Chapter 4
"Damn Edgar and his crew, why the hell are they taking so long?" Joaquin cursed, sitting at a desk across from Dexter, who was devouring a lunchbox.
They were supposed to play ML after lunch, but the two were nowhere to be seen. Moments later, Joaquin and the others jumped up at the sound of shouting from outside and in the hallway.
"Get back to the classroom! Hurry!"
Philip burst in, covered in blood, followed by several crying classmates. He slammed the door shut and yelled that there were monsters outside; they shouldn't go out.
"What are you talking about?" Joaquin asked, dismissing Philip as crazy.
More classmates piled into the classroom, terrified.
"Holy shit! What's going on? Why are they killing each other downstairs?"
"Wah! Kate! Kate! They ate her. Kate's gone!"
Joaquin's eyes widened, and he rushed to the door.
"Joaquin! Damn it! Are you crazy?!"
Joaquin threw open the door and rushed to the railing. He was shocked by the sight of the school grounds below, his schoolmates attacking each other relentlessly.
"Screw you guys!"
Philip was about to close the door when Dexter tackled him, cursing, saying Joaquin and Edgar were outside.
Dexter went outside; he saw two students heading towards Joaquin, their eyes bloodshot, their uniforms stained crimson.
"Joaquin!" Dexter immediately tackled the two students, slamming them to the ground. He was surprised when they got up as if nothing had happened.
Joaquin kicked them, but they just kept getting up.
The two attackers backed off. Before they could get close, an arrow flew, striking one of the students in the head. Edgar then smashed the other student's head with a baseball bat, brains splattering on the floor.
"Get inside!" Edgar yelled, shoving his two friends and Sairah into the classroom.
"Did anyone get bitten?" Edgar asked his classmates inside. They shook their heads.
"Close the doors, quickly!" Edgar
shouted. Dexter and Philip immediately moved to secure both doors.
There was a pounding, and they saw two students who appeared to be from Class A.
"Help us!" Fatima cried, Conrad cursing behind her as he was attacked by four zombies.
"Open the door," Joaquin ordered. Philip refused.
"They're Class A!" Philip yelled, insisting they shouldn't help Class F.
Conrad's heart pounded as five zombies attacked him, while he protected his remaining Class A classmates.
Conrad fell, but before he could be bitten, someone grabbed his bag and pulled him up.
Someone hit a chair into one of the monsters, followed by a volley of arrows.
Edgar and his friends appeared. Edgar cursed at Conrad, telling him to get up and get inside.
Once inside Class F's classroom, Dexter quickly closed the door again. Fatima sobbed while Conrad clutched his arm.
"Were you bitten?" Joaquin asked. Conrad shook his head, unable to speak from shock.
"Hey, help me here! More infected are trying to open the door!" several male classmates yelled.
"What the hell, Edgar! Why did you let them in? Did you forget what they did to our section?!" Philip shouted, grabbing Edgar's collar, who was wiping his cheek.
"Look, I don't know what you're saying. At this point, there's no Class A or Class F. Do you see those monsters out there? Even our classmates want to eat us," Edgar snapped. Philip's eyebrows furrowed.
Conrad had assumed Class F wouldn't help them. They only realized they were in Class F's room after their frantic escape with Fatima.
They were on the first floor, but with so many zombies around the building, they had to go upstairs. There were closed classrooms and living students, but none opened their doors to them.
"It's still not right that we're letting Class A in—"
"Dexter!" Joaquin yelled, as Dexter grabbed Philip by the collar.
"Dude, enough. No one cares if they're Class A or whatever. We're all in a crisis now, and we want to survive. Do you see those students outside the door? That's less than a quarter of the students in this school, and they're all monsters. Are you saying we should let those two add to the number that will eat and chase us?" Dexter snapped. Philip broke free, saying that at that moment, survival was their only priority.
Philip stopped when Joaquin and the others gave him a strange look.
"Dude, ask our classmates if they care that Class A is here," Joaquin said. Philip paused, then looked at his classmates. None of them were looking at them.
"Class president," Philip called to Grace, the only one looking in their direction. Several classmates looked over.
"I don't like Class A either," Grace replied. Edgar and the others looked at her. Philip breathed a sigh of relief and looked at his classmates.
"But like Dexter said, in this situation, it doesn't matter if it's Class A or Class F knocking on that door. Anyone, as long as they're not monsters like those outside who want to eat us, we should help," Grace said, putting on her earphones. Philip was annoyed but didn't say anything. He bumped Dexter and went to the other side of the room.
"Hey, help me here. Help me barricade this door," one of their classmates pleaded for help.
