The late afternoon sun was still high and warm over Cowell College that Friday. Everyone was hungry, and wanted dinner badly.

For once, none of the people in the Beard posse were heading home for the weekend. So Eirik, Ryan, Ryan Hogan, Ben, Danielle and Courtney made their way through the lines at the Cowell Dining Hall, loading up on cottage cheese, pastas, bad stir fry, and lots of salad fixings before sitting down.

“So what do you guys want to do this weekend?” Courtney asked before showing in the first mouthful of cottage cheese. “Since none of us are leaving.”

“I don’t know. I don’t really have any reading or work for Monday.” Ben took a bite of his chicken.

“Stop talking, more eating!” Hogan said, poking Ben in the side.

“Hey! I know, lets go to the caves again! Ryan and I can show you the Porter caves.”

“Cool idea Danielle, but don’t you mean ‘y’all’ not you?” Eirik laughed.

“Hey! Stop making fun of how I talk!” Courtney slapped Eirik’s arm, and he laughed back at her.

“I also kind of wanted to go to the Beach this weekend.”

“Well, Cave and Beach are our two ideas,” Ryan said, after taking a drink of his soda. “I say we go to the cave tomorrow, and the beach on Sunday.”

Everyone shrugged or nodded and went back to eating.

After no one had said anything in over a minute, Eirik lifts his head and speaks.

“How would you spell ‘nif’ anyway?”

Everyone chuckled and shook their head.

Later that evening…

“I love having all of the James Bond films!!”

“But Danielle, their Eirik’s videos.”

“NO! They’re mine Ryan, I claimed them, just like Eirik’s bed.”

“Quiet, quiet! This is the scene where he puts the Bond girl in the bathtub while he brings out the harem of dancing girls!!”

Everyone rolled their eyes.

RyanH walked past the door.

“Hey guys, watching more Bond?”

“Yep,” Ryan said. “As always.”

“Cool.” Hogan walked in and took a seat on the carpet.

“I’ve got a question still though… the first weekend we were here, where did you guys go, Eirik and Ryan? You weren’t around for a good chunk of the weekend.”

The two friends from High School moved their glances from Ryan Hogan to each other.

“Yeah, you guys never seem to want to tell us what happened.” Courtney added.

Later on, everyone went to sleep, and Ryan hoped to get a good night’s rest. But sadly, that was not to be.

In his dream, Ryan walked through his dorm room to the drawer below his bed where he put the ‘heavy jacket’ and the ‘phase blaster’ he brought back with him, along with its holster belt.

Putting all the stuff on, he walked to the middle of the room, and straight through the vibrant red outline of a doorway.

On the other side was a gaping chasm that Ryan stood before. The wind whipped around his body from below him. He looked down into it, and could see five figures shrieking and soaring upward towards him.

As they swooped past him, the rush of air chilled him and caused Ryan to loose his balance until he fell into the ravine.

Soon, Ryan was falling through the dense mist at the bottom of the canyon, and fell through a bank of clouds and landed in the middle of one of the forests around the campus.

Standing up, Ryan was aware of the five figures standing around him in the woods, and as he stood up, Eirik and Adam were next to him. The figures continued to approach until three more figures stepped up around them and the six of them all moved out together against the five shadowy figures.

And then light filled Ryan’s visions and he awoke.

“Fuck, that had better not have been one of those dream premonitions!” He whispered to himself lying in bed, and then promptly fell asleep, forgetting the whole thing.

The next morning…

Eirik and Ryan were woken up by pounding on their door.

Stumbling out of bed, Eirik walked over to the door, eyes half closed and opened it up.

“Ready to go to Brunch??” Danielle asked as Ben, RyanH, and Courtney stood beside her in the hallway. Ryan walked up beside Eirik.

“Aren’t you guys up a lot earlier than usual? Especially for a Saturday?” Ryan asked before yawning.

“I guess, but we’re all hungry. Lets go!!” Ben demanded.

“Sure, sure…. Give us a few minutes to get ready…” and Eirik shut the door. “Ugh… it’s way to early for Brunch…”

The phone rang.

“Ugh, it’s way to early for phone calls!” Ryan moaned, walking across the room and picking up the receiver from behind the curtain. “Hello?”

