11:24 AM

"Maybe I'll do better next time," remarked a boy with his backs on the grass. A flunked test hovered over his head and covered the scorching Sun on the sky. "I mean," he faltered, "A D- is not that bad. You think dad's gonna grill me over that, Erika?"

Only the wind answered him. He sighed and glanced at a girl who lied down by his side. She had headphones on her ears.

"Erika," he rose his voice. "Hey, Erika. I'm talking to you!"

"What?" She pulled her phones down and faced the boy with a scowl on her face.

"You think dad's gonna grill over this crap?" He showed her the test.

"Argh--" She pulled her head away and wore her headphones once again. "Who cares, Jamie?"

"He does!" Jamie chuckled. "And I lost a PS4 over a C+. This shit," he pointed at the red grade tainting the paper like an open wound. "I'm gonna lose an arm over this."

"At least your parents still care if you are doing good or bad. My mom can't even tell where I study."

"Is she still on antipsychotics?"

"Yeah," replied Erika, "I'm gonna go see her today. God help me, I've been dodging going there all week."

"I'm so sorry,” uttered Jamie as he sat on the grass, "when was the last time you saw her?"

"I don't really wanna talk about this."

"It's fine..." He frowned upon his grade. "And I am worried about a score--"

Jamie heard the sound of steps weighing on the ground. A person's shadow darkened the grass around him.

"What is it?" Inquired the boy as he rose his head to face who blocked his Sun. Yet Jamie stared into the barrel of a shotgun.

The gun blasted through his forehead and his head mauled the dirt.

"Argh, Jamie!" Cried Erika as she sprung off the ground and faced his murderer. “Don’t fire!”

She ran towards the stairway that led to the school's gates.

The Shotgunner pumped the used shell out of the shotgun. He aimed the sights against her backs.

Erika pulled the door handle and a pistol welcomed her.

“What--” She recoiled as a bullet broke through her skull.

Her body stood for a second before falling against the concrete and rolling down the stairs. Her blood dyed the concrete.

"They did not go off," said the Shooter standing by the gate. "We'll get in?"

His partner nodded. Yet the sight of an agonizing Erika shackled his legs.

"She's not dead." Remarked the Shotgunner. The girl wailed on the floor.

He rose his gun towards her head and fired. Erika's blood sprung at his black vests and blended in as if her life left her without leaving a trail. The Shotgunner rose his sights away from her as the gunfire echoed across the school halls.

"Now we go in."

A teacher taught in a crowded classroom.

"With the victory at Antietam in 1862, Lincoln introduced, as punitive action, the Declaration of Emanci--" The teacher's hand froze as he wrote on the blackboard. The sound of the gunfire reached the class.

"W-What the hell?" Asked a student recoiling from his chair and facing a window. "Gangs are at it again?"

"That was too close to be outside." Replied another student.

A curtain of eyes covered the glass and sought for the origin of the sound. The teacher sighed loud:

"Back to your seats! I'm still here, am I not--" He heard people running outside. The man opened the door and saw a scared student running down the stairs. "Logan, wait," he pointed at the boy, "where are you going?"

The boy ignored the teacher and dialed a number on his phone as he ran to the first floor.

"Dad," Logan covered his ear with the machine, "Dad, you hearing?"

"Yeah?" Buzzed a voice from the machine.

"I think there was a--"

Light reflected off the shooters' guns and robbed Logan of his voice. Hair hair rose from his trembling arms. His cellphone slid off his hand as he paralyzed in fear.

"Logan?" Asked his father through the phone. "What's going on--"

Bullets flew and impaled his son's throat, as well as his chest.

"Logan, answer me, please!" Begged the boy's father through the phone. "Logan, please!"

The Shotgunner frowned upon the screen as the calls for Logan grew louder and more desperate with every silent reply.

"We go up?" Asked the Shotgunner's partner as he contemplated his latest kill. "Hey, man," he faltered, "We go up or not?"

"They can see we're down here," said the Shotgunner glancing at Jason's corpse, “they ain't climbing down." He turned left and reloaded his weapon. "We go to the canteen."

"There's more security on the first floor..." Hesitated his partner.

"And then?" Asked the Shotgunner as he fired at a security camera. “They'll send us to the principal?”

A screen went off in the office of the school's security personnel. A guard jumped off his chair and ran to the school's canteen. He met with a crowd hidden beneath their tables.

"If we just stay here, we're gonna die!" Yelled a student with tears rolling down her cheek.

"Then get out and run." Replied another. "Wanna go first?"

The guard rose his voice:

"S-S-S-S-Stay where you are!" He stuttered. "T-T-They are close and police's been alarmed--"

Bullets flew against the lights on the ceiling. The glass recoiled and cut the students on the floor.

