Chapter 8 – The Situation Worsens

Before William could build any further on his thoughts, two staff members arrived with a medical stretcher, their movements brisk and professional. One of them, a tall man wearing a lab coat and a grim expression, strapped on a pair of surgical gloves and knelt by the young man’s lifeless body, his glasses crooked on his face and his expression twisted in anguish as if he was in great pain.

“Everyone, step aside!” ordered the second staff member, a woman with a sharp tone that cut through the murmur of the crowd. “And don’t touch the body. We’ll be conducting a full medical examination and documentation of everything that transpired here.”

She lowered her voice to speak to her partner. “It looks like the nurse’s report was accurate, but we can’t rule out the possibility that this is a case of overdose.” Her gaze switched to the crowd now, scanning them suspiciously. “We take cases like these very seriously. As you know, the city and especially this academy has a zero tolerance policy for illicit substances. Anyone found spreading such illicit substances will be investigated and face consequences.”

A girl gasped, and the students shuffled farther back, nobody wanting to appear guilty. The tenor of the situation changed in an instant. Now that the blame had been shifted from an unknown to a possible student’s activity, the tension had taken a different tone, and everyone seemed to be rigid and on their best behavior—that is, with the exception of William.

William’s gaze lingered on Ebenezer’s glasses, the way they barely clung to the edge of his nose, and his unfocused gaze. Something about the scene felt off, but he couldn’t put his finger on it.

The woman turned to the two professors. “Let’s clear this wing and take the body back for preservation. Unfortunately we won’t have access to lab results until after the lockdown lifts, so until then make sure to keep an eye out on any unusual behavior.” Her voice turned cold. “They’re adults now, they need to learn that their actions have consequences.”

She then spoke to the man with surgical gloves on, who was carefully taking samples with a cotton swab from Ebenezer’s nose. “Are you ready?”

“Just about. Give me a few more seconds.”

William gulped. They were about to take away the body, before he could even finish his train of logic. The alcohol sat warm in his stomach. For some reason, he felt like he had to…he needed to…touch the body? But why? Such a strange, intrusive, and possibly incriminating thought to have in a terrible situation like this, and yet somehow he felt like if he didn’t act now, he'd regret missing the opportunity to know something, forever.

The man with surgical gloves appeared to have finished swabbing. No time left to consider. A crude plan formed in William’s head, which he executed immediately even though he risked looking suspicious while doing so.

He took out his phone and fumbled it intentionally, an action made easier by the liquor coursing through his veins. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to–” he stammered, leaning down to pick it up. As he did so, he deliberately reached out just a bit too far with the back of his hand, reaching out past his own slippers to touch Ebenezer’s arm. But just as he was about to come into contact with his arm, an unpolished dress shoe came into view and kicked his hand away.

“You heard the lady. No touching the body,” said Professor Ghoulstein in as unpleasant a voice as ever, with that ever present raspy undertone that underlined his childishly high pitched voice with a smoker’s growl.

William tried again, but the professor’s foot kicked him away once more rudely.

“Did you not hear me the first time?” Professor Ghoulstein asked contemptuously. “Are you trying to cause trouble here?” He suddenly looked triumphant. “Or maybe you’re the guilty party! What’s your name?”

Professor Ghoulstein grabbed him by the shoulder and roughly pulled him up to his feet, then picked up his phone and shoved it towards him. “I asked, what’s your name?”

“William Blackwood, professor,” he replied reluctantly, taking his phone as the two staff members hoisted Ebenezer’s body onto the stretcher and covered him with a plastic sheet. Now he’d never know what his gut was trying to warn him about. He frowned. The crowd was beginning to disperse as well, with some students speaking to the other professor as others left the scene, not wanting to attract Professor Ghoulstein’s wrath in turn.

“Now, William, what were you trying to do just now? Tamper the evidence? Trying to take back the drugs that you gave that poor boy, is that right?”

William swallowed, not sure what to say. He had no defense for himself. His actions were clearly suspicious, because he tried to touch the body not once but twice.

“No answer, hm? So you are guilty!”

He looked to Finn for help, but Finn looked frozen as a stone, simply staring into the crowd. More students began to disperse, a few casting side eyes as Professor Ghoulstein continued to blame William.

“He’s innocent, he was with us this entire evening!” said Abby Fate, her cheeks flushed as she charged over with Vanessa Lullaby by her side. “We were hanging out together!”

Ghoulstein’s expression was inscrutable when he noticed Abby and Vanessa coming to William’s defense, before turning to a rage when he noticed what was in Abby’s hand. Abby still had the bottle of liquor she had lifted from the professor’s break room! William couldn’t even blame her for the major oversight, since she not only had the most shots out of all of them but she was also quite petite.

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“Where did you get this?” Professor Ghoulstein said, grabbing the bottle from her hand. “You stole this from the breakroom? Does this lockdown seem like a joke to you?”

Now it was Abby’s turn to be speechless. “I, um—”

“Enough!” Ghoulstein pointed at Abby. “You’re on toilet scrubbing duty, and you will begin right now.”