“Am I addressing Ryan Watt or Eirik Neilsen?”

“Yes, this is Ryan. Who is this?”

“Adam. I need your help once again.”

Ryan blinked a few times, then realizing what the comment meant he shook his head.

“No way! We nearly got killed last time by giant demon banana slugs! We aren’t about to help you again!”

“What? Is that Adam?” Eirik asked. Ryan nodded. “Great! We can get phone calls from robots in parallel realities, but we can’t dial out of the school without four people’s help! What does he want?”

“He wants us to help him out again.”

“I need you guys to return to PCSC for a little while. I’ll open the doorway in the middle of our rooms so you won’t have to go anywhere,” the robot’s voice said over the phone line…”

“Hey, how did you get a hold of our number? And how can you call us from another reality?”

“Um, plot device. I’m going to cut through now. Put on your gear and get a move on.”

The phone line went dead, so Ryan hung it up. “He’s going to cut through, get your stuff.”

Eirik sighed and reached into his drawer and pulled out his gear. Ryan did the same, and had a weird sense of déjà vu.

As he stood up and put on his heavy jacket, he could see a light red line appear, and move in a long, tall rectangle in between the foots of their beds.

“Well, its open.”

“How do you know?”

“You don’t see that faint red outline of a doorway?”

“Not at all Ryan.”

“Weird.”

A figure suddenly appeared in the room.

“Hey Adam…”

“You two coming or not?”

“We’re coming, don’t worry.”

And with that, the three of them walked through the doorway and vanished.

“So what’s up Adam? Why are we here today?”

“You are here, Eirik, because I have just gotten word that the Head Warden is going to be at McHenry hearing selected prisoners’ stories about what happened in the upper quarry.”

“Okay…”

“We need to be there to give our own testimonies. I’ve hot-wired some fake id cards to make sure we get chosen to talk. Here, take these and we’re on our way.” The android tossed two ID Cards at his visitors and headed for the door.

“Wait, it’s the middle of the day, won’t those scanner things you mentioned last time pick us up?” Ryan asked as they walked into the empty hall.

“Scanner things?” Adam said, turning around.

“Technical term.”

Adam shakes his head. “It’s the weekend. The scanners are more lax than since the staff could care less if prisoners want to wander around the woods if they escape their cells. Especially since the implant chips prevent anyone from leaving the grounds. Explosive things that.”

“What?”

“In their ankles, Eirik. Computer chips with small amounts of explosives that will take them out when they cross the border. Now quit jabbing and keep moving.”

Adam turned and kept walking out of the building. The friends followed.

There was a huge crowd gathered in the crowd behind the library’s big steps. Prisoners were being lined up in rows in a carefully set up grid. They were not wearing prison issue clothes today. They were all wearing random clothes that they were allowed to bring with them when they were incarcerated. Luckily, this allowed Adam, Eirik and Ryan to join one of the lines of prisoners undeterred.

“So how are these ID cards going to get us in?”

“Do I have to explain everything? These ID cards are linked to a program that keeps record of good behavior. People who conform and try to fit into the system get more rights, and thus, will get called on to speak.”

“Quiet down Cowell Scum,” a guard called, prodding Eirik with his club.

The trio took their place at the side of one of the rows and waited.

A few minutes passed, and once all the prisoners were gathered, a familiar figure took the platform. He had a beard and a long ponytail hanging down his back. He wore glasses, but they were odd. On one side was a monocle; on the other was a mechanical eyepiece, with a small laser sight on it. One of his arms was entirely mechanical, and it ended in a metal ring around his neck with a few wires leading out of it.

“Is that… Blade?” Eirik asked Ryan, whispering.

“It sure looks like it. But, he’s a cyborg!”

“You are both correct,” Adam replied, remaining perfectly rigid. “All of the proctors on campus are cybernetic. Although that is not widely known off campus. It is a well-guarded secret. If it wasn’t, people wouldn’t apply for the job knowing they could only leave the job by being killed in the line of duty.”

“Creepy.”

“Silence!” The voice was unmistakably Blade’s, but it was clearly produced by a machine, as it had a metallic ring to it. “Warden Greenwood will presently be taking the podium to hear your testimonies. Those that are helpful to her may receive special treatment, perhaps a single cell, or better meal options, or perhaps… even a pardon.”

