The Academy (Part 2 of the Syndicate Series)

Chapter 15- The Front Office

Rosine:

We were each in my room, waiting on edge for Forte to show up.

Dinner had been a quiet affair, our isolated little table silent as the room around us filled with other students chatting and laughing. As usual, a random person or two would stop by and say hello, usually to Daitan or Nyoka, but none of us said much to each other. We were all plagued by nerves and the constant worry about what might happen if we were to get caught tonight. Suspension if we were lucky.

Even now, perched on the edge of my bed, the small amount of soup that I ate was rolling in my stomach. There were people here ready to kill me, they had already proven that, and I was putting my friends out in the open with myself, ready to be caught. It was enough to make anyone nervous.

Daitan and Nyoka were talking quietly by the door, leaning against the walls while intermittently switching to a slow pacing pattern across the front of the room. Phoenix, on the other hand, was settled into the chair where she was reading before but now fiddled with a lighter in her fingers.

All of us were dressed in black in the hopes that if the security cameras weren't in high definition, it might help us escape detection. I doubted that a school like this spared any expense, though, and in order for this to work, there couldn't be anyone in the front office to see the security feed.

"Do you think everything is alright?" Daitan wrung her hands lightly, "It's already fifteen minutes past ten, what if the plan didn't work? What if Forte couldn't draw them away?"

"Then we'll stay in here, safe until Forte can let us know what's going on," I tried to use a calming voice, but it was very difficult for me not to start getting concerned about a possible collapse of the plan as well. I was worried for Forte too, he was smart and could probably come up with an explanation if he was caught, but he was risking a lot for me.

"Sorry," Daitan finally leaned back against the wall once Nyoka put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm not very good at just standing still or waiting around, I guess."

"I don't think any of us are," Phoenix muttered so quietly that I wasn't sure the others heard her, but she had a point. I could feel the tension running through my body, and it wasn't just Nyoka's accent that gave her away. Her posture was also tight, even if she was trying to appear calm to the rest of us.

I clenched my jaw, as if it would stop my own anxieties, but really I was counting the seconds until Forte came to tell us that the plan was in motion. According to my fixed and hyper vigilant gaze on the nearest clock, it was exactly another seven minutes and forty nine seconds until there was a quiet but quick knock at the door.

Nyoka yanked it open and Forte stuck his head in, looking relieved but serious. "Let's go. I saw both of the on call guards pass my door by the gym, we should be clear. I'd guess that we don't have long though, they'll want to sweep the hallways and the bathrooms before calling it an all clear."

We filed out the door in a line, with Forte in the front. He stayed a few steps ahead at all times, rounding corners ahead of us in case there was another teacher or someone else immune from curfew. In theory, he was allowed out later and could stall whoever we ran into for a second or two while the rest of us backtracked or tried to hide.

It was a good plan, and it saved our asses as we neared the front offices. Each of us was walking quietly, trying to keep the sounds of our footsteps silent. At one point, Nyoka took off her shoes completely so that she could just hurry along in her socks. We thought we were going to make it without any complications when suddenly we heard a voice ahead.

Forte threw us a look and gestured wildly for us to move back, then stood up straight, drawing his hood off and rounding the corner without us, "Good evening Mr. Strahan."