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	Something had felt [i]off[/i] to Zaylin all morning. There were missing students, and life continued within the halls of the school with infuriating normalcy. No extra security. No police roaming the halls. Only on-edge students, the average faculty, and more whispered rumors than Zaylin could count.
	Her hands clenched and unclenched as she headed to dance class after parting with two new-found acquaintances, Casandra and Jake.
	[i]If no one else is going to do anything,[/i] she resolved darkly, [i]then [u]I[/u] will.[/i] 
	The dance teacher--a rather beautiful Asian woman, her hair pulled into a feathery bun to the side of her head--had dove straight into her lesson, her demeanor comfortingly joyful.
	However, the atmosphere changed as soon as the headmistress’ voice rang over the PA: [b]“Would all students and staff report to the gym for an announcement.”[/b]
	Zaylin inhaled as a sense of foreboding raced through her. Possible reasons for the sudden call for an assembly ran through her mind in a jumbled mess. Voices rose in the room, and the teacher tried to regain order. Mostly failing, she called above the others in her thick accent.
	“Proceed to the gym in an orderly fashion!” She scarcely finished speaking before the first of the students rushed out the door.
	Zaylin waited impatiently, following at the end of the flood with the teacher a couple feet behind her. The dance class joined the boisterous flow of other students in the main hall, the echoes of the voices making Zaylin scowl and resist the urge to cover her ears. 
	In the gym, she shoved her way to the side of the doorway to get a better look at the already crowded bleachers. The sense of unease that had only misted among the students the first time Zaylin had laid eyes on the gym now felt like a weight pressing against the shoulders of every student. Such a drastic change in only two days’ time.
	Zaylin caught sight of a few familiar faces, but chose to wait. When the flow of students slowly ebbed, she made her way to one of the bleachers near the top. She sat on one of the few remaining empty spaces, with only a freshmen girl between her and the edge of the bench. The girl, thick glasses resting on her nose and her curly hair teased to give it extra volume, gave Zaylin a halfhearted smile, then playfully kicked a friend in front of her.
	Zaylin watched the other students come in. She smiled as Stella entered last with a boy she assumed to be Tobias, his arm draped over her shoulders. Zaylin’s smile faded as she took in Stella’s grave expression, the urge to make sure she was okay making her shift in her seat. Then, the headmistress began to speak.
	Immediately, silence fell as Mrs. Stanidford’s voice rang through the gymnasium. A wave of shock, denial, and panic rolled through the crowd of teenagers as the woman spoke the news that everybody in the room dreaded to hear: one of the missing students had been found, dead. Zaylin held her breath, biting her lip. She fought the desire to rise to her feet, to shout her enraged question of why nothing had been done yet.
	Before Mrs. Stranidford could continue, Zaylin gasped and her irises turned a pure gold while every one of her enhanced senses went into overdrive as complete pandemonium broke out among the student ranks packed nearly elbow to elbow. She had scarcely a moment to take in the chaos ensuing around her, from the boy to her left who burst into shimmering mist, to the storm clouds that bubbled and undulated outword from the center of the gym’s ceiling before she felt the dragon inside her rear. It pushed for release like she had never felt before. A wind of her own, unconscious making blew through her hair and flames burst into dazzling existence around her. She tried to push away the familiar tightness that preluded the release of turning into her dragon form, but it proved too much.
	In a desperate attempt to escape the now screaming girl beside her and the close quarters of the surrounding crowd, she summoned a gust of wind that carried her higher into the air than she expected, and catapulted herself to the space beside the bleachers.
	Before she could demand the air to let her down slowly, her body began to morph. In just over an instant, her body stretched and grew as she fell toward the gym floor. Leathery wings burst from her back, a tail extended behind her, and her face elongated into a thin snout. Her clothes stretched with her, then erupted into glittering jet black scales that covered all but the underside of her reptilian form. There, thick golden plates formed from the base of her neck to near the tip of her tail, while three matching horns sprouted from the top of her head.
	The tip of her tail whipped over a couple of the students on the edges of the bleachers, before she landed cat-like on the floor. Golden claws protruded from her scaled, yet still fairly human-like hands, while those of her hind feet dug into the wood of the floor. A crest of deep purple spines unfurled along her back to the top of her tail to complete her transformation.
	Her lips pulled back, revealing her dangerously sharp teeth in a smile at the exhilaration running through her. At long last, she was what she was meant to be.
	Alas, she had only an instant to revel in the energy and [i]rightness[/i] of her dragon form when she felt something push its way into her mind. Her eyes, glowing a complete, rich gold, widened, and she gave a surprised howl as information embedded into her mind. She gripped the sides of her head, but, as quickly as it had come, the presence vanished.
	Zaylin shook her head and snorted, black smoke rising from her wide nostrils. Remembering where she was, panic momentarily gripped her chest and she jumped nimbly to her feet. She stood on her hind legs, reaching nearly eight and a half feet tall from feet to crown. Her tail, about the same length as her body, swished behind her, and her wings folded slightly as she looked around at the hectic mess of the mass of other, specially chosen students as their powers, too, went into overdrive.