Chapter 2: Wrathful Axe

Cher could hear Hannah's sharp breathing as they hid under the table. Seconds passed, and her footsteps began echoing in the room, along with the sound of her axe being dragged on the floor. Cher and Jericho held their breaths and sat as still as they could. There were many desks here, and they could only hope that she didn't have the patience to check under all of them.

Then there was a loud sound of wood being toppled over. Hannah had just flipped one of the desks. Then another desk, this time much closer. Cher's heart was pounding, and she hoped to god that it wasn't loud enough to be heard. She slowly covered her own mouth to make her breathing less audible. She was shaking, and that terrified her, since just a single movement would put them at risk. Dozens of questions rushed by in Cher's head.

One second passed. Then two. Then three. It was only at four that the footsteps continued. Some chairs and desks shuffled around, before finally the sound of the door opening came. More footsteps. And then, the door closed, and silence followed. The two of them waited a bit longer to make sure she was no longer there, but after taking a peek, they finally began to breathe again. Cher's body slumped against the desk in exhaustion.

While Cher was doing that, Jericho ran to the door and took a peek outside. "She's going inside the other rooms now," he said. "If we're going to go and ambush her, now's the time."

"Ambush her? Shouldn't we run away?"

"What good would that do? Whether we like it or not, we'll have to kill the other Players. It's either now or later, and either us or them. And I'd much prefer to kill her now while she's injured rather than wait some other day. From our tussle earlier, I know that she has the advantage in strength. I probably can't beat that brute of a woman in a straight fight, so we have to ambush her."

Cher stood up from the ground and supported herself on one of the desks. "Are we really doing this right now? Are we really going to … kill people? What kind of screwed up game is this? And why are you helping me in the first place? If you're part of the game too, then you should be trying to kill me."

"Oh, trust me, I plan on doing that. But for now, it's better to work together and eliminate the other Players. A free-for-all's easier to manage when there aren't many contestants left. Come on, we need to follow her. "

He took out his knife, which was sheathed on his belt. It looked like a combat knife, but the blade had a dark blue hue. Before Cher could say anything back, Jericho soundlessly opened the door and snuck out. The look on his face as he did that was filled with bloodlust and hate. With that, Cher knew that Jericho was really going to do it.

She didn't feel safe along, so she followed after him. Trying to make as least noise as possible, she opened the door and looked around, making sure that Hannah wasn't around to see. She crouched as she left the room. With each tiny scrape her shoes made against the ground, she became paranoid, thinking about how it could probably be heard. Even so, she didn't stop, and kept following Jericho.

"Wait! Can't we think of some other way?" Cher whispered as she chased after him, sneaking across the hall, and going inside one of the empty rooms. Hannah was most likely inside one of the further rooms at this point, so Cher followed Jericho inside the room too. Staying in the halls was dangerous.

"There is no other way," Jericho replied. "Why are you trying to defend her when she's trying to kill you?"

"I'm not! It's just … we can let the police handle this or something!"

"Don't be so naive. We're killing her."

"Wai—!"

Just then, Cher's ankle surged with pain, causing her to lose her balance. To keep herself from falling to the ground, she leaned on one of the desks, shiving it to the side and shifting some chairs, all of which made scraping sounds on the ground. In the dead of the night, these sounds were much louder than they should.

Jericho turned around in shock. Cher was supporting herself on the desk, looking at her ankle, which has been sprained for a while now, and she just didn't notice. From the outside, there was the sound of one of the classroom doors opening, then footsteps getting louder and louder, faster and faster.

"Shit…!" Jericho said.

Cher covered her mouth, realizing it was her fault. "I-I'm sorry—"

"Run, now!"

As he said that, the classroom's front door burst open, and in came Hannah, axe in hand, malice in her eyes. Jericho had to push Cher to run, since she was frozen in fear. Everything had been happening too fast for her. The two of them headed for the back door. Hannah threw her axe towards them. It came fast, hitting the back wall, and a small amount of blood sprinkled in the air. Jericho's hand was lightly grazed by it. He winced in pain, but didn't stop running.

They ran across the hall as fast as they could while Hannah was busy retrieving her axe. Jericho held his hand as it bled, leaving trails of blood on the ground.

"You hand…" Cher remarked.

"It's fine. It's not lethal. Hurts like shit, though."

"I'm sorry—"

"Save that for later, just run!"

Cher's ankle was still in pain, but she couldn't afford to stop here. She had to run, before Hannah could catch up. But run to where exactly? Cher thought about it for a while.

"Let's go find other people!" she suggested. "Like, another teacher or something!"

"No! If we do that, they'll report her to the police. If she gets arrested, it'll be hard to kill her."

"Do we really have to?!"

"Jesus, you really don't understand, do you? Our lives are on the line here! It's a literal 'kill-or-be-killed' scenario! If we don't kill them, we—!"

