Amaranth Nightshade, a senior at Spektral academy, was walking up the flights of stairs to the top floor with great determination and frustration flowing through her. She had a small yellow slip of paper in one of her hands, which was the source of her current bout of annoyance.
Without knocking or calling through the door, Amy flung the headmaster's door open and strode right through. As she walked toward Allen's desk, she caused the door to shut behind her by controlling the energy particles inside of it. She did the same with the yellow piece of paper in her hand when she flung it toward the desk. She directed it to land on the center of Allen's desk.
While the piece of paper was flying over to the desk, Amy angrily walked over to the couch in the office and flopped down on it. She scowled at the piece of paper as soon as it landed on the desk. It was a detention slip from her Telekinesis class.
"I am NOT going to work with another group of students again, Allen. And I am NOT going to serve another detention because of it. How many times do I have to tell that teacher that I do not work well in groups?! We hardly ever were paired or grouped up at Daedalus. As was one of our motto's, 'you either sank or swam on your own,'. I don't do well with groups of people, Allen, you know that!"
She may have hated nearly everything about her old academy, but being able to be solitary in nearly ever aspect of her life wasn't one of them.
Amy had come from a fellow magical academy called Daedalus. It was a very high-brow school that only promoted excellence. If you failed to live up to that expectation, you were kicked out. There were no 'average' students at Daedalus.
Amy had absolutely hated it there, and a big reason for her hatred was due to the fact that her father was the headmaster of that school and her vicious older sister was basically his right-hand woman. Her entire family was known for taking advantage of the 'little man'. They used their powers and influence to try and get anything they wanted. Since her family had the power to control energy particles and everything is made up of energy, her family was quite powerful in the pecking order of the magical world. However, their greatest asset was also their greatest weakness. Too much energy around the Nightshades weakened them severely. Having too much energy around them could overwhelm their bodies, senses, and render them basically useless. If enough energy was used, a member of the family could even die. The amount of energy it would take to kill one of them from energy exposure alone was astronomical, though. It was hard to come by that amount of energy. However, it was not difficult to come by a couple of large generators and weaken them enough to attack. A lot of electrical appliances all in an enclosed area could weaken them, too.
Amy's family was very close, and each member looked out for the other. Well, that was until Amy came along. Amy hadn't exactly liked using her powers to hurt people or take advantage of them. She also hadn't liked being at Daedalus academy because the entire school was filled with rich, arrogant snobs that would just as soon kill you as look at you. She had hated the environment of both her family and the academy. Her father was ashamed of her and he had given Amy sister, Camilla, the responsibility of 'looking after' Amy. To her sister, that meant keeping Amy in Daedalus and not allowing her to leave the grounds... ever. Amy went to classes and tutoring sessions, but that was about it. Also, if Amy ever got in trouble with one of her teachers for mouthing off or for getting a low grade, Camilla would take her to one of the towers they had at the academy and punish Amy. The punishment usually involved whipping, beating, and/or emotionally abuse. Oftentimes, her sister would yell at her about how much she hated having to look after Amy because she was such a screw up and couldn't get anything right. She hated the responsibility of taking care of Amy, but she would not let their father or family down. She
would become a respectable member of the family. Sometimes, however, Camilla would just throw Amy in one of the dungeons and leave her there for hours with no sunlight or fresh air.
It was in this dungeon where she had met Allen Masterson for the first time. It had been during this past summer when professors and headmasters from fellow magical schools visited each other's schools to learn of the various techniques and strategies that were being implemented to see if anything new and successful could be added to their own curriculum. Most of the teachers and headmasters didn't stay at Daedalus for very long when it was Daedalus' turn to host. They usually got a quick tour of the building and an overview of the classes that were offered, and that was it. Daedalus didn't exactly exude warmth or friendliness. Of course all of Daedalus' staff and faculty were proper and did everything that was expected of a host, but their actions lacked sincerity. It was as if they were just going through the motions.
Allen had broken away from the tour of the building and gone down to the dungeons when he found Amy. Maybe he had sensed a life form down there and that's why he had gone down there. The dungeons were never a part of the regular tour. Amy had never asked him why he had gone down there in the first place, though. She didn't like to talk about that time, so she didn't ask.
She also didn't ask how Allen had persuaded her father to let her leave Daedalus and come to Spektral. All she knew was that after she had met Allen down in the dungeon and he had left for a brief amount of time. Then, he had come back about an hour later with the dungeon's key. He had let her out and said that her father had given him permission to take her to Spektral Academy for good. She had heard of Spektral Academy and had obviously heard of Allen Masterson. Many Daedalus students made fun of Spektral because they heard it was a nurturing environment and that they took in almost any magical creature. Of course, Daedalus students didn't exactly talk fondly about any school but their own.
Amy didn't care what Spektral was like. It had to be better than Daedalus, so she agreed to go with Allen. She had stayed with him at Spektral for the summer months since she didn't have any place else to go. Spektral was closed during the summer months, so there hadn't been any other students around except for the college students that stayed there to take extra classes. They were so busy with school and jobs, though, that they hardly noticed Amy's presence.
Amy had been very cautious of Allen at first. She naturally didn't trust anybody, especially a man in a headmaster's position. However, Allen made it nearly impossible for Amy to not open up to him. She had gone to his office the first few days she had been at Spektral to learn about the layout and what she could do around the place. First, the absolute freedom she found out that she'd have here was new and surreal to her. It appealed to her greatly. However, it was Allen's incessant friendliness that broke through her wall the most. Even when she would sit in a chair with her arms crossed and not saying anything, Allen would continue to talk as if she were a chatty and sunny individual. She couldn't seem to make him angry or upset at her. It was odd. She had always pissed people off, but she couldn't seem to get Allen angry at her no matter what she did.
Eventually, Amy started to come up to Allen's office more and more frequently, even if she hadn't been summoned. She even fell asleep on the couch in the office a couple of times instead of going to her room to sleep.
She had grown close to Allen and discovered that she actually enjoyed his company. He was fun, nice and funny. He was also very smart. He thought of things in a way that Amy never had before. He challenged her view on life, and she loved being challenged in this manner.
However, she found adjusting to Spektral quite difficult when all the students came back and classes began. That's what led her to be in Allen's office now discussing one of many detention slips.
