Novels2Search
Re-education
Chapter 13: Reunion

Chapter 13: Reunion

With only the USB and clothes on his back, Caden leaves the white room. What awaited him outside was a long, pitch black hallway. He cautiously walked along the side, tracing his hands against the wall. He took small, light steps, removing any weight from them in order to be as silent as a mouse. He was extremely cautious, as he did not know what could await him on the other side. He took around fifty steps before he saw something at the end of the hallway, it was a slope, a ramp even. As Caden looked at it in confusion, confused as to why it was a ramp and not stairs, he remembered that the scientists could only bring the unconscious students on a wheeled stretcher, so a ramp would have been the most logical. He approached the base of the slope, there was a dim light coming from the other side. He didn't want to attract any attention, and he wouldn't want anyone to see him as he walked up the ramp, so he got on his knees and slowly crawled up the ramp. He took small crawls towards the top, and when he finally made it up, he witnessed a familiar scenery.

"Wait, what's going on?" He mumbled to himself. What he saw at the end of the slope was the familiar hallway of his school. He looked around cautiously, as there might have been someone there, but luckily no one could be seen. It was dead silent, no noise could be heard from any direction. The only sound that filled the scene was the gust of wind from the heavy blizzard outside. It was cold, but now Caden was grateful that he had his warm school uniform on, unlike when they were sentenced outside in the blizzard. As there was no one around, Caden slowly crawled out. He took one last look at the bottom of the slope.

"How the hell is this here? There wasn't any underground entrance like this before." He thought to himself. And indeed he was right, in this school, there wasn't anything like it, but as he examined the entrance to the underground, he noticed small latches and contraptions that he could not explain. He inferred that these were used in order to close the entrance, much like a hidden room. He took his gaze off of the entrance as he examined the hallway, trying to figure out where he was.

As he looked around, he noticed a sign next to the door to his left, "Nurse's Office." The sign read. From the location of that room, he knew that he was on the first floor—obviously, and also that he was on the far right side of the main building. Caden silently approached the door of the nurse's office. Every window that faced the hallways of the school had curtains, while the side facing outside the campus didn't, so Caden couldn't peek through the window to see the inside of the room. He grabbed the doorknob, but as he silently twisted the knob, it stopped in the middle, signaling that it was locked. At the end of the hallway lies an exit that connects to the right wing building using a small pathway, it mainly contained the cafeteria and auditorium. Caden cautiously walked to the side of the hallway, trying not to fall into the underground entrance as the door to the right wing was behind the gaping entrance to the secret room. As he tried to push on the screen door, it was quite unfortunate since it was locked as well. He could have tried to break it down since it was made of glass, but it would have attracted attention from the sound of the glass breaking, and he didn't want that to happen as it could have been the end for him.

As his attempts ended in failure, he was now ready to explore the rest of the first floor. He slowly walked across the hallway, carefully checking to see if any doors were open, but sadly none weren't. He felt unnerved as the heavy silence creeped him out a bit. By this point he had already passed the class 1C and 2C classrooms and is now approaching the base of the stairs, while beyond the stairwell lies the other classrooms, including the 1A, 1B, 2A, and 2C, while another door leads to the left wing building of the school that contained the club rooms and, weirdly enough, the student council office, which is usually found in the main building of other schools.

As Caden took one step on the stairs, he quickly paused as he heard something approaching him from up the stairs, a sound that Caden was quite familiar with since he liked to hang out in a forest near his neighborhood, the sound of a chainsaw. Knowing danger was just above him, in quick thinking, Caden rushed back to the right hallway. He knew there was a storage shed just in front of the nurse's office, so he retraced his steps back there while the sound became louder as it descended the stairs. Caden ran as fast as he could, not minding if his rapid footsteps made any noise as the loud raging roar of the chainsaw drowned any other noise out. The figure holding the chainsaw was almost at the base of the stairs, and in the nick of time, he twisted the doorknob to the storage shed and realized that lady luck was smiling down on him as the room wasn't locked. He quickly swung the door open, got inside the cramped room filled with brooms, dustpans, and other cleaning supplies, then silently closed the door and locked it by pressing the button on the doorknob.

