𝘾𝙃𝘼𝙋. 𝙎𝙄𝙓𝙏𝙔 ─── 𝖲𝖤𝖠𝖲𝖮𝖭 𝟰
❝ 𝗛𝗔𝗥𝗗 𝗟𝗢𝗖𝗞𝗗𝗢𝗪𝗡 ❞
❪ 𝙏𝙃𝙐𝙍𝙎𝘿𝘼𝙔 ❫

𝟲𝟬. ╱ ✷      ❝ 𝗐𝖾   𝖺𝗋𝖾   𝖼𝗎𝗋𝗋𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗅𝗒   𝗆𝗈𝗏𝗂𝗇𝗀   𝗂𝗇𝗍𝗈   𝖺   𝗅𝗈𝖼𝗄𝖽𝗈𝗐𝗇   𝗌𝗂𝗍𝗎𝖺𝗍𝗂𝗈𝗇.   𝗰𝗼𝗱𝗲   𝗿𝗲𝗱. ❞
▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁

     "𝙄 𝙏𝙃𝙄𝙉𝙆 I do. I feel like I've let my friends down and I'm not there for them like I should be."

"I've been asking around trying to find him." Justin stands at his locker with Riley and Tony standing in front of him. "Pizza place doesn't know."

"So, he meets up with Tyler and then just disappears?" Tony questioned.

"He hasn't been in the neighborhood. I went and asked around the docks."

"We told you not to go down there." Riley hits his shoulder.

"Oh, you "told" me?"

"You never did say what you were doing there in the first place."

"Tony, my recovery is strong enough to see some familiar faces." Justin defends himself.

"Forgive me if I'm not a big believer in people recovering at the moment."

"We don't know Tyler slipped." Riley brought the topic back to focus, crossing her arms over her chest, "We . . . we don't even know for sure what we ever saw."

"Really? What did it look lie to you?" Tony turns to her.

"Yeah, but there's been nothing since, right?" Justin asked, "Has he done anything? Said anything weird?"

"He's Tyler. He says weird shit all the fucking time."

"Should we tell Alex about what we saw?" Questioned Justin.

"You think we should tell Alex." Tony sends him a look, "Now I know you're worried."

"I believe in Tyler." Justin grabbed his book from his locker and closed the door.

"I want to." Riley sighs.

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      "𝙄'𝙑𝙀 𝙅𝙐𝙎𝙏 . . . I've lost friends. I've made enemies. I need my life to change, something to, like, wake me up."

"Okay. 'Es dudoso que . . . lloverar manana'." Alex struggles to read the words from the notebook in his hands.

Riley sat next to Tony across from Charlie with Alex sitting next to him, an amused smile painted across her face as she listened to Alex study for Spanish in their class.

"What?" Alex looks up to see Tony and Riley both making faces at him.

Tony looked up, finding the two boys looking at him, "What? Nothing."

Charlie laughed, sitting up, "See, you're using "que", so it has to be the subjunctive. The subjunctive mood can also be used when expressing a speaker's feelings about perceived reality. "I'm sorry you're cold". Sien que tengas frio." He glances over to Tony, "Tony, I'm sorry you have to hear this. You could school us both."

"Yes, but it wouldn't be nearly as entertaining." Tony laughed, "Besides, Riley could help too. She's been around my family enough that she's learned a lot." He turns to the blonde girl, "¿Puedes creer esto? Pensando que los voy a ayudar, que no necesito esta clase, ellos sí".
(can you believe this? thinking i'm going to help them. i don't need the class, they do.)

"Lo sé. Montón de idiotas estúpidos." Riley replied, shaking her head with a smile.
(i know. bunch of stupid idiots)

"Oh, that sounded sophisticated."

Charlie leans close to him, "I'm pretty sure she called us stupid idiots."

Tony and Riley laughed.

"May I have your attention, please? We are currently moving into a lockdown situation." Bolan's voice comes over the speak, "Code Red."

