Changes

Its the summer! (Woohoo, finally)...

To anyone who cares, I effing KILLED those stupid Taylor polynomials. :D

No more Calc for me, like, EVER! (I hope)

Anyways, I'm at my grandparents now, and where they happen to live happens to be a place where

the internet connection is about as trustworthy as Marduke. On coke.

I wish I had super cool grandparents who actually used the Internet, but unfortunately (or fortunately, however you want to see it)

I don't. And so I had to dial up just for a few hours of crappy internet.

Meh, whatever :)

On another note : THANKS SO MUCH TO ALL MY REVIEWERS. :D

I love y'all!

Isabel's POV

Mum burst out laughing the moment I stepped into the kitchen, practically choking on his cereal. I frowned at her.

"I look like a freak," I announced grumpily to everyone at the breakfast table, showcasing my new uniform.

I didn't have anything against a uniform. In fact, I maybe even liked the idea. But back at Angel's High, our uniform was extremely bearable. We were given a choice between a skirt or pants, our shirt was light and breathable and as long as we stuck to some loose guidelines stipulated, anything went. But King's High took the word 'uniform' to the extreme stereotype. It was insane.

"It looks…" started Jimmy, struggling for words. "…nice?" He beamed unconvincingly.

I glared, looking down ay my clothes. I was in a knee-length grey checked skirt, pleated and in a thick, plaid fabric. Tucked into it was a prim, white shirt with starched collars and cuffed sleeves and impossible to button on buttons. With a little insignia on it too. A crown. Because its King's High. Get it? I rolled my eyes.

And then there was the tie that I nearly hung myself trying to wear. Yes a tie.

I was in my own personal hell.

Matt strolled down, whistling something decidedly too happy for my tastes. His uniform was decent – grey pants, a white shirt and the same navy-and-gold tie.

Pants! I wished I could wear pants. Sexism was apparently well, alive and rampant at King's High. I didn't mind wearing skirts -I'd rather not, but I never took much issue with it even at Angel Falls High. But this skirt was ridiculously uncomfortable, the pleats making it almost embarrassingly twirly. I despised it.

"Hurry up with breakfast, honey," mum called out, busy buttering bagels in post-marital bliss.

Almost instantly, a loud hoot sounded outside my house. Yeah, we take a bus too now; King's High was all the way at the other end of Angel Falls. Grabbing my bag, I rushed outside, Matt right behind me, and boarded the bus. Lucky for us, it was still relatively empty, and I chose an empty seat towards the back, Matt plopping down on the one behind me. Two stops later Ethan hopped on, looking frazzled and messy, his tie unknotted and crumpled, as thoguh he'd spent hours twisting and knotting at it. Sitting besides Matt, he grinned nervously at us.

"Don't think Neriah and Rochelle are on this bus," he commented with a shrug. I kept forgetting Rochelle lived with Neriah now.

People had started filtering into the bus now, shooting us queer looks. I recognized a couple of people from my old school, mostly in the younger grades, but it seemed that a lot of the students our age had been classified into the other two schools. Thank Heavens Shawn had been able to pull a few strings and have us all transferred to the same school.

When we arrived at King's High, I was, firstly, taken aback at the size of the school. Seriously, it was massive. It probably had had the same number of classes and rooms as Angel Falls High, but instead of being distributed between two compact buildings, this place was sprawling with seven - seven - different blocks distributed on a ginormous campus interspersed with playing fields and lawns and God knows what.

Ethan, Matt and I mulled around close to the gates, ignoring the curious, interested and often hostile glances of the resident students.

"This is going to be fun" said Ethan sarcastically, mussing up his hair and looking around for Neriah and Rochelle. I nodded in assent, one brow lifted, and leaned against the white wall, surreptitiously (or so I hoped) watching the students as they entered the school grounds. I soon came to realise that a) The uniform did not engender any form of conformity whatsoever. There were girls in the tiniest skirts and highest heels. (Although I distinctly remember a slightly botched mission of ours having something to do with that) There was even this one boy, all spiked hair and whitewashed skin, who had those iron-on labels plastered to the back of his shirt, announcing his love for some death metal band. b) Everything about the school screamed opulence, from the students to the campus to their cars and designer bags. c) We were all going to have a hard time fitting in.

