The Tunnel is Plan B

[Demi Smith]

A great spout of earth erupted from the edge of the courtyard, shooting into the air. It arched over a bush, rustling the leaves as it landed among some small piles of dirt. No sooner had it landed then another spout erupted out of the earth. Then another. Then soon enough, a head popped out of the hole, dust clouding around her like an old Peanuts character.

Demi turned and spat, dust clinging to her saliva to make a disgusting glob. Demi wiped her mouth on her sleeve, smearing more dust and dirt over her face as she did so. The girl then reached up, snagging a battered looking leather canteen and taking a swig. She swirled it around for a bit more before turning to spit that too. Another swig followed, but that one she swallowed hard.

Then Demi turned, looking back at the hole. She'd already gotten a fair bit down, and she was now at the point where she'd need to start curving. Demi smiled with satisfaction at the work. She really didn't know why she didn't try this earlier. It was just so obvious. Dig a tunnel from the courtyard to the building. Then she could use it to sneak out. She might have to go a little further, but Demi figured she could just build a system of tunnels.

Oh man, that would just be so awesome. Grinning, Demi dove back down, her burrowing actually picking up speed, one great cloud of dust erupting behind her after another. She'd be out of here by October...

[Aurora Holiday]

Aurora had been swamped with stuff to do, she had kept trying to postpone it all but now it was something she could no longer moving back. The air manipulator had been doing work all day, doing her best to enjoy the weather before it just got stupidly cold. She hated the cold so much, when even she used her powers it just made her freeze unless she totally prepared to use her powers and dress in like a full snowsuit. That as one of the things about wind and stuff, it made things seem cooler. What does almost everyone want on a hot day? A nice breezy wind, why? Because it made things cooler. Unfortunately, it wasn't the opposite in the colder months, even when it was clod it continued to make it feel even colder out which was never fun for her.

She sighed as she used her powers to change the page in her book, glancing around for some excuse to take a break. She had been working so hard all day, she felt she deserved a little time off of working. She was just about to go back to her mundane task of finishing work when she heard some leaves rustle and saw a bit of dirt fly over the bush. She figured it was a shifter or an animal that was digger to burry something but at this point she didn't really care what the distraction was, she just needed one. Plus, if it was indeed an animal or shifter, she could get to pet them, or meet a new friend possibly. She saw some more dirt fly over and chuckled a bit, who of whatever it was really wanted to bury something.

The digging seemed to have stopped momentarily and the brunette chose now to peek over to bushes to see who was her savior. She grinned at the sight, it was someone she thought very highly of, Demi. Sure the girl may have been younger, but she was so confident and so skilled at her age, it was truly something. Almost as soon as Aurora had seen the girl, she disappeared back down the hole. She wondered how deep it was and what she was digging for. Aurora stepped from the bush, avoiding the dirt and stuff and made her way over closer to the hole for more closer inspection.

She would have been totally willing to help but she wasn't sure how exactly she could, if she could even get Demi's attention, and figured it probably wouldn't be a good idea to explore the hole while Demi was digging. She did the only thing she could think of and tried calling Demi's name down the hole, "Demi?!" she said cupping her hands around her mouth, doing her best to keep her face far enough away to keep from getting a face full of dirt and dust.

[Demi Smith]

The voice reached down into Demi's hole. She wrinkled her nose for a moment, irritated at having been found out. That irritation quickly faded though, as she realized that she'd actually heard that voice before, and it hadn't come from one of the several adults who liked to tell Demi how much she was messing up her life.

"Aurora?" said Demi. She repeated it as she climbed back in her hole looking up at the other girl. Of course Demi recognized her: Aurora had straight up sparred with her. The wind-manipulator had kicked Demi's butt, but at least Demi had managed to get a few decent hits in, enough to leave them both with some mutual respect.

"Get down here or something!" she hissed, waving at the other girl. "I don't want people finding out about the tunnel!" And if Aurora didn't move fast enough, Demi would use her ability to shift the ground and push her. Aurora was fine, but Aurora attracting attention was definitely not okay.

[Aurora Holiday]

Aurora gave the fellow element manipulator a friendly grin, "The one and only." she said in response to her name being called out. She frowned a bit, sort of forgetting about how there could be other people around as she ducked looking around before she slid into the hole, down next to Demi. She looked around and chuckled a bit as she looked around the tunnel. She secretly doubted that this would remain hidden for long if they were just flinging dirt out of the hole, even if Aurora  had been in one of the more deserted places of the courtyard, eventually someone would stumble by and if dirt was flying out of a hole, they'd definitely get curious and check it out.

