The Phantom School 5 Chapter 5

Who would never forgive whom? I could only hope that whoever left that message there did not leave it for us.

"So... do you have any idea what that means for us?" I asked.

"No idea, I didn't do anything!" Onur said.

"Maybe we can find who left this message if we look around." Idil suggested.

"Or we could find thousands of other unpleasant things we wouldn't want to find..." Onur argued. In my opinion, both were right.

We had no other choice but to move on. It was clear that we weren't aware of many things going on in this place, but we wouldn't learn anything by standing where we are and running away from everything that moves.

"Maybe we can pay a visit to the infirmary or cafeteria. We could find something useful for... you know... defensive purposes, in case we ever need such thing." Idil suggested. It was not a bad idea, and I did not know what to do anyway.

"Fine." I said. "To the infirmary!"

- - -

We had arrived at the infirmary, and unfortunately, a lot of material were missing. The remaining were on the ground. We had found nothing useful for defense, but there was some blood on the wall. Someone had tried to write something on the wall, but it was unreadable.

"So that was pointless." Onur said. "Who did all this mess?"

"Is there anyone else in this building, except for us and Mr. Kenan?" Idil asked.

"I don't know." I replied. "I don't know if more people would be better or worse either." I added.

We got out of the infirmary in disappointment.

When we got out back into the hallway, we instantly spotted Mr. Kenan at the other end. But fortunately, the transforming structure had caused the hallway to be separated into two parts by a set of iron bars. Mr. Kenan and us were in different parts of the hallway. Neither of us could get past those iron bars. We did not have to panic, yet.

"There he is!" Idil warned us.

"Luckily, he is on the other side of the bars." Onur said.

"Don't get too comfortable. He saw us too, and I have very little doubt that he will come for us from behind, if we don't leave soon." I said.

Just as I antic.i.p.ated, moments later, Mr. Kenan turned around and ran towards the stairs to bypa.s.s the iron bars, reaching us from either the upper or lower floor.

"Don't stay there, come on!" I said. We had to leave before he caught us.

We started running towards the stairs on the other end. Unfortunately, Mr. Kenan was much faster than us this time. Before we could reach the stairs, he appeared in front of us. In panic, we stopped running and backed away a few meters. We were now trapped by him and the iron bars behind us. We had no way to escape.

"Do you have any plans?" asked Onur.

"I'm open for suggestions." Idil said.

"I'm actually amazed we made it this far without plans." I said.

"Wolfpack tactics!" Onur suddenly yelled. "It is 3 vs 1!"

Just as he was about to run towards Mr. Kenan, I held him by his shoulders.

"Idiot! What do you think you are doing?" I asked him.

"There is no way out, we have to fight!" he shouted.

I knew he was right, but I could not let him start another fight. I would rather try to slip past Mr. Kenan, with speed.

At that moment, I noticed the rather big knife in Mr. Kenan's hand. Either one of our ideas were terrible against a man armed with a knife, but we had no other choices. 'We have to do something', I thought.

We could try to get around him by running into one of the cla.s.srooms and going around him using the larger area in the cla.s.sroom. But it also carried a great risk of getting ourselves cornered. Furthermore, the cla.s.sroom might already have transformed into something very different.

I was preparing to run into the clasroom on our right at any moment. If we were to do something, we had to do it now. Otherwise, soon enough, we would've retreated all the way back to the iron bars. Like she read my mind, Idil got closer to the cla.s.sroom's door and held the door k.n.o.b.

Just a few seconds after, something very unexpected happened. Mr. Kenan stopped in the middle of the hallway and looked at us. He raised the knife with a sudden move, which made us run all the way back to the iron bars. With his fast hand movements, he stabbed himself in the chest, and dropped to the ground. The knife had gotten past his ribs; reaching his lungs and heart. He rolled around on the ground, choking in his blood, and looked into our eyes. He then spoke to us, fastly, but in a very weak tone:

"Trust... and protect friends... No more death. Never split up!"

It was very hard to watch him suffer, but we couldn't help him. We had to hear what he wanted to tell us. He could've found out something important.

"Sorry I couldn't... control my..."

He was constantly choking, but still trying to breath in, despite his damaged lungs. He was spending all his energy to talk to us. His voice was getting weaker.

"...had to suicide to protect you. Forgive me..."

These were the last words he managed to say. He tried to keep talking, but he neither had air in his lungs, nor the energy to use his muscles. His eyes went up and we heard a hissing sound. He was no longer breathing. That was it. We had lost him.

He tried to tell us something, but he couldn't tell us everything before he died. But at least we knew that, after all, he wanted to protect us; even from himself. What an honorable death!

On the other hand, the real question remained: What made him try to kill us in the first place?

Did it have any connection with Melis' agression in the past?

Could it ever happen again in the future?

We were about to find out, and for the time being, we were still trapped in this cursed place... We had to continue in order to uncover the mysteries of this school, and find a way out of here.