Riley tenses up, hands instantly beginning to shake at the thought of anyone coming into the school with guns.

Tony reaches over to put a hand on her knee, hoping to keep her quiet.

"This is a hard lockdown. Staff, please initiate lockdown procedures immediately. Students, please do not panic, and listen closely to this announcement and the instructions of your teacher. Seek immediate shelter in the nearest classroom. I repeat, this is a Code Red. Hard lockdown."

"Code Red. That's active shooter, right?" Charlie asked, looking between the three sitting with him, a worried look on his face as he looked over at Riley as she tried to control her breathing.

"Yeah, it's gotta be another stupid drill." Alex says before turning to the two in front of him, "Riley, are you gonna be okay?"

"I . . . . I . . . ," Riley stuttered as a million thoughts ran through her mind.

"It's okay, just breath." Tony encourages her.

"Okay, listen up, please!" Dean Foundry called out, everyone turning to him, "I need some students to help me barricade the doors. You, you, you three, let's go."

"He, uh, doesn't look like he was expecting a drill." Charlie cuts in.

"Tony." Riley whimpers, her eyes looking behind the teens into the room where Tyler once was. "He's gone."

"What? What is it?" Alex questioned just as the lights were turned off, "Who's gone?" 

"Tyler's gone." Tony stands up, pulling Riley with him.

"The rest of you, stop what you're doing and you need to shelter under the tables."

The four crawl under the table, Tony quickly pulling his phone out, his fingers dancing quickly across the screen.

"Tony, hey. What is it?" Charlie questioned him.

"Yeah, what do you two know? What's up with Tyler?" Alex asked the two of them.

"We think he's been buying guns."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      "𝙇𝙄𝙆𝙀 𝙁𝙊𝙍 instance, I thought I helped my friend Tyler after his assault, but now I'm not sure I helped him enough. Or if I helped him at all."

Clay quickly locks the door, testing that it's locked before he pulls out his phone to text Tyler. Waiting on a text back from the boy, he jumps as someone tries to get into the other door, quickly rushing and diving to the floor to keep out of sight.

Breathing heavy, he pulls his phone out to text Tony.

Tony
Clay: You with Tyler?
Tony: Missing.
Clay: And Riley?
Tony: On the verge of a panic attack

"Saw that one coming, didn't you?"

A gasp leaves Clay's lips, turning his head to find . . .  Monty standing above him. He sighed, "It's just a drill."

"What if you're wrong?"

"I'm not."

"What if it's Tyler?"

"It's not."

"Because what? He's better now?" Monty questioned him.

"Because it's a drill, and, yes, he's better. What reason would he have to do this again?" Clay argued with his imagination of Monty being in the room with him.

"Same reason as before." Monty shrugged, moving around the table, "Me, everyone who treated him like shit since he was seven. You of all people should know that. That shit doesn't just go away. It haunts you for the rest of your life. . .," He inhales deeply, ". . . which might end today."

"Fuck off."

Monty walks to the other side of Clay, crouching down, "Are you scared? Are you feeling what terror actually is? The feeling of sitting here helpless, and death is on the other side of that door."

"Yes."

"Yes what?"

"I'm scared!" Clay tightly closes his eyes before opening them back up.

Monty moves to sit next to him, knees pulled up to his chest as he looks at Clay, nodding his head, "Yeah. I know that feeling."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝙒𝙀'𝙍𝙀 𝘼𝙇𝙇, like, isolated, trying to make sense of it. Trying to hold on. Maybe we all have that moment of "what the hell have i done?"."

Tony flips through a book from Tyler's backpack, sitting it on the floor and digging through his bag as Charlie, Alex and Riley watch him.

"What do you think you're gonna find?" Alex asked, arms wrapped around Riley's neck as the blonde sat in between his legs, back to his chest in a way of comfort for the both of them.

"Anything. Something to tell me not to lose my shit." Tony tells them.

"He doesn't want to hurt anyone." Alex defends Tyler, "Not anymore. You guys know he's better."

