Chapter 23

Not waiting for anyone else in the little group to come to the same conclusion she’d come to, Anna peeled out of the classroom stumbling and sliding into the hall only to be stopped short when the texture of the floor surface changed suddenly in the dark-un-frozen hallway. Though she’d managed to encase many of the smaller monsters in ice, there was still the sound of battle coming from Mrs. Deville’s classroom where she knew a car-form had challenged the couple there.

It actually sounded like Mister Deville was having fun despite the noise as he was shouting things like, “Come to daddy.” and “Take that you fowl beast.” But when he called out, “Babe, watch this and toss me some of the condoms from your purse because this bastard is about to get fuc – ”

The words were drowned out by a clearly pained roar or grinding metal-organic gears. It cut short suddenly which meant it was probably dead and Anna grimaced at the weirdness of adults as she shook off the sound of Mrs. Deville exclaiming breathlessly to her husband.

“Oh, Marax, that was amazing.” She giggled. Giggled. And the white-haired teen turned to the boys and the teacher behind her as she shuddered before gesturing for them to go.

“That ice isn’t going to last long against the big thing out there. It’s just hiding us from it for now. Go. Go to the main entrance where the busses are coming in.” Two of the boys ushered their teacher between them and Liam came up to Anna.

“What about you?” He questioned intently. “What are you doing?” Anna didn’t have an exact answer for him but she had the vague outlines of a plan.

“I’m going to try and help anyone who needs it and make it as difficult as possible for anything that gets in here to follow."

“An excellent plan, Anna.” Marax Deville walked up with his wife linked arm in arm. Lian gave a shout of fear when he saw the professor’s bull-head. It must have been a transformation because some of his wife’s lipstick was smeared across the lips of his bull form to disappear into the fur of his muzzle. The lipstick wouldn’t have been visible on an illusion. “Buck up boy,” he dusted some frost off Liam’s shoulder. “It’s just me.” Liam leaned back a bit but he didn’t flinch much at the professor’s touch.

“Thank you, Mister Deville.” As she said the name, Anna watched Liam begin repeatedly mouthing it questioningly at Anna behind Marax’s back, pointing at what appeared to be a tall demon in what was clearly an imperial style military uniform. The boy was distracting her from what the teacher was saying.

“Anna, with me. We’ll clear this corridor room by room sending any surviving stragglers ahead to evacuate.” He cocked his head at Anna quizzically as she alternated nodding at the instructions that the powerful minotaur was giving her and shaking her head at Liam to stop. “Are you paying attention, Anna?”

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The minotaur narrowed his eyes at her then glanced over his shoulder to Liam who shrank back as Anna mouthed, ‘Shut up!’ at him. Mrs. Deville giggled at the interplay between the trio. Liam sidled over to stand beside Anna, maybe slightly behind her. The minotaur’s narrowed eyes followed the boy suspiciously.

“I’m ready, Sir.” Anna volunteered to get his attention off of Liam who was not nearly as brave in the presence of a friendly teacher who looked slightly different than normal, as he had been in front of mindless monster machines. “I wanted to seal the hallway with an ice wall after each classroom to cover our retreat.”

“Ughm.” That caught the teacher off guard as he made a disappointed sound somewhere between a cough and an ‘um’. Anna didn’t know what his problem was, but she didn’t want to keep standing around talking. She could sense the ice wall slowly losing structural integrity from the monsters assaulting it. There were still people shouting in some of the populated rooms.

“I’d like to leave a route open back to this location.” The demon minotaur exclaimed in his deep bestial voice with an incongruous British accent. “Eik,” He gestured to his wife holding his arm and leaning her head against his shoulder. “She’s going to stay here and guard our rear. I will come back to help her after everyone evacuates.”

“Riiight.” Anna glanced at the absurdly beautiful young teacher, not entirely believing that she really wanted to stay behind. Anna had seen with her own eyes just how powerful the woman was and that she had not been strong enough to face down the monsters on her own. Liam began to speak up something that would have been stupid anyways and Anna elbowed him to keep his mouth shut. “If that’s what you want to do, Mrs. Deville?”

“It is.” The teacher smiled brilliantly. “I have means of protecting myself that I can’t use around others.” She explained in her kind and gentle way, alleviating almost all of Anna’s concerns. “I’m the best choice to hold the rear.”

“Okay.” That was fine. That, actually, made a lot of sense.

“Liam, you be ready to escort any survivors to safety, Mr. Deville instructed. “Anna, you’ll be my defensive support. Raise shields in front of me while you stay in position behind me and to my right. I’ll enter each room first. Once the entrance is clear to the right, I’ll enter and go to the left and you will enter to the right. Hold and clear that corner while providing supporting cover fire with ice spikes and creating ice wall barriers as necessary.”

“Yes, Sir.” Her heart was pounding. Part of Anna was frightened of what they would find. But part of her, was rejoicing just a little bit that she was going to be using more of her magic.

“Have you done this before, Anna?” Liam hissed a bit loudly as she followed Mr. Marax dutifully.

“Yes.”

“Yes?” It came out as a high-pitched yelp.

“I assumed you had gotten at least some basic training from your mother.” Marax commented a little self-satisfied that his assessment had been correct.

“Never with monsters this large before. Never without my mom and sister there leading me.” It was whispered thoughtfully. Marax just nodded amiably.

“This will be the same. But we may be too late to save everyone.”