Chapter 5

“What the hell happened?” I asked, staring deep into her baby-blue eyes.

Hadn’t they been a darker shade just a moment ago?

She shifted her gaze away from me, opting to stare at the checkered floor.

“I don’t know what happened – all I remember was that there was an explosion. I think… I think a chair knocked me out…” she said, looking up to meet my gaze.

An explosion, likely one similar to mine. I shivered, remembering the pure strength of the concussive force that had been lashed out – I had been very, very lucky to live without massive internal injury.

I sighed, my nerves slowly coming back to me. Despite the circumstances, this was probably the most relaxed I’ve been since… since I was in the classroom, going through that boring lecture.

How I wished I could go back.

“Were you the one screaming in the hall for help?” I asked.

“Yes, I panicked a bit when I saw one of the tiny green men. I think they’re called a gol… goul… go-“

“Goblin.”

“Right! A goblin. It was standing on the opposite side of the room when I woke up, so I ran away as quickly as I could, away from it and the… the…” Tears slowly starting to streak down her face as she mouthed the words ‘bodies’.

The sounds of her muffled crying filled the room, reminiscing the moment she woke up to see her entire classroom likely being killed. I wished I knew some way to properly comfort her, but settled on setting a bag of crisps and a box of juice that I had looted right next to her. The best thing I could do was let her have some space, even in this small closet.

Standing up, I treaded over to the shelf next to the door. It was loaded with chemicals ranging from air fresheners to bleach.

Weapons.

Gears whirling in my head, I grabbed a bottle of ammonia hydroxide solution and bleach, simultaneously regarding the janitor who’d put them next to each other to be an absolute dunce. Ammonia and bleach made phosgene gas, which was – at the lightest – an extreme inspiratory system irritant, to one that could even cause death with some exposure.

While the Geneva Convention exists, it doesn’t explicitly state how the rules of wars are against these creatures.

After sealing each individual bottle into multiple separate Ziploc bags I had found, I stored them in my bag for future use. This was all I could store in my bag for now, since the other products wouldn’t fit into my now-stuffed bag of supplies and weapons. Speaking of weapons…

“Do you have any weapons on you? I asked.

She nodded yes while holding up a… was that a stapler? I chuckled, amused at the thought of her fighting off a goblin with it.

“That’s not much of a weapon.” Opening my bag, I removed the dagger, sword, and club in front of her. “Here, pick which one you want.”

After staring for a little while, she tentatively reached out and grasped the dagger. Feeling pleased with her choice, she slowly tossed the dagger from one hand to the other, feeling the weight of it rest on her palms.

With the weapons situation sorted out, I briefly considered the notion of fighting our way to the exit – but how on earth would we fight off a horde of the beasts outside with two people, especially with her sprained ankle? It wasn’t feasible in the slightest.

Stealth was the only option that made sense.

We couldn’t sneak our way out through the front door – that much I knew for sure. While the footsteps outside didn’t pass by our door often, the sounds of growling and whatnot echoed into our room. No front door, no windows, no methods of escape… except for one route.

The ventilation shaft.

I knew that each room had interconnected vents distributing fresh air equally into every single room, which further branched into the various floors of the building. This meant that all 4 floors of the building, including the rooms closest to the exits, could be readily accessed as long as we didn’t draw too much attention to ourselves while in there. If we did draw attention while in that tight, compressed space, the second option would be to…

I grimaced at the thought.

Spotting the ventilation grate at the upper left-hand corner of the closet, I quickly got to work unscrewing the latches. Thankfully the janitor had thought to store a basic toolbox in here, allowing me to make quick work of the screws. Before pulling myself into the shaft, I ran through the plan with the girl once more.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Here’s the plan – we’ll be going through the ventilation shaft to access the rooms closest to the exit, or to one of the rooms on the outside with an escapable window. Does that sound okay?”

She nodded, looking up the vent. Donning her some gloves and a mask to prevent dust inhalation and putting mine on, I hauled myself into the shaft, clicking on my phone light to gain some visibility inside. Once hearing her climb up behind me with a grunt of success, I slowly began moving forward - careful not to make any sounds – and continued on past various classrooms, only stopping to peer into the vents to scout the monsters that I could see. Goblins, orcs, and… harpies? They didn’t seem to do much, seeming to lounge in rooms in clusters after massacring the people within. Hardly any rooms were empty, except for a few that appeared to be empty before the event occurred.

