I turned back to the school entrance to see the doors open. Mr. Brower stood there, his eyes half glazed. He moved aside as people damn near mowed him down. Captain Rhoads went up to him and I followed.

"Mr. Brower, I'm Captain Rhoads. I hear you have a communications system."

"Y-yes, it is an emergency system I've been working on." Mr. Brower stood in the doorframe. His blue eyes were tired, and just as frightened as ours. He ran his fingers through his blonde hair, grimacing. "It only works if the new northern comm. tower is up and running. It was supposed to be up today."

"The rest of the colonial communications is down."

"I know. I was able to send warning to some of the farming outposts through my system, but I think they must have gone for the central building and cut the warning main system for here."

"Did you get ours?" turned to me, his eyes softened a bit and he nodded.

"Yes, hopefully your parents took refuge at the outpost. Winter, do you know if your sister had this morning's shift at the tower?"

Rosie ran up to me, and looked at Mr. Brower.

"Autumn, was still home when we left, but she had the mid-morning shift. She and Kal were going to take the long way around," Rosie said. Autumn must have mentioned that before I came downstairs. Kal usually came by to pick her up, and when they had later shifts they had a tendency to go the scenic route around the colony. It took forty minutes longer, but maybe that was a good thing.

"Hopefully, batarians haven't taken the tower yet," Captain Rhoads nodded "If they or someone else can make it there we can send out an SOS to the Alliance."

I felt something warm and wet drip down from my nose, and my head began to feel light. My knees were shaking, and Rosie took my hand. Suddenly all three of them were staring at me, with eyes flowing with concern. I moved to wipe my nose, but paused when blood dripped down on my hand. A raging headache marched from my amp to the front of my brain, and my body felt as though I hadn't eaten in days instead of hours. Mr. Brower pulled a handkerchief from his pocket then he tilted back my head and pressed the cloth to my nose with trembling fingers. He only knew me for the same reason I was bleeding. I was the one biotic student in the colony and the first he ever met. Sure, if I wasn't he would have known me for being Autumn's sister because he worked with colony communications, but he'd have never learned my name. "We should get you inside."

I took the cloth and kept tilting my head back, staggering a bit as he tried to guide me into the building. I paused and turned, looking for my brother. He was in front of the gate watching the soldiers stack crates containing materials for the new school wing near the gate. He looked rather small compared to the security officers and the looming wall.

"Gus!" Rosie yelled. Without a word he ran over, and as he got closer I could see his brows furrow as he looked at me. I turned around again. They were kids. I was almost an adult they shouldn't have been worrying over me. Just last week I told them I had gotten better because of Leslia and that my biotics didn't make me bleed anymore. Leslia wasn't just a great teacher, but a former Asari commando and the soul reason I never had to go to a biotic academy. She had left the colony two weeks before, saying I'd do fine on my own for a while. Maybe she was wrong. Rosie took my hand again, but I let go, as we made our way towards the cafeteria. At that moment she and Gus didn't need to be worrying about me. We were protected in the school. We were safe.

We were also easy targets.