Lauren wasn't prepared when the warning came over the loudspeaker.
It crackled to life, shouting to evacuate, and then something in the background shattered. The barest hint of a scream sounded, then it cut out.
There was a soft murmuring that ran around the room, then somebody stood, and it immediately grew to a roar.
Then the stampede started. Everyone raced to the door, shoving out.
Lauren waited for them all to leave, sitting still. Most alerts like this were false, but this one seemed different. It wasn't a fire alarm, so there wasn't a fire, meaning it was probably an intruder. And the safest thing to do with an intruder was stay right where you were.
Lauren calmly walked over to the door and closed it, then locked it and dragged a desk over in front of it. She pulled over another desk, planning to stack it, but then she paused. She wasn't quite strong enough to lift it up to that level. Casting a critical gaze around the room, she saw nothing that would help. The cabinets in the back were affixed to the wall, and she didn't think there was a good way to dettach them without tools. Whatever was inside might be useful, but she wasn't sure, because she had never seen it open, and it was always locked.
Unfortunately, she had left all of her tools outside in her locker, which included a hammer, screwdriver, and multiple lockpick sets. They might help, but that was assuming she could get to them, for which she would need to leave the room that seemed to be safe for the time being, and survive whatever was out there.
Lauren wasn't entirely confident in her athletic ability, even though she was one of the top students in that field, as well as in mechanics, though she kept the second part quiet, because it would draw too much attention, and may even cause her to be labeled as a nerd.
The safest thing to do when she didn't know what was going on was to sit and wait until hopefully most of the problem was over, then take slow steps outwards, always ready to bolt back to a secure location, to ensure that she was in the least amount of danger possible.
Lauren began to pace back and forth. Even if it was safer to stay in one place, she had a hard time with that.
There, outside the door, was shouting and groaning. There were a few cracks, wet and warm, and then cries for help. Lauren paused her pacing, cocking her head. She could go and help, but she wasn't sure if anything she did would help. Her presence may just put the other person in more danger.
As she considered, the cries were silenced.
Lauren was relieved for a moment. The danger must have passed.
Then the low groan came again.
Her blood ran cold in her veins. She could feel the heat seeping out of her muscles, the strength leaving her body.
She stumbled backwards until she hit the wall, her hand reaching out weakly and grasping at something, anything to support her, but she found nothing.
She slid down the wall, her eyes wide and heart beating fast. Whatever, or whoever, made that sound... They had killed the person who was calling for help. Killed them. There wasn't even a pause. It didn't even matter to them.
That could have been someone she knew. It could have been Lucy, or Tiffany, or Kally, or Xavier, or Sebastian...
And she had done nothing.
Lauren slowly keeled forward, hardly noticing as her hands hit the ground. She didn't process the cold tile beneath her hands, or the tears splattering down.
She didn't process the sound of splintering wood. She didn't process the loud groans, the shuffling movement that drew a drooling terror closer to her with each step.
She stared with eyes as sightless as those of the monstrosity that loomed above her. If they had still worked properly, she would have seen its crooked leg, its gaping, broken jaw, and its incessantly twitching hands. She would have seen the blood that joined her tears, the fatally wounded creature that refused to die.
She would have seen a zombie.
And she would have known that she was about to die, and have her soul trapped forever within a mindless, ravenous monster.
But she didn't see.
And there was no scream from the room.
There was one from outside it.