"Run!" Yelled a student rising from beneath the table and rushing outside. A mob followed him and a stampede rose. A wall of backs turned against the shooters as the multitude fought to fit into the cafeteria’s tiny exit.

"Go! Go! Go!" Yelled the Shotgunner as he pulled a submachine gun from his vests.

Both shooters unloaded their magazines at the crowd. Soft clouds of blood rose from their falling bodies as bullets shrinked the crowd. The firing bullets deafened them from their preys’ screams of pain.

"Most escaped," said the Shooter as he reloaded his weapons, “Fuck.”

"It doesn't matter," remarked the Shotgunner, "you're listening?"

"My leg..." Sobbed a student with a hand on his knees.

The Shooter’s hand shoved away the table from above her. She sobbed:

"No, no, please!"

A bullet silenced her cry.

"Go check why they did not went off," said the Shooter roaming the canteen with his eyes to the floor, "I'll clean room."

His voice reached the insides of the bathroom where three students laid down.

"I think I know that kid." Gasped an athlete.

"What's his name?" Asked the second student.

"No a fucking clue." He turned away from the canteen. He rested his hands on the wounds of an unconscious jock who had a bullet in his right thigh. "Try and stay silent--"

His phone rang. A new text arrived.

"Shit!" He pulled his phone out of the jacket and turned it off.

Steps echoed louder from the canteen.

"I think they heard, Brad." Remarked a jock.

The Shooter reloaded his submachine gun as he watched the entrance to the bathrooms.

"We gon-" Brad swallowed dry. "We'll tackle him."

"Are you fucking mad?"

"It's either that or we just sit down and fucking wait to die.."

"And Michael?" He frowned upon the athlete with a bullet in his leg.

"He's gonna kill us and Michael, dude. You got that scholarship playing ball? You wanna drive Penny to the deck again? Yeah,” he stood up by the side of the bathroom’s entrance. “It’s the best fucking chance we get.”

His friend followed him and surrounded the other side to the entrance. He saw sweat drizzling off Brad’s forehead as the Shooter’s steps became louder.

“Now!”

Both jocks sprung off their cover. Brad tackled the Shooter down while his teammate’s chest swallowed a clip of lead.

“Shit!” Gasped Brad as he rose his head and saw sunlight’s reflection on the Shotgunner’s submachine gun. “There’s another.”

The jock bit his lips and ran. His mind unbuilt the hell around him and Brad imagined himself running across an open field. Yet a bullet pierced his knee and his head hammered the bloody ground.

“Close,” remarked the Shooter shoving the dirt off his vest and standing up, “there’s two more hiding in the bathroom. I’ll go in--”

“He’s pretending.” Said the Shotgunner as he walked towards the fallen jock.

“No, please!” Begged Brad as he crawled away. His bravado collapsed as tears slid off the cheek. He always imagined that he would face Death with a bold smile on his face. Yet all he had to show her was a mask of tears.

A shell nailed Brad’s head to the canteen’s floor and freed him of his shame.

Two bullets echoed from the bathroom and the Shooter left with his face reddened in blood.

“Second floor?” He asked.

Red and blue lights painted the windows of the canteen. Police sirens cried.

The Shotgunner rose his voice:

“How we looking?”

The Shooter turned on the sound on his phone. A TV anchor spoke:

“A van with explosives has been spotted outside of St. Michael High. A special response team is on the way. The perimeter of the school’s already surrounded. A crowd of devastated parents is amassing on the outside…”

“I say we got 12, 18 minutes. Maybe much more,” concluded the Shotgunner, “they fell for it.”

“Second floor, then.”

They walked through the lake of bodies piling ahead of the canteen’s exit like musicians walk on their stages of light. Phones rang and lightened the blood on their vests. The symphony of vain calls crying for an answer from the dead were like the instruments of their parade.

Cameras filmed their abhorrent spectacle and the entire nation watched from behind the lenses.

“Our father, who is in heaven;” prayed a woman standing by the television. She held a trembling chaplet. “Holy is your name; Your kingdom come; Your will be done...”

“Mom, why are you praying?” Asked a girl walking by her side. Her eyes widened as she faced the screen. “Wait, is that Sebastian?” She squeezed her eyes to face the screen. “No, it can’t be!” She fell on her backs. Her hands covered the mouth.. “That can’t be! There’s no way he’d do that!”

The students that remained in the school did not move their eyes away from the screen.

“Shit, I think they’re coming,” said the history teacher. He looked around towards the dozen of students who followed him, “all the library’s doors are locked?”

