The long, winding halls of Retroville Middle School's main floor had long ago been enswathed in darkness. Whispers and occasional screams had replaced the normal vibrant chatter. It was now a different and frightening world inside these corridors, and few knew it better than the three young men traversing the dark on horseback.

"How much longer?" an anxious eighth-grader called Randall asked. He brushed his oily black bangs from his eyes and swung his lantern all around. Nothing of note waited to be seen. Hair back in place, he replaced his grip on the boy seated before him. Godwin, a better groomed blonde and fellow eighth-grader, let out a groan of annoyance but let his friend settle into the ride.

The final lad, Roderick, sat alone atop the group's second steed. He stared hard at the cracked and torn parchment in his grasp. "Not long," he promised, though he couldn't stop his free hand from rubbing his short chestnut hair.

His two friends shared a glance; they'd come to know that tic well. "You're lying," Randall gently whispered.

"I'm not," Roderick assured them just as their white Welsh ponies whinnied and reared back.

Roderick calmly gripped his reins as Randall cried, "Whoa!" and clutched Godwin tighter.

"Quiet," Roderick instructed while gazing around the halls. No attackers lurched from the empty classrooms; the only threat seemed to be the looming bend in the corridor.

"The horses started it," Randall grumbled.

Godwin turned towards Roderick as their ponies halted a few yards from the end of the hall. "Something got the horses spooked?"

Roderick shook his head and answered, "They're just tired." Roderick pointed at the map and let Godwin lean towards the parchment. "This shows Canterbury should be just around the corner."

Randall scoffed and said, "We'd hear it if a village was right there."

Godwin placed his left hand on the hilt of his Zombie Strike sword. "Dismount and investigate?"

"Indeed," Roderick agreed. He hopped off his horse and tied the reins to the other pony's bit. "Keep watch behind us. Shout if you see anything."

Randall accepted the group's torch from Godwin. With his free hand, he effortlessly unslung his green Dreadbolt Crossbow off his back, chambered a black bolt, and swung it around to watch over the hall they'd just traversed. "I've got this," Randall assured his friends.

Roderick nodded; that loathsome twitch in Randall's voice always dissipated when he was aiming a crossbow. Roderick unsheathed his Marauder blade and raised it towards the ceiling. He couldn't help but stare in awe at the majestic forty inches of sparkling foam. He gripped the red hilt tight and stared at Godwin, who'd readied his own blade.

"On me," Roderick said while approaching the bend in the corridor.

"Always, my lord," Godwin assured him. With that said, the two boys swung around the corridor with blades ready. Nothing but a dozen dark yards greeted them. Godwin sighed and mumbled, "Definitely not Canterbury."

Roderick took a few cautious steps forward. The hallway was sparse, only a single classroom and opposite janitor's closet halfway down the corridor. Roderick had expected the only light to be stray beams from Randall's torch, but a small lantern hung from the ceiling at the corridor's dead end.

"Let's not be so hasty," Roderick told his friend while sidling towards the light. "Could be a secret entrance."

"To an entire village?" Godwin couldn't help but scoff. A surprised look from Roderick caused him to drop his tone. In an offer of conciliation, he said, "Maybe our map leads to more instructions on how to get there. There could be a message."

"Maybe," Roderick agreed. They passed the janitor's closet and classroom - no attackers burst out nor were hidden within. "I didn't read the map wrong."

"I believe you," Godwin promised. "Maybe it was written wrong, though."

Roderick considered this as he craned his neck back towards their horses. "Randall? Still clear?"

"Nothing!" came the fast reply.

Roderick nodded and halted before the hanging lantern. He and Godwin looked all around, there was no message of any kind.

"Very odd," Godwin whispered. "Trap?"

"We'd be dead already," Roderick countered as he rubbed his itching scalp. He began to press on the cement walls, hoping to find a hidden switch.

"There's nothing," Godwin said after a moment. "The map must have been wrong."

"It was supposed to be here," Roderick dragged his palm down the cement; his fingernails strained against the rough rock. "It had to be here."

"If Canterbury exists, we'll find it," Godwin assured him. "On you, my lord."

Roderick took a deep breath, then nodded and shouted, "Coming back!" towards Randall. Roderick and Godwin began the short march back but halted after three steps when Randall didn't reply. "Randall!" Roderick shouted once more. "All clear?"

The only answer was a ceiling tile crashing before their faces. Both boys stumbled backwards just as a thin preteen dropped to the floor. The stranger was clad entirely in black. A loose ebony shirt, tight raven pants, and charcoal leather boots let her blend entirely into the dimly lit hall.

