PLAN

Taevlin looked at his two comrades utterly irritated with them. They were standing in the middle of the school hallway waiting for the last class of the day could end so that they could finally finish what they had been sent to do. He ran a hand through his ash gray hair resisting the urge to hit the two for not going on with the original plan, grab the girl, open an Egress to the Mid Dimension on the other side of The Gate, and deliver her to Headmaster. Their mission was as simple as that. Grab the girl and leave.

Artin was complicating things more than they should have been. The redhead had always been fascinated with the earthen side of the gate, for reasons Taevlin could not put beside himself to comprehend. It was a dream come true for the young drakkon. He was just but twenty seasons on this side of the gate but just around a hundred from the Merkon side, where he was from.

Sevin Brashwa was speaking animately with Artin Keina Verancy. Very much like the young drakkon, the blonde-haired werewolf was very much intrigued with the earthen side of the Gate. Taevlin, on the other hand, had no wish to associate himself with mere humans for more than was necessary. He wished Headmaster had chosen others to deal with the situation for it was not as difficult as he had expected. Surely he had better assignments to be given because of his rank? What had him slightly intrigued, however, was the energy signature the human, Lexine Woods, possessed. It was nearly as high as his father's. She was so young and seemed so harmless.

How could a weakly human such as she, possess such a signature? Was she human to begin with? Surely with their weak body constitution, she should have burst from the inside out with such an energy signature? Taevlin intended to figure all this out.

Maybe she was more than met the eye but she did not have a clue.

The bell for the end of the school day rang and Taevlin felt like stuffing his ears with cotton. This bell was even worse than the one they had at the academy!

The hallways were beginning to fill up with humans and their conversations hurt his ears. He was not used to verbal communication as his people communicated using their minds.

Their enhanced hearing made it painful to converse verbally. He had just come from a long holiday. Since they did not converse verbally in his home, he had almost forgotten how it felt.

He resisted the urge to clap his hands over his ears and maybe shout at the humans to keep their mouths shut.

To make it worse, there were some who had stuck some weird wire things in their ears.

Out of those objects came some kind of earthen music that hurt his ears even more than their speaking. How the human ears were able to survive while going through such torture was simply beyond his understanding.

'The classes have ended Artin. I suggest we go forth as agreed so as we go back to the academy. I tire being in the presence of these humans and their idle chatter.' he sent them a mind wave and they turned to him as if just noticing his presence. Sometimes his presence could go completely unnoticed. That is if they were not concentrating on his strong energy signature. His intrusion on their minds every time he wanted to speak, however, was not something one got easily used to. Even if to his kind it was perfectly normal.

"Of course. I think we have dawdled enough." the drakkon nodded and tapped his waist where his twin swords lay, still in their scabbards. A glamor had been placed upon all their weapons to keep the humans from seeing them and uselessly overreacting as their kind was known to. He had not even needed them this whole time.

The earthen side of the Gate was calm. He had not seen any lurking monsters, nor had he seen anyone fighting with another. It was nothing like the humans that were explained in their history.

Taevlin looked around until he spotted Lexine Woods with Ceeret. It was like they were glued onto each other's sides. She was making a simple package delivery so difficult since they could do nothing in front of her human friend.

'I will glamor the unwanted human. Sevin, you should get Lexine Woods since your strength should be enough to hold her down as Artin Keina Verancy opens the Egress.' The werewolf growled lowly at the direct order but nodded while the drakkon remained impassive. 'Please let us not dawdle any longer than necessary.' He stared at the two pointedly before walking off to glamor the said female.

***

Lexine sighed when the bell rang. The first school day was over and nothing had happened to her. Now she just had to get home and she would be fine. Her coal hair was a tangled mess due to the number of times she had run a hand through it. It was curious that the three guys were not in her final class. Especially since they had been in all her other classes.

Ceeret was convinced Lexine was being paranoid for no apparent reason. If they were going to do something bad to her, wouldn't they have done something already? Apart from the confrontation they had that morning, they had kept their distance, for which Lexine was extremely grateful for. The last thing she wanted was to cause a scene in the school compound.

After everyone had left the class, Lexine and Ceeret made a beeline for the door. Lexine stopped just as they were at the door.

She peaked her head out the door and looked both ways before gesturing for Ceeret to follow her. The red-head rolled her eyes at her friend but walked out as instructed. For every corner they had to take, Lexine paused, peaked, to see if the three guys were anywhere to be seen before dragging Ceeret with her.

"You do know that we are not in an action movie right. You are being paranoid Lex." It was times like this Lexine acted so much out of character. She was usually a quiet and cold but approachable sort of person if that made sense. But at this moment she acted so much like a child Ceeret was tempted to screw open her head and check if the brain was still intact.

Lexine shot her friend a glare, before puffing her chest out, "I might be James Bond in disguise."

Ceeret snickered at the thought but stuck to hitting Lexine on the back of her head. "Snap out of it dumbass. I owe you chocolate. Today is officially day one, even though it is technically not morning, I want chocolate."

