[Day 22 {week 3}] - Thursday - January 22, 0000 A.A

“Beetles are coming! Beetles are coming, up up UP!!”

As a frantic shout reached their ears, people jolted from their sleep and immediately grabbed their gear and put them on with lightning-quick speed, before rushing to their post. The blissful sleep they had been enjoying for 4 hours was rudely interrupted.

As for those who had been chilling and playing whatever offline game was on their phone or some board games they had found in some of the classrooms, they too dashed towards their room to grab their equipment and rush to the gates and barricades they were assigned to.

Once they arrived it didn’t take them long to realize that it had been another one of Coach McConnel’s drills as no beetles, apart from the few dead stragglers outside the barricades could be seen. Some of them grumbled in annoyance at being awakened or disturbed. Either way, there was nothing they could do about it, if they left now, Coach McConnel would have their damned heads and for the past week. No one wanted to get punished by him, some people are still recovering from the 100 commando push-ups he made them do yesterday.

The Coach walked into the main barricade and nodded with approval as he saw everyone was there. Then like all the other areas he dismissed the people that weren’t supposed to be on guarding duty to go back to what they were doing.

It’s been a week since they’ve started training under Coach McConnel with even the faculty members joining in. The only exceptions were the badly injured like Mr.Val. Coach McConnel had begun fairly slowly with some easy tasks, but by the third day he had ramped it up to exercising that pushed them to the brink. Their sleep schedule had also drastically been reduced in as little time as possible, practically everyone was forced to sleep a minimum of 4 - 6 hours.

Then there were the random drills they were subjected to, of which they must be present at their post within 2 - 3 minutes or else they would have to face the consequences.

Complaints had been very apparent after a while. Many of the students didn’t make the changes with open arms and wanted out. But each time they complained the worse it got for them and everyone else, in the end, it got to the point where people shut the hell up out of those people who were about to complain, for fear that they would have to do more stuff from coach McConnel.

Other changes were fairly minor from the weeks passed. Apart from people being a bit sleepier than before, the only other change was the completed locker barricades at the main entrance. It took time to get the lockers unhinged and re-adjusted onto the wall, some of their contents were also pretty useful. They had also created an alarm system with ropes that ran the length of each side of the hallway, if any beetles were coming the nosy items attached to them would ring at the barricade closest to the incoming attack.

~~~~~~~~(14:46 AM)~~~~~~~~

Niko and a plethora of other students and a few faculty were currently in training with Coach McConnel. They had done about 5 laps around Velysium Hall and were already fairly tired, but Coach McConnel was pushing them to do a few push-ups and other exercises to get a bit more fit and stronger. A few others were training their weapons and sparing off to the side with the martial art team member to help them.

“AHHH! I swear if this goes on like this, I will die….” whispered Leo as quietly as he could so as to not alert Coach McConnel.

“If you don’t shut up, the Coach will kill all of us. Be quiet!” Said Callie as she kept up with the coaches counting.

“Fine but seriously, I’m a gamer, not some athlete! I can’t huddle much more of th----” Before he could finish the Coach’s voice rang out,” Alright everyone, thanks to Leo, we will have to add another 50 push-ups to today’s training lets go!”

The groans and glares directed at Leo were enough for him to wish he was dead 10 times over. Still, the coach forced them to do it and this time no one decided to talk. The crazy thing about the whole thing was that Coach McConnel trained together with each group, which were 4 in total each day. At this point, most people believed he was mad or just extremely dedicated

Halfway through their punishment, the alarm system began ringing startling many people, before everyone started rushing to get their gear and weapons for the incoming attack.

Now up and very sweaty the coach allowed them to run and get their stuff, though they would not be fighting in the front since they had been training for a long time and would hang back while the rest handled it.

The drills the Coach had subjected them to proved to be very useful in the long run and people were at their post in record time, weapons at the ready and prepared to fend off the incoming beetles…..Except, this time, it was beetles that were coming.

