The Breakdown(Open)

It was a sunny afternoon day, though from Margaret’s room this couldn’t be told very easily. This was due to the fact she placed garbage bags over her windows to stop any natural light from entering in. Margaret was having an off day so far, once again she wasted an hour searching the library due to false information. This was the third week in a row that she had tried. She was not happy to end up with zero results.

Margaret approached the large desk located right under the plastic covered windows. The desk was covered with countless beakers, vials, and flasks filled with a wide variety of different chemicals, it looked a bit like what would come out of a mad scientist’s dream. There was a small space on the desk for her to work, in that space she slammed the formula sheet for the invisibility compound. She was running low on a rare chemical that was the key component for the formula, there was only enough for one last batch. This was added stress she did not need because if this mixture fails she would not have the resources to try again. If she had hair she would be attempting to pull it out at this moment.

Margaret ripped her lab coat off of the coat hanger on the wall next to the desk revealing her goggles to be on the same hook under the coat. She flapped it in the air twice as someone would to get dirt off a blanket and threw it over her shoulder, then quickly shoved both arms into the sleeves of her coat and adjusted her collar immediately afterward. She snatched her goggles off the hanger and snapped them on. She quickly turned back to the desk and pulled out an empty beaker which she slammed onto the desk beside the paper. She had a tight grasp on her forehead as she eyed her huge collection of chemicals trying to piece together which combination could create her solution.

Margaret was gazing at a vial filled with a colourless liquid that was located behind the rest of the glasses of chemicals, its label looks as though it had been peeled off. This struck her curiosity, she reached for it and picked it up with her thumb and index finger. She brought it closer to her face trying to figure out what it possibly could be. She pushed the empty beaker away and placed the unknown chemical in its spot. The empty beaker was pushed into the larger group of glasses which pushed one halfway off the edge of the desk.

She turned to a small lamp that was attached to the wall that was at the right side of desk, she pulled its metal string which lit up that section of the room so she could investigate this chemical further. Margaret picked the tiny vial back up, and then she unscrewed the black plastic cap off of it. There was barely a milliliter of the substance within the container. She took a whiff of it, the chemical had no distinctive smell, it was unfamiliar to her anyway. She looked closely at the ruined label and noticed a small faded A.M. stamp on it. That explained where it came from.

Margaret placed her elbow on the desk which had enough force to send the glass that was already halfway off the desk to plummet toward the floor. The sound of the glass impacting against the ground startled her and caused her to drop the vial which the small amount of liquid spilled onto her formula sheet. Now the chemical that spilt on the floor was harmless, but the chemical that was in the vial was Perchloric acid. Perchloric acid will combust upon contact with flammable objects, such as paper.

Margaret was completely stunned once she saw the object she sworn to protect was now bursting into flames, added onto that the desk was covered in chemicals, having it catch on fire would have dangerous results. After a split second she realized this and jumped away from the desk thinking of her options of getting out of this situation. Then she remembered the pump she had filled with water from a while back, she does know that water should be the last option during a chemical fire, but at the moment she couldn’t think of any other options. By this time the fire had already engulfed the whole desk, now the chemicals started to react.

Margaret ran for the pump which was on the left side of her bed, but upon gazing back at the chaos she knew there was no time before some of those chemicals exploded. She quickly ducked under her bed for cover and had the pump within reaching distance. Not even a split second afterward a hand grenade sized explosion erupted from the desk area sending shards of broken glass and burning wood all around the room. The shockwave created was so strong that it blew her door open nearly disconnecting it from the hinges holding it. The loud noise that originated from the blast could be heard all around the school. The smoldering ash that was once her work desk was now expelling multicoloured smoke. There was a significantly large hole in her wall big enough for an average sized person to walk through, as well there were small bits of snow floating into her room. As for the rest of the room there were small bits of flames lingering around mostly from the small burning bits of wood.

Margaret picked herself up bringing the pump with her, she observed the aftermath of the explosion with a very empty feeling that she wasn’t sure how to emote to. This moment wasn’t the time to for grief just yet, there were more important things to deal with. She sprayed water from the pump all around the room focusing more on the areas with larger flames. Her ears were still ringing with the echoes of the explosion, this gave her a very weak feeling she didn’t like.

Once the room was cleared of the searing flames she instantly dropped the pump and stepped toward the remains of her desk. Margaret looked down upon the ashes of what was two years of her life now gone. Every chemical she went through the trouble of stealing was now gone, as well as the formula sheet. She does remember a majority of the chemicals that were on it, but the amount that was used isn’t as easy to remember. She started to shiver, if she were to retell this story she’d of blamed it on the cold outside air that began to enter the room. There were tears starting to form in her eyes, but she refused to let them leave. She slowly began to replace her misery with blind aggression, her fists began to clench so much so her nails would leave indents on her palms.

