**Rebooted**

[Serenla the Cat]

Serenla gave one last look to her classmates, and looked out the door. They would be in good hands. She, however, couldn't even fend for herself, and would be better off hiding. She knew how to hide in this school, especially in the large library. Most good schools had either an amazing theatre or a huge library. This one, fortunately, had both. Serenla knew every inch of the library, and decided she would be safest there. She looked through the windows, seeing that any few cultists out there currently were occupied. Serenla took a deep breath, and unlocked the door discreetly. She couldn't hear her teacher yelling at her over the sound of her pounding heart. Everything happened so slowly, she could hardly believe what she was doing, but she had to. She just had to get out of here, or she would either die or lose her mind waiting to. So Serenla pulled down the handle, and slipped out, and stood in the hall. In a daze, she looked around, seeing only three cultists with guns. It took a bullet streaking past her face to wake her up, and then she ran. From there, it sped up, and Serenla ran as fast as she could through the halls, tears streaming from her eyes in her panic. The library, fortunately, was very close. She stopped at the corner, her caution stronger than her panic. Serenla peered around the corners, searching for cultists, and found herself making many detours before making it to the library, where she collapsed for a moment, sobbing silently and trembling.

Rain looked up at the school, and froze, her heart skipping a beat. Her breath wooshed from her lungs as though she'd been kicked in the chest, and her pupils shrank into dots as she stared up at the building full of

Innocent, sweet little children, terrified and alone

teenage students and middle aged teachers. Rain drew in a ragged breath, regaining her composure just as suddenly as she had lost it in those short painful seconds. The laughter of children danced through her ears, followed by screams, though she didn't know whether or not they were real. Why did the cultists choose this place, of all of the even busier buildings full of adults with money and influence? Why a place full of children teenagers with no influence and a pocket full of lunch money?

"We're here for one kid? What about the others?" she asked, her voice revealing none of the internal panic and terror. She had been masking her emotions for years, it had been necessary, especially after those first few months. And though she couldn't quite hide the trembling of her hands, she still tried to hide it.

Kat saw the girl running, and wanted to go to protect her. She even recognized the girl a bit, only enough to know that she was terribly shy, and not nearly brave enough to do what she just did. The kid was having a panic attack, or something like it, and Kat knew she couldn't risk trying to protect her, not when there were so many other innocent people in the school.

"Helloooo, did you even listen? We fight in here, we end up with civilian casualties inevitably, and we can't just lead them out. What do we do? You're Royal Guard, you should know!" She said, getting frustrated. It was horribly frustrating and stressful when an adult couldn't get things under control.  

[Ryuzki Hygaea]

Spyke stopped and finally notices Kat talking to him. "Oh sorry Kat I wasn't paying attention. The blood god cult is one the the things that set me off to where I go into kill all mode." He then sighs "Yeah fighting in here is a bad idea, lets work on getting people to safety and then I can track down their leader and take him out." He gets his cell out. "I should get a hold of Dusk and see if he can provide back up but I want to assess the situation. Something doesn't seems right." He then looks at Kat. "Why would the cultist attack a school? It doesn't make sense."

((I been thinking I should change Spyke's name to Ryu or something less crazy.))  

[Fadedepic]

Martini took his glock out and reloaded it before putting it in Haven's hand. "Aim it at the right people."

Gareth shook his head. Rain had a good point, but fighting is a lot different than playing superhero. "The entire city is in open conflict." He shouted over the barrage of gunfire as the cultists were now being combated by the city's SWAT officers, making the fields around the school become a battlefield with the surrounding buildings. Gareth put a .308 semi-automatic rifle in Rain's hands and ushered her into the building out of the way of the battle. "I understand the urge to save everybody, but we can't do that. Right now, we look out for our own - nobody else." He said with cold decision. "Search the math wing. We can only hold three or four stragglers. That's it. After that, we can't hold any more. You can hold your own in a gunfight with these inaccurate slobs, so you can go into the Arts department. Search thoroughly, then rendezvous at the cafeteria. Me and Martini will go down the Math wing. Go."  

