School Spirit (Part Fifteen)

The feeling of blood pounding in my head wasn't enough to keep the sound of what seemed like the world tearing itself apart from piercing my ear drums.

I had been fortunate enough to keep from shooting directly into a vein of magma, but what I had done in a bout of self-preservation had been enough to make the volcano go off. Damn Danger Room. However, it still had to follow the rules of nature. It wasn't just going to explode, which was why it had been giving off the warning tremors earlier.

That didn't mean it was going to wait politely for us to get to a safe distance either. There might not have been a safe distance, all things considered.

The volcano rumbled as I picked myself up off of the ground. I didn't go 'splat' after my very high, very scary fall. That was a start. It didn't mean that I still wasn't going to die. I started running toward Hisako and grabbed onto her wrist as I got close. We needed to get out of the dome. Everyone needed to get as far away from it as possible.

"Come on, come on, come on!" I repeated rapidly. Maybe if I said it enough, it would help us go faster.

"Is it going!?" Hisako asked as we ran for the edge of the dome. "Whatever! Who cares? We don't need to be here anymore anyway! We've got the thing!" She seemed pleased with herself as she showed me the objective she'd managed to snag.

Truer words had not yet been spoken. Even so, I didn't want to hear about the glorified game we were playing. I snatched the thing right out of her hands and stashed it away, "Screw the thing! Climb, woman!"

We both clawed and scrambled our way up the slope before getting to the edge. Stopping and looking over, the outside of the volcano seemed a lot steeper from that perspective than it had been when we had been going up it in the first place. If we ran down, we were going to fall and break our necks.

Well, I would break my neck.

With a turn of my head, I could see the other students regrouping, Julian and Brian had met up again, and Sofia had landed near the blonde girl she had on her team – Laurie. This didn't need a three-way team battle.

We had the objective. No matter what happened from here on out, they would follow us, which meant we could get them off of the volcano before the whole thing popped. We just had to be moving fast, and there was only one thing that came to mind in a matter of seconds that could work for us.

"Armor up!" I shouted at Hisako. Before she could question it, or really react in any way, I full-body tackled her off the edge of the summit. The terrified scream in my ear was deafening, but she was fine.

More importantly, we had a quick way down now. There was no time to explain, especially when I only needed partial participation on her end for my idea to work. Whether or not my ingenuity would be appreciated later remained to be seen at the time, but it definitely wasn't praised in the heat of the moment. I do have to say though, Hisako made a fantastic mountain luge.

"I hate you, Sol!" The poor girl simply did not appreciate the extended uses of her power, or my timely thinking.

"Noted!" I remarked, keeping myself low on top of her so I didn't fly off, "Can you roll over or something so you can steer? I don't think I can move you around when you're like this."

I tried to pretend that her arms flailing around above her were her attempts to either guide us down the mountain, or safely cradle me to her bosom. It was nicer to think that way about my teammate instead of the likely reality that she really wanted to swat me off .

Eventually, we did manage to get her flipped over onto her belly. She did her best to try and swim through land to keep us from plowing into any upturned rocks. I heard another loud noise from the volcano and turned around to see if it had blown yet. Not quite, though I did see that we were under pursuit.

Julian and Brian were hot on our heels, but the former couldn't really use his powers on us as well as I figured he would have. His arms were under Brian's arms so that he could fly along with him. I wanted to laugh. Every time he had used his telekinesis on us, he had used his hands to focus. Without full range of motion, his aim was not great.

Even so, if he got us, we would all be screwed. It wouldn't just be me and Hisako.

Rocks around us that Hisako wasn't slamming into were bursting with green outlines around them. I saw his hand get more on-target with us and suddenly sent out a concussive blast to the side, moving us out of the way. Hisako let out a surprised yelp, but kept us going downhill, "Yo! Stop! There's a volcano about to go off back there if you haven't noticed!"

"Hah! This is more important that some lame simulation hazard," Julian replied. He had found a way to maneuver his wrist under Brian's arms to try and grab us with his mutant power. It wasn't perfect, but eventually it would be enough.

I thought about shooting him, but if he got caught up in the eruption because I shot him down... well, I didn't dislike him that much, "Keller, quit being an ass! I'm serious!" I said in my persuasive manner, "The Danger Room is going to murder all of us if we don't get away from here!"

There was no reason to try and keep the cat in the bag at this point. If people thought I was crazy, that was fine at this point. This place was making its move now.

As unfortunate as it was though, I didn't exactly have a sterling reputation with the leader of the Hellions. That and the normal skepticism that came with anyone saying anything was amiss with the X-Men's most trusted piece of equipment meant what I had to say meant nothing.

Julian didn't let up. I had to keep helping Hisako dodge, "Ha! No way the advisors would let something bad actually happen in here!" Sometimes, I hated the people who went here so much, "Now quit making excuses, and get ready to eat dirt."

Instead of us eating dirt, Julian and Brian ate a whirlwind.

Much like the last time, it knocked him off-course, but not out of the running. The Hellions and the New Mutants were rival squads, so he had probably taken his fair share of wind attacks. All he really did was complain.

"Sof, if you throw one more wind storm at me!" Julian threatened aimlessly. He had to focus more on keeping himself in the air and keeping a hold of Brian than fighting, "Bri, stop squirming!"

Brian was terrified, and with good reason. He had hitched a ride under the pretense that Julian would be the only one in the area with aerial combat capabilities, "Your flying is really sucking right now!"