Waves of murmuring swept through the crowd. The trio gave each other side glances, but said nothing.

“I said Silence! Now then, we shall begin shortly. Warden?”

He stepped to the side and a woman walked up. Her eyes were harsher than her alternate at the UC. She held her hands locked behind her back, and she wore a fierce scowl.

“We shall begin! Guards, you will check each prisoner’s ID to see if their testimony shall be heard.” She nodded down at the guards around the assembled prisoners.

The guards approached the lines and scanned the cards, moving among their ranks until about the fifth or sixth try of one guard brought up a record that belonged to a prisoner who was whimpering and sniveling enough to be trusted to give testimony. Warden Greenwood nodded and the guards led the student up to a side podium with a microphone.

“Talk clearly, don’t dilly dally, get to your point, and get done, and you won’t be hurt.”

“Oh, but sir, violence won’t be necessary today. Not unless, sir, you try to resist us!”

Everyone began searching frantically for the source of the voice. The guards drew weapons, and the sniveling prisoner ducked down below the podium and covered his head.

“Up hear scum,” came a second, female voice. While the first one had been a slimy sounding voice, that seemed to hiss on every ‘s’, this one was strong and firm, but at the same time much quieter, like the person was barely trying to speak.

All eyes turned upwards to the top of the McHenry complex. All around its edges were five figures, all half human, half something else.

“Aye, found us eh?” Came the first speaker, which belonged to a squatting male with scaly skin, and long fingers. He smiled, and then spit at a grouping of guards who had surrounded the warden. But what came out of his mouth was not saliva, but fire. The creature spat fire!

He swung down from the roof behind the warden and grabbed her from behind. Guards made movements to engage, but the lizard-man puckered up his lips towards the warden’s face, and no one move. He spat out in front of him, towards the prisoners, to show he could do it again.

Gasps arose from the grouping of prisoners, who all made motions to try and escape the attack of the five demons as they all began to move. But the guards would not let them move. And that meant that Ryan, Eirik and Adam were stuck where they were as well.

“Huh-ha-huh-ha-huh-huh.” A deep, rumbling laugh came from the figure farthest to the left of the bunch. His body was massive, and looked as if his very form was carved out of solid rock. All he wore was a very large undershirt and a pair of very big, baggy pants that didn’t make it much past his knees. He leapt off the building, landing with such force he made the whole area rumble.

The figure on the right made the next move. It was the second speaker, a tall figure, made entirely of a black velvet cloak, tied around the waist by a golden colored rope, tied on her right side. Short gloves floated just past the place where her sleeves ended, and a white mask hung in the air in front of her hood. Its eye slots burned with a blue fire. She waved her right hand, and a long wisp of smoke swirled around her arm until she grabbed it and it formed a long staff.

The staff shot out in length until it reached the ground, and then shortened, bringing her down with it.

Meanwhile, a second female, with long platinum blonde hair, adorned occasionally with her own feathers smiled, then unfolded her arms from behind her back. This revealed that they were not actually arms, but long white-feathered wings. She wore a brown leather blouse, and brown leather pants and boots. Between the shirt and pants stuck out a mess of tail feathers. This one flew down and landed behind the crowd of students.

The last figure was similar to the fourth. It was also female, but was apparently a feral creature. She had shaggy brown hair all over her body. It wasn’t long, but it covered everything but her face. Her hands were a little larger than usual, and had thick pads on the palms, and claws on each finger. Her feet were much the same. She wore shredded prisoner clothes. She leapt agilely off the roof, from tree, to ledge, to fences until they she dropped on the opposite side from the rock man.

“Aye do believe you be surrounded from all sides! Well then, lay down ye weapons and we shall not harm thee!”

The guards did not budge, but kept their guns aimed at the five demons.

“I warn you,” came the soften siren voice of the bird-woman, “you would be best to listen to us.”

And then she opened her mouth wide, letting out a terrible piercing scream that cut into everyone’s head. The prisoners, the guards, and the trio clutched their head, which meant the guards dropped their weapons.

Realizing their blunder, the guards moved to grab up the guns.

“Don’t move,” lizard-man hissed. “If you do, I’ll burn the face right off your warden and make her uglier than Matron over there. He nodded towards the cloaked woman.

