Free The Academy by Zachary Rawlins

it fighting each other, or worrying about having to.”
    Alex eyes widened.
    “Why?”
    “We’re no better than they are,” Michael said ruefully. “Normal people, I mean. Humanity. We create families, allegiances, cartels – and then we scheme, Alex, we plot out agendas and attempt to advance them, or try to stop others from doing the very same thing. Just like in the real world, eh?”
    “That’s pretty depressing,” Alex observed. “All this power you keep talking about, and the best thing you can think of to do with it is fighting each other? Couldn’t we use it to help people instead?”
    “Seemed like Mitsuru helped you a lot the other night, you know,” Michael said dryly.
    Alex shook his head.
    “That’s not what I mean. Fighting monsters, that’s one thing, whatever they are. But why fight each other?”
    “It’s complicated, on one level. On another, it’s the same old stupid story – we aren’t enlightened, Alex. We disagree, fall in love, and hate each other, the whole spectrum of human experience. We have differences of opinion, and sometimes, we can’t resolve those differences peacefully.” Michael started to sound a lot like a teacher to Alex, in a very mundane way. “If a disagreement goes for long enough, and is important enough, people start to take sides. Once people start taking sides, conflict is inevitable. No different here than anywhere else.”
    “So what is the disagreement about?”
    “How best to protect people,” Michael sighed. “How best to apply the power we have. Like I told you earlier, it’s not a good-guy bad-guy thing – we all agree that we have a responsibility to protect humanity. We just have differing opinions on the most effective way to do that.”
    “Different enough that you’re willing to kill another?”
    “Sure,” Michael said, shrugging. “Don’t tell me you can’t think of anything worth killing over.”
    Alex wasn’t sure what to say to that, so he kept his mouth shut instead, and reached for the vile, cooling coffee.

Eight
     
     
     
     
     
    Blood crawled across the chain , red on black pitted metal, radiating out in coils from where Mitsuru crouched, motionless in the center. She bled freely from her palms, the wounds reopened, and the chain slid slickly through her hands, moving of its own accord. Her nosebleed was a steady trickle, and her blouse was red and wet all down the front. The floor where she had fallen was sticky, and there were two smeared red handprints on the white pine flooring.
    Mitsuru felt the blood crawl along the chain, animating it, leveraging her will against gravity, through a headache so severe that it made her feel as if she was looking at the world from a distance, from the mouth of a dark tunnel. She ground her teeth against each other and the sound was terrible, reverberating in her head, but she could not stop. Her jaw was clenched, and her body shook with effort. In her head, she raged against the Black Door, dark pitted wood damp and sticky with blood, the dull iron of the heavy fastenings spotted with rust, the whole of it wrapped and sealed in luminous threads that resisted her efforts to throw it open. She tried to force it, straining against the gossamer bindings that shut it tight, the structure of her mind buckling with the effort.
    Against the constraints that had been placed on her, against the advice of those who cared about her, and at the potential expense of her own sanity and wellbeing, Mitsuru labored to open the Black Door in her mind.
    Twining itself along the chain, her blood followed her commands, and for a moment, the coils of the chain stirred, animated by force of will. Deep inside of Mitsuru, a few of the luminous threads gave way with a high, musical sound, like a violin string snapping, and the Black Door flexed and groaned. She heard the links of the chain jingle as they rose, flowing and intertwining, moving in concert with her will and volition. In that instant, she felt the