Issue 1 Downtime

Ryan hurried over to Miranda, looking at the state of her. "Nothing for it but to get her out of here. Carpenter, carry her. I want to be mobile in case anyone finds us here before the spell snaps us back." He did, however, check the flow of her life force for anything amiss.

Nothing appeared to be amiss that rest wouldn't help. There was nothing physically wrong with her.

Slowly but surely Ryan would begin to feel a vague tug, like a whirlpool slowly gaining traction in his mind. Anyone close to him might get a similar impression, though weaker.

"Hell... Everyone, grab on. The ride home is pulling out!"

With Alex helping Miranda Kay runs over to Regan and pulls her along. Once they're next to Ryan she kneels down and slaps the side of her knee. "Here, boy! Come over here, Sunny."

It's hard to tell whether the ghostly dog responds because suddenly cracks appear in the world around them, making it hard to tell where anything or anyone is and the next moment Ryan and the kids are yanked every which way at once and down a long tunnel. Or maybe it's a tower? Maybe the cone of a huge spotlight? Whatever it is, they rush through it and towards the end, which shows Nailah and the room they started in. A portal opens and one by one everyone comes tumbling out.

Ryan shoved himself back to his feet, making sure everyone made it back.

Now that they were back in the real world, Miranda started to come to. She took a guess at who was holding her. "Alex? Can you put me down?" She sounded groggy.

"You're alright!" Kay shouts, relieved to see Miranda wake up.

"Yeah," Alex said, kind of shaken from the trip. "You feeling better?" He looked for a good spot, then carefully set her down.

"I... I think so," she said, not bothering to try to stand up from where Alex had put her. "Everyone else okay?"

"Looks like it," Alex said. "So... what happened? I mean, I don't think that was on the lesson plan, right?"

"No, though if Mister Gabriel can spare the time I think I'll drop in on the next Power Control class so we can talk about this once I had a chance to get to the bottom of this. In the meantime I would like to have a word with Miss Cusek and Miss Rourke, the rest of you are dismissed. If you feel unwell in any way please don't feel the need for bravado and go to the infirmary."

Brigid looks to Alex.

"I... I have to go."

Alex was shifting back to normal, hellish steel melting off of him as kind of a grotesque partial statue as he reverted to flesh. "Yeah, I... let's get out of here."

Ryan, meanwhile, seemed to be intent on staying to hear what happened, too. He just might have gotten tired of being out of the loop on what was up with his students.

"Just... really need a shower," she says, hurrying out.

Kayla scowled at the group, before turning and exiting. She couldn't get away from those losers fast enough.