“Matron?” Adam whispered. “But that would mean… no!”

“Adam, how bad is this?” He gave Ryan a look that answered it all: Bad.

“Be quite Alton,” Matron shot back. She turned and looked at each of the others in turn, first the Bear-Girl, then the Bird, and then the Stone Giant. “Tess, Belle, Graham, kill anyone who moves.”

She turned away, her robe tossed in the breeze she made. Matron walked up the steps next to Alton the lizard, and put her staff before her. It turned back to smoke and wrapped around Warden Greenwood before transforming into strong metal that prevented her from moving. It even formed a gag in her mouth.

“Graham, collect her.” He followed her orders and walked up to the podium. Graham lifted the Warden over his shoulder, while she kicked and struggled to no avail. The guards stood where they were as the five creepy creatures rushed off behind Graham into the woods.

“What was that all about?”

“I’ll explain back at Beard Eirik, but for now, we have to get out of here.” Adam drew his pulled out a pulse blaster and fired it off into the air. All the prisoners moved away from the trio in shock. Eirik and Ryan shrugged and drew their weapons.

“Well, this is certainly one way to spend a Saturday morning!” With that, Ryan and Eirik cleared a way through the crowd with fear and ran off towards Cowell, the opposite way from where the gang ran.

Back in Beard 120 - PCSC

“Adam, will you please explain who those people were!”

The android collapsed into his chair by his desk, wiping off the dirt on his face.

“That, I believe, are the Porter Demons.”

“Porter’s got its own demons? Cool!” Ryan said, standing up in amazement.

“And why are they called Porter Demons?”

“They are a gang. Porter is the prison block for condemned criminals. Death Row. Those were all students who were executed years back. Unfortunately, rumor has it they made a deal with a demon to bring them all back from the dead, sort of like zombies, if they were all executed. Well, they were executed, and the demon brought them back… as half-demons. Part human, but to give them life, he infused energies that mutated them into things from the natural world: reptile, bear, bird, rock, and magic itself into their psuedo-leader: Matron.”

“Damn, so we got a gang of undead prisoners running around the woods with the head Warden! So um… wouldn’t that be a good thing. Oppressive warden out of the way?”

“Not at all Eirik. She was one of the few people working for change in the PC System, partially because of the demon problem.”

“So we should go save her?” Ryan asked, sitting back down.

Adam laughed. “Like the three of us could take on the Porter Demon gang. We’re nowhere near ready! We’d need an army of armed people!”

Ryan looked up suddenly. “How about just three?”

Ryan and Eirik ran out into the open area in front of the dining hall as Hogan, Courtney, and Ben walked out from the dining hall brunch.

“Hey, there you guys are! We waited for you, but when you didn’t open your door we went to Brunch, thinking you would be here already, but you weren’t. Where did you go?”

“Well, Danielle, we’re glad you asked. We need to talk to you guys back at our room for a while.”

“Um, okay Ryan.”

The two guys turned and began moving towards the room, the other three shrugged and followed them.

“You guys seriously want us to believe that there are demons inhabiting a parallel version of Santa Cruz, one that is actually a prison, not a college?”

“Basically,” Ryan replied to Ben. He, Hogan, and Danielle were all sitting on Ryan and Eirik’s beds while those two stood in front of the room.

“Cool!”

Ben and Danielle turned to Hogan with a look of disgust.

“Cool? What are you thinking?”

“Its not as bad as it sounds guys!”

“Eirik, Ryan nearly got speared by a giant slug with a long sharp blade on its arm!” Danielle protested, standing up and slugging him in the arm.

“Ow!” Eirik laughed, grabbing her arm before the two of them began fighting and struggling with each other.

“Yes, I know it sounds bad. But we need you guys’ help. Hogan, Ben, you two love Counter Strike… this is kinda like that… but… not. Please?”

“Alright, we’ll go and hear this guy Adam’s plan, but we reserve the right to say no and come back, right?”

“Right, right.”

“Okay,” Eirik said, struggling with Danielle still, “so how do we get back in touch with Adam?”