With this in mind, she figured since she wanted to not do her work, she'd be more than happy to do what she could to help dig the tunnel a bit deeper to the point where they didn't have to just fling it out of the hole.... "So, trying to escape from prison again?" she said with a chuckle. It wasn't a bad thing, nor was she exactly sure, but usually there was high chance she was trying to leave. Aurora figured since Demi was so keen on showing everyone she was the best, and would fight anything that looked at her funny to prove she wasn't a wimp, the staff had permanently banned Demi from the outside world.

Aurora chewed on the inside of her cheek as she finished up looking around and looked to Demi, "Alrighty boss, how may I be of service?"

[Demi Smith]

Demi scooted over, glad that she'd at least given her little tunnel enough room for Aurora as well. It hadn't really been designed for multiple people or anything, but Demi had to carve out enough space at the entrance to move and whatnot. She didn't want to make it big enough for most of the people to work through though, and she honestly wasn't certain that Aurora would fit.

"Well, yeah, I'm gonna tunnel into the school first," she said, nodding and pointing, "or at least get close. I guess I should probably tunnel away too, but I'll get to that eventually,' Demi nodded. She didn't like that she had to be all patient and junk, but she understood it. Understood it enough to want to get to it. She turned and spat, the lob containing more dust and dirt than anything from inside Demi's body. The taste clearly didn't bother the girl much.

"Not sure that you can do much here, blow dryer,' replied Demi, half-grinning up at Aurora. She nodded and pointed at the hole. 'I kinda made it my size, 'cuz I don't want any of the idiots around here to, like, follow me or anything." she reached forward, shifting earth again. The tunnel showed, though it hadn't gone very far, only a few feet, the space obviously enough for maybe Demi. "I figure I'm gonna, like, cover it when I'm done or something,' she shrugged. Clearly this was one of those plans that you worked up along the way, at least, that's what Demi planned. Or something.

[Aurora Holiday]

Although the tunnel wasn't extremely roomy, Aurora had managed to squeeze herself in. She nodded a bit as she listened to Demi's plan, it was definitely interesting, she only wondered how long digging that far would take, especially since Demi already had a few people keeping an eye out for her. Unfortunately she had no ideas on how to expedite her tunneling process. She chuckled at the nickname though, it was certainly one she had yet to receive and was quite humorous, mostly because she had positive feelings towards Demi. If someone else had said something like that, that she didn't know or didn't like, well... let's just say things wouldn't have ended as well as they did.

Her mind briefly drifted to school an a sudden idea hit her, "Oh, Demi!" she exclaimed, "I'm a part of the security team, and we are training people to be on it, would you be interesting in something like that?" she asked curiously. She wasn't sure how much she'd be able to teach the girl but ultimately she would be able to beat the living heck out of people, well, not all people but still. Aurora knew there could be a few problems but she didn't really pay much mind to it, plus Demi was great in combat and would be a big help in protecting the school, maybe even some of the people would go a little easier on her, though she didn't want to push it...

If Demi wasn't sure, Aurora would be sure to explain all the things they did, plus they could train together if Demi wanted to. Aurora knew Demi was good with her powers so she wasn't really going to worry about pushing Demi to train unless she wanted to. Demi knew what it would take to get better and hopefully she didn't need Aurora to constantly remind her to train, though only time would be are of that, assuming Demi was even considering accepting the offer.

[Demi Smith]

Demi worked her power for a bit, which kind of looked like some odd dancing. Arms out, legs forward, then pull back, twisting slightly to make sure the dirt didn't accidentally blast her or Aurora. wasn't a whole lot of room, but that wasn't going to stop Demi from working.

Nor was hearing what Aurora had to say. Demi frowned at the thought. "Why would I want to work for the people that wanna keep me here?" she asked. She thrust her hands out a little harder than was necessary, the earth compacting hard for a moment, sinking far deeper then it needed to. Demi clicked her tongue in irritation as she pulled back, demolishing a bit more.

Slightly winded with the effort, Demi looked up at Aurora. "Not like they're gonna want me anyway. I'd just beat up everybody but you, and then they'd be all like: 'she's so not on the team,'" Demi chuckled at that, raising a hand to brush at the dirt. Did she even want to join something like that? It might mean teaming up with people here, working with them... but that sounded like the exact opposite of what Demi wanted... right?

[Aurora Holiday]

Aurora moved as close to the wall as possible, doing her best to give Demi a little more room to work with. She shrugged, "Well, I guess when you train you can just beat them all up, and simply tell them they need to get stronger." That's was something Demi seemed to like to do, or at least show them she's better than them. This could possibly give her a reason to beat them up, "I mean, you could possibly get let out more too, since you could say you're apart of the security team." The brunette simply shrugged again, "You definitely don't have to, it's just a thought."

Aurora chuckled at the thought of them rejecting Demi because she was better than them, "I would talk to them because not wanting you in because you're far more skilled than them would be silly. Plus if you don't have to hang out with them, you could just do things with me." Hopefully Aurora would be able to get some other manipulators similar to Demi and herself in the fact that they both had powers over one of the elements, they could like start a group within a group. She chuckled at the thought, all the people with elemental manipulation abilities forming their own sort of squad.