She fell to her knees feeling too weak to stand, her brain was still unable to process the current event. Her mouth began to stutter as words began to form in her head until she released “DAMN IT ALL!” These words were the only words she could think of at the moment nothing else came to mind. Quickly afterward she swiftly got back up onto her feet and swung her fist at the closest wall in an attempt to release her rage.

(I apologize if its a tad bit long)

Hearing the blast extremely clearly in her room, Rosemary bolted from her bed and ran out of her room. "Hey! What the..." She started to ask before she started to cough from the fumes. She tried not to breath in too much of what she could tell were chemicals form only one person's room, Margaret's. "Someone got power over wind and something to neutralize whatever...." She coughed again but it was a bit longer, almost like she was choking. She placed her arm over her mouth so that it could help her breath proper air at least as she tried to move away to the door of the dorms. "Let's get everyone out.... Someone get some *Coughs*..... Get some help!" She instructed as she got the younger ones out at least.

Margaret pulled her hand back from the wall in pain, she had done more damage to her knuckles than she did to the wall. She felt stupid for doing such a childish act. The pain coming from her knuckles only fed her rage even more. She didn’t hear much of what was going on outside of her room and ignored the chemical smoke. After she turned back to the remains of what was her desk she was still angered with herself for letting something like this happen.

She stood straight with both arms at her sides as she looked down at the smoking pile of ashes. She attempted to calm herself down while standing there, but she couldn’t. Margaret continued to clench her fists at the sight of her lost work almost as if she was trying to make her palms bleed. She stood there and unless provoked she is going to stand there for a long while. She had nothing to say and began breathing heavily through her nose absorbing the chemical fumes without much care.

She had the look of rage on the upper half of her face while her lips stayed shut in a large frown, the left end of her lip had a bit of a twitch and she was clenching her teeth as hard as she could. As sad as she was she wasn’t going to express it in any way because she doesn’t like to show weakness, even if no one is around to see it.

Due to the fact she wasn’t completely aware of her surroundings she did not notice that there were still small batches of embers at the other end of her room, more so near her doorway. They pose no threat as of now, but could erupt into flames at any moment. The chemical smoke continued to pour into the dorm, but a majority of it leaked outside into sky. The smoke was not a singular colour due to the source being filled with many different varieties of chemicals.

Once she was sure that people were out, Rosemary demanded a head count. "Ok..... Whose missing?!" She asked as she took deep breaths of the clean air outside the Dorms. "Someone go fetch some help.... Whoevers the fastest... GO NOW!.... What? What do you mean? Who...." She looked back at the Dorm and slightly swore. "Dman you Margaret... Rest of you, stay here! MARGARET!" She dove back into the Dorms, her hand over her mouth as she nagivated through the Dorm, using her glow to help her see her way to Margaret's room, finding her in the middle of the room and not moving so Rose grabbed her arm and pulled her.

"You're coming with me you fool! COME ON!" She growled as she pulled Margerat with all her might with the occasional cough as she pulled her away.

The sudden tug on her arm surprised Margaret as she did not hear Rosemary come in, which was odd considering that she shouted directly at her. Rosemary’s attempt to pull Margaret out of the room brought her back to the reality of what was actually going on around her. She did not struggle with Rose until she pulled Margaret to about half way down the room. The constant tugging on her arm started to irritate her and finally in an attempt to free herself from Rosemary’s grasp she quickly swung her arm forward.

She planted her feet firmly to the ground and she turned her head toward Rose, with her head shaking a bit. Her face looked about the same as before except the frown was a bit more dominate. “Let me go!” her face quickly switched to a much more livid expression and her eyes glistened with the tears she refused to shed. She took deep breath and released a painful cough almost immediately afterwards. Now aware of the toxic smoke she knew Rosemary was right, she had to leave.

Margaret took a quick look back at the ashes of her desk and then back to the person who currently has her captive. As much as she didn’t want to leave she had to. Now that she was facing Rosemary she said “go away, I shall leave on my own terms” in a bitter tone. Once again her facial features changed rapidly into a much more sincere look. At the moment she knew she didn't have the time for grievance and decided it would be best to bottle it up until she was out of harm's way.

When Margaret suddenly stopped after the ease of her comliance, Rosemary looked back with a defiant stare as she listened to Margaret but shook her head all the same with a couple of coughs every few seconds so struggled as she spoke. "No way.... Fool...... We.... Leave..... Now!" After finishing her sentence, Rosemary started to cough harshly though she had been trying to breath as little as necessary so with whatever strength she had left, she began to pull again.

Her strength was waning though as the chemicals intermixed causing her oxygen intake to fall so her muscles began to lose ability to move as Rose tried to get out with Margaret.