[Uncle Sciz]

"Well then!" Sciz clapped his hands together. "I guess I'll head to the auditorium," he said enthusiastically. "That's bound to be where the majority of students are held." He walked into the building, and disappeared into the many halls that branched off from the main path.  

[X_HeartofRoses_X]

Hollow grinned as the gun was placed into her hands. "Sure, sure...~" She said, gripping the gun with a manaic giggle. "So! Where do I go, then?~"

I'll play along for now... as long as I get to kill something.  

[Serenla the Cat]

Rain thought it was incredibly stupid of Martini to give the girl a gun. She was obviously up to no good, but no one seemed to notice. Or... maybe they did, and she was being overly suspicious of this girl. Would she really take away this girls only defense in a building full of cultists simply because she didn't trust her? Oh, you know very well that is NOT the case. Or did you not see the part where she completely fell apart. That's not natural, that girl is not natural, and you have every reason not to trust her with a weapon. Rain pushed away the nagging little voice. It wasn't like she could do anything about it.

She headed to the Art Dept. without a word, though not sure how she was going to find it. The school seemed to become a battleground very suddenly, and Rain found herself dodging bullets and shooting around corners before she finally found the lone hall that was the art classrooms. She began pounding on a door, and heard a few kids start sobbing. Right... lockdown. The only way she was going to get into one of those classrooms would be to shoot the hell out of the lock, and she wasn't about to leave them defenseless. Instead, she began yelling for Seth into each classroom, though that hardly did anything. Finally, at one door, a boy came to the door. Rain sighed with relief, until he yelled back. Seth had never shown up for class, he said, and Rain turned without another word. The kid was probably dead by now, and she'd have to be the one to tell Gareth. She headed to the cafeteria, and walked right in. Then did a 180 and walked straight back out, and broke into a run. That was a LOT of cultists. Instead, Rain began to search for the others; the cafeteria was definitely out of the question.  

[Uncle Sciz]

The door handle to the Auditorium slowly turned as Sciz walked out, a group of students following him out and a nondescrepit arm in his other hand. His suit had been ruined in the process, and with a quick change, he was now wearing a large brown overcoat with jeans and a white t-shirt. "Man, I haven't worn something like this in ages," He said, checking the various pockets of his overcoat. He turned to his side and looked at the students following him. "Are you going to go, or are you going to stare at me like an idiot?"

The students started heading to the school's exit, and Sciz turned the other way to continue his search for Seth. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Rain running from a nearby hall. "Rain!" He shouted. "How goes the search?"  

[Serenla the Cat]

Rain saw Sciz, and skidded to a stop. She sighed, not sure how to tell him. "Seth never showed up for class. He would've been locked out of the classroom, left out with the cultists. If he's alive, I have a feeling they plan on making him wish he wasn't," she said, hoping she was wrong. Maybe he was hiding somewhere, out of reach, out of sight. Unlikely, but the cultists didn't really have reason to be searching for him specifically, did they?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Serenla only sat for a moment before scrambling for a good place to hide. Unable to think clearly, and shaking visibly, Serenla was unsuccessful, and was in between shelves when she heard the door open. She heard only one set of footsteps, as the cultist began walking down the long aisles of shelves for stray students. Serenla heard him stop at the one just ahead of hers, and in her panic, came up with a shoddy plan. She began clumsily but quietly scaling the shelf. At the top, she looked down, and saw that she hadn't been quiet enough. A bullet streaked up, narrowly missing her but pulling a few of her hairs. She panicked, and fell backwards. The tall shelf tilted in the opposite direction, and Serenla landed hard on her back, the air wooshing soundlessly from her lungs. The bookshelf, however, continued to fall, and landed, of course, on the cultist. It also managed to set a chain reaction, knocking down the other bookshelves like a huge scale line of dominoes. The noise traveled far, and Serenla was hardly capable of getting up, let alone running away.  

