A/N- Thanks for the continued support. WARNING- this chapter is dark and twisty. Leave a review, I really appreciate all of those of you who take the time to read this and leave a little note :).
"Lie to yourself until it's true."
― Jodi Picoult, Nineteen Minutes
(October 17, 2014. 7:48 AM)
Santana thrashed wildly, kicking out behind her, trying to bite the strong hand clamped over her mouth. It was her fight for survival and she would not lose. Her legs hit the wall, the door, an empty bucket, and finally-
"Ouch!" A familiar voice groaned when Santana finally felt her foot connect with something solid, "San, you need to calm the fuck down!" The voice hissed.
Instantly, her arms fell to her sides and she was released, whipping around to glare at the owner of the voice in the darkness, "Puck?"
"The one and only." He replied with a slight chuckle. He was just a dark figure in the black of the closet, but his presence made Santana feel better instantly.
It didn't stop her from reaching out and landing a solid smack to where his chest ought to be, "What the hell is wrong with you? I thought you were the shooter! Don't you know better than to sneak up on people in a time like this?"
"Shh!" He interrupted, gently pushing Santana aside to lay his head against the door and listen for any sound from the hallway, "Do you want him to know where we are?"
"Not really, I want to get back out there and find Quinn!" Santana pushed against his shoulder, and tried to shove her way out the door. She was stopped easily by Puck, "Get out of the way Puckerman."
A staccato of gunfire came before Puck's reply, "No way. You go out there and you're never coming back. Just wait, I promise we'll be out there and gangbusting in no time. We just need a plan first."
"This is ridiculous! Why were you even hiding in this closet to begin with?" The Latina huffed, overturning the bucket she had kicked in her haste to escape Puck's grasp, and dropping to sit on the hard plastic.
"When all this shit started going down, I was in the hallway," He began, sliding down the door until he was sitting on the floor.
"Late for class no doubt." Santana filled in.
"Do you want to hear my story or not?"
The brunette groaned, "What I want is to get the hell out of this closet and find Quinn."
Puck finally registered what Santana was saying, and he blanched- grateful Santana couldn't see it in the dark, "Weren't all the cheerleaders in the gym together rehearsing?"
"How would you know that?"
"I saw you all in there."
"Perv. But Britt and I left before this all started, Quinn was still in there."
Puck took a steadying breath, things could be worse, "Q will be alright, she's the strongest girl I know. We don't even know if the shooter went in the gym."
"He did." Santana whispered, "When I was coming in the school, again this girl- she said that the Cheerios were dead. All of them."
The boy silently digested the information, resting his elbows on his knees, and dropping his head into his hands, "We need to go, we need to find Quinn."
"Finally, we're on the same page."
(August 2028)
"Do we really have to send her to school this year?" Rachel asked for the dozenth time. It was Sunday evening, 10:30 on Sunday evening actually, and Rachel had been asking the same question for the past two months ever since they had registered their daughter for her first year of real school in Kindergarten. Rachel was so preoccupied with and afraid of this event that she had been absolutely horrible at rehearsal for the last week.
Her wife rolled over from where she had been trying to sleep.
"We can't exactly keep her out of school forever, Rach."
"But why not?" The brunette sat up suddenly, struck by a brilliant idea, "We can homeschool! With my hours at the theatre I can be home during the day sometimes, and you're actually a teacher! This could totally work."
"Honey, no it can't." She sat up and drew Rachel's hands between her own, "What happened to us, you know that it doesn't always happen. We survived something horrible, and we came out stronger the other side." She ran a hand through the brunette's hair and continued in her softest tone, "We did everything we could for Spencer. We live in the best school district in the state, you've already met with the principal. Tomorrow everything is going to be fine."
Rachel huffed a sigh and flopped back down, "Fine. But I refuse to be happy about this."
Her wife smiled and cuddled behind the diva, "You and I both know that once you get Spencer in her first day of school dress you'll be more excited than she will be."
(15 years after, December 2029)
An excerpt from 'An Hour in Hell: the survivors' story'
Hurricanes, train wrecks, natural disasters, and unnatural disasters you can't go through one of these events without becoming closer with the people you went through it with.
School shootings fall into that category.
The students of William McKinley high school have never been closer than were November third when we finally went back to school. The hallways had been thoroughly photographed, catalogued, and cleaned since the tragedy and Monday was the first day we were allowed back in the building. It was this huge controversy, sending us back to the school where it all happened was simply nowhere else large enough to house us all.
