12:05 September 13th 2026

New York Preparatory Academy, New York, NY

“Okay.” Anna calmly ended the call and closed her phone while taking long deep even breaths. She repeated a word with each exhale. “Okay. Okay. It’s…going…to…be…okay…” Things were not okay!

But Anna shook her head to dispel that thought and moved with what felt like a preprogrammed deliberation as she removed the battery from her phone and returned it to the magically hardened case that she kept the charged spare in. Then she carefully peeked her head up over the desk she was hiding behind with Sara, Dean George, one of Sara’s friends who hadn’t been picked up yet, and three of the school’s security guards.

It had been going so well after the event. Ridiculously well.

Now it wasn’t.

How had things gotten to this point?

How…?

This is how:

To say that things had been hectic after everything blew would be an understatement.

Dean George had stepped up and handled it admirably well. She also had some really choice words for the contractor that the school’s board had used to ‘update’ the safety infrastructure. Seriously, Anna had heard words she’d never even knew existed and had stared in awe with the other three suspended students as Dean George cursed a river of vitriol that would go down in her mind as one of the most important moments of history.

The Assistant Dean would live, thanks to Dean George’s quick thinking and the school nurse also being a level eight licensed healer. She’d come running from the nurse’s office when Anna had breathlessly come running in for help. The woman had already had her potions and med-kit in hand and was about to make the rounds when Anna had arrived, too out of breath to even speak. Instead, the nurse had told her to just lead the way.

Once the wounds the Vice Dean had received from his computer exploding into him had been stabilized, Dean George had rallied the security team and sent them with the head nurse to assess injuries. Then she’d made sure that the assistant nurse was staying put in the nurse’s office to receive any patients that came looking for help. And once she was alone in the administrative office and everyone else had been shuffled off to carry out her orders, then Dean George had walked into her personal office, shut the door behind her, and screamed her fury for a full two minutes.

It was glorious!

Afterward, she’d walked out of her office into the main administrative office, calmly straightened her suit jacket and skirt, then held out her hand to Anna.

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“Miss Wattkins,” Her voice was smooth, even, prim like always and ever so polite and matter of fact. “The Academy would be extremely grateful if you would allow the administration to borrow your phone during this emergency.”

The Assistant Dean was still staring at his superior mouth agape. Sara and cronies turned to Anna in suspicion, and Anna’s jaw dropped.

“How…how did you know that I would have a working phone?” There were so many other things she could have said at that moment like; ‘that was amazing, I don’t even know what half those words mean’, or ‘you are the coolest dean ever’. Instead, she’d chosen; how did you know I have a working phone? It’s official. I am not cool. She shook her head internally.

“Anna,” the dean glanced away with an embarrassed sigh and tucked a loose strand of hair behind an ear before continuing. “It’s my job as dean, to know my students, their potential, their weaknesses, and any danger they may pose to their fellow students. Your magical capacity is high enough that if you lost control, you would…damage electronics. So, I assume you either have a magically hardened phone, or a backup battery in a magically hardened case to protect it. It's standard military procedure anyways. So…?”

She cocked her head to one side, looking at Anna expectantly. And Anna had shrugged and gotten out her phone and the battery in its case. Then she handed it over.

“Right. You four are going to be my assistants.” Dean George continued brusquely. “And if you don’t tell anyone about my little meltdown, I will teach you what the words you didn’t recognize meant.” Ooohhhh! Anna hadn’t been planning on telling…no scratch that. She’d been planning on telling everyone because it had been so fucking epic.

“What do you need us to do boss?” Anna had smiled up at the dean who looked at the other girls waiting for their response. They’d smiled their evil little smiles, traded glances among each other, then shrugged and agreed. For now.

Then the dean called nine-one-one for assistance. Students and faculty all over the campus had received injuries. Some minor, some not so minor. The security guards had locked down the campus and made sure no students wandered off.

That was how Anna found herself helping to coordinate the evacuation of the school with her mortal enemy. It wasn’t fun per se, but she got to wear a bright neon yellow-green emergency vest as she ushered the first responders to various locations throughout the campus or escorted students to the front doors when a family member, or representative came to pick them up.

It kept Anna occupied so she wasn’t straight up freaking out. But it also made her worried about her dad. He hadn’t come for her. It had been literally hours since the dean called him, and he hadn’t come.

Mom was out of town. Yeah. So, she couldn’t expect her mom to come get her. But her dad? He had his own practice. He could have rescheduled an appointment. Or called the school between appointments to let them know when he’d be able to come get her. He could have even had one of her older siblings come get her.

But nothing?

That wasn’t normal.

Was it?

They had to evacuate. It was clear that the school didn’t have the appropriate magical shielding or protections. With arcane AMD levels at Prometheus Purple, they needed to evacuate quickly. Not even the dorms for the international students were considered safe. And since the dorms had originally been built with protections, it was clear that the renovations that had updated the school had also stolen a lot of valuable material from it.

The dean had managed to secure a large room at a conference center not far from the school. She’d pulled strings and gotten a bus company to send out magically hardened buses and there was a steady stream of luxury tour busses ferrying students to the relative safety of the conference center. Many kids had actually been picked up by parents, chauffeurs, family security, in limos, armored luxury vehicles, and even a couple of helicopters that nearly collided over the lawn.