You never leave anyone behind.

Margaret had enough of this and twisted her head back to its ordinary position which was forward. She closed her eyes and thought of her situation, she unknowingly released a small tear and once she felt it running down her cheek she immediately swiped her arm across her face in an attempt to hide the fact it was there to begin with. She released her grip from the ground and allowed Rosemary to continue pulling her, now knowing that trying to reason with her at the moment was going to get her nowhere.

From just how much Rosemary was coughing in comparison to herself, Margaret realised that Rosemary may not have the strength to pull her the rest of the way out. Margaret wasn’t going to have the strength to drag Rose around either. She opened her eyes again and saw the large hole in the outside wall “I’d suggest we go out... that way,... it would be much quicker” she said pointing toward the hole. She was now feeling the full effect of the toxins that got into her body and felt even weaker than she did to begin with.

Margaret collected the rest of the energy she had left and considering how weak Rose was one would assume that Margaret could break free from her grasp. She ran for the destroyed wall and passed through the ashes of her desk, which would have burned her feet if she had not worn her shoes. She clung to one jagged side of the broken wall and stuck her head outside to breathe more easily. The hole was wide enough to have at best two people stand right next to each other and tall enough for an average heighted person to jump and just barely hit their head.

Margaret looked downward and predicted they were about three-four stories high. Then she looked for a safe place to land and a nearby snow bank caught her eye, it was not directly under her but it was not an impossible jump to reach. She was not too sure where the nearest entrance to the school was nor did she know what part of the school grounds this was. She turned her head back into the room “hurry over here!” she yelled

As she pulled Margaret, Rosemary felt the ache in her muscles and just how weak she was becoming when Magaret mentioned the wall and started to move there which Rose answered with a nod as she used her free hand to cover her mouth as she shook herself slightly and with sheer will and determination, managed to increase her speed as she caught up with Margerat, thankful that the girl finally saw some sense.

Rose navigated around the flames to not burn her feet as she leaned out of the hole and took some deep, needed breaths of Oxygen with a harsh sound fom some of the damage of the toxins as she followed Margerat's eyes as the scanned the terrain beneath them. Rose recognised a part of the grounds and knew where the nearest entrance would be.

"Normally..... I would..... Say.... This.... Is madness...... But... We... No.... Choice...." Rose struggled to say as she looked at the Snow bank, if they were lucky, they could just drop down and then slide their way down.

If they were lucky.

Margaret looked over to Rosemary and considered that since Rose hadn’t jumped just yet, then she would be the first to jump. She investigated the ground once more and tried to figure out the best way to angle her jump and land without injuring herself. It’s been a long while since Margaret had done any kind of physical activity besides walking and running, so this may not have a positive turn out. By the looks of the snow bank it was approximately 20 meters away from the building and whether it was compacted snow, snow that had covered some sort of object, or least likely a mountain of fluffy powdery snow she wasn’t sure.

Regardless she leaned back in an attempt to charge her jump and then leaped into the air aiming to land somewhere near the snow bank she saw. Her mind was clear the moment her feet were no longer touching the ground, but that changed when she began to plummet towards the earth. He lab coat rippled in the wind and would defiantly soften the impact of her landing. Margaret realised that this was not the most logical choice of action and figured many other ways they could have escaped as the ground came closer and closer. She could have easily ran out of the room after she regained oxygen in her lungs.

Margaret came close to the snow bank, but came up too short and landed a couple meters away from it. She stumbled on her due to a small patch of ice being located where she landed. Margaret herself had no idea how it happened, but one thing lead to another and the full weight of her body ended up onto her leg. There was a large crackling sound coming from her leg and a painful screech from her mouth.

Back inside Margaret’s room, the embers by her door had once again caught flames and started small by slowly climbing up the wall to try and once again engulf the entire room.

Rosemary heard the crack and grimaced but hearing the embers behind her made her make a snap decision as she gave herself some space before she dashed before jumping, preparing herself to land into a roll as one does when horse riding as part of her elbow scrapped the ice as she rolled herself onto the snow and slightly rolled down the bank before she even recalled how to stop herself.

Once she stopped, Rose allowed herself a moment to catch her breath and check for anything broken which was when she felt the gash in her elbow as she hissed with pain, at least she was able to breath now as she slowly stood up and looked around for Margaret as she put pressure onto her elbow.

Margaret was positioned in a way that the front of her body was facing the ground, she could feel her left leg under her body and close to her chest. It did not feel comfortable what so ever and she lifted her head to survey the area and to possibly find Rosemary since she heard her land not too long ago. The pain became unbearable, so she got both hands on either sides and began to push the upper half of her body upwards in a push-up position. She pushed one hand off of the ground to force the rest of her body the opposite direction, which was to the right to avoid having the injured leg make contact with the ground.

