'Thank goodness… it looks like they're okay now."
Having pacified them, Angelica now had the opportunity to see how Sammi was doing.
'Wha…t?'
At that moment her mind went blank. What did she just witness? What was happening?
Across the plaza, where Kai's group stood, was a gigantic violet vortex. Space seemed to bend at its edges, everything around it looked warped. Angelica could not figure out what she was looking at. Her vision had to be distorted, it was the only reasonable conclusion to explain what she was seeing.
'That vortex surely isn't gonna do anything to my kids… surely not… surely…'
Before she could finish her thought the vortex enveloped both Kai and Sia as well as Sammi who had jumped in at the last moment in a futile attempt to save them.
Then poof, in the next instance the 3 teens had disappeared. Vanished from existence as if they were never there in the first place. Angelica was left staring at the empty space where they had last stood.
…
…
…
(3:05 PM EST)
It was at this moment that the remnants of her earlier resolve shattered. The pillar of support that Shirayuki and the other girls had been leaning on, finally collapsed under the stress of this crisis. Her voice finally broke free of its silence.
"No! No! No! No! No! No!"
'Where did they go?'
"No, this… this can't… this can't be happening!"
'Kai… Sia… Sammi…Where? Where are you?'
"No no no, STOP! This…this…this…"
Her mind raced trying to figure out what had happened to her students as she stuttered her hysterical exclamations of denial. As such the 3 girls that she had painstakingly tried to calm down froze. They couldn't figure out why she started to scream out of nowhere.
On the other side of the plaza, where Kai, Sia, and Sammi had vanished from, stood Jack. As Angelica was too preoccupied with her missing students, she had tunnel visioned and ignored the fact Jack was still there. Standing. Standing in the wake of their disappearance.
Three of his classmates had vanished into thin air right in front of him. Shock and terror should have consumed the teenager, however, contrary to what people would expect, his eyes were filled with determination, not an ounce of bewilderment. He was filled with purpose.
The complete opposite of his teacher. His eyes were calm. He took a deep breath and started to run towards Angelica and the rest of his class.
Angelica, with all her screaming and terrified bellows, had drawn the attention of everyone around her. As they had been trapped in their own worlds, focusing on their own crises, they had failed to notice the disappearance of 3 teenagers from the crowd.
Only now that Angelica's loud outburst pulled them out of their stupor did they start to react. No, that wasn't accurate. There were a few people, standing quite a distance away, that saw what had happened to Kai's group. But they had been frozen stiff, similar to how the melodically robotic voice had affected them previously.
They had been dumbfounded by the supernatural phenomena they witnessed. They did not want to believe it, yet the screaming lady told them otherwise.
'This can't be happening, no this must be a dream, they couldn't have just disappeared. It's all an illusion.'
"Yeah, yeah that must be it. I just have to wake up."
'Right, if I die in the dream I'll wake up. Yeah that's it.'
Her thoughts had turned dangerous. She had come to the impulsive conclusion that this must be a dream and dying would wake her. In her mind, this was all too surreal to be reality, so it must be a nightmare. What else would explain this?
No, there was no other possibility. This was just some sick dream she must be having. All that stress over the past few weeks must have been building up, culminating in this disaster of a dream. All her fears become manifest.
Her deluded state of mind could not handle her reality as she dazedly moved her body towards the street. Evident from her now crazed expression what kind of dark thoughts have emerged from the depths of her psyche.
Luckily before she was even able to take a step into the road, a hand reached out. Some one had grabbed hold of her shoulder.
It was Jack.
He had made a B-line towards Angelica as soon as he heard her wretched screams of despair.
"Yuki! Sarah! Tanya! Help me! Ms. Anderson is gonna do something dangerous!"
All the while, taking the opportunity to latch onto her wrists, trying to hold her in place. Yet it proved to be quite difficult, after all Angelica was a full grown woman with a well toned body. Even though Jack was fairly athletic for his age, he was struggling to restrain her.
Hearing their names, the girls woke up from their earlier shock and began to move. They didn't know why Ms. Anderson was suddenly acting like this.
As they hadn't seen what had happened to Kai, Sia, and Sammi they couldn't grasp the situation.
What exactly happened?
Their confusion was palpable, but once they saw her face they knew that those questions could wait. What they need to do now is to prevent her from doing something irreversible. Something that they themselves would regret later on if they didn't go help.
Sarah helped Jack restrain Ms. Anderson's arms, while Shirayuki and Tanya kept her legs from kicking them as they brought her to the ground.
Angelica struggled to free herself from their grasps as she eyed the road beside them. It was futile. Although she was clearly stronger than any of her students individually, she could not break free, not when all of them were working together.
"Let go of ME!!!"
She tried to shove Sarah off her, but to no avail. Angelica knew it would have been better to knock them out with her punches, yet she didn't want to hurt them even if this was a dream. She could not muster up the courage to harm her precious students.