The tonfa slipped from my grasp with a sickening clink, its metal slick with gore. It was all bloodied and utterly pointless now.
I gasped for air, my heart racing as that broken thing lay crumpled at my feet, twitching once, twice, and then just… nothing. For a moment, there was only the sound of my own ragged breathing and the terrified whimpers of the students huddled in the maintenance alcove. Mrs. Yamamoto was muttering prayers, her face a mask of terror. Mr. Ishikawa was frozen, his eyes wide with shock. I did it. I had actually killed it.
But my relief was short-lived.
From the shadows at the far end of the hallway, another figure emerged. It was larger than the first, its movements more deliberate, more intelligent. It stood nearly seven feet tall, with elongated limbs that ended in razor-sharp claws. Its skin was a mottled gray-green, stretched tight over a muscular frame. What was most terrifying were its multiple eyes—six of them—arranged in a semi-circle on its head, all glowing with a faint, sickly yellow light. As it stepped into the moonlight filtering through the broken windows, I could see the way its muscles rippled beneath its skin, and the drool that dripped from its multiple rows of needle-like teeth.
It ignored me completely, its attention fixed on the huddled students in the alcove. With terrifying speed, it descended upon them.
The screams were immediate and horribly brief. It was a slaughter. I watched in horror as the creature grabbed Mrs. Yamamoto with one massive hand, lifting her off the ground as if she weighed nothing. Her prayer was cut off in a wet choke as its other hand tore through her midsection, spilling her insides across the floor. It moved through the remaining students with a horrifying efficiency. A student from the debate team was pinned against the wall, his glasses shattering as the creature's massive hand crushed his chest. A group of girls from the choir were huddled together, and the monster simply swiped them aside with one sweep of its arm, their bodies crumpling like broken dolls. The sound of snapping bones and tearing flesh was a symphony of nightmares.
I wanted to scream, to run, to do something, but my feet were rooted to the spot. My mind refused to process the horror unfolding before me. This couldn't be happening. Not here. Not to us.
In seconds, it was over. The only sounds were the creature's disgusting, wet crunching as it devoured flesh and cracked bones between its needle-like teeth.
I was frozen, a silent witness to the butchery of everyone I had failed to protect. I was the only one left.
I stumbled backward, my hands shaking, my mind refusing to process what I had just seen. I needed to run, to hide, to do something—anything but stand there like a statue.
That's when he stumbled back into the hallway, leaving a trail of blood. The quiet kid. He was in bad shape. His arm was soaked red, and he leaned heavily against the wall, his face pale and slick with sweat. He saw the creature feeding in the alcove, and his face, usually so sullen and unreadable, hardened into something cold and terrifyingly focused.
"There's no time," he whispered, his voice strained. "We need to move. Now."
He grabbed my arm, his touch surprisingly gentle despite the urgency in his voice. "This way."
We didn't hesitate. We ran.
The hallway stretched before us, a gauntlet of shadows and moonlight. Every corner held a potential threat, every dark doorway a possible hiding place for another monster. Our footsteps echoed in the silence, too loud in the empty corridor. I could hear my own ragged breathing, the pounding of blood in my ears.
We turned a corner and found a narrow records storage room. The door was slightly ajar. Inside, shelves were in disarray, supplies scattered across the floor. Papers were strewn everywhere, some stained with what looked suspiciously like blood.
He rummaged through the chaos, his movements quick and efficient despite his injury. "Here," he said, pressing something into my hands. "Emergency flare. This will work."
I looked down at the heavy red cylinder in my hands. "What do we do with this?"
"The roof," he said, his voice firm. "It's our best bet."
"The roof? Why not the vault? The school has an emergency vault in the basement, doesn't it?" I asked, confused.
He shook his head, his expression grim. "Vaults are tombs if we get trapped. The roof gives us visibility. If there are any rescue teams out there, they'll see a flare from the roof. It's our only chance."
His logic was on point, but the thought of going up, exposed to whatever was out there, terrified me.
"But what about those things? Won't they follow us?"