“The toilets?” she asked, looking like she was about to gag at the disgusting request as a few onlookers laughed, and others looked away nervously. “In the middle of the night?”

Most Trinity Academy students had never seen a mop before, much less a toilet scrubber. Ghoulstein’s request was not just a punishment but also a humiliation ritual.

“Correct. The supplies are here, and this is your punishment for stealing. I’ll be personally checking that you finished your duty tomorrow morning.”

“Am I supposed to scrub all of them?”

“Correct. Don’t think of skipping a single one, or I will escalate the matter to the disciplinary committee.”

“I mean, even if I actually do that, that’s going to take all night!”

Ghoulstein smiled sinisterly. “Then think before you decide to steal next time, young woman, and try to obey emergency protocols. Given the circumstances, this is a suitable punishment for a transgression of your magnitude.”

“And you,” he turned to William. “I will be watching you very closely. You will go directly to the sleeping quarters, and are not permitted into the halls after dark under any circumstances from now on. If I catch you, that’s your first strike to being expelled.”

With that, Professor Ghoulstein finally left to speak with Professor Snow as other faculty members and confused students began to arrive on the scene, some of them whispering loudly about the covered stretcher they saw being carried down the hallway.

Abby looked defeated and humiliated as she took a toilet scrubber and a bottle of cleaning solution from the closet, as Vanessa tried to comfort her in the most Vanessa-like way possible.

“I really would help, Abby, but my back is still sore from this afternoon,” Vanessa said. “And I feel the skin on my hands already peeling from all those chemicals. How about I treat you to something nice after lockdown. Maybe we can go to a horror convention, how about that? We can do matching outfits.”

Abby shook her head. “It’s alright, I’ll manage,” she said meekly. Compared to before when she seemed packed full of energy, she now looked quite down.

William wanted to say something to her but he couldn’t find the right words. It was his fault that she got in trouble after all, and he could feel Ghoulstein’s watchful eye bearing down on him. He decided to just leave before he got into any more trouble.

“Guess I’m going to the gymnasium to sleep,” he said to Finn.

“Me too,” Finn replied, still trying to avoid Ghoulstein’s attention.

With a bit of guilt, he left Abby in the janitor’s closet and began making their way to the gymnasium. On their way, they crossed Luke and one of his friends, the two of them speaking in low voices. Word must have gotten to them that Ebenezer died. Luke didn’t look happy, in fact he seemed quite angry.

Before long, they reached the gymnasium.

“Sleeping mats and blankets are to your left, and sleeping quarters are down by the side!” said a female volunteer.

William grabbed a sleeping mat and blanket and walked over to the sleeping quarters, which had been divided by gender down the sides. Plenty of students were already laying there, and a few were even snoring.

He and Finn set up their sleeping mats and settled down, with William placing his hands over his stomach as he looked up at the ceiling blankly. He simply meditated for a while, his body still processing the alcohol in his stomach as his mind spun in all sorts of directions, losing a sense of how much time passed.

He thought of Abby Fate coming to his defense when even Finn didn’t say anything. And now she was alone in the bathroom, scrubbing toilets in the middle of the night with the lights not even working, and it was all because she defended his stupid attempt to touch the body even though the staffers clearly said not to.

The more he thought about it, the more he realized there was no way he could sleep like this with the guilt and shame welling up in his chest. He didn’t even have the courage to face her and tell her sorry. Ghoulstein looking at him was a convenient excuse. If he was honest, he just felt bad and wanted to avoid the issue.

Damn it.

At the very least he should help her clean the toilets. He didn’t want her to suffer for the next six hours until sunrise all by herself just because she tried to help him when he made a mistake.

William rolled off his sleeping mat and stood up.

“Where are you going?” Finn mumbled, half asleep.

“Bathroom.”

It was technically true. He walked to the front and told the volunteer the same—it was a different volunteer now, as the previous one had retired to bed—then headed back into the hallway. Professor Ghoulstein’s words hung heavily in the air, but his guilty feelings for leaving Abby to dry were stronger. It was his duty to help her.

The hallways felt darker than even before, with no one left in the halls. William took out his phone, seeing that nearly two hours had passed since the incident, as he shone his phone’s white light in front like he’d done so many times in the past. Hopefully Ghoulstein had gone to bed already. Surely even he needed to sleep.

Before long, he reached the east wing girls’ bathroom and knocked.

“Abby,” he said. “I came to help you out a bit so you can go to bed earlier.” He paused, then added some more. “Sorry for leaving without saying anything, and thanks for trying to cover for me. I really appreciate it.”

No response came from within the bathroom. Maybe she didn’t hear him.

“Abby, you there?” he called out again.

He waited, but again there was no answer. Maybe she fell asleep on the floor, he thought. The poor girl. William put his hand on the door, hesitating for a second because this was the girls’ bathroom after all, but it was the middle of the night and he highly doubted that anyone else was in there.

He pushed with his shoulder against the bathroom door, its creak ringing through the night as he began to doubt if even Abby was in there.

But if she wasn’t… why?