Eden's Gate

Chapter 20: The Target Moves

Donna had been surprised that Eliza was more than willing to see her, given the nature of the complaints she had. Then again she had known Eliza for a long time and she did love the children. There had to be something complicating issues.

Donna opened the door to Eliza's office and stepped in, seeing her boss sitting at her desk.

"Ah, Donna. Please, have a seat."

Donna obliged, taking her seat in the wooden chair set up across the desk from Eliza. As she did, she heard the door close behind her and saw Sasha standing there, a smile on her face.

"Oh, hello Sasha," Donna said, "I didn't know you were there."

Donna suddenly felt very uncomfortable. Sasha just waved and moved her way over to the table she had been working at. On it was what could only be described as a brain with frog limbs though it also looked entirely like neither. She looked away.

"She's here to help with a project for her senior thesis. Don't mind her."

Donna was very happy to do that.

"So you wanted to talk to me about Edelweiss and Clifton?" Eliza asked.

She nodded, flipping open the physical copy of her gradebook that she still liked to keep, and filled with notes. The computers were all well and good, but Donna didn't trust what might happen if they stopped working - which she trusted them to do very much.

"Yes. Specifically...where are they?"

Eliza had a flash of disappointment in her eyes as she steepled her hands across the desk. "What do you mean?"

"Well, to put it as politely as I can, this is ridiculous. I understand that Clifton should not have been going through the grade book, but I don't understand why he would. He and his friends all had more than satisfactory grades, and none of them seem bitter enough to try and sabotage another's."

Eliza sighed, "they're children, Donna. You've worked with them for 32 years, you know how they can be."

"Yes, not irrational, just rationalizing differently. There has to have been a reason and I think it would have been a good idea to learn what it is so he could be corrected instead of punished."

"Perhaps. But it's not your call to make. As Headmistress, it is mine."

"Yes," Donna said, narrowing her eyes. This was going to be difficult. "And I'd like some help understanding your thought process."

"I think it is quite clear. He committed a rather heinous crime, and he was punished. It's not more complicated than that," she assured.

"Punishment isn't my problem. Even expulsion might have been something I could understand, but from the orphanage? Where exactly was he expelled to?"

Eliza remained silent, a frown coming across her face. Her gaze was intense and unblinking.

"And Edelweiss. I find it very odd that her parents, who have not been heard nor seen before or since, suddenly show up and spirit her away? She's not written her friends, and it's been a month, she should be out of the hospital."

Eliza, her gaze still unblinking, asked, "Donna. What are you implying?"

"I..." Donna was about to spit out...something, but she realized she'd sound crazy. That she had no proof and frankly, no reason to be here. "I honestly don't know specifically. Two of my students have disappeared, and taken together it's...suspicious. Something is going on, and I worry my students are in danger."

Eliza nodded. "Yes. I understand. It must all be very confusing. But I think this is a bit beyond you now, and it's time to let you go."

"...let me go?!" She snapped up in her chair, her hands going flat on the table. "I'll have you know, I am tenured! I have worked here for 27 years and I will not have some upstart try and cover up maltreatment."

"Yes. It was Atticus who tenured you, wasn't it?" Eliza pondered, "I used to wonder why. I wondered why Atticus would allow Blanks to work here at all. Why try to teach psychic children when you, yourself, are not psychic?"

Eliza stood up, turning to the rock on her desk which she picked up and examined. That strange rock. Ever since she came back with it, she had been...different. It was hard to place her finger on how.

"Psychics are unique in the world, gifted, and we operate in a way only other psychics can truly understand. But I realized," she paused, rubbing her finger against the symbol on the rock, "that we still share this planet with you. We never won't. You made me realize that. Blanks aren't some sort of distant thing that are incomprehensible, you're just...different. I'd like to thank you for that."

Donna stood up, "what are you going on about?"

"I never saw what Atticus saw in all of you, until you. Psychics and Blanks have to work together. If we were capable of existing separately, Blanks would have died off long ago. You're determined and stable in ways we cannot be. And I wanted to thank you for teaching me that, before you go."

"You really are firing me," Donna realized. "You absolutely will do no such thing! I will have your title, and you will lose this school for what you're about to do. And with any luck you'll rot in a jail cell for a long time once they find out about whatever you're doing to those children."

Eliza finally smiled. "You're right, if I fired you, I'd create quite a scene, and I can't afford that right now."

A curious and confused look struck Donna's face for a moment, before it was replaced by the pained expression of betrayal and horror as a knife slid into her back.

"That's why we're not going to fire you."

She turned her head to see Sasha standing behind her with a knife in her hand, which was now covered in blood. She stabbed it into her back again, this time holding it in.

"I'm sorry, Donna. You were a great teacher, it's a shame to lose you. But there are things in motion bigger than you can possibly comprehend. I can't let you stop them."

Donna heaved, and blood came out of her mouth. Things were going dark, and the world was becoming gray. She coughed one last time, and was gone. Her last memory was of Sasha laughing.

Kaitlyn walked into her classroom the next morning, only to see Nikolai sitting at the desk, strumming his guitar. The whole room lit up with his gentle turquoise glow, as a calming wave of peace flowed through it. He called this "bard magic," which was really just a manifestation of Projection through the use of his guitar. It was actually surprisingly difficult to do - Kaitlyn had seen Edelweiss struggle with it when she had first seen him do it - but it was also very pretty and very effective. Anyone who could hear the sound would be irrevocably effected by whatever emotion he was projecting.

But Ms. Marigold wasn't here.

"Excuse me, Mr. Pajitnov, where's Ms. Marigold?"

"She retired," he said. "She was talking about it with us teachers for a while, but then her friend needed her help so she decided to do it early."

The children exchanged a look. The one teacher they knew they had any chance of getting help from was gone. Eliza was already making her move.