“Oh, he gave me this.” That said, Ryan pulled out a phase dagger from his pocket. “Adam was amazed that I could see the outline of the ‘arch’ as he calls the opening between realities, as only robots or mages should be able to see it. So he gave me a dagger, saying that I would be able to cut through realities with it. So if everyone is ready, we can go.”

Ben, Hogan, and Danielle all asked for a few minutes to get ready. Ryan went and got his camouflage pants and just an undershirt, and Ben went and put on jeans. Danielle just went and cleaned off her make-up. Then they were ready.

“Gee, so now can we go?”

Everyone shrugged and agreed. Ryan shook his head and redrew out the phase dagger. He pressed down the button and focused, and the blade appeared, thin, long and red-purple. Ryan then moved to the middle of the room and began moving the blade in a square pattern. For a minute, the three new members of the group were afraid that Ryan and Eirik were really crazy, even though they had seen the odd jackets and the phase blasters they brought back with them.

Ryan turned back around. “Lets go!”

The three looked weary of walking through an invisible door, even though Ryan assured them it was there, so Eirik walked through first.

“Oh my god! He just… faded away! Like a ghost!” Danielle gasped.

“Duh? Hello, we told you it was a doorway to another reality!”

“Well you don’t have to be a smart ass Ryan!”

Ryan shrugged and motioned for one of them to walk through next. Hogan rubbed his hands together and hopped up to Ryan, than walked through the invisible opening.

Ben shrugged, and followed Hogan. Danielle still looked skeptical. But shaking her head, she walked up and through the door, with Ryan following shortly there after.

Ryan and Danielle found Hogan and Ben in amazement of the change in location. It was the exact same room, but the furnishings were totally different.

“…And that would be Danielle,” Eirik announced. Danielle looked over at Eirik and saw a strange looking man, all in grays, walking up to her and handing her a ‘heavy jacket’ and a gun in a holster. She took them, and turned to Hogan and Ben.

Hogan had put on his jacket, and had a gun that looked like a rifle slung over his shoulder, and a regular phase blaster in a holster under the jacket. Ben was holstering his gun under his jacket.

“So, three more people Adam,” Ryan said, discharging the dagger, “what’s the plan?”

“Your great plan is to head over to Porter and ‘see if we can find the gang’s hideout?” Ryan asked. “Guys, I’m sorry, but I thought our Robot friend here would have thought of something better than that!”

Adam drew his phase blaster and aimed it at Ryan’s head.

“Keep in mind that you, like demons, are out of phase with this reality, so I could easily blow you away if you pissed me off!”

Ben, Danielle, and Hogan all drew their blasters at Adam.

“And you are a robot with a mage magic core, so these things should be able to tear through you like butter,” Ben returned. “So unless I misunderstood your science lesson, you may want to put down the gun.”

Adam smirked and put down the weapon, then continued to walk away.

Danielle let out a deep sigh of relief and holstered her gun. “Boy, when Ryan asked what we wanted to do this weekend, I did not have this is mind. We may not be able to go to the Porter caves, but we should get to go to the beach.”

“Wait, Danielle, that’s it!”

“What’s it?”

“Adam! I know where the Porter Demons are!”

Everyone stopped in the middle of climbing up the big stairs from the media propaganda center up to Porter Prison.

“Where do you think they’ve gone?” the android said.

“The Porter Caves! Its cold, dark, damp! Perfect for demons! And its named after the college that they are named after!”

“Hmm, a good point,” Hogan said, rubbing his beard.

“Well, its worth a try I guess, although I doubt your non-super computer mind could possibly-

“- be right! I can not believe it!”

“Believe it Adam!” Eirik whispered. The group was standing in the first chamber of the Porter Caves, down the passageway, they were overhearing the conversations of several familiar voices.

“Well Warden, tss tss tss,” Alton laughed, with a hiss, “what do you think of our… humble abode?”

There were gagged mumbles.

“Oh, that’s no way to talk about our home. Matron and Graham put a lot of work into it to make it comfortable!”

“Well, I rather agree with her opinion Tess,” came the voice of Belle. “I would much rather have some more pillows and maybe a window or too. And these mini-torches are just atrocious!!”

“Belle, how the hell did you get thrown into jail anyway? And Porter especially?” Matron’s voice asked.

“Okay, so how are we going to fight all of these guys now that we’ve found them?” Ben asked Adam, Eirik, and Ryan.

