Rivals

Brent couldn't breathe.

There was a ton of bricks and broken masonry and girders on his chest, compressing his lungs. His body, enhanced by the green fire, fought valiantly to rebuild his broken bones, to grow new muscle tissue to replace what had been torn or crushed. He could feel every cell in his body straining, urgently reaching for health, for strength. His arms twitched as his hands pushed and heaved at the weight on top of him. A few bricks toppled down from the pile. Then a few more. A broken girder clattered away and there was a puff of plaster dust as he exhaled a stifling breath from his battered lungs.

His fingertips broke through, into open air. He shoved his hand out and reached for something, anything he could grip. He got hold of the twisted piece of rebar his sister had almost impaled him on, and pulled.

Like a snake emerging from its old skin, he slithered out of the rubble. Exhausted, used up, he dragged himself on top of the pile and just lay there for a while, breathing, healing, not thinking at all.

When his eyes finally opened again he saw nothing but destruction. Half the school had collapsed under its own weight. It was like Mandy Hunt's house but on a far greater scale. He saw what his sister had done, and he knew what he had to do next.

When he pushed his way through the buckled fire doors at the back of the school his clothes were in tatters and his face was filthy with his own clotted blood. He thought he must look monstrous, like some creature out of a mad scientist's lab tortured into abominable life. He didn't have time to worry about how he looked, however.

His entire class of students was standing in the parking lot, watching him. Some of them gasped when they saw him come walking out of a cloud of dust and smoke. Some of them screamed. He saw the teachers and the vice principals trying to maintain order. He scanned the crowd and found Jill and Dana, standing near the back. They had been among the first to escape, he supposed.

He walked over to them and the crowd parted around him. A few cheers went up but very few of the students joined in. They didn't understand what had happened, or what any of it meant.

"Brent," Dana said, staring at him. "Oh, Brent. You're alive."

"Yeah," he said, and tried to smile at her. "And I need a favor. You've got a driver's license, right?"

She did. She even had a car in the parking lot. So much the better. When the three of them (Jill insisted on coming along) climbed in and she turned the key, he lay back in the seat and closed his eyes, desperately needing a few moments of rest.

Then someone slapped the hood, and his eyes shot open. It was Weathers, who was coming around to his side of the car. The FBI man looked angry.

Wearily, Brent lowered his window.

"Where do you think you're going?" Weathers asked.

"Home," Brent told him. Which was true, as far as it went. He needed to stop there before they got back on the road. He figured he knew where Maggie was headed and he had to get there before she could hurt Lucy. He didn't tell Weathers any of that, though. "I need to take a nap." Which was also true, though he knew he wouldn't have the chance. There was no time to waste.

"Uh-huh. I bet you do. You and I need to talk," Weathers insisted. "This has gone way too far."

"Later."

Weathers started to pull open the car door but Dana locked it before he could raise the handle. She stepped on the gas and Weathers jumped back as she sped out of the parking lot and onto the highway.

"Thanks," Brent said.

Dana glanced over her shoulder at him. "No problem. But shouldn't you have told him what you're going to do? I mean, the police could take care of this, couldn't they?"

"I'm not really crazy about the police right now," Brent told her. "And as for Weathers, I don't trust him as far as I can - um." He reconsidered what he was about to say. "I mean, I don't trust him as far as he can throw me. He wouldn't try to capture Maggie. He would just try to kill her, at this point."

"Sounds like a happy ending to me," Jill said.

"Jill!" Dana scolded.

"If there's a way I can finish this without anyone dying, I'm going to find it," Brent muttered. "Is that really what you want, Jill? For Maggie to get killed? You put yourself in danger back there just to buy me some time. I didn't know you hated her so much. I mean, you two aren't friends, but - "

"We're rivals," Jill told him. "I'm in competition with every girl in school, including your sister. And when I compete, I always win, one way or another. Helping you send her to jail will be an acceptable conclusion. You can't be popular when you're in prison."

"They have to wear those ugly orange jumpsuits," Dana said.

"Exactly. You can't be popular in an orange jumpsuit."

As they headed up the on ramp, Jill craned over the back of Brent's seat and pointed through the windshield. "Look at it," she said. Brent saw what remained of the high school, the entire gym and the assembly hall fallen in like impact craters, a few jagged walls sticking up from the foundations where classrooms had been. "She smashed up half the school." She grinned wickedly. "Now who's the hero?"