Tony shakes his head, "I'm not sure what I know."

"Charlie, you and me, we spend more time with him than anyone."

"Yeah, didn't something change after the cops called him in?" Charlies asked.

Tony pauses, staring down at the papers of different guns that he had found in Tyler's backpack, "What the fuck?"

A whimper leaves Riley's lips, her bottom one trembling as Tony spread out the pages of different guns on the floor.

"Okay, there's gotta be an explanation." Alex tries to come up with a reason as to why Tyler would have the pictures in his backpack, "It's not what we think."

"Or it's exactly what we think." Charlie said.

"We have to turn these in and tell someone." Riley's voice is shaky as she moves to gather the pictures, but Alex stops her.

"Wait, hold on. We don't know that this isn't a drill." Alex moves to grab them.

"Do you really wanna risk that?"

"Even if it's real, what good will it do to turn the photos in?" Alex argues with both Riley and Tony. "You think it'll stop this?"

"It might! There's a chance!" Tony exclaimed, "If there's a chance, we gotta do something.'

"We don't know that it's Tyler. My dad said he was fine."

"Maybe your dad thinks everything's fine for you."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"That I'm the one who threw Tyler's guns away, and if I gave him a second chance, and he comes in, and he does this--,"

"Alright, let's just take a second, we can think about what we need to do." Charlie tries to calm the two boys down.

Riley moved away from the boys, into her own little corner as she pulled her knees up to her chest, letting the first tear roll down her face as fear filled her body.

"If you're wrong about this, his life is over." Alex kept going, "And if he goes down, how long do you think it's gonna be before we all go down too?"

"Maybe we're all terrified to find out just what the hell have we done."

"Okay." Tony sighs, "Do we protect everyone or just ourselves?"

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      "𝗜𝗧'𝗦 𝗔 drill." Clay has his eyes closed.

Monty looks over at him, "Can't stop thinking about Tyler?"

"Maybe it's not Tyler." Bryce's voice rings out as he walks behind the computers lined up, "Maybe it's another kid. There's, what, one thousand kids at this school? You think Tyler's the first one to think about taking a gun and shooting as many kids as he could before he died himself?"

"Nah, I'm still team Tyler." Monty shook his head.

"No. No, Tyler's better. You . . . you saw that." Clay pointed at Bryce.

"I did, but your plan's kinda falling apart, isn't it?" Bryce sits in the chair, "You don't know what Tyler's up to."

"I don't care. It's not my problem anymore."

"It's not your problem? So you think that if someone out there put a gun to the head of, say, Jessica, you don't think she'd rat Riley out?"

"Oh, or Alex? Or Zach?" Monty asked.

"Or Justin. Jesus. I bet he'd piss his little pants."

"No, no, he wouldn't!" Clay fought the boys, "None of them would."

"Okay, what about you?" Monty asked, "What would you do with a gun to your head?"

Clay turns to look at him, "I've had a gun to my head. I've had an AR-15 here." He points to his to his chest, "Right here, and I survived, and I did the right thing."

'"Cause you're Clay Jensen. You're Liberty High's hero." Bryce teases him, "You've stared down the barrel once already. Hell, you drove off the road 'cause you're not scared of anything, right? Are you a hero or a martyr?"

Clay jumps as the door handle rattles, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes. "It's just a teacher, checking the locks."

"Maybe."

Bryce stands up from the chair, moving to sit on the other side of Clay on the floor. "So you're not afraid to die, just as, like, a general thing?"

"Maybe I just don't care anymore."

Monty smiled, "You saw that, but speaking from experience, you really do 'cause once you're gone, all that's left is the shit you didn't do."

"Or the shit that you did do, but you did wrong."

"I always tried to do the right thing."

"Did you?" Bryce questioned, "If you die today, is your conscience clear?"

Clay shakes his head, "I'm not dying today."

"No one can ever say that and know."

The door rattles again, a shadowed figure trying to look inside the room.