Great.

I sighed to myself as Matt and Ethan debated the possibility of having the same classes. I could see a number of appreciative glances thrown in our direction, well, more specifically in the direction of Matt and Ethan, and resisted the urge to hurl. Some things obviously did not change. For a moment, I really missed Arkarian. I mean I was glad that all of us were in the same school, but Matt had Neriah, and Ethan had Roh, and Dillon had never had a hard time fitting in, and it seemed, for a petulant little moment, absolutely unfair that Arkarian had finished his formative schooling in the Middle Ages or whatever. I scowled.

Lucky for me, Rochelle, Dillon and Neriah entered the gates just then. I grinned immediately at Rochelle's choice of footwear - a well-worn, black pair of trainers that clashed brilliantly with her skirt.

"I hate this uniform!" she immediately burst out in greeting and I nodded fervently.

We heard a bell chime from somewhere within the depths of the school and we all rushed in the same general direction as the rest of the students, up some stairs and through a huge doorway into a hall of sorts.

The students mulled about in there, and I could see some familiar faces by a short moustached man with a clipboard.

"Ah," he murmured, looking at us as we hesitantly walked over to him. "The last few transfers I believe…"

Ticking our names on his clipboard, he nodded at a tall, striking woman on the stage.

"Silence please," she said calmly, surveying the crowd with that expression of patient suffering only teachers can pull off, and the babble immediately ceased.

"Wow." muttered Neriah. "Back at Angel Falls High we would probably have laughed out loud, into her face."

"Yeah but there's something so… scary about her," shuddered Dillon back and I laughed softly.

"Welcome back to King's High!" the woman said in that same stern yet calm voice of hers. "Its great to see all of you again."

She paused.

"Firstly, to those of you who don't already know, my name is Rosalind Corel, and I am the senior school principal, and the person in charge of you lot." There were a few nods and grins from the older students. "Now the purpose of this assembly, apart from welcoming you back to school and remind you of the challenging year you all have ahead of you, is to welcome some new faces."

"Great" I muttered under my breath and Matt swung his arm around me with a smile.

"As you all have probably heard", she continued. "An accident recently destroyed Angel Falls High School, due to which we have kindly taken in some of their students. While most of the students we have entered into Kings are in the younger grades, a handful of juniors and seniors with the correct course fulfilments will join your classes. I would like you to welcome them in with the true Kings spirit."

Rochelle rolled her eyes beside me, as Ms. Corel called each of us 11 seniors up on stage. The Kings High students clapped coldly for us.

Oh this was going to be just brilliant.

While I stood in the line to get my timetable, I saw Matt and Neriah beckon to us from a secluded corner. Grabbing my timetable with a forced grin, I moved quickly over to them, crossing my arms across my waist.

"You do know that we need to be on the lookout for a Potential" Matt started and the rest of us nodded.

"I can... I dunno….I call just feel that the person is here," said Neriah, uncomfortably looking around. "Its not a like a beeper system or anything - its isn't as though bells are going to go off in my head when I'm next to whoever it is - but I really believe that the Potential is here."

"Just look out for anything suspicious," continued Matt and I nodded. Rochelle, who was busy scrutinizing her timetable, looked up.

"Anyone else really looking forward to classes," she smirked and Neriah grabbed her timetable with a suspicious look.

Five minutes later, we realized that the six of us had almost completely different classes, and I barely shared any of mine with them.

"Rochelle, this isn't fair!" Neriah exclaimed. "Extra credit chemistry and geology? That's cheating you know?"

Rochelle just grinned slyly, shrugging.

Ethan on the other hand had taken a bunch of History and World Lit classes, along with Matt, while Dillon was just cruising by with the minimum number of classes he needed to take. Neriah seemed to be the only other person I had some classes in common with, and even she had elected many different subjects, mostly artsy ones that I had absolutely no interest in whatoever.