~~~~~~~

When Coach McConnel walked onto the barricade with his equipment, it surprised him to see a group from the cafeteria making their way through the beetle corpses they had left in the hall to act as an extra barrier between them and the beetles. Most of them had rifles and pistols, with the rest having makeshift weapons they had crudely made from anything they could find. At the front of the group Coach Haron could be seen with a rifle over his shoulder in a very awkward way. He had a disgusted look as he passed by the rooting beetle corpses, trying not to breathe in the horrid smell.

“Oh look who showed up.” Said Coach McConnel,” let’s see what he wants. Someone get the principal.” And with that, he left through the side door of the barricade to see what Coach Haron wanted. Someone left to get the principal, while Malcolm dragged Jenna out of the barricade despite her protest.

Seeing Coach McConnel come out from the side of the barricade with makeshift armor pads and one of the steel longswords the group stopped advancing and watched him as he came forward, seemingly uncaring of the guns their group had.

“McConnel!” Said Coach Haron,” Good to see ya!” he said Cheerfully walking over and warping his hand around Coach McConnels shoulder.

Coach McConnel looked at him with a raised eyebrow and promptly removed the man’s arm from his shoulder,” Same could not be said for you sam.”

“Ah don’t be like that. We used to be best buddies!” Replied Coach Haron,” yes, Used.” responded Coach McConnel, re-emphasizing the past tense in that phrase.

It was this time that the principal came out, inviting coach Haron to focus on her rather lustfully. Gone was the previously obedient man that used to follow everything she said to the best of his ability, not there was just what she regarded as a monster you were going to kill them all.

“Chisti! Good to see ya too!” Said Coach Haron, to which the principal responded with,” only my friends call me Christi. And you Sam, are not my friend.”

“Wow….ok, Understandable.” he said with the fakest face of sadness anyone had ever seen but then I’ll throw that right back at you, Only my friends call me Sam.”

“Oh guess I'll call you Haron then.” Said Coach McConnel as he crossed his arms,” Enough of this, Haron, Why are you here?”

The man in question just shrugged and decided to focus on what he came here for.

“Alright, Well I was here to say we found the Bug queen.”

That surprised the two of them and everyone in the Barricades. “What? Where?” Asked Coach McConnel.

“Bitch is in the Gymnasium, I sent some people outside and they spotted the thing through one of the gymnasium's exit doors. Huge bitch too.” Confirmed Coach Haron and he fiddled with his gun.

“You’re not here to ask for us to help right?” Began the principal,” that's insane we're all already struggling with the beetle hordes as it is, and you want to take on what's probably surrounding the queen?”

“Well, I never said I wanted help. No, I just thought it would be easier if we just joined hands in this, we could use whatever weapon you used to take care of the big beetles in the area, or if not you could give them to us so we can take care of the queen faster.” Said, Coach Haron

Both Coach McConnel and the Principal didn’t have to think much about it before responding,” no. we need those to defend ourselves.” Replied the Principal.

“Come on, we can clear out the school and make it many times safer than it currently is, le---” Before he could continue, Coach McConnell interrupted,” Do you have any idea of the number of beetles guarding the queen? The number of Megas, any other variants we might not have seen, and what they can do? There are too many inconsistencies and liabilities in attacking right now. A lot could go wrong.”

“Ah, who cares,” Said Coach Haron as he rolled his eyes,” I’ve got guns and the ammo to fight them off.”

“Along with inexperienced people to use them.” replied the principal.

Coach Haron clicked his tongue,” using a gun is easy, just point and shoot. They don’t need a lot of background training.” “Yes, they do.” Replied Coach McConnel,” How many people already got injured with that mindset?”

That Caught Coach Haron off guard it took a second for him to respond, he was getting really angry at this point, with veins apparent on his forehead." You know what, this was a mistake, I was trying to be nice, but I guess I shouldn’t have.” he said, turning back to his group,” Let's go!” to his orders the rest of them began making their way back.

