Burn It To The Ground
Delores
At Apex, they used to lock the doors once class began, but this place, for all its regressive traditions, keeps the doors unlocked for fire code, which makes me twenty percent less likely to hyperventilate.
If I have to vault the row and run, the door will slow me a bit, but at least I won’t slam into a fixed object.
Of course, I’d prefer not to even consider how I’m going to escape if people attack, but that’s not reality in our world.
Super great utopian experiment you have here, guys.
The room is less claustrophobic than the packed hallways—probably because of the high ceilings and windows.
That helps a little bit, even though I’m not usually frightened by tight spaces in the slightest. The threat of the evil Khan looms like the sword of Damocles over my neck because he’s had the entire summer to plot out his rotten behavior.
Since we know he was in Paris with some of the bad teachers via Cori and Ru-Ru, I’m certain there are shitty things coming; I just don’t know what.
It probably won’t be a repeat of plagiarism bullshit, obviously, but it will definitely make my life miserable, if only for a few days at a time.
I cast my gaze over the people in the seats, not all at once, but notice that they’re in careful packs and loner pairs.
The canines are always together, occupying two to three consecutive seats because heaven forbid a single one go without backup.
Feline shifters are a little less obvious, but they lean together to whisper in a way that says they’ve already compared notes on everyone else.
I note that the smaller pred variants are likely to be in duos or maybe trios, but the aquatics definitely choose to stay in very specific pods by species.
I suppose it’s because some eat others depending on type and they don’t trust nature not to take hold.
It’s fair, but since I’m always alone, I get to observe how everyone else interacts in every damn class.
I log it all, annotating my list so I know exactly how to react to various people if they act up.
It’s also something I share with Fitz so he can check on them; there’s way too much unknown about what kinds of magicals the Fae are allied with.
For all we know, there are beings that not even Aubrey and Rennie remember or had contact with.
I don’t like those odds, so I agree with my crazy mate about taking notes.
Finally, the Heathers make their entrance.
I sense them before I see them, but I don’t indulge their dramatics.
They’re like a cold front moving in; the way the center rows immediately straighten, and even the most heavily muscled guys try not to look too concerned as Pink and Gold stride in with their new acolyte.
They are wearing matching pale blue blouses today, as if they’re trying out for the flight attendant Olympics.
Today, they’re back to hair accessory BS, and I roll my eyes to the ceiling in supplication.
If they could just grow the hell up, it would help immensely.
Not gonna happen, but a bunny can dream, right?
They claim the exact middle of the second row, which puts them dead in front of the teacher’s lectern.
Gold makes eye contact with me, and I hold it for two seconds before breaking away.
I know the rules—it’s like prison. If you stare, you’re challenging someone, and if they look away too quickly, they’re weak.
I force my features to go neutral, as if I didn’t care before I drop my eyes to my page, pretending to check a margin note.
Nobody sits near me yet again, which is just as well.
I’m a blip on the periphery, and I like it better that way.
It’s safer, and I can watch the room for problems without seeming obvious.
The room’s white noise picks up as we get closer to start time.
I uncap my second pen and watch as the dark-haired girl with the Heathers flinches at the sound of them talking.
Her hand trembles slightly as she lines up her own pen with her notebook, but she doesn’t look back at me.
They must be chatting about me, and she has no idea what to do since I don’t even know her name, but she has to dog on me to fit in.
Three minutes after the hour, I scan the room for teachers, but the podium’s still unclaimed.
This seems to be a pattern this year—professors don’t show up until the last second, partly for the drama, I think.
I set my jaw, align my pens again, and do a quick check of my desk.
My water bottle is here, my phone’s on DND but available, and my bag is half-open so I can reach in and grab what I need without looking down.
I run through the exit plan again in my head — two routes to the door, three if I count the windows, which are only a seven-foot drop to the grass outside.
I’ll have to figure out how to break the damn things, but that’s an ‘in emergency only’ plan, anyway.
The tension in the air is real as we get to five minutes past the start time.