Passing by numerous rooms with muscles straining from the exertion (doing an army crawl is hard!), I decided to stop at what appeared to be an empty woodworking room. The girl behind me was also starting to pant in exhaustion, and I couldn’t help but feel bad that she had to crawl the same distance as me with a strained ankle. After quietly observing the room for a little bit longer, I slowly cutting open the grate to the room and lowered myself down, staying vigilant of any other surprises that might try to decapitate me. Thankfully, the room was dead-silent, and the windows open to the hallways were one-way glass – we would be safe in here for the time being, and had adequate vision of the entrance in front of us. After helping the girl climb down from the vent and brushing myself free of dust, I allowed myself to relax just for a tiny bit.

The room was relatively spacious with workbenches lining the walls with tools, drill bits and the like, including the stash of hardwood laying in the corner on top of some tarp. It was perfect to secure the room for the time being. After whittling a few wedges from a block of wood to secure the door and motioning her to do the same, we were able to slide 3 wedges under the door frame to prevent it from opening – probably not enough to stop a charging orc, but enough to block most creatures from breaking down the door.

With that out of the way, I took out the contents of my bag and laid it out on the large table in the center of the room to get a better understanding of our current food situation. It totaled to five bags of chips, a frozen (now thawing) microwaveable meals, a tuna sandwich, and plenty of candy – not enough to give us an appropriate buffer of time for food. Water wouldn’t be an issue as long as the taps were running, but I should definitely start bottling as many as I can in case they did.

While writing down our complete list of supplies into a notebook, I began brainstorming ways of potentially finding food. I didn’t plan to stay for long here, but it certainly wouldn’t hurt to take precautions – and that meant stockpiling what was remaining and available in the predicament we were in. Taking a look on the map I had downloaded on my phone during school orientation, the closest thing that would have a stockpile of food would be…

The bagel shop.

The 4th floor had only a single bagel / coffee shop but was fairly sizeable in its own right. The first floor had the cafeteria, but we had no way to access that location without dying on the way there.

… Or well, I had no way to access it. She wouldn’t be able to catch up with her ankle.

Staring at her from a distance while she fiddled with some tools, I took a better glance at her physical attributes. She was shorter than me by at least half a foot, with a pale, lithe frame – yet was quite toned by the looks of her arms and legs. While she still had that aura of uncertainty and fear around her, I could tell that she would be able to carry herself well if it came down to a fight. I nodded, feeling a bit more confident in her abilities.

“I’m going to go out for a little while to get more supplies – do you think you can handle being on your own here?” I asked, while gesturing to the room. “Maybe you could clean up the area a little bit while I’m gone?

She nodded without turning around, continuing to fiddle around with the items on the workbenches.

Something felt off about her, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on what it could be. Regardless, she had followed me in the vents on that ankle without a peep of complaint – that much deserved my respect.

“Sophie…” I heard her meekly say, still turned around.

“Huh?”

“My name is Sophie…”

Of course, I’d forgotten to ask what her name was.

“O-oh, yeah. My name’s Matt I said, mentally punching myself for forgetting to ask such a simple question. “I’ll be back soon, okay? Just wedge and lock the door behind me.”

I opened the door, making the tiniest of moments while peeping around both sides of the hall to spot any enemies that we couldn’t see from the window. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

Clutching the dagger in my hands, I began proceeding down the hall while constantly referencing the map on my phone – the last thing I wanted was to go the wrong way and have to trace my way back. Oddly enough, there weren’t any bodies up here given that most of the classes happened on the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd floor – which was good for my mental health, but not good if I wanted to forage more supplies. The bagel shop would at least ensure we had one less thing on our plate, as long as we -

‘God damn it!’

Just up ahead near the entrance to the bagel shop stood a gang of goblins – one with a dagger, two with clubs, one with a bow, and – most frighteningly – a human-sized goblin wearing full leather armor with iron greaves and gauntlets. After observing them for a little while, it became clear that the tall goblin was the one in charge as he slapped around the smaller goblins, in a rebuking fashion.

Just my luck. Why on earth were they congregating in front of a bagel shop?

People had to be inside there.

That was the only explanation that could explain why happened to be there with weapons, despite the fact that the 4th floor was almost completely empty.

The answer clicked in my head. The bagel and coffee shop itself was a favorite among students, especially the late-night grinders who didn’t go home. I couldn’t remember how many workers were in there specifically since it was mainly students who manned the shop, but I always recalled seeing at least two workers there at all times - two workers who had smartly barricaded themselves inside the room.

I didn’t stand a chance against the goblins in front of the door – maybe I could take out two or three of the smaller goblins and pick them off with my bow, but the large one with the armor would probably pulverize me before I could even get the chance to draw another arrow. Nor were there any other entrances that I could access the bagel shop from.

The only other option was to distract them long enough to get the supplies out of there, or maybe lock them into a room where they couldn’t escape. But who’s to say they couldn’t break their way out of there…?

Ah… the bleach and ammonia.

...

A glimmer of darkness shone in the boy's eyes, matching his Cheshire grin.