The gong chimed again and I walked over to my first class – Advanced math. If there was one subject I could do, it would be Math. It was simple and straightforward, where every question had one definite answer, just more than one ways to get there. If you just followed a logical deductive process, there was no way you could go wrong.

Walking into the class, I took a seat towards the back.

Our teacher, Mr. Quinn soon walked into class, grinning at all of us jovially. "Ah" he said, after a minute of scrutiny. "Rather pathetic bunch, aren't we?"

I grinned. We quite were. There were barely sixteen of us who'd opted for Advanced Math.

"Now now, I'm not going to eat you" he continued, setting down his bag. "Move on up front. Fill up the first two rows, there are exactly enough of you to pair up. We can't have you spread all over the room."

The seats up front were doubles, and being the last one to move forward, I had no other choice but to sit in the corner by some random guy.

Dumping my bag on the floor, I seated myself and pulled out a notepad, writing down the topic for the day and the date.

"I don't really recall letting you to sit here," my partner commented in a low, composed voice.

I raised my eyebrows, looking over at him incredulously, my temper flaring. Seriously?

"I don't really recall asking you," I retorted primly, looking back at my work.

He was of medium height, probably a couple of inches taller than me, and was currently slouched over his book. He had reddish-copper hair and strong features and would probably be considered good looking, were it not for the look of distaste he was currently shooting at me.

I ignored him.

"As all of you know this is an Advanced Math class, which means absolutely no slacking off is permitted." said Mr. Quinn. "Now, I personally believe that teamwork is the best way to attack Math, and usually divide my class into groups of two. So guys, the person beside you right now is going to be your partner of sorts for this class. Now you wont' have to do projects or such together, but you are going to have to solve all the problems between the two of you and reach one final answer. That way, you can learn from each other. Once I start grading you, I will of course be putting you with people you'd learn better from."

I groaned, as Mr. Quinn chalked out the first question on the board. Calculus. It was easy. Within minutes I was busy solving the sum, ignoring the hushed discussions around me. With a small, triumphant 'aha!', I reached an answer, and turned to face… him.

He had finished almost at the same time as I had and we glared at each other with thinly veiled hostility.

"X+29" I relented finally and he nodded stiffly, showing me his calculations to the same conclusion.

God this was going to be torture. I decided to try and strike up a truce.

"Okay, we can't obviously go on like this the rest of the year" I started, a little harshly I admit. "So, my name is Isabel Becket."

"Actually I see no reason why we can't" he replied with a frown. "As far as I'm concerned, I'll do my work and you can do yours."

I gritted my teeth. Of all the nerve!

"But, I'm Jared Stirling" he added, turning around to start the next question.

Sometime, very rarely, I really don't like my powers. They're too passive, too reactionary, too defensive. Now if I could only be like Roh… I'd blast this pale little prat right where he belongs!

Dillon's POV

This was going to be one easy year to get by. All I had to do is pass English and Physics, and I'm done. It almost sounded too good to be true.

I glanced quickly at my watch. My next period was Physics, and I had just enough time to grab my books before the bell rang. I jogged over to my locker, whirring in the combination. It jammed. Well, what do you know… prissy, rich schools have crappy lockers too.

Looking covertly around me, and making sure no one was watching, I jammed a finger at the locker, smiling at the deep dent it made.

Needless to say, the locker immediately opened.

Grabbing my books with a grin, I whirled around and found myself face to face with a set of large, confused eyes. I immediately paled. The girl reached up just at my shoulders and was looking at me as though I had just sprouted two heads, eyes darting from my face to the locker and back.

Holy. Fucking. Shit. Did she see me? She couldn't have. I was so sure that there wasn't anyone around. My brain instantly went into an overdrive, remembering the time when Ethan accidentally revealed his powers to Mr. Carter. He had to go before the Tribunal, if I remembered correctly, and he very nearly was stripped of his position. But with most of the Tribunal dead, maybe the same wouldn't happen to me?