I steady my breathing, glance once around the room, and let my eyes slide over every single face one last time.
The new girl glances at me, then away, then at the door, then at Gold, as if waiting for her cue.
Pink leans over and whispers something, her lips moving so fast I can’t read them.
Gold gives the briefest, nastiest little smile.
They know something, but I'll let it go for now. I’ll find out soon enough.
The door to the hallway bangs open like a shot, and I have to clench my frame to keep from jumping. For half a second, the chatter goes silent, and all eyes pivot toward the incoming figure. I lower my pen, set both hands flat on the table, and brace for impact.
Asani enters with the lazy slowness of someone who has never been told ‘no’ in his entire life.
I see the casual violence in his attitude in the way he approaches the podium with swagger.
His haircut is a millimeter above ‘I can’t be bothered’, and his jaw is dark with stubble.
He wears sunglasses that are technically inappropriate for the classroom, but nobody says a word about it.
Instead, the room reacts as if a gun’s been loaded and cocked—all the predators sit up, as if that will help.
The Heathers exchange a glance that’s equal parts calculation and smugness, making me suspicious.
The tiger drops his bag onto the front table, producing a solid thud that resonates through the hall.
He leaves the glasses on, surveying the rows — not a sweep, but a series of micro-pauses, as if he’s cataloguing every person by both face and family.
When his eyes get to the Heathers, there’s a tiny smile, quickly erased as he moves on.
When he gets to me, the sunglasses tilt, and there’s an immediate glint of recognition.
I square my shoulders and stare back, my face blank.
I have nothing to prove, but I’ll be damned if I flinch first.
The Khan cousin waits another full ten seconds before taking the glasses off.
When he does, it’s a theatrical reveal. His gaze is clinical, as if he’s here to dissect us as much as teach.
“Welcome to Shifter History 403,” he says.
“My name is Dr. Asani Khan. For the next three months, you are going to learn the darkest parts of the history of our kind—the one that explains why you are all here instead of dead or exiled.”
He sets the sunglasses on the lectern and opens the laptop, not looking at the screen as he types his passcode.
The silence is so complete I can hear the air-handler’s death rattle in the wall.
Clicking on his computer for a moment, he scans something before continuing.
“Attendance is mandatory. Participation is not optional. You will not get extra credit for showing up, but you will lose points for absence, inattention, or attempts at subversion. If you don’t like the rules, drop the course.
If you don’t like me, file a complaint—I get them every semester, and they all end up in the same bin. Is that understood?”
No one answers. This is the only time in my life I have ever seen the Heathers completely mute despite their apparent belief that Asani is in league with them somehow.
“Good. I will call on you at random. If you’re unprepared, you will be humiliated. If you try to cheat, you will fail, and your family will know. I have eyes everywhere.” He doesn’t smile, but there’s a pulse in the air that says he enjoys this more than he should.
Maybe I was wrong about him repeating the plagiarism thing? Fuck.
He lifts a textbook that looks like a brick with a Council logo on the cover and drops it open to the first chapter. His eyes are sharp as he dares anyone to speak before he reads.
“The time before the Treaty was not one of peace, but of failed diplomacy and chaos. Our kind—the predator elite—forged a more perfect world by imposing order on the magicals, the Fae, the humans, and the prey shifters. They were not strong, smart, or evolved enough to maintain a society that was civilized and orderly. Our strength was not only physical but intellectual, and we conquered not by the sword alone, but by the pen, the contract, and the oath. The weak and disloyal were destroyed. Afterward, the strong ruled, as is nature’s intent. ”
I blink, looking at him as I struggle to keep my face from showing the shock I feel deep in my soul.
Sure, the propaganda in our texts was bad in previous years, but this?
This isn’t even subtle; it’s completely slanted, patently false, and dangerously close to suggesting that no one but the preds deserve to continue living on this planet.
I knew the Treaty wasn’t good for the prey animals in the end and that the magicals got exiled, but…
It doesn’t take a genius to realize that this is calling for straight-up fascism.
Holy fuck.