LOGAN

"I can't get it to open," Alfie said, prying at the window's handle, but it wouldn't turn. Logan pushed Alfie away and tried it for himself, grasping the handle, thinking if he pulled hard, it would be unbounded from its sticky hinges. Instead, he yanked it off.

"Fuck!" Logan exclaimed.

"Well done, genius," Pete grumbled. He whirled around and faced the door. The footsteps were fast approaching. "Hide."

Logan dashed toward a stall to his right as Alfie went to the opposite door, carefully closing the door behind them. Logan stood on top of the toilet seat, realized he was too tall, his head and shoulders sticking out, and so he had to lean forward and crouched down to stay hidden. That only made his knees a little wobbly; the toilet seat made a groaning noise.

"Please stay still. Please stay still," he muttered.

It was apparent to him that none of the vectors had done the trap, luring them up to the second floor, forcing them to explore the halls and to find their way out. If it were, then it would be the children, what Bren called the honchos, who had done it. Logan had never seen them trap anybody before, and he hardly saw them together. Honchos didn't form their own Children of the Corn together. One honcho usually surrounded themselves with a mindless horde and became its sadistic ring leader, left to their whims. Despite his past encounters, Logan knew little of vector behavior, and he shuddered to imagine if they had evolved to such intelligence. Bren was the science guy, so he probably had more answers than him. Vectors that could lure and trap you? Fuck that. If it were people, well, they were just as worse as vectors as they could do efficient planning and coordination for an attack. Logan had thrown punches before, but enough to kill? Logan shook when he thought about taking another person's life. Would he have it in him?

Pete was still standing in the middle of the bathroom, and Logan didn't hear one of the stall doors opening and closing.

What are you doing? Logan thought. He assumed the man froze, got scared off, or something, so he cracked the door open. Pete was nowhere in sight. Had he gone through one of the stalls without hearing him? Pete was a bigger dude than him, heavier and burly, and he should be making at least some noise, and he could even hear Alfie shifting on his weight as he stood on the toilet seat.

Logan grimaced. Christ, we're doing a poor job hiding.

The footsteps stopped right in front of the door, the crackle of a CB radio resounded through the echoing silence. Logan heard a man behind the wall.

"I'm here," he said.

"Anything?" Another man from the other line asked.

"Door's closed."

"Alright. I'll send Bast to you. Keep an eye on the door."

"It might be a freak."

"Hold tight."

"I can kill a freak. I'm going in."

"Christ, you listen to me, boy, don't you—"

The door opened, and the rifle's barrel poked in through the small gap.

Logan was about to close his stall door, realized it was too late for him to hop back onto the toilet seat. It would make noise, and he cursed himself for stepping off of it. He crouched there, transfixed as the man slowly come into the bathroom, praying that he wouldn't spot him. His stall was at the very back of the row, after all. He readied his sledge-eye maul, already suspecting that the man would check every stall. When he reached his stall, he would bludgeon him to death with the sledgehammer end of his weapon. Logan nodded, repeating his plan in his head. He had the advantage of surprise, though there was a risk that the man would fire his rifle in time. All he had to do was dodge at the right time, hoping luck was on his side.

The man stepped fully into the bathroom. It surprised him to find that he was around his age, lanky and tall, though Logan could tell he was trembling with the way the hunting rifle swayed in his grip. Logan smirked, seeing as how the guy carried a break-action rifle, the kind that Bren had shown him—or tried to teach him—weeks before. He remembered that it only held one round, a powerful single shot, yes, but only one, nonetheless. Logan could make that work.

The man was nervous as a rat, lips quivering, saw through his grimaced expression how he tried to control the adrenaline pumping through him in overdrive. By now, he probably realized he wasn't dealing with a stray vector. If it were, it would have attacked him by now.

Logan caught a shadow by the corner, and it only took him a split second to realize what—or who—it was. Pete's shape hid in the darkness; a broad statue tucked away like a trap...and the man just walked into it.

In a single bound, Pete was already behind the guy, wrapping his massive arm around his neck, bicep bulging, putting him into a chokehold. The man hiked up a shallow breath that was quickly cut off, trapped at the back of his throat. In a split second, he clawed and clamored for breath as he turned beet red. Pete kicked the end of the man's legs, bringing him down to his knees. He grabbed the rifle with his free hand, yanking it away from the man's grip, and threw it to the side. The gun skidded to a stop right in front of Logan's stall.