"Let's barricade the door," Joaquin said, grabbing a chair. Conrad joined Edgar to get some chairs and desks to barricade the door.
"Ahhh!" one of their classmates screamed as someone pulled her hair while she held the doorknob near the window.
Hands and heads appeared. Sairah quickly raised her bow and shot the monster in the head.
Their classmate ran away, clutching her head. The girls in the classroom cried.
After barricading the door, Edgar wearily sat on the floor. The monsters continued to pound on the door.
"What do we do now? Does anyone have a phone? Let's call the police," Sairah said. Dexter said he had a phone and pulled it out of his pocket.
Dexter stopped after seeing that it was on emergency call and the campus Wi-Fi was down.
"This isn't good. The Wi-Fi is down during class, and there's no signal on the fourth floor," Dexter said. Joaquin cursed, causing his classmates to panic.
"What's happening! Why are they attacking us! Why do they want to eat us!" a girl cried, standing in the middle of the classroom.
The infected outside went wild, trying to break down the door.
"Close the door properly! Hurry, cover the windows with anything you can find—newspapers!"
"Will this work? There are more of them!"
Some students inside the room panicked, and every move they made made noise, causing the creatures outside to become more agitated.
Some cried for help at the window.
"Be quiet!"
Everyone in the classroom fell silent, followed by the monsters' screams outside the classroom. The girl looked that way.
"They react to noise, so can you all be quiet? Stop moving too."
One of the boys at the door, holding the doorknob, slowly sat down on the floor after the monsters stopped pounding.
A moment later, someone screamed in the hallway, causing the creatures to run away.
"Oh my god."
One of the girls standing in front of the window covered her mouth and sat on the floor. Some trembled in fear, while others just stood there, listening.
"Was the canteen food that bad that the students here are trying to eat us? Do we look tastier than Manang's cooking?"
One of the girls was holding a video recorder and looking at the footage.
"Is this real? Are those really zombies outside?" said the boy huddled in the corner of the room, pulling his hair.
"Don't be funny. We're not in the movies. How can there be zombies—"
"Then what are those creatures outside? Don't tell me you think they just have a fever, that's why they're going crazy outside, hungry, that's why they want to eat us, and on drugs, that's why they're red from head to toe?" the boy in the corner interrupted, looking at his classmate.
"Please, don't say things like that. It's scary."
"It doesn't matter what they are, but this is the reality—we're the only ones left in this building, and even the school teachers have become zombies."
Edgar Espinosa stared out the window, his gaze fixed on the school grounds. From above, he saw many students running towards the main gate, being attacked by their schoolmates from various parts of the school grounds.
"We need to figure out how to get out of here. It's even more dangerous to stay here," the boy said, turning to his classmates.
"Damn, what are you saying, figure it out? We're Class F! Do we look like we can do that?" one of their classmates sarcastically retorted.
"Die, Class F. Die without thinking, without moving, and become zombie food," Edgar snapped, causing one of the guys behind him to laugh.
"What can we do?" asked their female classmate. Half of their class was losing hope. As usual for the lower section. Low morale, low IQ, but—
"We will survive."
His classmates stopped. Edgar looked at them and said that in this situation, there were no test papers, teachers, or adults to tell them what was right or wrong.
"We will do everything to survive."
Since they couldn't use their phones due to the lack of signal, they now had to think about how to get down.
"Can't we just stay here?" Philip asked, terrified, sitting in the corner of the room.
"If we don't get help today, we need to go down," Edgar said, sitting on the floor. Joaquin, Conrad, Dexter, and some of their classmates were beside him.
Edgar was writing something, and Joaquin asked what it was.
"We need a map, and unfortunately, we don't have one. I'm trying to remember the parts of the school where we can get supplies, food, and hide," Edgar said. Philip stood up, saying that if they went down, they should immediately leave the school.
"What do we need supplies and hiding places for?!" Philip shouted. Edgar stopped and looked at Philip.
"Dude, common sense. Before you reach the main gate, you have to go through the school grounds, and you see the school grounds now," Edgar said, pointing to the window.
"There's only one way to the abandoned building. We need to go through the gymnasium to reach the abandoned building and climb the wall to get out of the university," Edgar said. Grace said it wasn't a good idea to go to the gymnasium unprepared.
"There are always a lot of people in the gymnasium, and earlier I heard on the library speaker that all the grade 7 and 10 students are in the gymnasium," Grace said. Sairah said that with how quickly the infected were spreading, she was sure it was impossible to survive if you were in a crowded place and not hidden.
"Damn it, what do we do now? I don't want to die yet," Philip said, pulling his hair.
"Who here wants to die?" Edgar replied, continuing his work.
"We all want to live and go home."