Margaret was now lying on her back and heavily breathing. She lifted her head and looked down her body to see her left leg awkwardly positioned with the melted sole of her shoe parallel to her face. A bit disgusted by this, she lightly grabbed onto her leg with her hands, one hand at the ankle and the other above the knee. She began to move it back into place slowly, one of her eyes were almost closed as she didn’t want to watch. Small crackles came when she closer to finishing which only made it more difficult to do. With a large pop (and not to mention the excruciatingly painful steps) her leg was back in place.

“GOD DAMN IT!” She spoke through her teeth in rage, she continued to cuss as if she believed that it would make the pain go away. She felt the muscles in her left were still being a bit unresponsive, especially the lower half of the leg. She raised her head again and when she did all she could notice was the hole in the wall of the school with smoke pouring out of it and into the sky. She moved her hand onto her face with her hand resting on the top of her mouth and her thumb extending to her cheek bone.

“Somebody just end it all here” she said helplessly.

Once Rosemary started to move, she realised that she slightly sprained her left ankle. "Why is it always my left side that gets the problems, except in this case my right elbow?!" She muttered angrily to herself before she heard Margaret's outburst of rage and a tell-tale pop.

Slightly limping her way over, Rosemary heard Margaret's mutter. "Never pinned you as a quitter!" She started before she soon added, "Then again, normally I wouldn't have run back into a gas filled room with flames licking my feet in order to get someone out...." She lightly shrugged as she kept the pressure on her elbow, the blood staining the middle length sleeves of her white V-Neck whilst some of the blood stood out against her pale complexion whilst her cream trousers slightly darkened from having the heat of the flames mix with the cold of the snow as Rosemary approached to Margaret's side.

Margaret sat up straight with her hands planted onto the ground to keep her up and turned her head right, directly square with her shoulder, at the sound of Rosemary’s voice. Her eyes fixed upon Rose’s location, then moved downward after hearing her comment. She felt the cool breeze blow onto her hairless scalp except for the parts covered by her goggles which she’d forgotten were atop her head until this moment, they were large cracks going across them which would make them difficult to see through.

“I have nothing as of now” Margaret replied “all that mattered to me was burned and destroyed in that explosion” “I have nothing left to do, but wait for my damned tumor to finish me off”. She had used up all her rage and now was left with nothing, but depression which had left her with a feeling of emptiness.

She figured that she had done quite some damage to her leg because she was still unable to feel some of the muscles below her knee. She did not seem to give any type of reaction toward this, physically or mentally, after she was aware of her momentary handicap she didn’t even give it a second thought.

“Just leave me out here, I’ll parish much quicker” Margaret mumbled.

Back inside Margaret’s dorm, her entire room had been engulfed in flames once more and it was now making its way out of the room and plotted to do the same to the rest of the dorm. From where the two were standing the fire could easily be seen attempting to escape the building from the hole they jumped out of.

Rosemary looked up at the dorm and gasped, "Oh yeah? Well we've got to get to the school to warn everyone of a fire! And the chemicals that were used, so stop moping and......." She paused before she shouted with all the renewed breath in her lungs. "SWIFT SWAN!"

Rosemary caught her breath afterwards and waited from some sort of answer before she turned back and looked around for some wood. "You're not giving up on me..... Why? Because otherwise you'd be the failure, not the experiment or whatever the heck it was you were doing.... Do you want to be known as a failure? Do you want that? Or do you want to survive and make sure that this school doesn't burn down because of your big-headedness?!" She lectured before she topped to rgain her breath as she limped towards a couple of planks of wood and dragged them over.

Margaret felt anger once again refuel her body after receiving Rosemary’s lecture, she furrowed her eyebrows and clenched her teeth. She folded her legs so that her knees were parallel to her shoulders and planted her feet firmly to the ground. She pushed herself upwards with her legs, so that now she would be standing again, there was slight pain coming from her left leg, but she ignored it. She shifted her entire body into Rose’s direction, raised her right arm and pointed at her with her index finger.

“Do not think I’m getting emotional over some small science fair project!” She exclaimed “this experiment was my only chance at survival, without it I’m destined for death!” she lowered her arm afterward.

Margaret caught a glimpse of the fire bursting out of her room from the corner of her eye and the attention of her eyes switched to that, but she was still facing Rose. She knew she couldn’t just let that fire continue burning down the school; that would benefit her father more than anything else. She wasn’t going to admit she was helping, but she turned toward the building once more and began to walk, with each stride there was an odd clicking noise originating from her left knee.

Margaret turned her head back just enough so that she could see Rosemary “now hurry up, before the entire dorm room combusts”