"Fuck."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      "𝙀𝙑𝙀𝙍𝙔𝙊𝙉𝙀'𝙎 𝙋𝘼𝙎𝙏 is the reason for what they do today."

"I gotta . . . I gotta call Scott." Riley's hands shake as she moves to pull her phone out of her back pocket, "I need . . . I need — I can't — my hands won't stop shaking."

"Hey, it's okay." Tony takes her phone from her shaky hands, "I got it. I'll dial it for you."

"Thank you." She takes the phone back from his hands, pressing it against her ear as it rang, "Scott."

"Hey, baby, aren't you supposed to be in class?"

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      𝗟𝗢𝗨𝗗 𝗟𝗔𝗨𝗚𝗛𝗧𝗘𝗥 fills out of the locker rooms filled with baseball player, Scott's phone ringing loudly as the guys begin to tease him.

"Oh, is that your lady, Reed?"

"Reed's girl is calling again!"

"Shut up!" Scott laughed, quickly answering the call, "Hello."

"Scott."

"Hey, baby, aren't you supposed to be in class?"

"I . . . I, um, I just wanted to hear your voice."

His eyebrows pinch together, picking up her shaky breath, "Riley, hey, talk to me. What's wrong?"

"I don't know if — if it's a drill, but I just needed to hear your voice, I need you to talk to me." Riley takes a deep breath, a whimper leaving her lips.

"Whoa, a drill? What are?"

"I think someone's in the school with a gun." Riley cried, "And . . . And we think that it's Tyler, because he's missing and there were . . . he had pictures of guns in his backpack. Scott, I'm scared."

Scott can feel his heart drop at the words that leaves her mouth, moving his hand out to grab onto Eddie's shoulder to stable himself, "Wh—,"

"Yo, Scotty, you don't look too good, brother." Eddie cuts him off, hands shooting out to catch his wobbling frame, "Scott! What's wrong?"

"Hey, listen to me, okay? I love you, Riley." Scott's palms begin to grow sweety, "I love you and I need you to stay where you are. Are you with anybody?"

"T—Tony, Alex and . . . and Charlie."

"Okay, that's good. Stay with them. I'll be there as soon as I can, okay?" Scott tells her before hanging up the phone, "I gotta go."

"Whoa, whoa, hey, what's going on?" Eddie pulls him back, "Scott! What the hell is going on?"

"There's a shooter at Riley's school. She doesn't know if it's a drill or not. I have to go."

Eddie stares at him in complete shock, his blood running cold, "I'm coming with you."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝘼𝙉𝘿 𝙒𝙀 try to clean up the messes we've made."

"He's our friend, Tony." Alex argued quietly with Tony.

"I know that. Of course I know that." Tony argued, "Do you see what the hell this is doing to Riley? I just had to talk her down from a fucking panic attack!"

"We all want to protect Tyler and believe that he's better." Charlie looks between the two boys, "What if we're wrong?"

Tony stands up, "Yeah."

A quiet scream leaves Riley's lips as a popping sound filled the room, clutching onto Charlie who had quickly backed up to pull her into his arms.

"What was that?" Tony asked just as more gunshots rang out.

Riley begins to sob loudly as she tightens her grip on Charlie's arm, trying to move as close to him as she possibly could as he backed them up under the computer table with Alex and Tony.

"Fuck this. I'm taking this stuff to Foundry right now." Tony tells them before he rolls out from under the table and rushes off into the main library but making sure that he kept low.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck." Riley breaths heavily, hands shaking more than they were before, "Please, please, I just want to go home. I want Scott. I want . . . I want Jeff."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

       "𝘽𝙐𝙏 𝙎𝙊𝙈𝙀𝙏𝙄𝙈𝙀𝙎 the weight of what we carry is too much. Sometimes its too much to handle. What do we do then?"

"So you still don't care about anything, Clay?" Bryce asked, "You stil don't have any regrets? You're glad that I'm dead, and he got blamed?" He points at Monty.