The man swiftly pulled out a knife from his belt. Logan was about to scream at Pete to watch out, but the soldier was already onto him. Before the man could even drive the blade in, Pete already grabbed his wrist and twisted it, his bones cracking under the shallow gasps of air and Pete's heavy breathing, and the man merely let out a muffled cry as Pete brought him face down on the ground. The knife clattered onto the floor.

Pete let go of the chokehold. The man's eyes bulged as he took a large intake of air, coughing violently after, hands clutching around his throat, still afraid that Pete would choke him.

Pete grabbed a clump of the man's hair and slammed his head against the dirty, white-tiled floor. Blood gushed out of the boy's nose, a handful of teeth came loose. He let out a desperate screech, but Pete still had a hold of his head.

Pete raised the man's head a little higher, him yelping as the soldier pulled hard on his hair, his fingers clawing at Pete's fist. "Stop. Please—" The man could barely utter a plea.

Pete smashed his head on the floor again.

This time, Logan could hear bones crunching under the force. The tile floor had a single crack, an indention of where Pete had slammed the man's face. The man stopped fighting, barely clawing anymore, though a muffled whimper escaped his lips. Another desperate plea. He had his eyes closed, puffy with veins building out around his eyebrows, now covered with blood seeping from the fracture on his forehead.

Logan froze, mouth hanging open, eyes wide with shock as he watched the sight in front of him. Pete's hardened and emotionless expression showed no hint of pity or shame. Yet, in the way Pete had knelt over him, Logan saw a man out for blood.

Then, a little smirk escaped at one side of Pete's lips.

Pete slammed the boy's head again, and again, and again. The cracks on the floor grew wider until it split open, the tiles came all loose around the man's head. Blood leaked everywhere, from the man's nose, ears, mouth, and the fracture on his head. One of his eyes popped out, most of his teeth clattered to the side. Pete slammed the head down once more time, and chunks of muscles and other organs flew out from the sickening crunch of broken bones. Half of the man's front face was gone.

Logan thought the man was dead from the third slam. From then on, Pete was merely beating on a dead horse.

Pete stood up, panting, his fist covered in deep red and gore. He looked down at his right arm, the one he used for the chokehold. Logan didn't notice earlier that the man had bitten Pete.

Pete sneered. "That's what you fucking get for trying to bite me, asshole." He ripped a sleeve off from his shirt and wrapped it around the wound. There was a little blood leaking from the puncture.

Logan slowly crept out from the stall and picked up the rifle. Across from him, Alfie did the same, gawking at Pete and then at the dead body.

Pete picked up the fallen knife and rummaged through the man's pockets, finding four more bullets for the rifle. "Give it to me," Pete said to Logan.

Logan flinched and dropped the rifle, sending it clattering onto the floor.

Pete sighed. "What the hell's wrong with you, man? Fine. I'll pick it up." He strode toward Logan and grabbed the gun off the floor. Pete shook his head as he strode toward the door, muttering, "Can't fucking get help these days..."

Logan didn't want to apologize, so he kept his mouth shut. Pete dropped the trident rake on the floor since he couldn't carry it with the rifle. It was too long and big.

"Holy shit, Peter..." Alfie grumbled, pointing at the dead body. "Was that wholly necessary?"

Pete shrugged. "It was either him or me. Unfortunately for him, I don't play fair." He pulled the hammer's safety back. He didn't bother wiping the blood off from his hand, and he ended up smearing the man's blood all over the rifle's grip and barrel. "And just so you know, only Bren can call me Peter. You got that?"

Alfie gulped audibly and nodded.

"Good. Let's get the hell out of here."

——

Despite how Logan tried to be fast and quiet at the same time, he couldn't catch up to Pete's maddening speed. He was a hound, no, a wolf in a man's body with the way he silently stalked across the corridor, merely leaving a muffled echo that even Logan had trouble detecting. He was Bren but bigger and burlier, not the lanky boy he remembered. He still couldn't believe that Bren had bested him in a one-on-one fight. With the way Pete fought in the bathroom, the soldier was clearly holding back for Bren's sake. Pulling memories of Bren made him wince. Where was he now? Was he looking for them just as he was for him? Was he hurt?

If he was dead...no, he couldn't afford to think of such things. Though he had promised to protect Bren's back, Logan was far away from him. I made a promise long ago, he thought. I can't break it off again.

It felt odd being back inside school grounds again, devoid of students, and Logan wondered where kids from town had gone or what happened to them. Most of them were probably dead. As for the others, did they got recruited and joined this homicidal group? That other guy was certainly around his age, so they must have.

