Phantom Thunder

Chapter 5

I woke up to the sound of a bell. It was a loud, deep sound, like an old church bell. It filled the stillness of the dorm.

I blinked. Morning light was streaming into the dorm. The large clock on the wall real 8 o'clock. In the bed next to mine, a girl sat up and groaned. Her bouncy curls framed her face in a frizzy mess.

"Morning" she greeted me, then rolled off her mattress and stood up.

"Hi" I said a bit unsurely.

The girls were slowly waking up. Across from me, and two beds down, Lilian winked at me, then yawned. I couldn't help, I yawned too.

"You're Ghost, right?" The girl from the bed next to me with curly hair asked. I nodded. I'd crawled into bed early last night, partly because I was tired, mostly because I didn't want to be conscious when all the girls came to bed. Meeting them all at once seamed a little overwhelming.

"I'm Jessica" she held out her hand and I shook it timidly.

She smiled, then went to the other side of the room to jump on one of her friends that was still in bed.

I looked through my drawers and grabbed the academy cargo pants and tank top. I reached for my toothbrush and my heart wrenched painfully. It wasn't my toothbrush. It was Laura's. I blinked back tears. It didn't matter. I hugged my cloths and walked quickly to the bathroom.

I stared at myself in the mirror. The tears had abandon me. I felt numb. The emerald eyes of the girl in the mirror stared back. Ghost. Silver blood. She was a warrior. Mackenzie Stanton was the one still hung up over her little sister. But Mackenzie died along side her family back at the Stanton house. I was Ghost now. Crying over Laura wasn't going to bring her back. Nothing would. And crying over her wouldn't achieve anything. Moving forwards would.

I washed my face and brushed back my long black hair. I took a large breath and let it out slowly, then left the bathroom. I sat down on my bed and looked around the dorm. Lilian came over. She'd changed in the other bathroom.

"Come on" she said. "Breakfast. And be at the gym at nine."

I followed her down to the banquet hall. Teenagers were filing into the hall in different groups, some still in pyjamas. I followed Lilian over to a table on the back wall. It was set up buffet style. Bowls of fresh fruit, waffles, toast, pancakes, bacon, eggs, smoked salmon, oatmeal, cereal, any breakfast food I could imagine was there. Lilian grabbed a plate and began to load it. I followed suit.

When we were satisfied with our food, we sat down at one of the tables in the corner. I estimated each table could sit about ten, maybe twelve kids. The food was delicious. A few minutes later a boy came and sat down across from Lilian. I knew he look familiar. I was almost positive he'd been crawling through the window with a golden scythe while I blacked out, but the world had been fuzzy, so I wasn't positive.

Lilian suddenly became extremely interest with her chunk of pineapple.

"I'm Blake" the boy introduced himself.

"Ghost" I replied, still slightly bewildered but Lilian's reaction.

"Yeah" he said, "we've met. While you were kinda passing out."

"And you were crawling through a window with a scythe."

"Not your usual meeting conditions."

"Definitely not" I agreed.

Dispute acting friendly, and despite the fact that they'd saved my life, I was hesitant to trust these people. I'd learned to trust no one. Especially if trusting them was easy.