"Who are you?" Roderick cried out while pointing his sword at the stranger. He stared into the woman's bright green eyes, but a black cloth hid her hair and the top half of her face. Only her eyes and lips, devoid of all emotion, stared back at him.

The girl gripped two symmetrical silver and blue swords - one in each palm. As she raised them up, Roderick jabbed his blade towards her. The girl effortlessly parried the blow with her left hand.

"My name is Cindy Vortex," the stranger flourished both her blades, spinning them around her wrist and aiming them towards her two victims. "You should not have come here." A small smile crept over her lips as she added, "Prepare to die."

Roderick and Godwin raised both their longswords and arced them down towards Cindy; she lifted her own swords and caught both blows on her blades. With a swish of her wrists she sent the boys' weapons to the side and quickly jabbed her blades straight towards their chests.

Roderick and Godwin sidestepped Cindy's straight attack. They swung their swords towards her back, but she rolled forwards and underneath their strikes. As she spun along the ground, she sliced her swords at their feet. Both boys jumped over the slashes and tried to stab their swords straight down on her.

Cindy barely rolled past their blades and jumped to her feet. She raised both swords straight up towards the ceiling, ready to parry any blows coming her way. Roderick and Godwin did the same.

"You're quite skilled," Roderick told his foe. His arm shook with anticipation as he watched Cindy connect both her blades together, forming a nearly five-foot long double-sword. "Any chance you'd like to stay the blade and discuss a truce? We're heading to Canterbury and could use -"

Cindy abruptly jabbed her staff at Roderick's heart. Godwin swung his blade down on the center of her weapon, sending it crashing to the floor.

"A pity," Roderick spat while thrusting his blade at Cindy's neck. She shot her head to the side and stared down at her pinned staff. She yanked one of her double blades free, jumped backwards, and waited until her right foot landed on the wall. With perfect timing, she kicked off the cement, spun around, and slashed her sword across Godwin's throat.

"NO!" Roderick roared as Godwin clutched his neck and collapsed to the floor. He wanted to fall to his knees and mourn his friend, to weep over his body and fondly remember the three days' of struggles and fights and laughs and terror they'd shared. But the blade plunging towards his forehead gave him no chance.

Roderick swung his head to the side and madly sliced his blade towards Cindy. She spun away from the blow and sent a horizontal slash aimed at Roderick's waist. He thrust his own weapon down, parrying her strike back towards her.

"You wench!" Roderick roared while flourishing his sword and thrusting towards Cindy's heart. She deflected the blade, but he kicked at just the right time to send her flying into the wall behind her. He slashed towards her throat, yearning to give her the same end as Godwin, but she raised her sword in the nick of time. Foam crushed against foam; the edge of his blade crept towards her neck as he used every ounce of his strength. For the first time, he caught a glint of fear in her eyes.

Cindy managed to push Roderick away, but he elbowed her wrist hard. Her sword clattered to the floor and he swung his blade back at her throat. She gripped his wrist tight; the muscles in her arm bulged and quivered as she realized she couldn't hold him back.

"My name is Roderick Ward," Roderick spat as his own muscles threatened to burst from the effort. His blade crept closer and closer towards the blonde's neck. "You should not have come here."

Cindy kicked up between his legs. Roderick shot his own knee up and blocked her blow. He shoved harder against Cindy, and the foam halted a millimeter from her skin. "Prepare to die."

Roderick prepared to give one last push towards Cindy's death just as a loud Whoosh! rang through the hall. Roderick felt a sharp thud against his left thigh. He let the leg collapse and stumbled down to one knee.

Cindy took this opportunity to push his wrist away. He clumsily swung at her, but she ducked beneath the blade and fluidly scooped up her own sword. She kept spinning, raised the blade high, and crashed it down onto Roderick's right arm.

Roderick dropped his sword and let his dead limb hang limply beside him. He swung his left arm towards the clattering weapon, but Cindy simply stabbed his left shoulder with her blade. Roderick collapsed onto the ground and watched as another raven-clad figure walked down the hall. This boy loaded a new bolt into what used to be Randall's crossbow, swung the priming lever, and leveled the weapon at Roderick's chest.

"For what it's worth," Cindy said pointing her blade at Roderick's heart, "this is a pity."

"At least I die with honor, for my friends." Roderick swallowed his fear and hid all but a slight tremor from his voice. "What do you live for?"

Cindy hesitated, but another Whoosh! sent a final bolt slamming into Roderick's heart. He closed his eyes and let his last breath drift through the silent halls.

Cindy stared down at the dead boy before her. Silence hung in the halls for a long moment, then she turned towards the boy in black beside her. "That was my kill."