He yanked himself out of his thoughts when Pete suddenly dropped to one knee up ahead. Aside from sunlight coming from the windows near the ceiling, Pete had picked a spot where a wall, unreached by natural light, bathed him under the shadows. At the end of the hall was an emergency floodlight, illuminating the entryway to the left with light. These people had generators on...electricity! The mere thought and possibility of it excited Logan.

They couldn't run back to the hall they came from without being seen, and Pete knew it. Pete gestured for Logan and Alfie to take cover, and Logan reached one of the classroom doors, but it was locked. Alfie tried another, but it was locked, too.

"What now?" Alfie asked.

Logan pulled him to the side, and they hid beside the lockers. A man's shadow fleeted at the end of the hall, briefly walking past the floodlights and entered their side of the corridor. Logan could hear his grumblings, complaining that the other man, the dead man in the bathroom, who hadn't been answering his calls.

The man got closer enough that Logan could hear his words. "Idiot kid. If I find you dead, I'll go down to hell and scream at you that you deserve it, and then I will be the one to clean up—"

He didn't get to finish. Pete shot on his right eye, the back of his head exploding into chunks against the wall. The man keeled over and crumpled onto the floor.

Pete pushed the release open and dropped the stock, ejecting the shell casing dropped like a pin on the ground. He then fished for another round in his pocket and slid it into the chamber. "Go!"

"I thought we're trying to go for stealth," I hissed.

"He would have seen us eventually. I can't take that risk," Pete said.

More shouts from the end of the hall, cautious ones, hailing for others to check it out. The other men had clearly heard the shot, and Logan hoped there's not many of them.

There was only one way out of this corridor, which was through the hall with the floodlights. No matter how Logan wanted to sneak around them, they had to fight them face-to-face.

"They're expecting a gunshot. They probably think this guy neutralized a vector," Pete said, pointing at the dead man. He picked up the rifle—a bolt-action—which could carry four or five more rounds. He checked the chamber and the magazine and found them full. Pete switched weapons and gave the old hunting rifle to Logan. "Here. Use this." He pulled the last three bullets from his pocket and shoved it inside Logan.

Great. How am I going to use this? What if I miss? I only get one bullet, and then, I'm dead...

Movement from the end of the hall. Shit, no time to waste, Logan thought. He grabbed the rifle off from Pete's grip. Behind him, Alfie pulled out his Molotov cocktail just in case, his lighter at the ready. Logan nodded to him, and he nodded back.

"What are we going to do? That's the only way out, and they're on the other side," Alfie said.

Pete grinned. "Simple. We're gonna have to fight them head-on."

He must be crazy, Logan thought. Yes. Something's definitely wrong with his head. This is not a good idea. For two seconds, Logan allowed himself to study Pete, his eagerness with the way he strode toward the end of the hall, the smile from the bathroom playing in his head as he watched the soldier readied the rifle. Yes, the training from West Point had done wonderfully, albeit too deadly, and Logan couldn't help but had the scratching urge to get as far away from Gauthier. Nothing good could come about of what he was about to do; the dead man's shattering skull echoed at the back of his mind, and Logan shuddered.

Too late now.

Logan followed after the soldier realized Pete didn't mind his footsteps any longer. They could distinctly hear three men on the other hall, voices grew desperate and concerned, though Logan reckoned there must be more of them. He held the rifle at the ready, repeating to himself how he had to make every shot count. White noise hissed from the dead man's radio, a voice calling for him to pick up, though by now, they would have heard the echo coming from their hall.

Logan pictured them hiding behind the pillars, getting ready for them to come out of the hall and into theirs, how easy they could ambush and shoot them. It was obvious from the way their radio calls suddenly grew quiet. They probably realized the guy was dead.

Up ahead was a small, circular foyer, the school's logo painted on the floor. He could see a large door to a chemistry lab on their right, big signs saying what to wear inside. On their left was just another shorter hall that came to a dead-end, two classroom doors on each side. Onward, the hallway bent to a corner where the enemies were waiting.

"Light that up," Pete said, pointing to Alfie's Molotov.

Alfie took out his lighter and lit the bottle, alcohol, and gasoline wafting into the air.

Pete gestured for them to continue forward, but Alfie was already lagging, unsure if they should. Doubts crept into Logan, too. There was nowhere to hide there, only behind lockers and trash bin, so he didn't know what Pete was up to. Logan was pretty sure bullets could wipe out those garage containers easily.

Then, Pete rushed forward to one garbage bin. This one had wheels on them, and Pete quickly shoved it forward, wheels squeaking as it slid across the floor, directly into the opposite hall.