“You can’t force those kids to fight Haron!” Said the Principal more ticked off at him than he ever will back at her.

Her words caused Coach Haron to stop,” I am not forcing anyone. If they want to leave they can come to you for all I care, but once they’re gone, and we’ve beaten that Beetle shitting bitch in the gymnasium, they’ll be on the losing team and I am not taking them back. So see ya.”

And with that, He left.

~~~~~~~~~~~

“The Nerve of that Fool!” Screamed that Principal as she slammed her fist down onto the table,” It's pretty clear he was trying to get the throwers from us so he wouldn’t have a problem taking us down when he felt like it.”

“Yeah, that was pretty obvious.” Said Mr.Valko,” I think he knew we would catch on and wanted to try it anyway.”

“How could a man just change like that? He was so nice before and now he’s just…”, Began Malcolm trying to find the right word to describe Coach Haron.

“I wouldn’t say he’s changed much,” said Coach McConnell,” I think the guy we saw then was a person hampered by the laws of society, the one we see now is the real him, we’ve just never tried to really see it before.” To his words, silence overtook the room for some time.

“Do yall really think he can take care of the Queen?” Asked Mrs.Stillwater, effectively changing the subject.

After the meeting with Coach Haron, the faculty had gone into a room to talk about what was to happen. Zane was put in charge of finishing the punishment for the last group in training. They had been talking for a while now and had all been wondering if guns would be enough to take care of the queen and her guards.

“Who knows they could or Haron could get everyone there killed. It could go either way.” Said Coach McConnell.

“The question now is what do we do about it? Haron’s clearly going to get all of them killed,” Asked Mrs.Gibson.

“I don’t want to be the one who says this, But I don’t think we can do anything.” Said Mr.Val,” We already tried to convince them to leave Haron before, all we need to do now is hope that they leave him and come with us when they hear his horrible plan.”

“How can you say that!?” Screamed Mrs.Gibson to which a very Audible crash could be heard from the outside as a furry of steps could be heard going away as Coach McConnel opened the door.

Although all of the students seemed to be busy doing their own, the fidgeting and awkward way in which they handled themselves long gave them away.

“Let’s leave it at that today.” Said the Coach going out to discipline a few students.

~~~~~~~~~~

Despite his recent change in personality, Coach Haron had kept his word.

Over the course of that day, many people found their way over to their group from the cafeteria. It would seem that all of them were rational enough to realize that the plan to assault the queen was pure suicide and left the cafeteria despite everything they would be leaving.

Almost all of them were in horrible shape. Most of the boys had bandages and injuries from taking blows from the beetles, while most of the girls were bruised all over from servicing the members of Coach Haron’s group to survive.

The students that had been here before looked on at their classmates not knowing what to think. On one hand, they’ve been having a horrible time, with the beetle night raid that one day killed multiple people. But looking at the new arrivals that were sitting at the sides of the hall, they couldn’t imagine what sort of hell they’d been in.

“Hey, Steven, look it’s Joe….” Said Toby pointing at one of the boys who had a bandage wrapped around his head. He looked pale and starved. The look in his eyes was very different from the person they had seen and talked to just before the disaster they found themselves in hit the world. “What happened to him..” Asked Steven as he adjusted the makeshift spear he had with him at all times. Even since the Beetle Raid, many of them had taken to always carry their weapons with them in case another emergency happened. “Let’s go ask. Come on.” Said Toby as he started towards the new arrivals.

Seeing them approach, Joe looked like he was just about ready to scamper off, there was a look of fear in his eyes before it set as he realized that he wasn’t with the cafeteria group anymore. “Joe, what happened to you,” Asked Tody as he sat down next to his friend and placed a hand on his shoulder. He was no expert, but he could clearly see signs of trauma.

