Okay, this was it! He pulled open his locker door and smiled devilishly. He bent down, squeezed the scissors in his hand, and cut the little green wire. A clock started to count down.
"In just about three minutes, this whole place is gonna blow up," Skander heard. Immediately, he shook out the shock in his hand, and turned around. His feet pounded against the upstairs floor. His heart raced, he opened his mouth, and started to scream.
Mrs. Woods stood from her desk. "What in the world is that noise?" She walked towards the door, "stay here," she told her students. But before she could open the door, Skander pushed it so hard it almost slammed into her forehead.
"GET OUT!" he shouted. The students panicked.
"What is wrong with him?" One girl asked her friend.
"GET OUT, NOW! THERE'S A BOMB IN THE SCHOOL!"
Everyone scurried from the room. They ran down the stairs and outside of the building, through the parking lot, until they reached the softball field. Other students from other classes followed them. A herd of cattle, they made their way outside.
The boy hurried from the locker room and ran into a frantic mob of people. He knew what was happening, but he didn't care. Not everyone could escape, not in this crowd. He had trouble finding a way out, but he made it. He ran to outdoor track, sat on the hot asphalt, and waited.
"GET OUT! EVERYONE GET OUT! THERE'S A BOMB!" One by one, the class doors opened and people ran to freedom and safety. When he was sure everyone had heard him, he hurried downstairs and outside. Then he noticed the boy.
About a football field away from the school, the students and faculty stood, waiting. They didn't know if it would reach them. The uncertainty was unbearable. They huddled like a huge football team. They were on the farthest part of the softball field, where the bases were about a hundred feet away from them. A fence enclosed them in. They were as close as they could come to the edge of the land--where it stopped and the ground fell around the huge trees--and almost hugging the holes of the metal fence.
"I want to know one thing," Skander said. He couldn't believe his bravery at this moment. This guy had tried to kill everyone, but he was saving them. Skander, of all people! He was the one they had ignored on a daily basis, but now he was their hero. "Why would you want to murder innocent people?"
The boy stood. "They're not innocent. They're evil. I'd laugh at seeing the face blown off of a fifteen year old girl. You're blocking the view. I can't wait to see this!"
"You're disgusting."
The boy lifted his arm to punch him, but Skander grabbed a hold of him. He twisted the boy's arm back and listened to his high-pitched wail. "Let me go!"
"Why? So you can try to kill off another nine hundred people?" He heard sirens in the distance. Someone had called the police.
The boy wriggled free when Skander tried to hear if the police were coming closer to them. He socked Skander in the eye, kicked him between the legs, and watched him writhe in pain on the ground.
But Skander wasn't done. He grabbed the boy's foot before he could shove it into Skander's side. He flipped him over and the boy's face hit the pavement. Skander got up to dust himself off.
Then it happened. The noise almost knocked him down. Flames licked the sky and ashes sprinkled the ground. The school he'd known, the school his parents had attended, was dead. The boy quietly crept up behind him. He wrapped his spaghetti arms around Skander's neck. From his left pocket, he pulled out a gun. "Look at it, ain't it beautiful?" Skander tried to push the boy away. "Not so brave now, are you, big shot? Do that again and I'll put a bullet in your head."
This was not the way it was supposed to happen. Skander was a simple boy, possibly an alien with supernatural powers. No one was supposed to get killed. No one was supposed to be hurt. But with every hero there is a villain, and with every story there is an end. Skander was listening to the boy's uneven thoughts, and the sound of fire trucks and police cars and ambulances. He closed his eyes and prepared himself. But what he thought was his pounding heart was actually the hurried steps of a police officer. "Put it down! Now! Put the gun down!" The man drew his own gun and aimed it at the boy.
"Oh god," the boy thought. He dropped his gun and Skander let the officer rip him away from the boy.
The officer put away his gun, wrestled the boy to the ground, and slapped handcuffs onto his wrists.
He looked up at Skander, standing like the small and weak boy he always were, but with a power so strong that if he wanted to, he could take a bullet and sustain his life. "You did good, kid," the officer said. He pulled the boy to his feet and walked to the police car, dragging the villain away.
Skander decided to go home and rest for a while. It was tiring being a superhero. He thought it was all over, but when he started to walk home, he discovered not only did he hear thoughts and have super strength. His hands rose to his face, but he did not see them. Oh, Skander thought, a little less scared of this one: he could become invisible too.
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