Soaring Over The World (Soaring Saga #2)

**Chapter Four~Here We Go Again**

"Aaaand that's lunch!" My teacher, Mr. Staceks, announced as the bell rang out, "Off you go!"

     I stood up, my chair's metal legs scraping the tile floor. I grabbed my workbook and pencil case, then stood up to leave.

"Oh, uh, Cirocco?" Mr. Staceks called. I turned. I nodded to the other five, telling them to go. Then I went over to Mr. Staceks.

"Yeah?" I asked, dropping my supplies and leaning on a desk by him. Everyone had left the room by now.

"Someone had come by earlier," he explained, "asking if you were there and to talk to you. He said to meet him out in the hall by your locker. He was only around your age, but... well, be careful. He doesn't go here, otherwise I'd have recognized them. Just go chat with 'em, see what they want. Okay?"

"Uh-huh," I replied, "I'll be good. See yah after lunch?"

"See yah after lunch."

     I picked my stuff back up and left.

     Yeah, Mr. Staceks is great: funny, lets work be fun and interesting, really cares for the students. He's probably one of my favourites, though I'd never tell him-- or anyone really-- that fact. But it's a fact.

      I wandered down the crowded halls, maneuvering through kids, getting slapped with people's wings more than once. Anyhow, I got to my pale grey locker, opened it, and turned on the little lightbulb I'd hung at the top. I also had photos of us Soarers in a group selfie, struggling to fit with our wings, thick jackets, and just straight up one another. 

     Raina was taking it, so she was in the bottom corner, yanking River to her side in the bottom middle. I was on the bottom left, leaning on River's other shoulder and making the peace sign with my two fingers. Ari was above me, leaning his arm on my head and doing a finger gun at the camera. Audra was on the top right, just standing and grinning, while Neil McVerytall was in the middle of the two and had his arms around Ari and Audra's shoulders.

     When was the person who wanted to see me gonna get here? I stuffed my notebook and pencil case into my locker, struggling to fit it in with my backpack. I groaned as one fell down, then I grabbed it and shoved it back in. Two more fell out, and I groaned again. I bent to pick them up, and suddenly a pale hand came from the crowd of kids' legs, and yanked me away.

"What the--?!" I yelped as I stumbled to my feet and struggled to follow the person, running into multiple people and didn't see the face of the person who'd grabbed me. Eventually they opened a door and swung me inside.

     And of course, like any movie with kids at school, we were in the janitor's closet: small, dusty room with a single light bulb on the ceiling. Walls lined with mops, buckets, brooms, and a table. In the middle of the room, and what took up most of it, was a tall shelf drowning in cleaning chemicals, sprays, and tools.

"Who the heck are you and why...?!" I brushed the dust of my ripped jeans and trailed off when I saw who it was.

     Lio! I went on full guard-mode, but when he was unarmed, he looked extremely harmless. Surprisingly harmless. He also looked younger. Like, my age.

"Okay, I can't be here for long," he explained as he stood in the partially open doorway, and I was tempted to tell him to close it before the janitor came in, "I just need to tell you something to tell the fee-somethings... the fire-birds-with-a-name-I-can't-pronounce people."

"Phoenixes," I told him, trying not to show any amusement.

"Whatever. Sure. But please tell them the PardusFighters are planning something big in Norway! Like, really soon! In one of the closest cities to the ocean, and I think the name started with Wood, or Tree. Treeleaf? Woodleaf?"