“
And in these days man
shall seek death, and shall not find it. Man will want to die, and
death shall flee from him. Revelation 9:6
,” Tarynn Hill spoke strongly as she held her bible firmly to
her bosom. Royal Carter, the jock, did not challenge Tarynn this
time. No one did. All eyes in the class fell on her, as the
scripture she quoted sunk in.
Mrs. Westwood took the initiative to break
the news to the class.
“
We have a problem,” Mrs.
Westwood broke the silence. “ I do not know how serious the
situation is outside but everything is under control,” she said
with her mouth but her eyes told another story. “We are going
to—“
A loud crash at the door startled the
students including the teachers as a girl slammed her head
continuously into the classroom door from the outside. She never
turned the knob to get in but kept smashing her head into the door
like a hammer. The left side of her head was mangled and the facial
skin was jagged. The upper torso was drenched in congealed blood.
The girl’s skin was ashen and she looked deathly sick. Her straight
brown hair was matted to her forehead and stuck in the dry sticky
blood on her face. The part of the pupil that could be seen was
dilated with a slight white haze like a person with cataracts. Her
eyes were rolled upwards as if she were looking into her own skull.
It looked as if the girl had a grand mal seizure and her eyes got
stuck in that position. There was a thick dark substance that
dribbled from her mouth that resembled old blood and bile.
The student rammed into the door yet again
with a sound resonating like a drum. She appeared to be oblivious
to what was going on around her. She let out a gurgling, hoarse
moan as she continued to pound at the door with her head.
“
Oh my
God
! That is Anna Pearson!” Sue
Ellen cried. “What happened to her freaking face?”
Anna Pearson was an all around girl who got
along with everybody. She was the quiet type of student. The one
everybody went to with his or her boy drama. She was an office
worker and voted Class Favorite her seventh grade year. The site of
Anna terrified everyone. There was no soul or life in her eyes. She
looked like a crazed maniac. More like possessed.
Sue Ellen jumped up and ran towards Mater.
She grabbed her best friend’s hand and hightailed it to the back of
the classroom. The other students followed pursuit, immediately
jumping out of their desks yelling and pushing as they tried to
make their way to the back of the classroom as well. The pupils
looked like a mad herd of cattle as they each tried to safely
secure their spots.
Mrs. Westwood ran to the door to make sure
it was secure. The sight of her student, Anna Pearson, brought
dread to her heart. Mrs. Westwood slowly backed up from the door
into a corner as she stared at the disfigured body of the unsightly
child.
More students with mutilated, marred faces,
and bodies joined Anna in battering the door like rams. The hoarse
gurgling moans became louder as more students rammed the door.
Under the weight of the mangled bodies on the other side of the
door, parts of the ten by twelve window of the classroom door
shattered all over the floor.
Anna shoved her head in through what was
left of the glass in the broken window. Her face got caught in some
of the jagged glass and protruded into her eyeball causing it to
pop out on the floor. The rest of the glass ripped into her face as
she moved in and out. The glass cut from the entrance of her mouth
all the way to the back of her neck. Anna puckered what was left of
her nose into the air like she was sniffing the finest of fresh
baked bread. She extended her abnormally mutilated jaw and
continued to moan gnashing her teeth.
The high pitch cries continued from with
inside the classroom as the intruders from the outside flailed
their dark bloody arms and hands through the open space in the
door. One student’s arm, that was already severed, fell off onto
the floor. Mrs. Westwood screamed the loudest as the detached limb
continued to wriggle around on the floor.
“
Please wake me up! Please
wake me up! Please me wake up!” Mater chanted. Sue Ellen grabbed
Mater’s hand in disbelief and continued to scream until she could
not anymore. It had gotten to a point to where they both could no
longer yell because they had almost lost their voice.
Drew jostled his way out of the crowd of
classmates in an effort to make it towards the door. He knew it was
only a matter of time before the unwanted guest entered their
domain. The weight of the mutilated figures on the other side of
the door threatened to fall in. Before he grabbed a desk, he pulled
his pocketknife, which was twelve inches long and serrated. He took
the sharp knife from his back pocket and swung at the flailing arms
and gnashing mouths. He kicked the convulsing arm sending it flying
into the wall. It was hard work but he pushed two desks with all
his strength towards the door to barricade them in. The weight from
the intruders on the other side caused the hinges from the door to
become ajar.