[Ryuzki Hygaea]

Ryu stopped and listen hearing something loud fell not too far from where he and Kat are at. "Did you hear that?" He then looked around trying to figure from where the noise came from. "Sounds like a bunch of shelves falling over. I could never forget that sound, Jay once knocked down all of the shelves in the royal library trying to find a certain book." He then looks at Kat. "Which way to the library?"  

[X_HeartofRoses_X]

Since no one answered her, Hollow decided to tag along with wherever Martini decided to go.  

[Uncle Sciz]

"Huh, well that's strange," Sciz said, taking a bite out of the arm. "Well, do you know where Martini and Gareth went? We should probably meet up with them." He stopped and thought for a moment. "What were you running from, anyways?"  

[Serenla the Cat]

Kat realized as soon as he said library who was responsible for the shelves. She groaned loudly, and took off running in the direction of the library.

"This way!" she yelled, slowing at the corner so he wouldn't lose her. Stupid, stupid kid.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Rain, having for a moment forgotten why she had been running so fast, took a quick look over her shoulder. She sighed, surprised that she had either lost them, or they hadn't bothered to follow. Maybe they hadn't even noticed. It had still been very startling though.

"Well, I think someone else has chosen the cafeteria as their rendezvous point..." she said, again looking over her shoulder, just in case. She heard the crash, and considered going to check it out, but decided she had better warn Martini and Gareth about the cafeteria first. Maybe help a few classrooms out. She began helping the ones closest to the exits, clearing the area of cultists before convincing the teachers to open up so she could help them. She wasn't a cop, so most of them were skeptical, but she didn't look like a cultists, so after one teacher trusted her, the rest saw her helping out and followed suit. She would give a teacher and the most capable two students a gun, to keep them covered, and trailed the class with her own. It was slow work, but it was fairly effective. Hardly any students were shot, and even fewer died.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

She heard the cultists rushing in before she found the breath to move. Everything had started going dark for a moment, and she was so dazed it hardly registered in her head how much danger she was in. There were quite a few of them; not surprising, with that much noise, they must have expected quite a few people. She stayed low to the ground, and started crawling. She squirmed her way under one of the bookshelves that hadn't quite fallen flat, praying that they didn't expect any student to be so small. Serenla struggled to fill her lungs in the tiny amount of space, and still breath quietly. She wound up taking short, quick breaths until she felt as though she would pass out before forcing herself to try to breath easier. She trembled, and tears fell into the rough carpet. Please let someone come, she thought. I don't want to die this way. If they kill me here. What if they're taking prisoners. Oh god oh god oh god. Serenla realized she was about to faint, and stopped herself mid panic again. Stay calm. She had to stay calm.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Left on his own and unable to keep up with his sister, Mat began to try to clear the halls so that maybe some students could get out. It proved slow work, as his spells mostly killed slowly. Fire, poison... the only one that killed quickly was lightning, but it took up much more energy. He was only able to put up a light armor spell, and really wished that he had been making more time for lessons with his mentor.  

[Ryuzki Hygaea]

Ryu quickly follows Kat keeping up with her as the best he could. "Once we get to the library, I need you to stay out of site while I kill any cultist that might have gotten in. The most likely thing is that someone is hiding in there and might have made a noise and the cult is hunting them down." He then has a fireball ready to throw at the cultists. "For the moment let me do the fighting, just stay out of the way. You're quick and all but this is a real battle no war. At this rate we will have a all out war just to wipe the cult out."  

[WritingWithLove]

Ella screamed as the shots were fired, and she hid behind Phoenix. She covered her ears from the piercing blasts, and she said loudly, "Get me out of here!"  

[X_HeartofRoses_X]

Phoenix hissed as the bullets fired at them, removing his bangle slowly and firing a stream of fire from his hand, singing the cultists that had fired at them to ash. "Run!" He yelled, slipping the bangle back on and ushering the kids forward, following behind them. "Hurry! To the castle!"