The men started shooting, shredding the entire garbage bin into smithereens in a hail of bullets. Logan saw Pete's steely facade, and he wasn't sure if Pete was disappointed at them. Then, he realized why. The men had just spent their magazines empty; the audible clicks of guns echoed from the other side.

Then, Pete smiled. He grabbed the Molotov from Alfie, slid behind the corner, and threw the bottle into the hall. Screams and yelps followed, the desperate cries of men as they burned, similar to how vectors sounded. Pete took out the rifle and didn't waste any time to shoot, taking one man down, could hear the thud as he slammed onto the ground. Pete ran to the opposite side and hid behind the lockers. Alfie followed, carrying another Molotov, his last one, in his hand.

Logan hid behind the empty corner that Pete occupied earlier. He peeked through the side and found that the corridor led to an upper-floor cafeteria, railings overlooked the main level below. Large windows that went up from the floor to the ceiling surrounded it, reminding Logan of the cathedral school in New York. There were at least eight men in the cafeteria, but one of them was already dead; the burning body laying at the center, licks of yellow-orange fire still thriving hot around his charred body. One man with a bullet on his gut squirmed on the floor. His buddy tried to drag him behind a table, but Pete peeked out of cover and shot him between the eyes. The back of his head exploded. The other gunmen drew their attention toward Pete's corner.

Jesus. Not again.

Logan spat a curse. Then another. He didn't want to be caught in another deadly battle in a cafeteria again, this time with humans instead of vectors, but here he was, doing it all over. He held tight on his rifle and found his hands shaking. Sooner or later, he had to aim it at another person and kill them. He let out a shaky breath.

From the corner of his eye, Logan realized that Pete was screaming at him above the roaring gunfire, pointing for him to move forward. As the other gunmen surpassed his side of the hall, it left Logan open to rush forward, maybe a couple of seconds before he started to draw their attention back to him. Fortunately, there were massive pillars on his way, and the gunmen would have a hard time picking him off as he rushed inward. It would give him enough time to drop behind cover at the table up ahead.

Logan had to risk it.

He took a deep breath, feeling the adrenaline coursing beneath his skin, and momentum—and stupidity—drove him forward. He darted for the table, letting his years of football training overtake his muscles, become the runner he was born to be. Bullets began flying around him, breaking chunks off the walls from behind, from the pillars, bolting from pillar to pillar until he reached an open spot.

He dropped and slid across the floor just as a bullet wheezed an inch past his head. Logan let out a scream, rolling over until his body hit the table. Chunks of the concrete floor flew past his face, its specks going into his right eye. He winced, rubbing them off, "Fuck!" He realized he had come close to a bullet entering his head. He reeled back behind the table, crouching down until Pete and Alfie surged into the cafeteria after him.

Alfie roared a battle cry Logan had never heard before coming from him. For a man who would rather openly smoke weed than shoot a gun, Alfie used his tall stature to intimidate them, like a Viking coming out from the shadows, eyes glinting with furious rage. Alfie threw the Molotov cocktail right at the men hunkering down five tables below. The bottle landed right on top of them, flames spreading out, and covered the two men hiding behind the table. One man coated in flames flailed around, running off until he hit the railing, and keeled over the ledge. He fell below; a trail of black smoke followed after him. Flames wrapped around the other man, but he quickly put it off and moved behind another cover.

Alfie quickly dropped down beside Logan, mouth gaping. "Holy shit! Did you see that? Did you freaking see that shit?" He was trembling.

Logan gritted his teeth. Of course, he did, but five of them were still alive. He didn't know if he should feel horrible for wishing the second guy had burned to death, too.

"We're sitting ducks out here," Logan said close to Alfie's ear, and the man nodded.

He saw a spiral staircase leading down to the main cafeteria, but they had to run over an open area and could no longer count on the columns and pillars for cover. They had one Molotov left, which was Logan's, and he took it out and handed it off to Alfie just in case they needed it.

Pete was already moving in the opposite direction, and Logan realized he was trying to draw the gunmen's attention, a diversion. Pete looked back, cocked his head, and pointed at the stairs. Christ, he wanted them to go and leave him. He's going to get killed out there with only four bullets left against five heavily armed men. Pete briefly stuck his head out and took a shot, but he missed. It was enough to draw the others' attention to his location, now far across the balcony.

Logan and Alfie crouched down and crawled, and when they couldn't use the tables for cover, they hurried for the stairs. Alfie reached it first, and the first thing Logan smelled was the thick smoke drifting from below.