I realised I was jumping to conclusions. Okay, rationalize, Dillon. The girl still looked at me in shock, although she seemed to be gathering herself a little. Now's the time you say something. Say something, Dillon. Preferably something smart and witty that completely throws her off and leads her to the fortunate conclusion that she really couldn't have seen you dent your locker with a tap of your index finger because, really, that was impossible.

For the life of me, I couldn't think of anything to say. I believe I might have resembled a fish, opening and closing its mouth.

The girl took a step back, and then another, eyes flitting one last time to the locker.

Holy smoking sharks say anything Dillon! Anything!

"Uh…Hi!" I managed to finally blurt. I winced. That was bad. She realised the same too, a small frown settling on her brow.

Eyes narrowing, the girl spun on her heel and walked away quickly before I could do anything. The second bell rang.

I cursed under my breath. What a royal mess! Matt was going to annihilate me. I had just possibly broken a cardinal rule of the Guard. It foremost and most revered tenet. A stone of dread sunk deep into my gut. This was not going to end well.

Shaking my head and resisting the urge to hit something really, really hard, I walked to Physics class. Act normal, that was the key. I couldn't let my emotions get the better of me.

My Physics teacher was a petite, pretty, middle-aged woman, wearing something extremely tight in all the right places, and I could just see the reason why most of the class was male and actually looked attentive.

"She's actually forty, you know?" said the girl who chose to sit beside me spitefully and I turned to find myself face to face with an attractive blonde with a toothpaste ad smile on her face.

A sign of my extremely frazzled emotional state – I had failed to notice the girl when she first sat here. Under ordinary circumstances I would have more than attempted to befriend someone that good looking, but I simply smiled noncommittally, whirling my pencil with one hand, deep in thought.

"My name is Barbara." she persisted. "Barbara Walters."

"Dillon" I replied back with a lopsided smile.

"You're from Angel's High aren't you?" she asked charmingly, leaning towards me slightly.

"Yep" I replied easily, scratching down an important sounding formula into my legal pad. "Is it that easy to tell?"

She laughed. I had no idea what she found funny. I laughed along.

"A tip to the newbie. You should come to our pep rally today." She said brightly. "Its right after school. I'm on the cheer squad, so you'll probably see me there."

A cheerleader? Perfect. I turned to face her, smiling appreciatively.

Come on… a guy's got hormones. After the thrashing my romantic life, and not to mention ego, took after the Neriah debacle of last year, I wasn't really going to be turning down attractive blondes.

"Wouldn't miss it for the world. What are we… rallying for exactly?" I asked. Her smiled widened.

"Our basketball team. The Cavaliers. We're the best, I'll have you know!". Barbara twirled a lock of hair around a finger.

The King's High Cavaliers? Could they be any less corny? But hey, I wasn't going to reject what looked like an easy elevation up the school social ladder because of terrible clichés and slight vapidity. I threw Barbara a covert glance.

I was about to say something qhwn someone stormed into class, in a flurry of books and papers.

"Ms. Johnston that's the third time you're late this week!" reprimanded Ms. Nessar in frustration and the girl flushed a bright red.

"I'm so sorry, Ms. Nessar. I didn't hear the lunch bell go off" she replied softly. I looked up then, eyes widening. It was the girl. You know, the one who could potentially end my life at the Guard. My mood immediately dampened.

"That's the same thing you said yesterday." replied Ms. Nessar, hand on her hip. "And the day before"

The girl just looked stubbornly at her feet, clutching her books almost protectively.

"Look Allison, you're an honours student and I know that" said Ms. Nessar soothingly. "But lately that's been hard to see. You need to clean up your act or this year's going to be difficult for you."

The girl nodded and silently walked towards her seat at the other side of class. I made a mental note of her name, eyes following her almost subconsciously.

"Oh and you also have detention after class." called out Ms. Nessar, before returning to Thermodynamics. Barbara snickered next to me and I turned to her

"Who is she?" I asked her softly, tilting my head in the general direction Allison Johnston.