Ceeret looped her arm around Lexines' and dragged her off. Lexine remained rigid as if the three guys would pop up out of nowhere and drag her off. There was a shop down the street that Lexine and Ceeret bought sugary treats which Ceeret's mother did not allow her to take. During her moments with Lexine would she sneak and eat as much sugar she could stuff herself with.

"I will go get my bag then we meet at my car. I think you need to drop off that book and get your bag too?" Ceeret pointed to the book in her friend's arm. Before Lexine could utter even a word, Cee had sauntered away leaving Lexine standing in the middle of the hallway. Lexine's chest constricted. She grabbed the fabric above her chest.

Was this a panic attack? Lexine pinched herself before walking towards her locker. She was being paranoid for no reason at all. There were people all around her.

They would not do anything that would attract attention, would they? She doubted it. Reaching her locker, she pulled out her black school bag and threw the book into the locker. She only had an Engish assignment and that was due in two weeks. She would procrastinate till the day before it was due. Or she could do it early for once? Lexine laughed at the thought. Like that was going to happen. Even if she did it early, she would be left with nothing to do. There was nothing more beautiful than struggling to finish an assignment the day before it was due.

Lexine shut her locker, planning to give herself a homework free day. She would begin her assignments the next day.

.

Ceeret hummed as she walked to her locker. There was a skip in her step that earned her odd looks from the people around her. It was almost like she was happy being back to school.

Ceeret, on the other hand, was harboring illegal sweet thoughts in her head. After a milkshake she would get ice cream, then a doughnut and juice. No, two doughnuts. Then she would top it off with a good bar of chocolate that her mom would kill her if she knew.

Her mother liked dragging the whole family in the outrageous diets that lasted months. Hiding stashes of candy all around the house was no use since it seemed her mother had a nose for sugar. Needless to say, getting her mother angry was never a good idea.

Ceeret neatly placed the book in her locker, took out her bag, and put in the book she needed for the evening. Someone patted her shoulder from behind her and Ceeret jumped up in shock.

It seemed Lexine's jitters were starting to get to her too. She composed herself for a second before turning to the owner of the voice behind her. It was the silver-haired guy from that morning. She wondered how he had gotten into the school with his dyed hair.

Her eyes landed on the silver earring dangling on his ear drawn to it. It was a simple two rods that were intertwined together held by a small silver ball at the bottom. He was too close for comfort and she took a surreptitious step back, only to be hit by the locker door.

"Hi." She smiled toothily peeling her gaze from his earring, "May I help you? Are you lost."

He did not speak for a few seconds just gazing into her green orbs. Ceeret was close to pushing him aside to get back to Lexine when he grabbed her arm and mumbled something under his breath and a sweet smell filled her nostrils. Ceeret scrunched her face up. There were no flowers in the school. Her attention was returned to the silver-haired guy who stood before her. "I am sorry, where are we?" she looked around and shook her head as if trying to get out of a daze.

"That was easier than expected." Taevlin shook his head and scoffed at the fact that humans thought themselves superior beings. He channeled his energy signature and send a mind wave to the two idiots who were on the mission with him.

'Human has been taken care of. The rest is up to the two of you. I will open my own egress and meet you both at the academy. You have ten minutes.' He turned to the red-headed female who had now sauntered down the hallway. Her eyes were slightly dazed and she took in the school hallway in awe.

Taevlin chuckled to himself. The effects of mixing wolfsbane, jasmine, and aloe vera were very different on humans. It usually caused a fifteen-minute sleep to drakkons and and Shadow Beings. If inhaled by werewolves it caused them to pass out for an hour or two.

Wolfsbane, however, was very deadly to werewolves so he avoided using his creation on any werewolf he knew. He threw one last glance at the human who was now talking to two other human boys.

The boys seemed confused about how she was acting.

Taevlin walked into an empty class and took out a small brown leather pouch from his pocket. Out of it, he removed a few grains of what would look like sand to the human eyes. Taevlin threw them to the ground and spoke under his breath, "Deschid Ieşire. Eirene Academy!" The wind blew all around him and lifted his black shirt up slightly. His hair flew to his face and his earring bobbed on his neck. A small circle appeared on the floor and he gestured using his hands a widening motion and the circle got bigger till below him he saw the familiar school grounds.

Opening an egress as he had done was tricky because it had not been opened by a suitable door maker hence was very unstable. He could easily get hurt or the scene could suddenly change and he would fall to his doom.

He pictured where he wanted to land in his head as he waited for the Egress to steady, before jumping in. His clothes fluttered around him and he shut his eyes and felt the wind weave between the spaces in his clothes. Slowly he accustomed his fall to the wind and landed softly on the grass. He looked up to see the Egress immediately close.

****

Deschid Iesire. Eirene Academy. - I open Egress. Eirene Academy.

S/T:

Ceeret: (Walks around the school in daze)

Some freshman years: isn't that the head of the cheerleading squad.

Ceeret: (walks up to them and pinches them on their cheeks) what cute little monkeys.

The freshmen: ...