As bad as her fighting them would have been, it was worse, because of course she was after Hisako and I, "You're not getting away!"

I wondered where Laurie was, because she wasn't with her, when I saw her lagging behind in the arms of the second flyer on the New Mutants; the red-haired, red-winged Jay Guthrie. He must have been their backup.

This goddamn test. It was going to get us all killed, and not by each other.

"Sofia, stop!" I snapped, dodging her attempts to blow us off of the mountain. She was using more control than I figured she would have at this juncture in the competition. From what I'd heard, she could be a hothead, "Seriously, I'm not even kidding! Fuck off already!"

"There is no way we are losing when we have come this far!" Sofia said with determination burning in her eyes.

That was it. I was done. If people didn't want to listen, that was fine. I would worry about me and mine. If my team were the only ones who would get with the program, so be it.

I grit my teeth and held up the glowing ball that signified an objective. Everyone else's eyes were locked on it, "Fine! You all want the stupid thing so bad!? You can all just have-!"

"Sol, no!" It was Hisako who talked me down, "If you give it to one of them, they'll just stop here. That, or the other will just try to fight them here."

They would be dead meat when the volcano went off. Giving up the objective in my hand now would just get them killed. It was why I hadn't tried to shoot anyone down yet, even if I was fed up.

I was stressed, paranoid, and tired of trying to convince people that there was something wrong again and again. I knew, so saving myself was possible. It wasn't my problem if no one wanted to listen.

...Only, it was.

Wasn't that what being a hero was all about? Working to do what you thought was right, even when it was hard? There was no way I could just let the worst happen without at least trying, no matter what anyone said.

I looked back at Hisako. She still cared, even though everyone else was making it hell to try and get through everything in one piece. I wouldn't have been much of a friend or a teammate if I just decided to back off when she was still trying just because it wasn't easy.

Well, since we were all going down the volcano anyway, I might as well encourage everyone to keep coming after us and get away from the thing faster.

I put the objective away and fired two shots at both Sofia and Julian. When I was sure I had their attention back, I flipped them both off and sped up, firing an extended blast that boosted us along down the volcano faster.

They certainly came at us with more heat afterwards, so there was that at least. And it was good timing as well.

The moment the volcano went off was surreal. The mountain depressed inwards on itself before blowing out of its top. I wouldn't have called it an eruption so much as I would have called it an explosion. The whole damn thing blew apart.

Rocks flew everywhere, but they were just a small hazard compared to the gigantic death cloud of ash that came steaming out into the air.

For those who were capable of flight, they slowed down to turn and look at the blast. This was an unwise choice for oh so many reasons, "Don't stop, you morons! Keep going!" Now wasn't the time for 'I-told-you-so'. The mountain underneath Hisako and I was turning into chunks of soft rock that we were almost gliding through. We were dead if we slowed down, or I was at least.

Julian looked back fearfully, but picked up his pace, flying himself and Brian past Hisako and I, "What the hell? What's happening!" He asked in a panic.

My answer was short, sweet, and explained all that needed to be known, "Volcano! Eruption! Fucking fly!"

Sofia kept her hands over her ears. The sound of the original blast was loud enough to leave my ears ringing and I knew it was coming. For the unprepared, it was probably much worse. She turned her back toward the eruption and shouted in horror, "Jay! Laurie!"

They had been closer to the eruption than any of us. A side effect of Jay showing up to pick up Laurie after Sofia started coming after me. I could see that one of Jay's wings wasn't flapping properly as he tried to fly. Sofia slowed down to allow them to catch up properly so that she could try to protect them or get them moving faster.

He looked like he was in pain. A lot of it. At least everyone was still alive.

I braced as we reached the bottom of the volcano and shot fairly deep into the forest. Hisako bowled over a few weaker trees before she slowed down too much for us to use riding her as a means to travel. Instead of flying away like Julian and Brian, Sofia touched down in the woods nearby, still helping Jay and Laurie.

Jay dropped to a knee, gritting his teeth in pain. Once we were close, I could finally see what the problem was. Some of the ash from the volcano had gotten to him. It had landed on his wing. I could see how bad the burn was, without even knowing enough about anatomy to tell how wings were damaged.

"Grrr," Jay growled under his breath, trying to hold in his pain, "Where's Josh?" He asked, a kind of down home drawl to his voice, "Could really use some o' that magic touch right about now."

Laurie didn't know what to do. None of them were healers. None of us were either. They had one on their team, but he wasn't around, "He's with Nori and David," She said before looking up at us, "We have to get back to the rest of our team."

"Well, we've got to find our people too," I said. I could sympathize, and I didn't want to leave them alone, but I needed to link back up with the rest of the Paladins, "I mean, I'm not really worried. As long as Eddie is with Ruth, they'll probably be fine. But then again... I don't trust this place."

Hisako spoke up, "Speaking of which," She pointed in the direction of the volcano. We could already see the gray cloud moving through the trees, "That ash isn't going to stop coming this way. We've got to keep going, now. Run," She grabbed my arm and pulled me along, as if she needed to. The New Mutants got with the program and hustled along as well.

While Sofia could have flown faster than her teammates could run, she stuck with them on the ground, making sure Laurie could help Jay along. That was admirable. Julian and Brian were long gone though. It was luck that Hisako and I had wound up anywhere near the New Mutants as fast as we all went flying into the woods. Those two had stayed in the air and were probably trying to find the rest of the Hellions.

No one around me had gotten killed so far. That was good. I just hoped there hadn't been anyone else close to the volcano when it blew.