Abbie fights back

The hallway felt miles long, the checkered floor blurring into a dizzying smear of black and white beneath Abbie’s frantic footsteps. His lungs burned, each breath a jagged shard of glass cutting through his chest. Behind him, the rhythmic, metallic *clack-clack-clack* of Miss Circle’s compass-leg echoed against the lockers, a rhythmic reminder that death was not just following him—it was gaining.

"Abbie... oh, Abbie," Miss Circle’s voice sang out, distorted and dripping with a terrifying, motherly sweetness. "You can’t run from your grades forever. An 'F' is a permanent mark, dear. Don't you want to see your final results?"

Abbie didn't look back. He knew what was back there. He knew the towering height of Miss Circle, the manic grin of Miss Thavel, and the cold, silent calculating gaze of Miss Bloomie. He was a failure in their eyes. A mistake in the equation of the school. He hated math; he hated the way the numbers twisted and turned on the page like nesting snakes, mocking his inability to make sense of them.

He just wanted to find Lana. Lana, with her sock-puppet hands and her gentle laugh, was the only thing that made the oppressive atmosphere of Paper School bearable. If he could find her, maybe they could hide together. Maybe they could survive the night.

His vision blurred with tears as he rounded a corner, his sneakers skidding on the polished floor. He saw a heavy, reinforced door slightly ajar at the end of the corridor—the storage room for the janitorial supplies. It was thick, windowless, and had a heavy internal bolt.

With a desperate burst of speed, Abbie lunged for the handle. He threw himself inside, slamming the door shut and sliding the bolt home just as a heavy thud vibrated through the metal from the other side.

"Open up, little student," Miss Thavel’s raspy voice hissed through the gap. "We just want to fix your mistakes."

Abbie backed away, his hands shaking so violently he had to tuck them into his armpits. He was panting, his heart drumming against his ribs like a trapped bird. He turned around, intending to find a place to hide among the shelves, but the words died in his throat.

The smell hit him first. It wasn't the scent of floor wax or old paper. It was metallic, thick, and cloying.

The moonlight filtered through a high, barred vent, casting pale ribbons of light across the center of the room. There, piled in a grotesque, tangled heap of paper-white limbs and stained uniforms, were his friends.

Abbie’s knees hit the floor with a dull thud.

He saw Claire’s bow, now soaked a deep, dark crimson. He saw Engel’s broken glasses glinting in the dim light. And there, at the very top of the pile, her eyes wide and glassy, was Lana. Her sock puppets were torn to shreds, scattered around her like fallen leaves.

"No," he whispered. The word was small, pathetic. "No, no, no..."

He crawled forward, his hands dragging through something wet. He reached out, his fingers trembling as he touched Lana’s cold cheek. She had been his light. She had told him it was okay to be bad at math. She had promised they would get out of this school together.

The grief was a physical weight, crushing the air out of his lungs. He stared at the pile of bodies—the only people who had ever been kind to him—and felt his world collapse. He was a coward. He had run while they had stayed. He was the one who was supposed to die, the failure, the weakling.

Then, something shifted.

The sadness didn't vanish, but it was suddenly consumed by a white-hot roar. It started in the pit of his stomach and surged upward, a searing heat that burned away the fear, the stuttering breath, and the trembling in his limbs.

He looked at the door. He could hear them out there, laughing. They were mocking his grief. They were waiting for him to break, to come out crying and begging for mercy so they could enjoy the kill.

Abbie stood up. He didn't feel like Abbie anymore. The boy who was scared of long division was gone. In his place was a hollowed-out shell filled with a singular, jagged purpose.

He looked around the room. His eyes landed on a heavy, industrial-sized paper cutter mounted on a workbench—the kind with a long, curved steel blade that could slice through a hundred sheets at once. Next to it lay a box of heavy-duty geometry tools: oversized metal protractors with sharpened edges and heavy, solid brass compasses used for chalkboard demonstrations.

Abbie walked over to the workbench. He unscrewed the pivot bolt of the paper cutter with a strength he didn't know he possessed, freeing the long, razor-sharp blade. He gripped the handle, feeling the weight of the steel. In his other hand, he took a sharpened metal compass, its point glinting like a needle.

He didn't hide. He didn't cower. He walked back to the door and stood in the center of the room, facing the entrance. He stood over the bodies of his friends, a silent guardian of the dead.

"I'm ready," he whispered, his voice devoid of emotion.

Outside, the scratching stopped.

"Abbie? Are you being a good boy in there?" Miss Circle asked. "We’re going to count to three. If you don't open the door, we’re coming in the hard way."

Abbie didn't answer. He simply reached out and slid the bolt back.