“
Hey! Hey! Somebody help
me! Bring more desk!” Drew yelled as he leaned on the desk that he
brought to prevent the door from caving in.
With each bump the door opened causing the
desks to slide propelling Drew slightly forward. He fought back by
pressing the desk forward holding them there with all his
strength.
“
We are all going
to
die,
If I
don’t get more desk!” Drew yelled to the top of his
lungs.
Sue Ellen and Mater snapped out of their
frightened daze and ran towards Drew grabbing desk and pushed them
along the way.
“
Help them!” Tarynn
shouted at Royal Carter, the snobby boy who had insulted her
earlier. Royal stood there to frightened to move, his big blue eyes
frozen in terror.
More students including Tarynn Hill, Cookie
Rogers, and Josefina Torrez assisted Drew in stacking desk against
the door to prevent the deathly ill looking students from getting
in.
SNAP!
All of sudden, Josefina started to scream.
Her long hair got caught by one of the bloody flailing fingers. The
grisly hand had inhuman strength fueled by unyielding hunger as it
pulled Josefina’s body into the desk causing the barricade to
tumble, splitting in two.
“
Ayudame! Ayudame!”
Josefina cried.
“
What is she saying?”
Royal whined from the back of the room. He was crouched, hiding,
behind some of the female students.
“
You can’t see?” Drew
Jacks yelled as he ran to Josefina’s aid, “they have her hair! Help
us!”
No one in the classroom moved to assist
Josefina but Drew and Mrs. Kissing. Everyone was in total shock.
Mrs. Kissing directed Mrs. Westwood to move the students towards
the back of the classroom opposite the door.
Drew, with the assistance of Mrs. Kissing,
grabbed onto Josefina’s waist and pulled her towards them with all
the energy they could muster up. The deathly ill looking students
from outside of the door had powerful brute force. Drew went into a
tug a war with Josefina as each time he would make leeway of
securing her they would slowly pull her back towards the door. Sue
Ellen fought her way to the door’s window by swatting, with a
schoolbook, at the infested bloody hands that were entangled in
Josefina’s hair. Mater worked diligently at trying to rid the
diseased hands from the doomed soul’s head. Josefina yelped louder
as she felt her jet-black silky strands rip from her scalp.
“
Grab my knife, I put it
back in my back pocket!” Drew directed at Mater.
Mater fumbled at first from nervousness but
dashed into Drew’s back pocket without delay to retrieve his knife.
Drew took the knife and sliced at the hands that grasped Josefina’s
hair expecting the brutal assault to stop. However, it did not. The
mangled bloody hands and arms continued unaffected by the deep
gashes that Drew inflicted upon them with his blade. The hands
viciously clawed at their food source. Drew, to his horror, began
to cut at Josefina’s hair in a desperate effort to free her. But it
was too late. A longer arm broke through the window and vigorously
pulled Josefina to the door like a slingshot. Josefina made a loud
thud as her body slammed into the door at an amazing speed.
Josefina let free an agonizing high pitch
cry that overpowered all of the other cries in the classroom. The
ear splitting wails that Josefina let escape from the depth of her
being made the hairs on the back of Drew’s neck stand at attention.
The student who snatched Josefina up began chomping on her arm. By
the looks of his face, Drew could not decipher who it was. The left
side of the student’s entire face was missing with the exception of
his teeth. His skin was ashen and mottled. His lips were bluish
black. His eyes were rolled up into the top of his skull and the
sockets trickled dark, thick, gooey blood. Black veins ran freely
through his once vibrant honey brown skin. Blood sprayed out of
Josefina’s limb as her screams drowned out the moans of the
undead.
Drew, to his astonishment, discovered that
it was Bolton Black snacking on Josefina’s arm. Bolton was the
all-star running back on the football team. He went back and forth
between dating Cookie and Josefina. Josefina was always Bolton’s
first pick even now as he feasted on Josefina’s flesh. Sue Ellen
took a textbook and jabbed into the only side that was left of
Bolton face. She noticed a large gash in Bolton’s neck. It was a
wound so severe that he should not have survived it.
