Evelyn was breathless as she clutched the phone tightly, I could imagine her huddled over as she spoke to me. “He’s-he’s lost it! He’s attacking everyone! J-”

“What?!” My hand almost cracked the phone in half as I cut through her words, the metal was beginning to shrink in my palm before I let go of it, “Are you okay? Are you hurt?” I saw Elias’ eyebrows furrow from out of my focus but I ignored him.

“I’m fine, we’re fine. I just need you to get here. Now.” She had tried to steady her voice, but I could hear the

“I will be there in 5 minutes. Do not move and stay hidden.” Throwing my phone to the side and onto the seat cushion of the passenger seat, I turned to Elias, speaking rapidly as I put the key in the ignition, “One of the guys at the party went crazy. He’s attacking everyone. I need to go.” My phrases were minced and lacking the same emotion I felt swirling around within me but I needed to get there.

His eyes went momentarily wide as he took in the information, but when he finally spoke his voice was strong and determinate, “Go. I’ll call the police.”

In those five minutes it took to arrive to the isolated house I broke every rule I had ever been taught when it came to driving a vehicle. Pulling into the driveway and past the farm fields, my headlights brightened the wide eyed and screaming faces from the other party-goers. They ducked past the car, running like hell was on their heels.

The dirt turned into mud with the amount of steps running through it. I could see the beginnings of red bruises and traces of blood spatter their faces as they ran past.

What the hell happened here?

Mark and Evelyn hobbled from the confines of the house, she held her arm like it was sore which only made my anxiety tick higher. Blood peppered Mark’s forehead and hairline along with drips of sweat. If there was a scale for the fear I was feeling at the moment, it had flown right out off of that scale.

“Go sit in the car, call mom and dad. I’ll be back.” I hopped out of the idling truck, making a bee-line for Evelyn and Mark before switching my steps to point towards the house. There surely was people still in the house, and the police were slow in Bedlam, there was no way they were getting here before worse injuries occurred. Despite my shaking hands and lead-anchored steps, I knew someone had to go in.

Evelyn stepped away from Mark to scold me, wincing slightly as she walked from the pain emanating from her shoulder, “No way! I’m not leaving you!”

“Please,” I stuck my hand out to stop her from coming closer. She needed to stay as far as she could from the absolute anarchy raging down around us. Looking torn, I added quietly, “Just keep Mark safe. I need to make sure there’s no one else left in the house.”

Entering the house, the overwhelming quiet was the first thing I noticed. Gone far away was the ground-shaking music and bellowing voices I had heard not even an hour ago.

I analyzed the house the deeper I stepped into it. Looking for people hiding or in need I recognized the letterman jacket as it was huddled in the corner. Taking steps towards him, the wooden floor creaked.

“Jack? Are you okay? Do you need help?” He was hunched over with sagging shoulders. They were static except for the rise and fall of his breaths, “Its Rory, Evelyn’s brother, do you-” Just as I placed a hand on Jack’s shoulder he turned like the devil controlled his limbs.

His fist connected with my face with such strength my jaw went agape.

Stumbling backwards a few steps, I pressed a hand against my cheek, heat had bloomed where his knuckles connected with my face, “Jack! What are you doing!?”

I was not a fighter. Quite the opposite, I knew exactly what fighting did to people. Violence was a plague; a disease that did nothing but infect the minds of everyone who witnessed or took part in it. I knew violence too well; it had been a reoccurring character in my childhood, a character I vowed to stay far away from for the rest of my days within this universe.

His steps shook the house as they tried to close the distance between us. His lumbering form and stocky shoulders reminded me of a bull charging a red flag, but it wasn’t his build that caught my attention. Instead it was the look in his eyes. Before, in the car, his blue eyes were glazed with vodka, they looked everywhere and shifted slowly but now, the look of determination in his blood-shot eyes ran daring shivers up my back. New rips shredded the front and arms of his jacket, letting me see a peculiar thing on his skin.

“Jack…”My cracking and quiet voice trailed off upon seeing the the object digging into his forearm. Digging into the skin of his forearm; a metallic object had dug its pincer-like arms into him. A red vial was embedded into the length of it, a long clear tube. Dirt had scuffed the edges like he’d picked it up from a patch of dirt.

It was nothing a human could create. And such a thought made my bones run dry and brittle. Tears pinched my eyes but I refused to let them fall.

He stepped forwards and I knew he would kill me if he caught me.

Letting go of the tension ruffling through me, my fist collided with his face. I felt his skin ripple beneath my knuckles like surface tension. Ready for him to crumple to the floor.

But he didn’t. Staying still, his nostrils flared as death raged on in his mind.

I scrambled away from him and found hiding spot on the other side of the house. It was bad, and didn’t hide me well but I just needed a moment to sort the disorganization my brain was feeling.

I heard him coming before I saw him. Like an earthquake seized him, Jack tore apart the house. My hands jutted out before me in half-surrender, I didn’t want to fight. The thing on his arm was making him feel this way, he just needed to calm down, to breathe.

“Jack please! You’ve been infected! That object is-” His calloused hands gripped the sides of my chest, only to let go as he threw my sagging body through the kitchen wall. The drywall and tiles bent and cracked under the pure velocity and weight of my frame. Banging against the counters opposite to the gaping hole now decorating Laura’s childhood home, I crumpled and laid against the tile floor. Debris and beige dust settling on my skin, through my blond hair and over my clean clothing.

When I finally rose from the floor, Jack Bailey was gone. “What the hell was that?!” I croaked, my hands still shook with the memories of throwing punches that would’ve decimated a human. Missing the energy to rise above a sitting position, I continued sitting.

He was gone, my mind felt slow as the reality of what just happened sank in. I sat in the middle of the kitchen, still as a tree with cerulean blood dripping down my face, watching until the puffs of smoke and shadows dissipated.