5.

The hallway was eerily quiet.

 

Tracy was running, her footsteps pounding the halls in echoic rythym, constantly scrubbing her hands across her face, expecting blood, but there was none.  She didn't know where she was going and she didn't care--she wouldn't peer into any classrooms, for fear of the same scene unfolding around her friends.  She just wanted to get as far away from the carnage as possible.

 

Just then, she burst into the room filled with vending machines, the one just across from the lunchroom, and heard voices.

 

Her blood ran cold--she had only just remembered the lunch schedule, the alternate one that ran during fourth period.  Lucas's.

 

She wrenched open the double doors, her brain screaming, and a scene--of absolute normalcy--met her eyes.

 

Had what had gone on in Mr. Packard's room all been a dream?! she thought insanely.  How could her mind have POSSIBLY conjured it all?

 

She took off running, the terror on her face apparent.  The panic that had permeated her whole lunch group didn't seem to have reached this one--everyone seemed to be talking quite normally among themselves.  That is, until they saw her running, her eyes desperately scanning the crowd.  Where was Lucas?

 

Almost everyone had their gaze on her, but she had no room to feel nervous or embarrassed; she was still full of fear and confusion and panic.  Just then, she spotted Lucas across the room--and he was looking at her along with everyone else.

 

Just the sight of him was like a punch in the stomach.  His thin-slanted eyebrows were crinkled around clear blue eyes (she'd once complimented them, and he'd looked at her like she was crazy), and his dirty-blonde hair was in its usual disarray, curling around the nape of his neck and behind his ears.  His features were sort of elfin, with a dignified age to them.  Tracy had described him, picked over his image in her mind so many times, relished in his half-smiling gaze.  But now, he was just confused, a slight frown marring his features.

 

She raced over to him, out of breath from running and fear.  "Something really freaky is going on," she gasped. 

 

"I...heard," he said, his eyebrows further drawing together.  Still confused.

 

"Everyone in my class just went the same way as Valerie Thomas!" Tracy cried in exasperation.  "They just got a nosebleed, and collapsed, and then they were all about to go for me!  We need to get out of here or something!"

 

He stood up, still uncertain, but before either of them or any of the people around them could take a single step, a BLEEP-ing noise came over the intercom.

 

A voice that was not the usual came over the loudspeaker.  It was a generic male voice that could have been any student, teacher, or faculty member.

 

"Attention, students, the school is now in lockdown.  Stay in your classrooms, sit up against the walls, stay away from the windows, and stay safe.  We--"

 

The intercom went dead with another loud BLEEP.

 

For a second there was silence.  Then an older-looking boy stood up with a flourish and screamed "Something's spreading through the whole school, and if we stay here I guess we're just going to have to curl up and die!"

 

In the half-second of lull that followed, Tracy scrubbed at her face again, once again coming away clean.

 

Then the screaming started.

Reviews

[Lyzzy Redd]

OH GOSH I LOVE THIS.

It's so spooky. It's so...creepily beautiful.

That makes me sound like a sadistic freak. But you write very well, especially this story.