Drew took his knife and quickly stabbed
Bolton in the one good eye that was left. Drew quartered his
squirrels after cleaning them so he knew how to hunt and attack the
vital organs. He noticed that Bolton continued to gnash his teeth
and chomped down once again on Josefina arm.
What?
Drew stood back perplexed that Bolton did
not go down. He ran up again to the soulless creature and this time
landed the blow in the center of Bolton’s forehead. Bolton dropped
like a sack of potatoes.
“
YES!” Drew shouted as he
continued to cut at the wildly flailing arms. Ever so often he
would land a vital blow to the noggin of the undead with his knife
causing them to drop instantly to the floor. Sue Ellen and Mater
pulled the now injured Josefina back to safety in the middle of the
classroom.
At a point Drew grew tired of fighting the
endless bodies that flocked to the door. He worked diligently to
stack the desks back up against the door against the wild
fluttering arms. Mrs. Kissing, Tarynn, and Cookie assisted Drew in
blocking the door again. Drew grabbed the teacher’s desk and pushed
it in front of the student desks to help secure the barrier. The
students who sought refuge in the back of the classroom was flooded
the room with screams and pleas to go home.
“
Shhh! Shhh!” Mrs. Kissing
said in effort to calm the class down over the loud moans. “They
can
hear
us. The
noise! It attracts them to us. Stop screaming, we must be
quiet!”
The students were in hysterics and the
yelling continued along with hoarse gurgled moans outside the door.
Sue Ellen motioned for Karley, the rail thin blonde, to come and
assist with Josefina. Sue Ellen dashed towards the light switch and
flickered it off and on until the students in the class settled
down. The gurgled moans continued outside the door as Mrs. Kissing
made her way to the front of the makeshift barricade. She waved her
hands up and down like she was trying put out a fire.
“
Please be quiet,” Mrs.
Kissing whispered in a hushed shaky voice, “they are attracted to
sound. Shhh…”
The students all became silent one by one as
they witnessed in horror of what used to be some of their
classmates bang against the other side of the door. Sue Ellen
stopped flickering the lights as she glanced down at Mater and
Karley attending to Josefina’s wounded arm. The students were all
huddled in one corner of the room shivering. Some were silently
tearful while others stared at the door in fright. Mrs. Kissing
walked over to Mrs. Westwood who was backed up against the wall in
a defensive position.
“
Do you believe me now?”
Mrs. Kissing asked.
Mrs. Westwood opened her lips to say
something but nothing came out. She nodded her head instead and
pointed to the floor where there was a puddle of yellow liquid
beneath her feet.
“
Did your water
break?”
Mrs. Westwood shook her head no.
“
Where is your cell
phone?” Mrs. Kissing asked.
Mrs. Westwood pointed towards her desk that
was securing the makeshift barricade. Mrs. Kissing sprinted for the
cell phone.
“
What is your
password?”
“
Err…. One, zero, two,
one. I, I mean one, zero, three, one!” Mrs. Westwood shouted in a
state of confusion.
Sue Ellen glanced up at the two teachers
conversing while attending to Josefina. Josefina began chattering
her teeth as if she was cold or had fever. Sue Ellen grasped the
Spanish beauty’s injured arm. The devastation that the human mouth
could inflict was tremendous. Drew walked over to Josefina and
studied the bite. Josefina’s arm was severed to the bone. He shook
his head. He knew that Josefina would bleed to death if she did not
get medical attention and soon. Sue Ellen frowned at Drew; she
could feel that Josefina was running a high fever. Drew noticed
that tears fell slowly from Sue Ellen’s eyes, something that Sue
Ellen never did.
Drew walked back over towards Mrs. Kissing.
At the moment, she seemed to be the only sane person in the
classroom. He noticed that Mrs. Kissing had retrieved Mrs.
Westwood’s cell phone. He watched as her hands fumbled so much that
she nearly dropped the phone a couple of times.