“Oh hey guys,” He said, sounding as bad as he looked,” I rather not talk about it, I...I...I had to see a lot of people I cared about die and, just no, I don’t want to.” At this point, his head was in his hands and he was crying. Toby and Steven were trying their best to cheer him up but they had no idea what to say to calm Joe down. Looking around, many of the people that had just arrived had also broken down upon meeting some of their friends. Only a few were holding it together enough to talk about the events happening in the cafeteria and from the scrunch up looking on the people listening, it must not have been good by a long shot.

It was at this point that both Toby and Steven felt immensely lucky about their situation thus far.

[Day 23 {week 3}] - Friday - January 23, 0000 A.A

“Move it all of you!” Screamed Coach Haron at the large group of people, wielding whatever they could use as a weapon, making their way towards the door leading to the boys gym corridor. “Anyone who doesn’t do their part doesn't get to eat. Alright! I want that queen dead by the afternoon!” His bellowing voice frightened many of them to walk faster into the corridor where the fighting had already commenced, with some gunshots going off here and there.

The people in the cafeteria were around 400 strong. Coach Haron had decided to take 300 people with him, most of which he intended to let die for a safer position within the school. The remaining 100 were mostly people too injured to go or girls he didn’t want to get hurt. The rest were some of his followers armed with guns and other weapons to keep the order in case someone got any funny ideas to try and take things over while he was gone.

Watching with a stern gaze as the final few people made their way through the door, Coach Haron felt like he was being watched. Turning his gaze he spotted the Principal, Coach McConnel, and a bunch of the other faculty members who hadn’t been in agreement with how he was running things. All of them were watching him with looks of either anger or disgust. Only coach McConnel was as expressionless as ever, arms crossed and staring at him with unmoving eyes. Even with a rifle in hand, he still shivered at just how scary McConnel was.

Haron smirked at this. He had long since made up his mind that after he was done with the queen, he would take care of their group later,’ Just you wait McConnel, once I’m done you’ll be fearing me.’ He thought as he went into the corridor surrounded by 4 of his followers.

Meanwhile, at the very front of the large group, beetle corpses were being pushed or carried away to allow for more room to fight. Even with all the guns Brandon and his team had, there was still plenty of people who had already died, most of them being vastly unimportant but it still left a sick feeling in his stomach.

To conserve their Ammo they had not trained much with the guns, and thus their aiming was off and the recoil from the gun hurt and stung the more they used it. that's not even mentioning how many times they thought their ears were ruptured from the awful noise.

Just then, a group of the bigger beetles made their way towards them, completely ignoring the smaller beetles they crushed and killed as they made their way towards them, very intent on stopping their advance.

Once again, Brandon and his team leveled their guns at the creatures and opened fire, bullets sprayed in all directions as a few of them, including Brandon, lost control of the rifles. Still, the bullets managed to hit and kill, or severely injured, many of the bigger beetles and they screeched in pain. However, the bullets also hit some people in the way acting as a meat shield to protect them from the beetles.

“Fuck!” said Brandon as he looked at the guy he had shot in the neck as blood pooled from his mouth and the wound.,” I Killed another one,” he said watching as the boy, whose name he didn’t know, died. It seemed like just yesterday his greatest worries were getting into a good college and keeping up his football career, now he was unsure of what to make of a situation like this. He had never seen himself as a killer, but here he was, having killed multiple people for the sake of his own survival...worse part yet he felt no remorse for having done it...well almost.

“Hey, what are you doing! Move up and take his place!” Said one of Brandon's team members as he pushed a bunch of the geeks to the front to cover their position. All of them were terrified and could barely move as many of the beetles, injured or not made their way towards them.

The group then steadily made progress towards that boy's gym. Casualties were mounting up, but none of Coach Haron’s followers had died yet. In fact, a few of them had gotten nauseous from all the gruesome and gory death they’d witnessed and had made their way to the back of the group where Coach Haron was enjoying some food. Upon entering the boys gym, there weren’t many beetles there as most of them had left to try and intercept them. Thus they moved through it fairly easily, with Coach Haron even joining in to help.