"Allison Johnston?" laughed Barbara derisively, tossing her hair. "Why, she's just a frigid little bint. She's half Hawaiian or something and transferred in last semester from Sydney. Aced all her classes, got the best student award… all that jazz. She thinks she's better than everyone else here. She was always annoying, but this year she even more weird. Hangs out in the library all the time. Pathetic."

I nodded, keeping an eye on Allison throughout class. She seemed decent enough, took notes at the speed of lightening, solved all the numericals within minutes. But Barbara was right, something was a little off. She seemed dazed and stiff, almost too controlled.

All the better for me though. I should easily be able to convince her that what she thought she saw never happened. Now that I'd regained control of my tongue, that is. I frowned at my own lack of tact earlier that hour. The bell went off then, ringing loudly. There was a flurry of activity and the crowd started moving out in the hallways, rushing towards the pep rally. Allison just sat there, rubbing her temples in soft circles. I looked at her, intrigued.

"Come on Dil!" said Barbara enthusiastically, grabbing my hand. "Its time for the pep rally. Trust me, you are going to love it. I'll introduce you to all my friends so don't you worry, you won't be alone. They'll love you, I just know-"

"Thanks," I said hastily, extricating my arm from her grasp. "I'll just be a minute though. Just need to…uh…ask Ms. Nessar something."

Barbara pouted, but thankfully walked away with a smile and a wave. As she passed by Allison, she snorted condescendingly.

Feigning to be busy packing my books, I waited till she left and then walked over to Allison Johnston, feeling like I just had to say something.

"Uh, so I just wanted to explain about...today", I started lamely. "I was just opening my locker…I dunno what you think you saw but, it was nothing." Okay that was terrifically terrible. Abysmal. Catastrophic. I resisted the urge to wince.

She cocked her head slightly, peering at me with intrigue through those slanted dark eyes.

"So, you're not just saying you know what I think I saw, but that you think that what I think I saw never actually happened?" she clarified calmly, fingers still on her temples. "You seem pretty concerned about my supposed hallucinations."

I opened my mouth to say something, but couldn't. Damn.

Stupid stupid stupid Dillon! I decided to change tactics while she surveyed be with that same unreadable expression.

"Okay. So we got off to a bad start. I'm Dillon." I settled for, sticking my hand out and grinning slightly. I don't know why I did that. I don't know what I thought that would accomplish but at this point in time, anything was worth a try!

"Yeah I know." she replied wearily, putting her books away and ignoring my outstretched hand. I raised a curious brow and she caught my expression, shrugging lightly. "I could hear Barbie there gushing from the other side of the room."

I winced.

"I'm Allison." she continued, putting her books into her bag and getting up to walk away.

I followed her into the now empty hallway and she suddenly stopped, turning to face me, arms crossed across her chest.

"Stop following me." She stated, dark eyes narrowing in annoyance.

"It's the hallway. We're both headed outside. Its hardly inconceivable that I use it." I rebutted, slightly chaffed and she rolled her eyes, walking again and slowing down till I was in step with her.

"For the record, what exactly is it you think I thought I saw?" she asked me slyly and through her stony veneer, I saw a little intrigue.

I raised an eyebrow. Like hell I was going to tell her.

"What exactly is it you think I think you thought you saw?" I mimicked, crossing my arms.

There was a long silence, with her sizing me up. I could just see it. Even though she was at least half a foot shorter than me, slender and lean and probably light enough for me to benchpress without expending my superstrength at all, she exuded an aura of quiet defiance.

Neither of us was going to relent, I could tell, before she completely surprised me by dropping her arms.

"Forget it," she finally said, and suddenly, I saw an immense weariness in her, as thought she had not slept for days. What was just moments ago stubborn defiance was replaced with dull nonchalance, and I had to say I was taken aback. "See you around then Dillon." She paused, a slight smirk settling on her face. "Have fun at the pep rally, Dil."

And with a slightl snicker she walked away. Despite myself, I grinned, running my hand through my hair.

Dedicated to:

Holland. And whoever else was super dissapointed that they lost.

That was an intense game though..