Marcus's POV
My fist hit with the locker door so hard it left a dent.
"Easy there, Marcus," laughed Jake, one of my friends. "What's got you so mad?"
I rubbed my fingers, trying to ignore the pain shooting up my arm. "Nothing. Just... nothing."
But it wasn't nothing. It was everything. This morning I'd gotten another letter from my dad, and it was full of the standard disappointments. "Your grades are falling, Marcus. Your magic numbers are average at best. Maybe you should consider a trade school instead of trying for the magical university."
Average. The word made me want to punch something else.
I'd been trying so hard to prove I was special, to show everyone that I wasn't just another average student at Riverside School. But no matter what I did, it never felt like enough. I was strong, sure, but my power was just okay. I was popular, but only because people were scared of me, not because they actually liked me.
And now my dad was giving up on me too.
"Yo, Marcus!" Tommy called out from down the hall. "You gotta see this!"
I followed the sound of his voice and found a crowd of students gathering around the main entrance. They were all looking at something - or someone.
"What's going on?" I pushed through the crowd until I could see what everyone was looking at.
A girl with dark hair was standing by the front desk, looking totally lost. She was holding a schedule in her hands, and her eyes were red like she'd been crying. But that wasn't what caught my attention.
It was the way she was standing. Like she was trying to make herself invisible. Like she was ashamed of something.
"Is that her?" whispered a girl next to me. "The one from Starfall Academy?"
My ears perked up. Starfall Academy? That was the fancy school where all the rich kids with strong magic went. What was someone from there doing at Riverside?
"Yeah, that's Maya Chen," said another student. "My cousin goes to Starfall. She said Maya totally failed her Assessment in front of everyone. Like, epic loss. They kicked her out the same day."
Maya Chen. I watched as she walked past us, her head down, totally ignoring all the stares and whispers. She looked unhappy.
And suddenly, I felt something I hadn't felt in weeks. Hope.
Here was someone who was actually lower than me. Someone who had fallen further than I ever had. Someone who would make me look good by comparison.
"Hey, Jake," I said quietly. "I think I just found our new entertainment."
Jake grinned. "The Starfall reject? This should be fun."
The plan formed in my mind as I watched Maya disappear down the hallway. If I could make her look even worse, maybe people would forget about my own problems. Maybe they'd see me as someone important, someone who belonged at the top of the social ladder.
All I had to do was make sure everyone knew that Maya Chen was a fake, a failure, and a liar.
I started small. During passing times, I'd make comments just loud enough for people to hear. "Can you believe Starfall Academy let a fraud like her fool them for so long?" or "I heard she was using illegal magic enhancers to fake her abilities." It worked better than I expected. Within a few hours, everyone was talking about Maya Chen and her amazing failure. Students who had never even heard of her before were suddenly experts on her life.
"I always knew something was off about those Starfall kids," said one girl at lunch. "They act so superior, but look how easy it is to fool them."
"My mom says some students use magical devices to cheat on their tests," added another. "Maya probably bought all her good grades."
Each story I spread made me feel a little bit better about myself. Sure, I wasn't the most powerful student at Riverside, but at least I wasn't a lying cheater who got kicked out of the best school in the area.
But the real test came at lunch.
I saw Maya sitting all alone in the corner, looking at her sandwich like it was the most interesting thing in the world. She looked so sad, so beaten. Part of me almost felt sorry for her.
Almost.
"Come on, guys," I said to my friends. "Time to welcome our new classmate properly."
We walked over to her table, and I put on my biggest, fakest smile. "Well, well, look who we have here. The popular Maya Chen, sitting with the new kid."
There was some transfer student sitting with her - a guy I'd never seen before. He looked up at me quietly, like he wasn't impressed by my presence at all. That annoyed me.
"I'm Marcus," I said, making sure my voice carried across the restaurant. "I run things around here. And I think you should know that your new friend here is bad news. She's a liar and a cheat who got kicked out of her fancy school."
Maya shrank back in her chair, and I felt a surge of pleasure. This was working fine. Everyone in the restaurant was watching, and they were all seeing me put the famous "fallen star" in her place.
But then the new kid stood up.
"Is that so?" he said, his voice totally calm. "And what makes you think you have the right to decide who I sit with?"
I laughed, but something about his tone made me uncomfortable. "Because this is my school, transfer boy. And I don't like troublemakers."
"Then maybe you should leave," he said.
The cafeteria went dead silent. Nobody - and I mean nobody - talked to me like that. I was Marcus Thompson. I was the strongest, toughest kid at Riverside. I didn't get told what to do by some strange new student.
I stepped closer, my hands tightening into fists. "What did you just say to me?"
That's when everything went wrong.
The new kid smiled, and suddenly the temperature in the room dropped. I felt something I'd never experienced before - raw, ancient power that made my magic feel like a candle compared to a forest fire.
My knees started shaking. My tough-guy act fell like a house of cards. Whatever this Alex kid was, he wasn't just some everyday transfer student.
"This isn't over," I mumbled, backing away as fast as I could without actually running. My friends followed me, all of them looking as confused and scared as I felt.
I spent the rest of lunch hiding in the bathroom, trying to figure out what had just happened. How could some random kid have that kind of power? And why was he saving Maya Chen?
But the worst part wasn't the shame. The worst part was the awareness that my plan had backfired completely. Instead of making myself look strong, I'd made myself look weak in front of the entire school.
I was washing my hands when my phone buzzed with a text from an unknown number: "Good job today, Marcus. The Chen girl is more solitary than ever. Keep it up, and you'll be rewarded."
My blood turned cold. Who was this? How did they know what I'd been doing?
I wrote back: "Who is this? How did you get my number?"
The answer came immediately: "Someone who appreciates your work. Maya Chen is dangerous, Marcus. More dangerous than you know. By spreading stories about her, you're helping to keep everyone safe."
"What do you mean dangerous?"
"She's not what she seems. The power she's hiding could hurt innocent people. People like your little sister Emma."
My heart stopped. Emma was only eight years old. She went to grade school across town. How did this person know about her?
"You don't know my sister," I typed, my hands shaking.
"I know she walks home from school every day at 3:15. I know she stops at the park on Maple Street to feed the ducks. I know she's completely helpless if something were to happen to her."
I stared at the message, my entire body shaking. This wasn't just some random person. This was someone who had been watching my family.
"What do you want?" I typed.
"Keep doing what you're doing. Make sure Maya Chen stays separated and friendless. Make sure no one believes in her or wants to help her. In return, your sister stays safe."
"And if I don't?"
"Then Emma might not make it home from school tomorrow."
I dropped my phone, and it clattered on the bathroom floor. Someone was threatening my little sister. Someone was using her to force me to keep bullying Maya Chen.
But who? And why was Maya so important that someone would scare a child to keep her alone?
I picked up my phone with shaky hands and saw one final message: "Oh, and Marcus? If you tell anyone about this talk, Emma won't be the only one who gets hurt. Keep your mouth shut, and keep Maya Chen unhappy. We'll be watching."
I stared at my image in the bathroom mirror. An hour ago, I thought I was just picking on a weak kid to make myself feel better. Now I understood I was being used as a weapon against her by someone who knew where my sister lived.
Maya Chen wasn't just a failed student from Starfall Academy. She was someone that strong, dangerous people wanted to destroy. And they were using me to do it.
The worst part was, I didn't have a choice. Emma was all I had left. Our parents were always working, always moving, always too busy to care about us. I was the one who walked her to school every morning. I was the one who helped her with homework. I was the one who made sure she was safe.
And now, to keep her safe, I had to keep destroying Maya Chen.
Even if it meant becoming the kind of person I hated.