Go forward, or go back: whatever choice she made had to be the right one. The corridor was empty, but Hilary imagined men rounding the corner, picking up speed, coming at her like a hungry pack of jackals. The hallway seemed to stretch on forever-a trick of the mind, she knew, but it made the choice to turn around even less appealing. Maybe it was her gut telling her to keep going forward. She listened to her gut.
Fear bubbled inside, igniting every nerve, seeping into her joints, taking over like a quick-moving fire. She had thought she understood fear. Roller coasters and scary movies and snakes made her shiver and set a clammy chill against her skin. But this was a new level, an entirely different dimension of terror. Her fuzzy mind conjured up horrors beyond anything she had ever conceived possible before today. She became the central figure in each nightmare, the object of supreme violence.
A drill into her leg.
A makeshift club bludgeoning her head.
A machete peeling her skin.
Hands pushing up the skirt of her school uniform.
Compared to those, a gunshot to the temple felt almost merciful.
Near the end of the corridor, Hilary slowed. Langford’s classroom had to be nearby. Her footsteps clomped on the linoleum flooring; she might as well have been shouting, “Hey, I’m down here. Come find me! Come get me and skin me alive.”
Hilary ached to think how close she had come to leaving this godforsaken school. By now, she would have been clear of The Quad and deep into the dark woods beyond. Maybe she’d already be with the police, safe. An angry and vengeful voice inside her head spoke up.
“Save yourself,” the voice said. “You can’t help Andy or the others. The Shire was Andy’s idea, not yours. Why should you get killed because of his stupid idea? Go back upstairs. Get outside. Run! Run! Run!”
Hilary shook her head and dislodged the voice from the dark crevices of her mind. Out in the open, those thoughts became exposed for what they were: fear. She knew the voice was lying to her. Andy hadn’t made her join The Shire. She did so under her own volition. She liked the rush, the thrill. It had made her heart flutter. Each theft had hit like a comet and left behind a void that could only be filled by another rush. Addictions could be dangerous. She knew that now.
Everything had snowballed from there, including Hilary’s feelings for Andy. If she didn’t love him, would she have fled the school? This question came to her not as a conscious thought, but more as a feeling. It came to her as she ran the rest of the way down the corridor, as she breathed hard as a galloping horse, as her heart leapt about her chest, and as her skirt flapped like a cape around her waist.
Not that room. Not that room. Would you have done this for Solomon? Not that room. Not that room. For David? For Pixie? Not that room. Maybe not. Maybe only for Andy. Maybe only for him, she realized.
As she approached the end of the hallway, Hilary’s earlier thought returned: Somehow I’ve missed Langford’s classroom. Panic clogged her thinking, but it didn’t make her turn around. One more room-she’d check one more, even though she believed it wasn’t this far down.
Hilary opened the classroom door on her right. Nothing there, so she shut that door and went on to the next. One more. Just one. This next room was on Hilary’s left. The door was closed, and she pulled it open with force. Her head poked through the door frame. There was enough light for her to see the Harkness table in the center of the room. She went inside and shut the door behind her. She flicked on the room light and immediately spotted the backpack tossed into a corner.
Hilary flung herself forward, tripping over chairs on her way to that backpack. She dropped to her knees and tried the zipper, but it got caught on the fabric and she feared she might need a knife or something to cut it open. After a moment’s struggle, the zipper gave way.
Hilary emptied the contents onto the floor. Folders. Papers. Junk. More junk. And then she found it-tucked inside a mesh pouch was a red plastic case containing the glucagon emergency injection. There was also a package of glucose tablets in the same pouch, along with several vials of insulin and a few hypodermic needles.
She opened the red case and examined the contents. She found a capped hypodermic needle and a small clear vial labeled Glucagon for Injection (rDNA Origin). The dosage read 1 mg (1 unit). Andy would need the entire vial.
Andy needed the glucagon, not the insulin, but Hilary put all of his medicines into the backpack, just in case, and headed for the door. Her hand was on the knob when she heard a loud bang coming from down the hall. Someone had slammed a door. Hilary pressed her back against the wall and felt her knees go weak. Her breathing grew labored as her blood turned to ice. She thought about the light seeping out from the classroom into the hall like a homing beacon for her potential murderer to follow. She could turn it off, but that might only draw attention.
Hilary heard more doors slam shut. Heavy footsteps were coming her way. It sounded like one person to her. Whoever was out there did not spend long searching each room. He went quickly from room to room, and Hilary doubted she could make an escape while he was occupied with his search. She looked for a place to hide, but the room had no closet, no door to another room, no windows.
Hilary searched for a weapon, but what could she use? A chair would be too unwieldy. A ruler was blunt and flimsy. There was nothing here, really. She could use one of the hypodermic needles, but what damage could a thin needle inflict?
The needles made Hilary think about the backpack, and that gave her an idea. The backpack could be a weapon of sorts. Something she could swing. Working frantically, with her vision blurred by tears, Hilary transferred the diabetes paraphernalia to the pockets of her skirt. Then she stuffed the backpack full of the heaviest books she could find. Her hands trembled as she closed the zipper.
Out in the hallway, doors continued to slam shut. It wouldn’t be long now. She took up a position to the right of the door. Sweat dotted her forehead as she still breathed fast. Hyperalert, her eyes were open wide, but they weren’t actually seeing anything. This was all about her ears, all about those footsteps coming her way.
Hilary positioned the backpack on the floor just beyond her left foot; she gripped one of the straps in both hands. Her knees were bent and her hips engaged, ready to uncoil at a moment’s notice. Another door slammed. She guessed he had three more doors to go before getting to this one. Hilary shut her eyes and gritted her teeth to keep from crying out.
The door across the hall opened and slammed shut again. Blood thundered in Hilary’s ears. She tightened her grip on the strap. She heard footsteps crossing the hall. The doorknob began to turn. Hilary wound her hips a few degrees more.
The door came open and Hilary uncoiled at the waist as she lifted the backpack off the floor. She swung her makeshift weapon high and connected with something-the man’s chest or head. The strike produced a powerful jolt, which momentarily numbed her arms. She heard a loud grunt, followed by a thud as a body hit the floor.
Hilary let go of the backpack and sprang from the wall. Through the open door, she saw in the hallway a heavyset man on his back, writhing in pain. This was the one called El Cortador. The man was groaning, trying to get back on his feet, and he seemed hopelessly dazed.
As Hilary stepped over him, El Cortador lunged with startling quickness and seized hold of her ankle. He squeezed hard and Hilary shrieked at the intense pressure exerted on her tendons and bones. She wriggled her ankle, but the man would not let go.