"Leave me alone."

"Last day of your life. No need to keep secrets. Are you sorry? Are you sorry for what you did?"

"Yes. Yes. I'm sorry."

"Wow." Monty chuckled.

"I didn't think he'd actually admit it." Bryce says.

Monty laughed, "We got through to him."

"It's too bad you won't live, but then again, who does?"

"Blade Runner, nice." Monty snickered.

"Well, we only know it 'cause he does."

"Am I going crazy?" Clay asked, the two next to him laughing.

"Asked and answered, no?"

"Going crazy? My boy, you done gone."

Clay stands up from under the table, "If there's someone that needs to be saved, I'm gonna try to save them. And if this is the day that I die, then I die standing up. Though I still think it's a fucking drill."

"My dad gave me this quote once, 'if you're going through hell, keep going'.'

Clay unlocks the door to the room he was in, walking out and looking around the empty hallway.

"Clay!" Principal Bolan breaks Clay out of the daydream of himself getting shot by the shooter, standing in the door of the main office.

Clay breathes heavily, following after the principal who grabbed him by his jacket.

"Get down!" Bolan closes the door to the office, sitting in a chair, "What were you doing' in that hallway?"

"Is this a drill?" Clay questions him frantically.

"Did you hear the gunshots?"

"Yes!"

"You did so why did you leave your classroom?" Bolan asked.

"I thought it was a drill!"

Bolan puts his head in his hands, "Goddamn it, Clay. This is a hard lockdown. There were first responders on the scene with guns drawn. You thought that was a drill? Another rule that just didn't apply to you, so you thought you'd run around and be a pain in my ass?"

"No! Someone kept trying the door, and I thought someone might need help, and I didn't want to die sitting down!"

Banging on the window causes Clay to jump, turning around to find an officer standing there.

"Yeah." Bolan holds up a finger as Clay looks back at him in disbelief.

"Wait."

"Alright. Now listen to me. No. Look. It's okay." Bolan tries to calm him down, "Clay, you are not gonna die. You are not gonna die. The bullets were blanks. The officers tried the doors. The alarms were to make sure students and teachers followed protocol, and the only one who didn't was you."

"They . . . they pounded at the doors."

"Those were their instructions."

"And the bullets were blanks?"

"Simulated gunfire to make sure the students will be able to recognize it."

Clay stares at him for a moment, "So it was a drill."

"Well, if it wasn't you'd be dead." Bolan tells him before standing up and moving towards the door, "Wait here."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      "𝙒𝙀𝙇𝙇, 𝙄'𝙈 going through hell. A lot of us are going through hell."

"Are you okay?" Riley has her head resting on Tony's shoulder, his head laying on the top of her head.

"Are you okay?" Tony asked quietly, knowing how much this would probably affect her.

Riley sighed, "I don't think I'm ever going to be okay."

"Yeah, me either."

"This lockdown is all clear. I repeat. This lockdown is all clear. An announcement will be made shortly to provide staff and students . . . "

"Thank fuck." The blonde mumbled, as Tony helped her get off of the floor, "Let's go check on Charlie and Alex."

"Yeah." Tony nodded, the two walking into the only to find Charlie and Alex kissing, "Dammit! Now I own her fifty bucks."

Alex and Charlie pull away, turning to the two who both had different expressions on their faces.

"Well you to recovered quick."

"Kind of."

Riley giggled, hiding her smile before her hand as Tony also laughed.

"What?" Charlie asked.

"We should've seen that coming'." Tony smirked.

"What did Foundry say?" Alex asked, now back to being worried about Tyler.

"He, uh, he was gonna look into it, and then he said he heard from the office that this was just a fucking drill." Tony nodded.

"Okay, so if the cops bring him in again, what is that gonna mean for us?" Charlie asked.

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      "𝘼 𝙇𝙊𝙏 of us are going through hell."

"What the fuck?!"

Bolan turns around to find Clay standing behind them.