"They will," he said, his voice dropping to a near whisper. "It's a stupid plan, but it's the only one I've got."
A new sound interrupted our conversation—a high-pitched chittering, a hundred tiny claws skittering on concrete. It came from the hallway we had just left. The swarm. They had finished with the big one and were coming for us.
He slammed the records room door shut. "This won't hold them," he said, his voice tense as he helped me wedge a heavy metal shelf against the handle. The sounds of the swarm immediately intensified outside, their claws scraping against the metal door.
"They're trying to break through," I said, my voice shaky.
"I know," he said, his breathing ragged. "We need to keep moving."
We were trapped in the small, dark space. The only light was a faint, blinking emergency light on a control panel. In the dim glow, I could see the extent of his injuries more clearly. The gash on his arm was deep, and his face was pale.
"Who are you?" I asked, the question tumbling out before I could stop it. "You're not just some student from advanced combat."
He was silent for a long moment, just breathing. Then he looked at me, his expression softening. "Right now, I'm just a guy who's tired of losing people. We can talk later."
His simple, direct answer disarmed me more than any command could have. I felt a hot flush of shame. "Aoi is dead. Everyone is dead."
He took a step closer, his presence surprisingly calming. "Then live for them," he said, his voice firm but gentle. "That's all we can do now."
His words were a balm on my raw fear. I felt a strange warmth spread through my chest, a flicker of hope in the suffocating darkness.
He pointed to a service ladder built into the wall, leading up into a dark ventilation shaft. "This will take us past the locked door. It's our only way."
The shaft was a claustrophobic tunnel of metal. "Okay. I'll go first," he said, his tone leaving no room for argument. "Stay close. Just... don't look down."
I nodded, my throat too tight to speak.
He climbed the ladder first, his movements stiff with pain. I followed, my heart pounding in my chest. The metal rungs were cold beneath my hands, the air in the shaft stale and musty.
We crawled forward in silence, the only sounds our breathing and the scrape of our clothes against the metal. Below, through the grilles, I could see the dark, ruined hallways of our school. In one classroom, desks were overturned, chairs scattered as if in a panic. In another, I saw dark stains on the walls that looked suspiciously like blood.
"You okay back there?" he whispered, the darkness making it easier to speak.
"I think so," I whispered back.
"Good. Just a little further."
We reached a junction, and he pointed left. "That way. To the roof access room."
As we moved, the sounds of the swarm faded behind us, replaced by a single, chilling sound from above. A slow, deliberate scraping.
"They're in the vents," he whispered, his voice tense. "They're tracking us."
We moved faster. The metal beneath us creaked and groaned with our weight. I tried not to think about how far below us the ground was, or what would happen if the shaft gave way.
Finally, I saw the light ahead. The moonlight shone through a broken panel at the end of the shaft. He pushed the panel open and helped me out into a narrow utility room. A maintenance ladder climbed up, a single yawning hatch above it. But as we looked up, we saw it. The swarm had found the shaft entrance. They were pouring into the vent, a writhing mass of claws and glowing eyes, coming right for us.
There was no time to think. He shoved me toward the ladder. "Go! I'll hold them here!"
"But you're—"
"GO!" he roared, swinging his pipe at the first creature that spilled out of the vent. "THE FLARE! NOW!"
I didn't wait. I scrambled up the ladder, my heart pounding in my chest. I burst through the final door and onto the rooftop, the wind whipping my hair across my face. The sky was a hellish red, fires burning across the city below.
With trembling hands, I activated the flare. It erupted in brilliant red light, a pillar of fire that cut through the storm clouds.
"Come on… someone has to see that," I panted, staggering back from the edge.
I heard a single, ragged shout—his voice—cut off by a wet, final crack. Silence hit like a wall.
He was gone.
I sank to my knees on the cold concrete, the flare burning brightly in my hand. I survived. But I was alone. And the boy who had saved me, who had fought with a quiet courage I would never forget, was gone, too. I looked at the burning city, the flare a beacon of my failure and my survival, and the dam of my composure broke, and a raw, ragged sound tore from my throat.