She wondered what Demi would think of that idea, "If you joined, we could train other people with powers like ours a form out own little group so you don't have to talk to the other people if you don't like them." She wasn't exactly sure how Demi would feel about training people assuming she would make it in, but they didn't even have to form the group through the security team, they could form this little friend group anyways.

[Demi Smith]

Demi snorted at the thought of training with all the other people. However, she put aside a lot of her doubt and stuff for a moment as Aurora mentioned that she could get out more. The idea sounded... tempting, very, very tempting. Plus, Aurora made it sound like Demi being skilled would actually give her a better shot of being on the squad... and there was something about doing things with other people.

Though Demi just barked a laugh at the thought of banding with people with similar powers. "These wimps? I don't know if there's any point in teaming up with them at all. Besides, most water people are, like, really wimpy,' Demi frowned, and definitely wasn't tying to show that her main issue with water people was that they rendered her almost useless. Somehow, Demi managed to have better luck with wind people (the case in point being the person in the hole with her).

"I dunno. I guess I, like, could show up or something," she said, shrugging. She grinned then, looking back at her tunnel. "Be a lot easier to hide something like this if I managed to get on the squad. Hey," she looked back at Aurora, "could, like, you get some of this dirt out of the hole? I need some room to move," with that, Demi rolled her shoulder, grinning as she took a few more steps toward the hole.

[Aurora Holiday]

Aurora kind of just shrugged the snort off, she figured Demi wouldn't really be up for training people, or really making a group with people of similar powers but it was worth a shot. "Alrighty maybe the whole group thing was pushing it a bit, but still!" she said with a grin, "We could leave to go, 'make sure there's no trouble in town.'" she said with a chuckle, it might possibly be the easiest way for Demi to get out, and was a pretty good excuse to get them to let Demi out off of the school grounds without having to sneak out all the time, though Demi was most likely capable of that.

Aurora had yet to really meet anyone that had water abilities so she couldn't really agree or disagree with Demi's statement about them, the thought of water messing with Demi's own powers slipping her mind. She smiled as Demi basically said she could show up, much of which Aurora took as she would show up at least once. She nodded in agreement, "They probably wouldn't watch you as closely either, so none of them will come snooping after you and find it."

She nodded and began to do what she could to move the dirt out using her powers of course. It was weird because she wasn't actually moving the dirt itself, just the air around the dirt. She did her best to pick up the more loose dirt and sort of blow it out of the hole, giving them a more open space to sit and work/talk. "It'll be really fun, they practically have to let you on the team, you're already better than some of the people that are on the team." So, maybe she was being a little biased but Demi was pretty good and there definitely were a few weaker links on the team.

[Demi Smith]

Sneaking out did have some appeal to Demi. She'd managed it a few times and, well, that was what this whole tunnel thing was all about in the end. She wasn't sure she really wanted or needed a real excuse though... that did feel a bit like playing their game, which was what she didn't want.

"People do keep telling me stuff like that," she admitted as Aurora continued. Wouldn't watch, wouldn't come snooping as much... wasn't that what Demi wanted in the end? She sat back for a moment, staring at her tunnel, wondering. What if she played just a little bit? Like, just sort of faked it or something? It sounded like it wouldn't really be hard, not for someone with Demi's powers. She could totally manage it, right? Right.

Before she could say anything though, someone else spoke. Demi heard someone calling out a "hey" followed by a "what's going on over there?"

"Great, staff," mumbled Demi. She pushed past Aurora to look up a little, trying to peek out of the whole without being noticed. She could technically bury them if need be, but, well, that might not work out great for Aurora. She didn't have Demi's affinity for dirt, after all. Demi just knew that she didn't want to get caught...

...not again, anyway.

[Aurora Holiday]

Aurora just kept working away as she let Demi think about it, though the look on her face wasn't extremely promising though Aurora would try to get her to come to at least one session. She heard the voices almost right as Demi did and did her best to keep Demi from looking, with any luck she could get them to leave and not know Demi was even a participant in this hole, that is, if they didn't see her, "Stay down!" she said in a hushed tone, as she moved to look out of the hole at the staff members that had decided to pay them a visit.

She paused before peeking her head out and rubbed dirt on her face and arms and stuff, "Demi, help me really quick..." she quietly said. Assuming she got a little help with smearing dirt on herself, she would then go to look out of the hole. "Oh heya there!" she said as she flashed them an innocent smile and gave them a half wave. "Sorry! I was just on a treasure hunt!" she said chuckling a bit, "And my map lead..." she said trailing off as she patted her pockets, doing her best to make it look as if she once had one. She put on a frown as she looked around at the ground, "Hmm... must've accidentally got buried or something..." she said as she climbed out of the hole, using her powers to push a bit of the dirt back into the hole before the staff could get a chance to look into it, and praying that Demi would help and cover the entrance to the hole with her own powers.