The sound of the chainsaw came closer and closer, with an additional sound of something being dragged. Caden's sweat began to fall to the ground. Since there weren't any windows in that room, he began to sweat buckets from the combination of nervousness and lack of ventilation, even with the shivering blizzard outside, the cool winds couldn't reach the inside of the room. As he finally heard footsteps followed by the ever increasing sound of the chainsaw, he knew that the figure was near the room, or even just beyond the door. Suddenly the sound stopped, the chainsaw had been calmed and came to a stop. Caden let out a silent sigh. He heard the sound of keys clattering, followed by a click. The roar of the blizzard could now be heard as he inferred that the figure had opened the door to the pathway of the right wing. After a brief moment, the sound of the blizzard was muted as the door was closed again.

A few moments passed, and Caden got out of the room. He waited for a bit before leaving just in case the figure turned back into the main building. He immediately looked out of the glass doors as he tried to catch a glimpse of the figure, but because of the fog, he couldn't see anything outside. Caden sighed in relief as the danger was now engulfed by the blizzard and nowhere near him, but as he glanced to the ground, he was mortified as he saw a trail of blood that leads to stairs. Caden immediately dashed across the hallway and up the stairs as he remembered that his classroom was on the second floor. He grew worried about what could have happened at the end of the trail of blood. His fears increased as the red trail led to his classroom. He increased his speed as he got closer to the room, and just as he was about to turn and enter the open entrance to the room, a figure was exiting at the same time.

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"Oh shit!" Shouted Caden as he fell to the ground from bumping into the figure. As he looked to see what he had run into, his face beamed with happiness as he saw his best friend, Josef, in a similar position after bumping into him.

"Caden!?" exclaimed Josef, he quickly got up and grabbed Caden's shoulders, "Is that really you!?"

"Wha.. what, yes, yes it's really me."

"Oh thank heavens you're safe, I didn't know what I would have done if something happened to you."

"Whats wrong? And what the hell is happening in this school, and what's with all this blood?"

"Well... see for yourself." Josef pointed inside the classroom while his gaze met the ground. As Caden peeked inside the classroom, he saw the same nightmare fuel sight that Josef first saw when he woke up.

"Fucked up, right?"

Caden was speechless, he didn't know what to say or do in that situation, so he simply closed his eyes and closed the door, leaving behind the mountain of headless corpses inside the room to continue rotting, never to see the light of day as the heavy blizzard roared in the moonlight.

Caden took a deep breath and said, "Let's just... forget about that, there's no helping it."

"How did you survive?" asked Josef.

"Oh well.. when I woke up, I was chained to this table, but luckily I got out just in time, I saw these scientists perform an experiment, it said something about a virus of some sort, and also look here.." Caden pulled out the USB from his pocket, "it says that it contains valuable information about the virus and how to make an antivirus for it."

"Wait, a virus? What does it do?"

"I'm not sure either, all I know is that it could control people."

"Oh! I also have something, I found this when I woke up."

"Oh shit! what!? a gun!?" Caden was surprised as Josef pulled out the revolver from his pocket.

"There's also this that came with it." he handed Caden the note.

"The principal? kill him? so.. does that mean that he's behind all of this?"

"I don't know, but it's our only clue at the moment."

"Alright, but before we do any digging, let's find somewhere safe to hide, and no, I'm not hiding in that room filled with headless corpses, nor do I want to see it again." said Caden

Josef nodded, and the two set out to find somewhere they could deem as safe.

The two walked with confidence as Caden told Josef that the chainsaw figure exited the main building. They were still a bit cautious, as they didn't know what else could be in this school, but at least they had one less thing to worry about for now. The two were almost ready to descend the stairs to the first floor when Josef remembered something. "Oh wait! Isn't there an empty classroom on this floor that isn't being used?"

"Umm Yes! Yes there is."

