Read The Last Hero (Book 1): Ultra for Free Online

hope it’s global warming you’re thinking so deeply about, young man,” she said, in that sarcastic drone. She was a short woman, quite plump, with thick-rimmed glasses atop her bulbous nose.
    I felt my cheeks getting warmer. Mrs. Porter wasn’t the kind to take any prisoners. “Yeah. I was just, erm… I was thinking about how warm it is. For—for early summer. Whether that has anything to do with… with global, um, warming.”
    I heard a few sniggers around the class. Mrs. Porter narrowed her eyes. “Oh, that’s interesting. ’Cause we finished talking about global warming a good half hour ago.”
    Shit. A Porter trap. A Porter trap I’d fallen right into.
    “Sorry, miss,” I said.
    “Oh, don’t apologize to me. Apologize to your classmates for holding up their lesson.”
    I nodded.
    When I realized Mrs. Porter wasn’t adding anything to her demands, I realized she was serious.
    “Go on,” she said. “Turn around to each and every one of your classmates, look them in the eyes and say sorry.”
    “Miss, I—”
    “What’s up, Kyle?” someone at the back of the class said. “Need another poop?”
    The class filled with laughter. I felt my face heating up. I didn’t know what to say or what to do, just that I wanted out of here.
    “Stand up,” Mrs. Porter said. “Look into each and every one of your classmates’ eyes and say sorry.”
    “But I—”
    “Just do it, Kyle.”
    I gritted my teeth. My heart pounded. I didn’t want to do this. I just wanted to get out of this mess, one way or another. This was a nightmare. This was hell. I didn’t think I could sink any lower than I already had. Evidently, I was wrong.
    I pulled back my chair. Better to just get it over and done with.
    I looked around at my classmates. Looked at each and every one of them. I saw them trying to hold in their laughter. Saw some of them staring at me like I was weird.
    And then I saw Ellicia.
    Her glasses were at the edge of her desk so I could see right into her eyes. Weird how different someone looked when they didn’t have their glasses on. Ellicia looked amazing either way.
    She wasn’t smiling. She wasn’t laughing. She was just looking at me differently to all the others. And I figured that was okay. If Ellicia was looking at me like she was, then nothing else mattered. Sure, she had to find what happened yesterday hilarious, but as long as she didn’t mock me right now, everything was fine.
    “I’m sorry,” I said. “For—”
    “Zip your fly up, Kyle, for hell’s sakes!”
    I heard the voice from the back of the class. From Harry Walker, one of Mike Beacon’s best friends. And then I heard the class around him erupt into laughter.
    No. I’d zipped my flies up. This was a joke. It had to be a…
    When I looked down at the front of my pants, I saw it wasn’t a joke.
    My flies were unzipped.
    My red, stripy boxer shorts were on show.
    I listened to the chorus of laughter and felt my face burning to melting point. I looked around at everyone. Saw each and every one of them laughing, and I wished right then I could go full Carrie on them.
    But when I saw Ellicia smiling, trying to hold back the laughter, a new feeling sparked inside me.
    I felt upset. Like someone had converted my embarrassment into madness, into anger.
    And then I felt a tingling sensation shoot up my body.
    I squeezed my hands together.
    Gritted my teeth.
    And then I heard the blast.
    The laughter disappeared. It turned into screams. A few yelps of shock.
    I felt a breeze hit my face. My heart still pounded. I didn’t know what’d happened.
    Not until I looked to my right and saw the windows had smashed.
    “Everybody outside!” Mrs. Porter shouted. She rushed over to the alarm and hit it. And I could sense the fear in the air. The panic. Gun crime was just something that happened in the modern world. The windows had smashed. Someone was here. Someone was on our campus. Something was happening.
    I watched my classmates rush past me