She had no real way of proving that they believed what she was up to, but if she could cover the hole fast enough before they can look at it and realize something was wrong, there wouldn't be a problem... She sighed and began to converse with them, doing her absolute best to convince them that she was alone and it was just a silly game one of her friends was playing with her, and to her, it was a little foolish of them, going around and burying her stuff... just completely annoying.

[Demi Smith]

Thankfully, Demi had extremely quick reflexes. When Aurora said help me, she practically dumped dirt and dust onto the other girl. Demi didn't quite understand the whole plan, but she understood the broader strokes: Aurora was going to go up for some reason. Sure enough, the other girl climbed out of the hole, meeting the confused staffers, who no doubt had been expecting to meet someone else.

Though the excuse that Aurora gave had Demi flinching. What kind of stupid idea was that? Demi goggled at the other girl, clearly not getting what was going on here. Did Aurora really---why was she kicking dirt down into the hole? What was---OH! OH, okay, Demi totally got it now. She grinned, turning to spit out a wad of dirt. She finished by wiping her mouth on her sleeve and then looked up at the top of the hole.

Demi focused, drawing her hands wide and began whirling them, swirling. Dirt pulled about, forming a strange film of dust and dirt that wouldn't hold under a whole lot of prodding. Demi reinforced it as best she could, even holding it for a few more moments. She could hear people moving above her.

What Demi didn't know was that the staff had come over and begun talking with Aurora. He clearly didn't quite buy the whole excuse, and he went around to look. The hole didn't look too deep, and he looked back at Aurora. What followed was a rather pointless and circular lecture about how it wasn't a great plan to dig holes in the Academy ground. Demi rolled her eyes and stuck out her tongue just listening to it: she didn't know how Aurora could take it...

..and she really didn't get the why...

[Aurora Holiday]

Aurora could feel her heart pounding as the staff member took a look around at the hole, most likely very suspicious. Luckily Demi had caught on and managed to cover the hole/make it look as if Aurora had filled some of it in more or less. After a few moments of talking and trying to keep him from inspecting the hole with detail, he turned to her and gave her a spiel on how digging holes was probably not the best thing to do on school campus, especially in the courtyard. She gave him a smile and apologized once more as he turned and walked away, she rolled her eyes at his back and huffed as she turned back the where the hole was.

Aurora sat on the ground and looked over for the staff member and waiting till he had gone out of sight to enter the hole, "Alrighty, he's gone but I don't think he believed me very much." She have a chuckle, "I'm not the greatest at lying." It wasn't that she couldn't do it, it was just that she simply wasn't good at making up excuses as to what else she may have been up to, seriously though, a sort of treasure hunt, really? Hopefully Demi hear too much about what Aurora had told him and heard her ridiculous excuse though if she did say something, she'd simply reply to the other girl that it had worked, and she was just jealous se wasn't an expert at lying like Aurora was, obviously joking about that part.

She moved to the edge to help shovel out some of the dirt she had blown back in to give Demi time to use her powers and hide herself. "Sorry about blowing dirt back in here, though I'm relieved you realized that was your chance to hide yourself... That could have been pretty..." she paused as she chuckled a bit, "...dirty, if he found you." she said with a short laugh. She peaked out of the hole to look around for any people that could be around and curious enough to come over to the hole, or if the staff member she had talked to earlier had decided to come back again. Luckily the staff member wasn't around, and there weren't any student within eyesight which meant that for now they were in the clear.

[Demi Smith]

Demi held her breath and the thin crust for a while longer. Then Aurora spoke down to her, moving the stuff aside and Demi flicked her wrist, dismissing most of it with that flick. She snorted and leaned against the side of her hole, following Aurora's path with her head as the other girl moved along. Demi hadn't heard quite everything Aurora said, but her hopes weren't exactly high. A hole in the middle of the courtyard was a pretty hard thing to explain overall.

Aurora's apology got a shrug in a return. "You covered for me, that was cool,' said Demi begrudgingly. She looked at Aurora for a long while, wondering why the other girl would do that. Sure, they'd trained together or whatnot, and Aurora had flattened Demi and all, but they weren't, like, friends or something, at least not as far as Demi could tell. Allies though; she'd definitely consider Aurora one of those. She shifted again, moving to run her hand along the wall.

"So, uh, thanks," she said, looking up at Aurora out of the corner of her eye, "for the whole covering for me thing. I'll probably have to move the tunnel or something though," she tapped the wall, watching more dirt and dust fall down. She considered it. "I could join you on that stupid team thing too,' she said, still looking at the wall for a while. "Just, you know, because I want to."