Students flowed through the doors like injured soldiers returning from battle. Some were on crutches, many had bandages, bruises, scars. But our injuries were not all so superficial.
Shortly after the first bell rang and everyone was sitting in the same classes we had been on the day it happened, (many of those classes had empty seats), the intercom crackled. The tension was palpable as many students feared the worst, flashing back to two and a half weeks ago.
This time though Principal Figgin's voice was calm as he welcomed the students back and reiterated all the procedures in place to make the school safer than ever.
No matter how much bleach those crime scene techs used after they were done collecting evidence, those of us who had been in the school after the initial shots could always see where the pools of blood had congealed under our dead classmates.
(October 17, 2014. 7:50)
Slowly, Quinn opened one eye, then the other. Blinking away the black at the edges of her vision, Quinn sat up carefully. She was very aware of the pounding in her head and suspected that she had a concussion, reaching up to soothe her temple, Quinn jolted as her hand came away bloody.
It was then that she registered the sticky dampness that ran from her right temple all the way down her cheek. She thought she might throw up.
Looking to her left, Quinn had to cover her mouth to keep from actually throwing up. Lying motionless beside her was Maria, her base since freshman year, in a pool of deep red which stained her uniform. Quinn pushed up onto her knees and looked around her, in the gymnasium was a number of other girls like Maria. All Cheerios in their uniforms, and all motionless in dark red stains.
Quinn jumped to her feet and the world swam around her. She turned and retched, heaving and throwing up everything in her stomach.
She surveyed the girls as what had happened became apparent to her. Quinn carefully walked among her former teammates, looking at the familiar faces and searching for two in particular. But she found neither.
She counted eight girls sprawled on the ground. Some Cheerios had escaped.
As she was trying to formulate a plan, a sound to Quinn's left drew her attention. It was a raspy breath drawn in with great difficulty. Quinn hurried over to the form it had come from.
It was Jennie, a freshman who had just joined the squad. Quinn remembered just last week when Jennie had finally mastered her first backflip. Now she was holding both hands to a dark splotch in her uniform top where her lung would be. Blood was seeping between her slackening fingers.
Quinn took over applying quick pressure, she nearly recoiled her hands when warm blood flowed easily between her hands. Jennie blinked before focusing on the blonde's face, "Quinn." She rasped out.
"Shh, don't try to talk."
A gunshot drew both girl's attention. It sounded as though it were from the other end of the school.
"Am I going to die?" Jennie asked between ragged breaths.
Quinn's eyes grew quickly damp, even as she shook her head she knew judging from the paleness of the girl's face and the copious amounts of blood on Quinn and the floor that her chances weren't good. So she lied, "Of course not. You're going to be fine, Jennie. And I'm going to stay right here with you."
"And we'll make it out of this?"
"Yes, Jennie, we'll make it out." Quinn readjusted her hands so she could apply more pressure, "Does that hurt?"
Jennie blearily furrowed her brow, "No, I haven't been able to feel anything for a while now. That's good right Quinn?"
Tears freely fell down the blonde's face. This girl was fourteen, Quinn remembered from one of the team sleepovers she had two younger brothers, "Yeah, Jennie, it's good."
They both knew Quinn was lying.
Silence drew out between the two of them, it was broken by another burst of gunshots, "You should go Quinn. You can make it out."
The captain shook her head vehemently, "No, I'm not going to leave you here alone." Jennie had brilliant blonde hair and air of confidence that rivaled Quinn's. Some of the seniors had even taken to calling her 'Mini Q' because of the strong resemblance.
"Will you pray with me?"
Quinn nodded, she wrecked her brain for the appropriate words and took a breath to begin, but before she did, she removed her hands from the wound and reached up to remove the golden cross that had hung around her neck since she was eight. She fastened the necklace around Jennie and the freshman grasped the small cross with one hand. Quinn gently drew Jennie's head onto her lap and brushed some hair out of her face as she began praying. Her hands were completely soaked in blood which she tried to wipe on her uniform but couldn't quite get it all off.
She prayed for a few minutes until Jennie's labored breathing drew to a stop and Quinn carefully stood up. She was completely covered in blood at this point and if she hadn't thrown up earlier, she was sure that she would now.
A gunshot from closer than before pulled her to the present and she took off towards the locker rooms behind the gym.
A/N- I'm sorry.