’t spill on it. The jocks can't use it against me anyways and I would rather they start a fight in here than where everyone might get involved.

I turn the water on and place my shirt in the sink. As I start to rinse my arms, I wince from the bruises forming from where the clubs landed on me. The door to the bathroom opens and three jocks walk in. One of them I recognize as the idiot that decided to fight me on the way to the buss freshman year, Tyler. He is a shorter boy, rich and athletic but doesn't have the height and mass to be really good.

“We want the gun Adrian. There’s more of us and you can’t shoot us without getting everyone else mad.”

Tyler is threatening me, I never caved in before so why would I start now, idiot. “I killed over a dozen of those midgets, do you really think I’d lose in a fight?”

“You used a gun, you can’t here. Give it to me.”

“No, and if you take it from me how many do you think will be mad at you?”

“Doesn’t matter, I’ll have the gun.” Tyler lunges and grabs the gun from the counter, and points it at me. The safety is still on; besides that, it was set up to be called and dismissed by grandpa. I kick at Tyler and he falls to the ground. I close my had around the air, and perform grandpa’s Translocation Grasp on the pistol, recalling it to my hand. It appears, though I feel as if my head split.

“Exactly I have a gun, you don’t and can’t.”

“But that, I was holding that gun!”

“Like I said it’s my gun, now leave before I decide to use it.”

I hear the door to the bathroom open and close, Tyler’s ‘friends’ must have left. Looking down, Tyler’s pants darken, and I sneer at him. He crawls for the door a bit before standing up and running away.

I put the gun on the counter once more and rub the temples of my head, dam this headache hurts. No wonder grandpa said to never do something ‘impossible’ in front of others. I finish rinsing my shirt and wring out most of the water before putting it on. I would have winced in pain from the bruises but the headache is far worse. I pull a few more magazines out with Translocation Grasp, but find it difficult to focus due to the headache. I place them in my bookbag and rest for a few minutes on the toilet.

Once I leave the bathroom a few of the cheerleaders walk up to me. One of them gives me a kind smile. She’s always ignored anyone that wasn’t on a team, so she probably just wants to use me.

“Adrian, it’s been so long since we’ve talked. Jeff told me you beat up some of the midgets. How did you do that?”

So, she wants protection? Unlikely, she probably just wants my weapon. “With a gun, you should have heard the gunshots, right?”

“Really can I see it?”

I point to the pistol barely covered by my shirt. “You already can.”

“I mean really see it, like see if it’s a real gun or if Jeff lied to me.”

“No, leave me alone. You have never talked with or glanced at me before, so why should I believe you to be my friend now?”

“. . .”

“You want nothing but my gun. You will not get it, leave me alone.”

I proceed to walk into one of the classrooms, leaving a few now upset cheerleaders behind. I move over to a corner where Mrs. Garcia has a couch. The rest of the room now void of desks save for the much larger desk for the teacher. Some pictures from Spain and Mexico adorn the walls and a single pinata hangs in the corner farthest from the door. I look over to Jason who is pulling water bottles out of the garbage.

“Why?” I ask.

“We might need them, who knows if anything else is going on that will affect power or water.”

“I hadn’t thought of that, any luck?”

“Just a . . .” As Jason was talking, I heard a scream and my head throbs.

“I guess another round of midgets arrived.”

I get back up as Jason runs out. I hear desks scraping against the ground, as I approach the door. Pulling the gun out I look to where there should be a line of desks, only to see the councilor lady pulling at the desks form the inside as she tries to tell the midgets that we don’t need to fight. There is a little over a dozen of the things already at the wall of desks, another group of the midgets is approaching from further back, they have a few crude bows with them. A midget wearing more than a loincloth seems to be giving directions, he also is holding a walking stick and has too much cover from the surrounding creatures for me to get a clear shot at him.

Dreading what the sound will do to my headache I take aim at one of the archers, they are too far out to hit me with an arrow but they are taking aim at the student at the wall of desks. I fire and miss the archer hitting one of their spearmen behind it, my head sent ringing from the noise. At least one of them died.

The clothed midget points his walking stick at the line of desks, his lips are moving as a flame is ignited on the walking stick. I fire again at the archer, and this time I hit. The clothed midget glances at the fallen archer and then pushes his walking stick forward. The flame at its tip flies off it and streaks towards the desks. Should I shoot the clothed midget? Can't others are in the way.

The flame explodes washing over the students manning the desks. They scream and drop to the ground in an attempt to extinguish the flames. It does not work, and they stop moving still on fire. Several of the students are now fleeing back into the classrooms shouting that this can’t be real. The councilor runs screaming something about a bomb.

Great, now I’m practically alone against over two dozen of these things. I pull a second pistol using Translocation Grasp, and focus on the other trick my grandpa made me practice Spatial Aim. It’s a lot easier than grabbing something from a distance, being basically sensing just where to aim instead of aiming yourself.

I begin to unleash a rain of bullets, one on each of the midgets. Closest one taking precedence, I can hear the midgets charging and arrows being shot. The smoke from the burning desks must be giving me some cover as none of the arrows land close to me. Over a dozen of the midgets are dead on this side of the smoke when the pistol in my right hand is empty. I have two left in the left which I unleash blindly before backing up into the room.

I close the door, and check to see if anyone is in here. There isn’t just some scattered desks. I dump the spend magazines into my bag and replace them with one from my bag and the other drawn via Translocation Grasp. There should be one more loaded magazine stored, and several boxes of ammunition. There is probably a rifle but I can’t pull something that big through Translocation Grasp.

Still having a moment, I reload both pistols before ejecting the magazines again. I add another bullet to each magazine, and load them back into the pistols. I hear a few thumps against the door, it opens into the hall following the fire code so it would take a while for them to bash it down.