In the middle of the fight, the foldable wall connecting the Gymnasium and the boys gym was torn down as a huge Beetle crashed through it. Even with its formidable size compared to the rest, at an astonishing 8 ft tall, it was clearly not the queen as through the hole created by this new beetle, all of the group could see a massive glowing creature collapsed upon the bleaches with small beetles tending to the eggs it had laid. In Front of the massive creature a mound of corpses, human or not, could be seen as it helped itself. The entire area now reeked of death from all the decomposing corpses.

They didn’t have any time to adjust to it as the 8 ft tall beetle swiped at the group with its bladed feelers with a screech, beheading several at the front and giving fresh cuts to many more. Discord broke loose as people screamed and ran for their lives as more and more beetles poured from the collapsed wall. 7….10…. 25 more 8 ft tall beetles emerged and started laying waste to the group as the casualty count climbed. At this point, most of Coach Haron's team at the front had died apart from the smart one who had left the second the thing began moving.

“Leon!” Bellowed Coach Haron out of pure terror as he watched a 7½ft tall beetle shoot lightning from its feelers turning 8 people into charcoal.” Is the car where I ask you to leave it?!” He screamed as he frantically shot at the beetles, doing virtually nothing to the 8 ft, with minimal success with a bullet cracking the carapace of one of the emerging 7½ff beetle.

“Yeah!” Screamed Leon, an Art teacher, as he rushed away from the front as their meat shields were being slaughtered. He dug through his pockets and quickly pulled out a car key. “Good! Through it over here!” Said Coach Haron with wide eyes as his surviving followers did their best to hold back the beetles. “No, wait for me there!” Said Leon. He wasn’t stupid, the second he tosed that key and didn’t arrive at the car once Haron started it, he would be left behind.

It was then that one of the 7½’s deemed it acceptable to display one of its other abilities and spray acid from its month, Liquefying more than 20 people at once. Some of it had hit Leon's leg causing him to fall and scream from the pain. Upon his fall he had effectively let go of the key which landed not too far from Coach Haron's feet.” You'll be remembered Leon!” shouted Haron as he picked out the key and fled from the boys gym through the exit door, with multiple of his followers in toe, including Brandon who was glad to have retreated to the back to stay with Coach Haron.

Waiting off to the side of the boys gym was a military troop transport truck which they had taken the guns and uniforms off the dead personel. People climbed in as fast as humanly possible, with some of the students that had followed them out of the gym doing the same. Haron immediately stepped on the accelerator the second the car roared to life and left leaving many screaming people calling for him to turn around. Others just ran for dear life somewhere other than this place as an 8ft tall beetle created a hole big enough to get out of the gym.

~~~~~~~~~~

Students were running back through the corridor and towards the cafeteria to warn people of the incoming cruising, though that was just what they told themselves as an excuse to run away leaving the rest to die.

The second they made their way through the doors and into the cafeteria, many of them could only stop and look on in horror at the carnage that was happening. A horde of beetles led by several Megas were currently ripping the 100 or so, they had left behind, to shreds as they tried to run away, many more were also gathering the food in the cafeteria and taking it elsewhere. It was hell. Pure hell. Blood was everywhere, body parts littered the ground, mostly everyone but those with guns that had banded together was dead, but they were sure to follow soon enough upon being surrounded.

A scream from the back woke many out of their trance as they remembered the hoard currently making its way here from the gym. Thus they started running towards the only place they could run to, Velysium Hall.

Still, it was futile, only 2 would make it to Velysium Hall, luring part of the hoard to them. It would be from them that they hear of Coach Haron's escape with many of his followers, from them that they hear of the incoming horde, and from them that they hear that they are the last surviving group within the school.

This time the battle was much worse than the beetle Night Raid. Much MUCH Worse.