Before Jericho could finish his sentence, just as they were about to turn a corner, Hannah popped out, ready to swing. Jericho didn't notice, since he was busy talking to Cher, who ran behind him. Cher was the one who noticed first.

As fast as she could, she grabbed the back of Jericho's shirt and pulled it back. Had she not, the axe would've divided his face clean in half. Off balance, they fall to the ground, with Hannah standing in front of them, looking down.

Immediately, Jericho swung his knife at her. Hannah kicked him in the forearm, and the knife went tumbling to the ground. Hannah raised her axe again, but Jericho wasn't just going to sit still and accept his death. He tackled her in the torso, pushing her to the ground. The axe flung away. Hannah tried to grab it, but it was just barely out of reach. Jericho, trying to keep her from retrieving her weapon, tried to keep her from it. Hannah had more strength and power and Jericho, so all he could do was grab her face, trying to scratch out her eyes with one hand, and digging his fingers into her arm wound with the other. He'd sneak in a punch or two, sometimes slamming her face with his fist, doing anything he could. Hannah screamed in pain, but she fought back. It looked obvious that sooner or later, Jericho would lose, and she'd grab her axe.

For what seemed like forever, Cher stared at the violence in front of her. When Hannah threw a kick at Jericho, his scream brought her back to her senses. She picked up his knife on the ground.

And yet, the cold grip of the knife's handle seemed to have permeated her body, as she froze yet again. Even as she steeled her mind to kill another person, she couldn't move. Fear dominated her body. The weight of authority over another person's life pushed down on her. Her legs felt like they were about to crumble. She didn't want to watch this. She didn't want someone to die in front of her. She didn't want to kill.

"Get off!" Hannah screamed viscerally as she threw a powerful kick straight to Jericho's face, dazing him. His grip on her loosened, which gave her plenty of time. In a single quick move, she reached out for her axe, and grabbed it with her hand.

When she saw that, Cher panicked. She knew that Hannah would immediately swing that at Jericho, who was dazed at the moment. She took a step forward, but stopped.

<What's the point? Even if I act now, I won't be able to make it.>

<Yeah, what's the point?>

What brought Cher back to reality was a scream. Not Jericho, or Cher's, but Hannah's. Hannah had her hand gripped on the axe, and stepping on that hand was someone's boot.

"You have some hardcore views on discipline, miss Robins," the man said. "But I don't think this kind of education is good for the school's image, you know? It might scare potential students away."

"You…?!" Hannah's face turned to shock and surprise. In fact, so was Cher's.

Standing over her, shoulders slumped, was a man with messy unkempt hair. The moonlight reflected on his circular glasses.

"Sir Lucas?" Cher's voice was small and faint, but he still heard.

"Williams! Glad to see you haven't learned a thing! You should've gone home early and slept, before you become sleep deprived again."

"Why are YOU here?!" Hannah asked angrily.

"Now, now, ma'am, no need to be so aggressive." Lucas kicked the axe away and grabbed her by the arm, pulling her up.

The moment she was on her feet, she didn't hesitate. She immediately threw her fist towards Lucas. It was a very fast right hook that probably would've knocked someone out if they got hit. However, Lucas raised his arm and blocked it almost nonchalantly. Then, he immediately grabbed her face with his other hand, and effortlessly slammed her head against one of the windows. The glass shattered into pieces, covering Hannah's face in blood. Lucas smashed her face again on another window, then moved to another window and smashed her face there as well. After that, he tossed her to the wall, which she hit head first and fell to the ground, bloodied and unmoving.

Lucas flicked his hand around, looking quite pained. "Man, I'm REALLY getting old. That hurt a lot more than I expected. But, that should do it."

Jericho got back up on his feet. His nose was bleeding, but he seemed like he was fine, if a bit wobbly. He took the knife from Cher's hands and pointed it at Lucas. "Are you another Player, too?"

Lucas raised his hands. "Relax, I'm not."

"Oh yeah? Then how do you know what a Player is?"

"That's complicated, so you'll just have to believe me. I'm a pretty trustworthy guy, right? At least, I think I am. More importantly, you better get your hand checked. It's doing a lot more than bleeding right now."

Cher and Jericho looked at his hand. There was a small cut on the side of the palm, and it was covered in blood. But the skin around the wounds was starting to blacken and decay. It was decomposing.

Jericho suddenly fell to his knees, screaming, as if he'd just noticed the pain.

"How'd he get that wound?" Lucas asked.

"She threw that axe at us, and he got grazed by it," Cher replied, then shook her head as she got her thoughts straight. "Lucas, can you explain what's going on here? Why are people trying to kill me?!"

"We can talk about that later. First, we need to get you two someplace safe, so we can treat that guy's wounds. We also need to run before anyone finds us, since all that glass breaking could've alerted a teacher. Anyways, you two might not trust me yet, but if you want to live, you'd best follow me."

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Chapter 2: Wrathful Axe

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