“How should we know?” Eirik replied.

“Well, haven’t you done this before?” Danielle yelled in her loudest whisper.

“Um, if you count ambushing demon slugs and nearly getting killed… then yes,” Ryan admitted sheepishly.

“Great! So what are we going to do than?”

“Get Pummeled?”

They all turned to where the voice came from, behind them. A giant figure stood in front of the doorway. It was Graham.

“Oh, we’re fucked!!” Hogan yelled.

The group didn’t realize they were knocked out until they came to outside on the Porter Meadow.

“Ouch.” Eirik reiterated, reaching up to rub his throbbing head. At least, he tried to rub his throbbing head. But he found that his arms were both tethered to the ground, as well as his legs. “Um, if anyone else is hear, are your arms and legs tethered to the ground?”

“Yes, yes my arms are tethered to the ground,” Hogan’s voice replied, while his head nodded, the only part of him that can move.

In turn, Ryan, Danielle, and Ben replied. But there was no sign of Adam anywhere.

“Does anyone know where Adam is?”

“We do. He’s right here,” came the guttural sound of Tess’ voice.

They all stretched and craned their necks from the plus pattern of their four bodies.

Four members of the Porter Demons were standing close together with Adam, a little ways off to the left of them, Matron was standing next to a tree, where Warden Greenwood was tied to a tree, still gagged.

Adam’s head was slumped over, and Graham had him held firmly by the shoulders between his large rocky hands.

“Okay, so what do you guys want with us? Why are we tied up out here?” Eirik demanded to know.

“Oh, don’t you know? We’re all from Porter, so in addition to being horrible criminals who were executed, we are also all very artsy!” Alton explained.

“And Matron, she’s the artsiest of them all. Not only was she a serial killer, but she was also a world-renowned sculptor and painter! So she devised this creative little way for you all to die!” Belle laughed.

“But why us?” Ben and Danielle cried in unison.

“Because,” Graham laughed, “you were demons, and you got in our way!”

“Okay, you got me, how do we die like this?” Hogan asked.

“Ooh, I am so glad you asked!” Tess cheered. “You see it is almost noon, when the sun is at its peak! And you are all lying out here in the sun! And today is meant to be a scorcher! You’re all going to fry! Muahahahaha!!”

“Okay, I don’t like her much!” Ryan said, trying to look at his friends.

“Agreed,” the other four friends replied.

“So, uh, do you think we can get out of this guys?” Eirik asked.

“Um, nope, don’t see any real way out of this,” Hogan answered back.

“Unless Ryan could reach that phase dagger thing,” Danielle replied.

“And I can’t. Looks like were stuck, unless some miraculous plot twist decides to reveal itself!”

“Like a android who can fake being turned off.”

Their heads all twisted around as best they could to see Adam’s head lift before he drew a phase dagger and stabbed it into the rocky hand of Graham. The rock giant growled and released his grip. The android spun around and slashed Graham again before tossing the phase dagger so that it cut the tether on Ryan’s right wrist. He sat up and cut the rest of his ties.

“That was way too convenient!” Danielle cheered.

“Yes, but I was stuck for a way out of the situation. Would you rather I leave you all in the sun to bake?”

“NO!” they all screamed in unison.

“Good,” he said and then promptly cut off the rest of their ties.

They all stood up and faced the demons, who were busy attacking Adam. The robot was holding up pretty well.

“Wow, that is impressive!” Hogan said, looking at Adam spinning kick to the face of Alton.

Ryan and Eirik drew their weapons. “Shall we help him out then?”

The others shrugged and drew their weapons. Danielle and Ben drew their standard pistols, and Hogan pulled out his rifle.

And a great battle ensued between the ten of them, the six heroes, and the four demons. It was intense, it was exhilarating, it was dangerous… but I don’t feel like writing it all, so suffice it to say, I’ll give a quick rundown of the outcome.

Hogan got off a bunch of good shots against Graham, but his rifle overloaded and blew up, so he had to use his regular blaster.

Belle got thoroughly trounced by Danielle in a catfight that ended in the bird-girl getting knocked out onto a rock, but Danielle had hurt her leg, and had lost her gun.