The boy took off his black mask and revealed perfectly coiffed obsidian hair. Nick Dean shrugged and said, "You hesitated."

"Did not," Cindy argued while walking over to Godwin and picking up her second dropped sword.

"Did so," Nick shot back.

Cindy scoffed and attached her two blades back into a large staff. "As long as we're criticizing, thanks for the speedy assist," she snapped. "How long does it take to kill one idiot on a horse?"

"About ten seconds," Nick shot back with a wry grin. He pointed at the crossbow and went on, "But the first bolt I tried to shoot jammed. We shouldn't rely on this one."

Cindy shook her head and started searching Godwin's body for more weapons or food. "You could have run over with a knife."

"Please," Nick argued while doing the same with Roderick. "It was only two-on-one. I've seen you take four."

Cindy shoved Godwin's body aside; he carried nothing of value save for his sword. "Anything?" Cindy asked.

Nick still knelt over Roderick's' body. He dangled the crossbow behind him. "Nothing. Save for that." He stood back up and faced his comrade. "And this," he handed Cindy the map Roderick was certain had lead to his salvation.

Cindy stared down at the cracked parchment. "How many of these are there?"

"Gotta be a ton," Nick answered while slinging the crossbow over his shoulder. He scooped up Roderick's longsword, bobbed it up and down to get a sense of its weight, and decided it would serve him well. "Too bad the kid who made them was a better cartographer than swordsman."

Cindy leaned against her staff and studied the map. It had been two days since she and Nick had followed a different copy towards this very spot, since they had been ambushed. They'd barely survived the attack, but before they could recover and leave another group had shown up. After Cindy and Nick had dispatched that unfortunate trio, they'd realized they may have stumbled upon a prime location to set up shop.

She stared back at Roderick's peaceful form. "It really was a shame," she told Nick. "They knew how to fight."

"Not well enough," Nick countered. He led Cindy back towards the bend in the hall and pointed past Randall's crumpled body, towards the two horses patiently awaiting their masters' return. "What do we do with them?" Nick asked.

Cindy realized that was an excellent question. "We can't keep them here," she answered. "Noise will ruin the ambush."

Nick nodded but countered, "They're a heck a prize to cut loose."

To their knowledge, there were only three horses in the whole school. Cindy turned back towards Roderick. How had he managed to acquire two of them?

"We could use them," Cindy offered.

Nick sighed at the resurgence of their days-old debate. "You really want to leave this place?"

"I don't like graveyards," Cindy shot back. "Besides, we've taken out, what? Two dozen people? That's a drop in the bucket. There's gotta be hundreds of kids left in play. It'll take forever to thin them out this way."

"But it's working for us," Nick countered.

"Barely," Cindy motioned back at Roderick. "You weren't the one a hair away from a slashed throat."

Nick scoffed and shook his head. "So what do you want to do? Go back on the road and try to find Canterbury?"

"It's how we found this place," Cindy said. "Maybe it's how we discover somewhere better."

Nick turned away and stared down the pitch-black halls. "There's nothing better than this, Cindy. There's no Canterbury."

"How do you know that?" Cindy asked.

"Because how could a peaceful settlement survive in this?" He motioned around the dead school, down at Randall.

Cindy hesitated and fought back a wave of guilt. "The River did."

"And how long did that last?" Nick asked. He cringed as Cindy dropped her gaze to the floor. "I'm just saying it took five hours for that to fall apart. You really think somewhere in this building there's a thriving civilization? That some kid's held it together for days?"

Cindy respected Nick enough to deeply ponder his question. She'd seen the horrors of war. Cindy stared at her double-sword, then back towards Roderick and Godwin. Hell, she thought, I'm one of them. Maybe that was why she needed to believe that out in the halls there was someplace, and someone, better.

"I do," Cindy answered.

Nick rubbed his chin. "You know I'll follow you anywhere, right?"

Cindy smiled and once more answered, "I do."

Nick shrugged. "Then what the hell. You have any idea where to go?"

Cindy nodded and started inspecting the ponies' satchel bags. A smile crept over her face as she realized it was full of salted mutton. Another bag was loaded with sheepskins of water. "The last group we killed, one of them mentioned how the map seemed wrong. He said that he'd heard Canterbury was on the third floor."

Nick couldn't hide the skepticism from his face, but he said, "Then let's check it out." He climbed atop of Randall's horse.

Cindy scooped up Randall's torch, still blazing away. She handed Nick her double-sword and seated herself on Roderick's steed.

Nick motioned at the barren school before them. "On you, m'lady."

Cindy nodded and held the torch out before her. Without another word, she kicked her horse in the ribs and felt it lurch forward. With each step, the torch's light spread and fought back more of the darkness.