"Code Red, I repeat, this is a Code Red, proceed with lockdown procedure."

The vice principal's voice boomed in the school as students reluctantly complied. The procedure for lockdown was simple; you simply went into a corner of the class where if someone were to come in, they would not be able to see you. In this case, everyone made themselves at home in the computer room connected with the classroom, squished together. Evidently, no talking was actually allowed, but this whole"lockdown procedure" was just another one of their school's drills, and so they began whispering. 

"Did you see Stanley today?"

"I have a math test next period, I'm so cooked."

"Shh," the teacher reminded them. Of course, it only reduced their chattering for a bit, and then they immediately started again. 

The classroom door handle twitched, and everyone who heard it fell silent. This was perhaps the scariest part, although everyone had expected it. It is the teacher's job to make sure the door was locked, so that in the case of a real lockdown, no one would be able to get in. All of a sudden, the silhouette behind the door seemed to ring a bell.

"Wait, is that Jeremy?"

Suddenly they were chattering again. 

"Jeremy? He missed like 3 days of school, why's he walking in now?"

"Oh my gosh he made us do our presentation without him, it was sooo bad!"

Then suddenly, something fell, a heavy, metal object, that was spherical in shape. Everyone fell silent as the door creaked open. 

"Sorry guys, I think I forgot to lock the door," the teacher whispered.

One of the students giggled. "Aren't you gonna get in trouble for that Miss?" 

"Yeah," she sighed. At least it was a drill. She prepared herself for the scolding she would receive from the principal. Wait, the principal? Was it not Jeremy who had walked in?

Drip, drip.

A horrified look filled the faces of the students, who were sitting across from the teacher. The teacher, who had her back to the wall with a window, was puzzled. She herself slowly turned around. 

Drip.

Jeremy had come to class, well, not his entire self. A bloody socket revealed that his eye had been gouged out. A twisted, wire-like claw spouted from his shoulder, which appeared to be ripped. It had the texture of a shriveled sausage, a dried raisin, either way it didn't stop the vomit coming out the teacher's mouth. A sound came from the hole in this chest, an almost perfect imitation of the vice principal, "Code Red,  I repeat, this is a Code Red," as if he was stuck inside a walkie-talkie on loop. 

The last signs of life in Room 210 were the screams that came afterward.

On that day, 129 unidentified bodies were found dead in that high school. 

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________

"C-Candice Lai? I-Is Candice-"The teacher shaked violently.

An officer put her hand on her shoulder. "Ma'am, it's okay, please take a break and we'll take it from here." She then sent the teacher to sit in the ambulance amongst the others. "Candice? Are you here?"

The sirens of the police cars seemed even louder.

"Report her as missing too," she ordered, and the officer beside her with a bushy mustache scribbled. 

"Alright, Yu-jun Lee?"

The silence was even heavier than the sirens.

She sighed, pressing her hand against her forehead. "Him too." No guns, no weapons, it was a case she'd never seen before. No one could remember the perpetrator, no one alive at least. Even those who were dead were mutilated beyond identification. "We gotta conduct a DNA test." 

Ishaan listened in, his heart frozen. Just a day prior, he had been with Yu-jun. And now, he was missing. 

A familiar glow-in-the dark hoop in a plastic bag caught his eye amongst the evidence. What were the odds? 

"Excuse me, young man, do you recognize this?" The officers had noticed his pained reaction. 

Ishaan did not want to tell the officers anything. His heart hurt too much to say it. If he had told them who it belonged to, and they conducted a further investigation and found undeniable proof that he was dead..

"Apologies, we'll get back to-"

"It's his. Yu-jun Lee's"

His name seemed to echo through the ears of everyone around. "Yu-jun's..dead?"some whispered. 

"No, it hasn't been confirmed!" But some began wailing. "He's dead, oh my goodness!" It was as if the reality of their situation had finally settled in, upon hearing the name of someone they were all familiar with. 

Ishaan felt tears well up in his eyes. If he hadn't chosen to come to school later, if he hadn't taken care of something in the morning..The blood of the dead seeped into his nose. 

"Sir, can I, sit down please?" 

"Of course, please do. And in case it's confirmed, I, my condolences."

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

"This is crazy," Marnie grumbled. In her 5 years of being an officer, this was the strangest case so far. "So many casualties and not a single weapon?"

"No noises of explosion either. And why target that school?" Youvon could not fathom it at all. 

"Do you think, it's related to Novarica? The tensions between us and them are kind of high, and the war never really ended-" 

"Okay, slow down, let's think about it some more." Marnie had an inkling that this whole attack was political, but right now that wasn't her focus. "Autopsy results. There was one body among the others, they identified him as Jeremy Neuvill, or, whatever became of him. His DNA is, off, is what they told me." 

This raised eyebrows in the room. "Different? How so?"

Marnie coughed, clearing her throat. "Well, we see here," she slid over the photo, making some of the officers gasp and retch a bit, "lotta abnormalities. That missing eye? Could be the work of a human. The hole too. But what really bugs," she tapped on the arm, "is this claw we got going on here." 

"Was his skin, peeled off? There's like excess flaps on the shoulder area, like it shot out of there, but that's not possible-" 

"But it might be," Marnie's tone darkened. "Like I said, we gave the body over to the forensics. They had a suspicion. That arm, might not be Mr. Neuvill's."