“Fuck that!” Cried a student opening a window to the outside,

“Stop,” the teacher held him, “if you jump, you’re just gonna break your--”

A shotgun shell pierced through the locks of the library.

“Everyone down!” Yelled the teacher as a bullet crossed by the side of his head and pierced the shoulder of the student who stood by the window. His paralyzed body rolled over the window and fell outside.

Voices cried in despair as the shooters walked in the library.

“Wait, let’s talk!” Begged the Teacher as he rose his arms. “I know who you two are. You were good kids,” he faltered, “but life’s not easy for anyone and I get that. Nobody kills because they were loved. I want to talk, I want to hear your problems…”

The Shooter smirked.

“Now?” He asked the man as his pistol tore a hole through the Teacher’s throat.

The old man contorted on the ground as the students in the room hid all across the library. Their cries crawled through the covers of the books that filled the shelves.

The Shotgunner roamed the room. He followed the noise of fingers typing on a cellphone screen. He looked below a table and spotted a girl. Tears covered her face and reflected the machine’s light like a mirror. She texted her mother:

“I love you and dad so much. Wish you two stopped fighting. I love you. I love you. I love you two. Pls take care of my sis. I love her too more than anything--”

She rose her head and stared into the depths of a Shotgun’s barrel. Her body froze if she looked into an abyss.

“Please go on,” said the Shotgunner as he pumped an used shell out of his weapon. “I’ll let you finish.

She swallowed dry and texted. Her fingers trembled as she touched the letters with the strength of a woman who grasped every remaining second of life in her. A tear followed every letter as she continued:

“You may make me very upset, mum. But I do love you. Forget everything I told you and dad. I love you--”

She earned an answer. Her heart tightened as she read her mother’s answer out loud:

“don’t worry, hun. It’ll all be alright.”

The girl closed her eyes.

A shotgun shell voiced the final dot of the sentence. Her body mauled the ground.

Blood tainted the Shotgunner’s face and he recoiled.

“You alright?” Asked the Shooter.

His partner rose from the ground and fired against the bookshelves. Cries of pain from behind the documents echoed his gunfire.

“Let’s go away.” Said the Shotgunner.

“There’s people behind there,” he pointed at the shelves, “will we just leave?”

“I only got one shell left.”

The Shooter recoiled. The meaning of those words struck him like a blade to his tongue. He silently followed his partner as they returned to the first floor.

“How we looking?” Asked the Shotgunner.

His partner rose the sound of his cellphone and a TV anchor’s voice buzzed:

“Failed homemade explosive devices have been confirmed around St. Michael High. We are here from the southern quarter from where shots were heard just a couple minutes ago. We have news that two SWAT teams are greenlighted to infiltrate and neutralize the shooters. Over 72 students are believed to have remained in the school, which makes this possibly one of the deadliest mass shootings in the history of the USA--”

The Shooter rose his gun and pierced the leg of a student who crossed the hallway. His bullet crossed through the girl’s leg and rebounded from the school’s lockers that covered the halls. The projectile bounced repeated times and sounded like a salvo of applauses as the Shooters walked through their last victim.

They returned to the canteen where their stage of corpses stood.

“The lights,” remarked the Shotgunner as his partner fired at the white lamps lightening the roof. A bullet exploded the bulbs and the phosphor in the glass rained like party poppers over their heads. The symphony of dozens of phones ringing and vibrating on the floor were like a premature Requiem Mass.

The shooters kneeled on the floor side by side. The Shotgunner embraced his shotgun as if he begged Death for a warm hug. The mouth of his shotgun kissed his palate.

Exposed organs littered the ground and their stench hurried his fingers. Yet his partner faltered:

“A-Any last words?” His hands trembled.

“Who cares?” Replied the Shotgunner. He rose his eyes to the cameras that faced them as if he knew that the world hid behind those lenses. “Nobody’s gonna hear.”

Both shooters joined the dead lying on the floor.

The echoes of their gunfire guided the boots from the SWAT as officers entered the room and witnessed the eerie spectacle.

The Shooter’s cellphone buzzed with the voice of a news anchor:

“We’ve got breaking news. Both shooters, who have been confirmed as Sebastian Cooper and Gary Dixon, have been found dead in the canteen of St. Michael High. A combined effort of medical and anti-explosive…”

Sebastian’s mother dropped her chaplet as the announcement arrived. Her daughter cried with both hands over her mouth.

“M-Mom?” Faltered the girl as she glanced at the lowered cross. “Y-You’ve stopped your prayers?”

The woman grasped her chaplet. She replied as tears veiled her hands:

“They’ve been answered.”

(This short novel is neither a political statement, nor an endorsement of the described events. All similarities to real events and / or real people are mere coincidences)