The door flew open with a violent bang. Miss Circle stepped in first, her towering form casting a long shadow, her compass-arm raised high. Miss Thavel and Miss Bloomie crowded behind her, their faces twisted into predatory masks of anticipation.

"There you are, you little—"

Miss Circle stopped. Her eyes traveled from Abbie’s blank, staring face down to the heavy steel blade in his hand, and then to the pile of bodies behind him. She let out a sharp, barking laugh.

"Oh, look at you! Planning to fight back? With a paper cutter? How adorable. You can't even solve for X, Abbie. How do you expect to survive this?"

Abbie didn't speak. He didn't scream. He moved.

He was faster than they expected—far faster. He lunged forward before Miss Circle could swing her heavy limb. He didn't go for her head; he went for the joint. With a guttural snarl, he swung the paper cutter blade in a wide, powerful arc, slamming it into the mechanical hinge of Miss Circle’s compass-leg.

The steel shrieked as it bit into the mechanism. Miss Circle let out a high-pitched wail of shock and pain as the blade wedged deep, severing the tension wires. Her massive form stumbled, her balance destroyed.

"What?! You little brat!" Miss Thavel hissed, her long, clawed fingers snapping at the air as she lunged to fill the gap.

Abbie didn't retreat. He ducked under her swipe, the scent of her stale perfume filling his nose, and drove the sharpened brass compass into the top of her foot. He felt the metal punch through bone and floorboard, pinning her to the spot.

Miss Thavel shrieked, her body jerking back, but Abbie was already moving again. He ripped the paper cutter blade free from Miss Circle’s leg with a spray of dark, ink-like fluid and spun around.

Miss Bloomie, the smallest and swiftest of the three, tried to circle behind him, her box-cutter blade extended. Abbie anticipated her. He threw the heavy brass compass at her face with all his might. She flinched, the heavy tool glancing off her forehead, and in that split second of disorientation, Abbie was on her.

He swung the heavy blade downward. It didn't find her neck, but it caught her shoulder, slicing through the fabric and skin with terrifying ease.

"You... you're supposed to be afraid!" Miss Bloomie gasped, clutching her shoulder as she backed away, her eyes wide with a sudden, flickering realization. This wasn't the boy who cried during exams.

"I was," Abbie said. His voice was cold, flat, and echoed in the small room. "But then I saw Lana."

Miss Circle struggled to stand, her broken leg sparking and leaking fluid. She looked at Abbie, her manic grin replaced by a snarl of genuine fury. "You think this changes anything? You're still a failure! You're still nothing!"

"I'm the one holding the blade," Abbie replied.

He stepped over Miss Thavel, who was still clawing at the compass pinned through her foot. He walked toward Miss Circle. She swung her good arm at him, a desperate, clumsy blow. Abbie parried it with the flat of the paper cutter blade, the impact vibrating up his arms, and then he lunged.

He drove the tip of the blade into Miss Circle’s chest, right where her heart would be if she were human. He didn't stop there. He pushed, using his entire body weight, driving her back against the wall.

"Subtract... one," he hissed into her ear.

Miss Circle’s eyes went wide. A gargling sound escaped her throat as she slumped against the wall, the life—or whatever animated her—fading from her gaze.

Abbie pulled the blade out. He turned to the other two. Miss Thavel had managed to rip her foot free, but she was limping heavily, her face pale. Miss Bloomie was holding her arm, her predatory confidence completely shattered.

They looked at the boy standing in the center of the room, covered in ink and blood, standing before a mountain of his dead friends. He didn't look like a student anymore. He looked like an executioner.

"Who's next?" Abbie asked, raising the blade.

For the first time in the history of Paper School, the teachers were the ones who backed away. Miss Thavel and Miss Bloomie exchanged a look of pure, unadulterated terror. They didn't see a failing student. They saw the sum of every cruelty they had ever inflicted, returned to them with interest.

They turned and fled into the darkness of the hallway.

Abbie didn't chase them. Not yet.

He let the heavy blade drop to the floor with a metallic clang that echoed like a funeral bell. The fury was still there, a low-burning ember in his chest, but the sudden silence of the room brought the grief rushing back.

He turned back to the pile. He walked over and sat down next to Lana. He picked up one of her torn sock puppets and placed it gently back onto her hand.

"I'm not scared of math anymore, Lana," he whispered, his voice breaking as the first tear tracked through the blood on his cheek. "I learned how to take things away."

He sat there in the dark, the only living soul in a room full of ghosts, waiting for the sun to rise or for the teachers to return. It didn't matter which came first.

Abbie wasn't running anymore. He was the one waiting in the dark now. And he had all the time in the world to finish the lesson.