said that the threat being reported on the news—as ludicrous as it may sound—is very real.'
He looked around the room and, just for a moment, they all saw the first glimmers of panic set in deep within his mind. He quickly spoke again to hide it.
'We’ll split into four groups, each going to one of the four entrances into the building. Josh, since Jessie has stopped answering his radio…' A sudden distant look passed over his face like a cloud. 'I don’t know, maybe he decided to leave once he saw those things outside,' he said distractedly, almost as if he was talking to himself. Just as quickly, he came back to the now and continued his thought. 'I’ll need you to head over to the access doors in the basement and make sure those are locked and secure.'
The group looked to one another and began exchanging nervous chatter.
'People… People… We need to stay focused on this. This is no joke,' he said, his voice cracking minutely. 'We have more than just ourselves to worry about here. We have the children.'
The soft sound of the television filled the ensuing silence.
'I understand you’re having a difficult time killing these things, Chief,' a reporter asked.
'Just shoot them. Shoot them in the head,' the voice of an exhausted man in a police uniform responded. 'They seem to go down permanently when you shoot them in the head.'
Chikara felt an errant and indistinct sense of deja vu.
'Then, you gotta burn them. Beat ’em or burn ’em. They go up pretty easy.'
And with that, they set to it. There was some disagreement early on as they broke into groups, but for the most part, they accepted this new reality without complaint. Chikara went with Helen, Jim Rhodes and Ross DeChamp, the fourth grade P.E. teacher, and headed off toward the East Entrance. Not a lot of conversation took place en route. They were all lost in their own uncertainties. Whether it was worry over their own families, loved ones, or pets, no one said much of anything. They just walked down the corridors in hurried silence, passing several closed classroom doors. From inside, several sets of small, scared sets of eyes looked out, their lashes wet with tears.
When they arrived at the doors, Chikara took a second and looked outside through one of the wire mesh- laced windows. There were several more of those people milling about now. At one point, she thought she recognized Sam Theroux, the owner of the nearby bodega. His glasses were gone and his features were contorted into a perpetual sneer, but sonofabitch it sure looked like him. It wasn’t until he turned to face her full on that she noticed one of his eyes had been torn out.
'Oh. My,' she whispered. 'God.'
'What?' Helen asked as she quietly turned the key in the locks and carefully wound the length of chain DeChamp had brought along through the door’s push-bars. For some unspoken reason, they’d decided to go about their business as silently as possible. It was as if they all instinctively knew that too much noise would undoubtedly mean getting the attention of the people outside. She slipped a padlock through two of the links and snapped it shut. For good measure, she pulled gently on the door to make sure it was tightly closed.
Off to one side, Jim Rhodes stood with his arms crossed indignantly.
'Nothing,' Chikara answered. 'Never mind.'
'Let’s get back,' Jim said, looking up and down the hallway with a hint of nervousness. He’d been looking through the window on the other door and had not liked what he’d seen. Not one bit. He’d also seen Sam, thus his face had abruptly turned white and a good portion of his bluster evaporated.
As they turned away from the door, Jim and Chikara exchanged looks that spoke volumes and those volumes said the same thing: ‘We’re in a bubbling vat of shit here.’
Hurrying back down the hallway, they’d not gone more than a dozen steps when they were brought up short by a loud banging sound from the direction they’d just come. Through the window, they all saw Sam’s distorted face pressed against the slim pane of glass. His lone eye glared at them and his mouth dripped long strands of saliva. Apparently, he’d seen them as much as they’d seen him. Immediately, Sam banged his fists against the door again and again. His hands rained down against the metal in an insane drumming rhythm which echoed down the empty corridor. As one, the group took another step backward. From where they stood, they could see the double doors shaking in their frame. Sam had obviously been joined by more of those people outside and they were all now pounding with him in earnest.
'We should get back to the Lounge,' Ross DeChamp said, his voice sounding small and scared in the large hallway.
'Yeah, no shit,' Helen murmured and her words echoed hollowly in the emptiness of the corridor.
~ * ~
When they got back to the Lounge, they met up with two of the other groups, who each had variations of the same incredible story. As the group talked, Chikara couldn’t help but feel her gaze being pulled toward the ceiling. It had seemed like a long time since she’d left her classroom and she felt compelled to get back there. The kids were probably scared shitless by now after they’d no doubt looked out the windows and seen god-only-knew what.
As the teachers continued talking amongst themselves, she quietly slipped off and headed back down the hallway to the stairs.
~ * ~
Midway up the stairway to the second floor, Chikara stopped.
She was sure she’d heard something coming from the hallway at the top. At first it sounded like the screech of a rusty door being opened against its will. Slowly, she took another step. Then another. As she reached the last step, she stopped yet again.
Abruptly, an unmistakable shriek echoed down the hallway just outside the stairwell.
Without another thought, Chikara ran up the rest of the stairs and down the hall and as she got closer to her classroom, she heard the scream again. This time she was able to pinpoint its origin and to her dismay it was, without a doubt, coming from inside
Those last few steps seemed as if they were being taken in slow motion; like in a dream when, no matter how fast you tried to move, it was never fast enough.
She reached out and quickly unlocked the door. Grabbing the doorknob and twisting it, she pushed the door open with all of her might and rushed inside.
~ * ~
'Say,' Helen interrupted the other teacher’s conversations, holding up her hand. 'Hey, shut up, willya?
Having now gained all of their attention, Helen looked around the room and then back to the Lounge’s closed door.
'Did anyone see where Chikara went?'
The group shook their heads and looked stupidly up and down at one another.
'Maybe she went to the bathroom,' Jim Rhodes said.
'Jim…' Helen rolled her eyes and walked off to go look for her. 'You really are an idiot.'
~ * ~
Chikara pushed on the door and it abruptly bumped into something soft yet unyielding. She pushed again and heard a soft thump like the sound that comes from stubbing your toe on a table in the middle of the night. She pushed harder against the bulk of the door, her face slamming painfully against the wood. Stepping back, she looked down and was horrified to see Luke’s wide eyes staring up at her. The boy’s mouth hung open, his tongue protruding slightly from between his teeth. There was a smear of something dark across the side of his face.
Another scream broke the silence and, putting her shoulder to the wood and planting her feet solidly against the flooring, she pushed the door open. Luke’s inert body slid with it, his way greased by more of what looked like the pool of oil he seemed to be lying in.
As she stepped into the room, utter chaos met her gaze. The children’s desks were overturned; paper and books littered the floor. Glass glittered like diamonds amidst the clutter and there was more of that dark material spread everywhere. As her eyes adjusted to the light, she saw more figures lying like abandoned dolls about the room. Her vision slowly cleared and her mind put names to those dolls: Sean in his JVC baseball shirt, Angela, Juan, Claudia, Stephanie, the boy they all called Gordo, Tina and Julia.
Her kids.
They lay motionless on the floor, pools of what she now recognized as blood quickly congealed around them. Near her desk, she saw Jeffrey’s thin legs sticking out from underneath. It was like he’d gotten caught trying to climb under it. He must have thought it was the one place he’d be safe.