Once they reached the landing, Logan knew why. The man's body who went over the railing had landed on heaps of tarps, clothes, and all kinds of litter, ones that could quickly burn. The gunmen had made the cafeteria some kind of a storage warehouse, filled with old, worn-out bags, a large mound of shoes, and empty plastic crates. To Logan's horror, he realized that these might be from the gunmen's previous victims. Just like on Elk Mountain Road, these people had been ambushed, their stuff stolen, and ending up here. Logan didn't see any of their stuff around.

Could Haskell be here? Miguel and Yousef? It didn't seem like it. The building wasn't heavily guarded when they came in, so it must be one of their several lookouts or something, like an outpost. They must have taken the others somewhere else.

Logan and Alfie covered their nose and mouth. The fire had spread across the cafeteria center, jumping from table to table, engulfing them into flames until it billowed up to the ceiling, which was starting to turn brown and then black. It only took a few seconds for the cafeteria to quickly fill up with smoke.

"There! I see the door!" Alfie screeched, running toward it.

It was getting harder to see. Logan coughed, his eyes burning, unsure if they were alone at this level or not. Gunfire rang from above them. He was about to cry out for Alfie to wait, but the man had disappeared into the smoke; heard door hinges creaking opened and closed. Logan scampered after him blindly, running over an overturned table, hitting his ankle on a chair, and he fell face-first on the ground.

And that was what saved him.

He felt a gust of wind from behind, rolling over to find a man standing there, holding an ax. He had swiped through the air of where kicked him, though he missed his balls and hit his right hip instead. The man cried out, wincing in pain, leaning to where Logan had hit him. Logan kicked him again, this time, striking right on his lower gut, toppling him back to the ground.

Logan tried to get up, but the man rolled over and grabbed his ankle, and Logan stumbled back to the ground. The rifle clattered out of reach.

"Let go!" Logan cried out.

The man quickly crawled up to him, his hands finding the scruff of his collar, and pulled, hauling himself on top of him. The man sat on his stomach, his fingers wrapping around his throat, and did not hesitate to squeeze. Suddenly, Logan's vision blurred, eyes teary from the smoke and the chokehold. Drool came out of the man's lips and landed on his face, him still squeezing hard around his throat.

Flight-or-flight seized his muscles, and Logan struggled to come loose, clawing at the man's arms, drawing blood and peeling some of his skin, and his legs frantically trying to find a foothold to get the man off of him, though Logan ended up merely flailing around like a fish out of water.

Logan felt the maul still dangling from his belt, and he quickly pulled it out, and with the bladed-side, struck the man right at where his kidneys would be.

The man screamed, blood pouring at where Logan had hit him. Logan pulled the weapon out just as the man's grip on his throat loosened, reeling back to get away from him, thrashing on the floor. Logan coughed and heaved some air, welcoming the oxygen back into his lungs, but he knew the man would eventually come for him again.

Logan whirled around and scrambled up toward the man, who then glanced up, noticing him hovered over a second too late. With a nimble step, Logan bashed his head with the hammer-side of the maul, cracking the man's skull wide open. The forehead's left side had caved-in, his left eye almost popped out of its socket, and Logan whacked him again—a killing blow. The man crumpled onto the ground, twitching, but those were only from his nerves.

Logan ran, letting the adrenaline guide him, saw shapes fleeted to his right, more men streaming into the cafeteria, shouting at each other to put the fire off. It was already too late for that. It had spread everywhere.

I killed him.

He found the rifle underneath a table and crouched back down to grab it.

I killed him.

One of the shapes ran toward him, though he quickly realized that the gunman hadn't noticed him yet. Still, he would see him eventually if he got closer.

Not wanting to risk it, Logan aimed his rifle and shot the man, taking him by the side of the throat. The man whirled around and glared at him, eyes wide and mouth gaping. For a moment, the man stood there, shocked, as if he couldn't believe that he, of all people, got shot. He raised his hand and touched the wound on his neck, and then stared hard at his blood-covered fingers, confused and astonished. Then, his eyes rolled back, and he fell to the ground.

Logan fished out the bullets Pete had given him earlier from his pockets with his trembling fingers, but he had forgotten how to use a break-action rifle or where the release latch was, his panic overwhelming him. It had a different mechanism than a bolt-action. Frustrated, he turned around and made a break for the door instead, all the while men behind him hollered and shouted, trying to find where he was.

Banging on the glass pulled him out of his panic momentarily, but that was a mistake. Vectors crowded behind the flimsy barrier, drawn by the gunfire. It didn't take long for it to shatter, and about a dozen vectors rushed in.