"What the actual fuck are you thinking?"

"Clay, would you take a seat in my office, please?" Bolan asked him.

"No! I will not take a seat in your office! You think that this is the way to make us safe?" Clay asked, growing angry, "You know what would make me feel safe? Not having to go to school with metal detectors or video camera or armed fucking guards!"

Students begin to pile out of the classroom, Clay's voice catching their attention.

Bolan begins to stutter as he tries to direct the students back to their classrooms, "There's still class, folks. Okay? Bell has not rung."

"No, you're killing us!" Clay moves around, pointing at the teenagers filling the halls. "Don't you get that?"

Riley, who stood behind Alex, tightly held onto the flannel he was wearing, worried for her cousins.

"You made a drill with gunshots and hammered down the door to prepare us for what exactly? For what it feels like to be hunted?! To practice getting ready to die, to make us feel afraid for our lives?" Clay yelled, pointing his finger in Riley's direction, "I mean, Riley is fucking terrified of guns, and you put us through this shit!? We already know what if feels! You're scaring us to death! Every day! Every day! Every day!"

"Calm down, son." One of the guards standing behind them tries to calm him down.

Clay spun around to look at him, "I am not your goddamn son! Get the fuck away from me! We are children! We're kids! We should be living our fucking lives instead of practicing how to cheat death, because you know what? Everybody fucking dies! Everybody dies! So, please, please let us live!"

"We are trying to keep you alive." Bolan tells him, "That's what every minute of this drill has been about."

"No! It was about you checking a fucking box, a regulation, a law, whatever the fuck, because you know what? You know what? We're not safe!"

"That's enough."

"Hey, fuck you, "that's enough". Who are you?" Clay spun around as the office grabbed him by the shoulder. "Who are you to say it's enough?" He pushed him, "Who are you?!"

The guard begins to try and grab Clay, but he fights him, taking one of the guns that was in his holder and holding it up in the air.

Clay waves the gun around, kids backing up at the sight of it, "Am I safer now?"

Riley gasps as a hand grasps her shoulder, the person turning her around to hide her face in his chest, the blonde taking in the scent of Zach's familiar body spray, letting her relax in his hold, his good arm keeping a place on her neck so that she didn't look.

"It's okay. It's okay." He mumbles, feeling her breathing pick up, "It's okay, Lee."

"Clay!"

"Huh? I've got your gun! I've got your gun!" Clay keeps it in the air, teasing the officer with a crazed look in his eye, "Am I safer? Look at me. I'm armed. Should I give this to a teacher can save their fucking class? Huh?!"

"Clay, please." Bolan pleaded with the boy, "Put the gun down. We'll go to my office, and we will talk this over, okay? Come on."

Clay breaths heavily, looking around at all of his classmates, his eye locking on Tyler who had a yellow safety blanket rapped around him, "Tyler . . . what happened to us? What did you do? What did you do?"

Tyler's voice is quiet, shaken with fear as he looks at Clay, "I didn't do anything."

Clay sobs quietly, lowering his arm with the gun just as two of the guards tackle him, "Get off me! Get off of me now! No!"

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      𝗥𝗜𝗟𝗘𝗬 𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗡𝗗𝗦 in the hallway, back pressed against Zach still the best she could with his broken arm, watching as the EMT works carried Clay out on a stretcher, everyone either just watching or videoing as he was rolled out.

"Alright, let's get to—," Bolan is cut off by two figures running into the school doors.

A relieved sigh leaves Scott's lips as his eyes lock onto Riley's, "Fuck. Thank God."

The blonde quickly detaches herself from Zach, running towards her fiancé and throwing her body at his.

Scott hugs her back tightly, kissing the top of her head more than once as she sobs in his chest for a lot of reasons. For Monty. For Bryce. For the guilt. For herself. But most importantly she cried for Clay.

The Reed boy looks up, locking eyes with all of his friends, everyone who had shared the exact same secrets, "What the fuck?"