CHAPTER 4 — THE FIRST WAVE
The hallway outside the classroom felt different when she stepped into it — heavier, like the air had thickened. Students moved past her in slow, uneven currents, their conversations muted, their footsteps dragging. She wasn’t sure if it was her imagination or her field still settling.
Mara walked beside her, calm and steady, as if the strange atmosphere didn’t touch her at all.
“Your waves haven’t fully stabilized,” Mara said. “They’re still radiating.”
The girl swallowed. “Is Lila going to be okay?”
“She’ll recover,” Mara said. “But you need to understand something. Emotional destabilization doesn’t just affect people. It affects everything.”
They turned a corner.
A row of lockers flickered.
Not the lights above them — the lockers themselves. Their metal surfaces shimmered like reflections on water, bending and warping for a split second before snapping back into place.
The girl froze. “Did I do that?”
“Yes,” Mara said. “Your fear is still leaking.”
She pressed a hand to her chest, trying to contain the sphere again. But her emotions were tangled — fear knotted with guilt, guilt knotted with anger, anger knotted with confusion. The sphere vibrated violently, refusing to settle.
Mara watched her carefully. “You’re close to triggering a wave.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means reality is about to respond.”
A locker door suddenly swung open on its own, slamming against the metal frame with a sharp clang. Papers spilled out, fluttering across the floor like startled birds.
Students jumped back.
“What the—?”
“Did you see that?”
“Is someone messing with us?”
The girl’s pulse spiked.
“No,” she whispered. “No, no, no—”
The lights overhead flickered. The floor vibrated. A low hum filled the hallway, rising like a distant engine.
Mara grabbed her shoulders. “Listen to me. You need to breathe.”
“I’m trying!”
“Try harder.”
The hum grew louder. Lockers rattled. A ceiling tile cracked.
Students screamed and backed away, some running, some frozen in place.
The girl squeezed her eyes shut, forcing herself to inhale deeply. She imagined the sphere again — wild, unstable, thrashing — and tried to contain it.
But the fear was too strong.
The sphere burst.
The wave hit.
It wasn’t visible. It wasn’t loud. It wasn’t dramatic.
It was a pulse — a sudden, crushing shift in the air that rolled down the hallway like a shockwave made of emotion instead of force.
Lockers dented inward. Lights exploded in showers of sparks. Phones in students’ pockets vibrated violently, screens cracking. A vending machine toppled over with a metallic crash.
Students dropped to their knees, clutching their heads, overwhelmed by dizziness and nausea.
The girl staggered backward, horrified. “I didn’t mean—”
Mara stepped in front of her, shielding her from falling debris. “This is a wave. Your first uncontrolled one.”
“How do I stop it?”
“You can’t stop a wave once it starts,” Mara said. “You can only survive it.”
The hum reached a peak — a sharp, piercing tone that made the girl’s ears ring.
Then, slowly, painfully, it faded.
The lights dimmed. The lockers stilled. The air settled.
Students groaned, confused and shaken.
The girl stared at the destruction — the cracked tiles, the dented metal, the toppled machine — her heart sinking.
“I did this,” she whispered.
Mara nodded. “Yes.”
“I hurt them.”
“You destabilized them,” Mara corrected. “There’s a difference. But the longer you go without training, the worse the waves will get.”
The girl’s throat tightened. “I don’t want to hurt anyone.”
“Then you need to learn control,” Mara said. “Real control. Not just containment.”
“How?”
Mara’s expression hardened — not unkindly, but with the weight of truth.
“You need to leave this place,” she said. “Now. Before the next wave hits.”
The girl looked around at the chaos she had caused — the frightened students, the damaged hallway, the lingering static in the air.
She knew Mara was right.
She couldn’t stay here.
She couldn’t pretend anymore.
She wasn’t normal. She wasn’t safe. She wasn’t just a girl.
She was a Kireth.
And the world was already starting to break around her.6Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrnOQlSgj2y
and then Add to home screen.