[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/AiePTnS.png[/img]
[h3]Within the Gym[/h3][/center]

	Zaylin maneuvered expertly through the bodies crowding the gym, trying to stay further away from most of them while remaining within earshot. She tried to find others familiar to her, someone else to perhaps ask about what Amy had told them--if she told them anything at all. Her roommate, Athena, maybe. With the mission to find Athena on her mind, she rescanned the crowds. Worry settled in her stomach when she could not find the older girl.
	[i]She’s probably still on a bus or something.[/i] She took a deep breath, trying to banish the thought that her roommate had truly gone missing. [i]Or maybe back in our room.[/i] 
	The urge to use her powers to lift her up enough to see over the many heads became overwhelming. Among all the unfamiliar people, she finally caught a glimpse of Stella and Tobias talking with a brunet girl. Glad to have spotted some friendly faces, Zaylin hurried toward them. Her pace slowed as a freckle-faced redhead joined the others.
	[b]“…a specialty that can get us out of here,”[/b] the redhead was saying as Zaylin neared enough to hear her above the other conversations, a thick British accent in her voice.
	Curiosity fought against her worry, and she stole near them as the girl finished speaking. She caught a quick glimpse of a magical light around the red-head’s fingers as she stepped beside the group, the brunet answering the other girl’s question.
	“I’m in.” Zaylin cocked her head and blew an extra-long strand of her bangs from her eyes. “What is it you--”
	Before she could finish her inquiry, the headmistress’ voice rose above the others, calling a relative silence to fall as students eagerly listened to what the woman had to say. The mere sight of the woman made Zaylin growl, the sound low and guttural. 
	She crossed her arms over her chest and raised an eyebrow at Miss Staniford's ‘report.’
	“Because we haven’t figured [i]that[/i] out already?” Zaylin grumbled, shifting her weight to one foot.
	Her gaze darkened further when the headmistress answered the question someone else asked, the question, she was sure, was at the top of everyone’s minds, with a short, vague statement. Zaylin leaned forward slightly, as if trying to hear better as the woman obliged the second student from somewhere in the crowd.
	[b]“The school feeds on your abilities.”[/b]
	“It does [i]WHAT?[/i]” Zaylin shouted, her slack-jawed expression changing to crinkled anger. Her hands moved to her sides and balled into fists. Licks of flame danced over her knuckles. However, her voice only joined the many others whom Miss Staniford had lost with that statement, losing the rest as she finished.
	At least they knew now, to some small extent, why they were there, stuck in a loop that brought them right back to the school. But that single answer only spawned more questions, as answers so often do, especially when told by the mouths of unwilling adults:
	Was the school itself some sort of sentient being, or was it actually something deeper, something lurking and living within the very stones themselves? How long had the headmistress known about this? How much did she really know, but was not telling them? Most importantly, how in the world were they supposed to combat something they knew nothing about?
	Others tried to shout their own questions up at Miss Staniford, but their voices merged with each other, forming a giant mesh of noise with an occasional partial sentence more audible above the others.
	Zaylin had the feeling the headmistress would offer little help besides the advice to ‘stay in groups.’ Not willingly, at least. Surely she had some sort of documentation of the place hidden somewhere. She had to have found out about the building somehow, after all. But where would she keep something like that?
	[i]Stella’s message was about the library,[/i] she thought, [i]but I doubt she’d keep something like that somewhere anyone could find it… Her office would be a good place to start.[/i] Her jaw set in determination and fists clenched slightly harder. [i]Looks like I’ll get to try my hand at breaking and entering.[/i]
	Zaylin looked to the others in the group, the noise of the students getting on her nerves. “If she’s,” she nodded toward the headmistress, her voice a low growl and gruffer than she intended, “finished being unhelpful, what do you say we get out of here? Find somewhere quieter to talk.”