DAWN WILL RISE 

Part 2: HEROES 

    Ella drove over the dusty playing field so she could quickly access the concrete playground with its basketball nets to one side.
    Her car pulled up well away from any children, but most had been hustled to their classrooms. It seemed to the young mother that her four children stood alone - except for the small one who was clinging to the gutter of the girls' changing shed for sport.
    The boys' shed was on the other side of a wall and Simon ran around to climb up to help.
    Dawn was snagged by her pants on a roof projection and was clearly going into shock, which meant she would soon lose her tenuous grip of the fragile guttering.
    Ella hurried over, but was suddenly almost knocked off her feet by a man barrelling fast across the concrete towards the child. Meanwhile Simon was reaching for Charlie.
    The man was Mark and he jumped higher than he had done in his life before and grabbed his daughter around her small waist, falling on his feet, then backwards still holding the little girl. His head hit the hard concrete and he lay still. The relieved principal had been standing to catch his pupil, waiting for a staff member to fetch a ladder.
    Ella stared at Mark as sirens approached!

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