Ben and Alton got into a heavy firefight, one fighting with actual fire, the other with energy bolts. Their dual ended with Alton unconscious and Ben beat up and bruised.

Eirik and Ryan both tried to take on the feral bear-girl Tess, but she was way to quick and agile for their shots, so they eventually just shot at a large rock that exploded as she leapt over it.

That just left Graham. Hogan and Adam fired at least a hundred rounds at him… each, but he hadn’t yet gone down. So Adam got tired of it, grabbed up a large tree branch and bashed it across the back of Graham’s legs, causing him to loose his balance and fall. The force of the fall knocked him out.

So the group of humans and robot walked over to the tree where Matron stood next to the warden.

“Stand aside Matron,” Hogan commanded, aiming his gun at her robes.

“Like I’m going to listen to you.” She generated a long javelin out of smoke and hurled it at the group. Danielle ducked and shot at it, shattering the spear.

“Watch it! You could poke someone’s eye out!”

“I wasn’t aiming for your eyes!” Matron lifted a glove to her face, and a blue ball of fire appeared in her hand. She threw out her hand and it flew at the group. Ryan instinctively drew out the dagger and cut the fire in half as it passed them. The blue flames dissipated.

“How the hell did I know how to do that.”

“I don’t know, nor do I care, so long as you die.” Matron lifted her hand again and smoke began forming around it. But suddenly, an explosion racked across her hand, and the glove fell to the ground. The other glove flew to the invisible hand, clutching it in pain.

Hogan then lowered the still smoking barrel of his phase blaster.

“You… suck!” Matron gasped before she herself dissolved into a cloud of smoke.

Guns aimed in all directions, the group approached the Warden and cut away the metal ties with the phase daggers.

She was appreciative of their efforts, but was furious that they were out of their cells. So while she used her cell phone to call for guards to come get her, the others ran into the woods, but not before they noticed that all of the other Porter Demons had vanished.

The group cut through the woods, and around the campus until they reached McHenry once again.

“Well, I shall leave you five now. I’m sure you know the way back. I shall get a hold of you when I need your help again.” With that, Adam turned and left, heading off in the direction of Cowell.

“Well, might as well cut through before those guards find us!” Ryan laughed, drawing the dagger.

He cut open the doorway, everyone holstered their weapons and they walked through the door before the vague red line vanishes.

That evening at dinner…

“Well, who here enjoyed that! Uuuhhh! That rifle was so cool! Just like out of Counter Strike! I wonder if Adam has a phase sniper rifle…”

“Hogan, you are so weird!” Danielle yelled out in frustration. “That bitch Belle pulled out a small chunk of my hair! I certainly didn’t enjoy it!”

“Well…I thought it was kinda cool,” Ben said in response. “I can’t wait to see how these phase blasters work!”

“Yeah, and aren’t the heavy-jackets just the neatest things?” Eirik said, eyes all squinty and teeth showing.

“Hey guys.”

The group looked up to see Lucy and Alex walking over to them. Alex’s tray is overflowing with three plates of food, as usual.

“Woah, going a little light today, eh Alex?”

“Oh sod off!”

“Luuuuuuuucccy!!” Danielle cried, making Lucy beam as she sat down.

“Hey Alex, how are ya doing?” Hogan asked,

“Alright, okay,” Alex and Ryan said in unison. Everyone laughed.

“Ya know, it wasn’t really what I had in mind, but I guess we did get to go to the Porter caves.” Danielle paused and took a long drink from her orange juice. “So should we still try to go to Natural Bridges Beach tomorrow?”

“YEAH!” Hogan said banging a fist against the table. “And if I only had that rifle still, I could take out all sorts of cool water sprites and banshees from the top of the bluff I bet!”

“I don’t think so Hogan! Tomorrow, lets just try to have a nice calm, sane day!” Eirik laughed, holding up his hands.

“Yeah, cause the way this school year is mirroring our adventures in High School, we won’t be getting many of these at all!” Ryan laughed as well.

“Um, may I ask one thing?” Lucy interjected.

“Sure, what?” Ben said, chewing on some salad that Hogan was quite upset about him having.

“What on earth are you guys talking about?”

“Oh, right…. Um….”

The group got very quiet as Alex and Lucy looked at them inquisitively.

…End Episode 2