"Then let's go check there first."

The two resumed their walk across the hallway, while checking the other rooms. This floor mainly contained third-year classrooms, with the exception of their desolate class 1-F outcast room in the far right side of the hallway. They checked each room, including the glass door in front of the stairs that lead to a balcony, but all of them were locked. With nowhere else to go, they approached the empty classroom's door. Josef twisted the doorknob, and luckily, it was unlocked. He slowly opened the door, and what awaited them on the other side was a long metal broomstick, quickly swinging down to his head.

"Wait, stop!" said a voice from inside the room. Josef fell down to the floor in shock, but luckily the metal broomstick was only inches away from his head before coming to a stop, Caden on the other hand took a step back as soon as he saw the broom stick being swung down.

"Josh? Matt?" Said Josef.

"Josef? Caden?" Said Josh.

"Oh thank God you guys are alive. Quickly, come inside." Said Matt.

Josef and Caden sat on the wooden chairs as they caught their breaths. It was a long day, and a lot happened in the short span after they both woke up, both equally as fucked up. After giving the two a minute to rest, Josh approached the two.

"So how did you guys survive?"

"Well.. It's a long story..." Josef explained everything, including Caden's side. He also explained the gun, including the note, as well as the USB and its contents.

"Sounds like we've got a lot ahead of us." said Matt.

"By the way... how the fuck did you guys survive?" Asked Caden.

"Well, basically, after I got my uniform back, I went out of the classroom while Mr. Fatmouth was talking and went to the roof to relax. There was a room there with a heater, so me and Matt normally hung out there often, but suddenly purple gas started to appear, and the next thing I knew, I was unconscious." explained Josh.

"So you weren't taken anywhere?"

"Nope, when I woke up, I was still in that room." Said Josh.

"So whoever was responsible for this didn't check the roof for people." Muttered Josef.

"How about you, Matt? You were in the classroom with us when it happened. If I'm not mistaken, you were near the door." said Caden.

"Yes, I was in the classroom. I was supposed to follow Josh to the roof, but it took me a while to find my phone. When I went to the door to leave, purple gas started to seep through. When it covered the entire room, I panicked and jumped out of the window."

"What the fuck! You jumped out of the window!?" exclaimed Caden.

"Yep, don't worry, I wasn't hurt. I landed on a bush, so it cushioned my fall a bit."

"Yeah that's lucky, but you're still crazy for doing that." said Caden.

"True, but now that we know that most of the people who were in the classroom were killed, jumping out of the window is the best choice."

Caden sighed, "I guess you're correct."

The group ended their conversation there and continued to relax. Caden was laying down on the floor, Josh was doing pushups at the corner, and Matt was guarding the door. The lock was broken, so someone needed to be ready just in case someone entered. Meanwhile, Josef was sitting on the desk, reminiscing on everything that happened today, from his trip to school to the hell of a situation they were in. Along the way, he had something knocking on his mind, but he had trouble remembering what it was.

"Hey Josef, were there any others who survived?" Asked Josh.

"I just told you a while ago, our classmates are all dead."

"No, I mean from other classes."

"Others... Oh, shit! Avery and the others." Josef had finally remembered that he needed to find his girlfriend and other friends from class 1-A and see if they survived, or what was left of them.

"Oh yeah... what do we do?" Asked Caden.

"Well, we better check just in case they survived." Said Josh.

"But first we need weapons, We only have a gun with six bullets and a broomstick, it's best if everyone has a weapon just in case we run into someone dangerous." Said Matt.

The group scavenged the room for anything that they could use to their advantage. Josef broke off one of the long legs of the teacher's desk in front of the room while keeping his revolver as a last resort, Caden took the fire extinguisher that was hooked to the back wall of the room, Matt had brass knuckles that he always brought to school in order to show off, it was a bit illegal to bring such a weapon to school, but in this hell, everything goes, and Josh had a long metal broom stick. With weapons ready, and nerves steadied, the boys were ready to tackle the horrors of the school.