9 Awakening Part 3

Mr. Henderson latches his right arm beneath Noe's knees and the other around his shoulder, letting Noe's head rest on his clavicle. Walking out of the cafeteria where whispers follow his every step, he places him down in the infirmary where the softest beds in the whole institute are installed.

Flaying a blanket from off the bed in the next rectangle, he tucks it beneath Noe's injured arm.

Inspecting his work, he realizes that all the blood that had stained the bandages seems to have evaporated. Noe's wound is completely healed.

Mr. Hederson's eyes drift onto Noe's face in wonder, stunned curiosity, and worry. Gently shaking his head, a smile plays across his face and he turns around to leave. A hot hand wraps around the tips of his fingers. Even in sleep, Noe longs for him.

A stool is brought across the small cubicle lined in turquoise sheets and Mr. Henderson sits upon it. Knowing Noe shall sleep for a while, and that he has no more classes to attend, he leans on a vacant part of the blanket, lays his head on his arm, and rests next to him. The school nurse is nowhere in sight. A comfortable peace encircles the room as the two sleep.

Noe is the first to awake.

Feeling gentle pressure on the side of his abdomen, under the quiet sunset painted in the large window on the infirmary wall, he turns his neck.

Upon seeing Mr. Henderson's black hair nudging his stomach, his eyes burst into radiant happiness. Calm overcomes his senses. He relaxes all of his muscles.

The ghosts followed them into the room. Sprawled across the plane, a few stand, swaying to and fro, with one aimlessly bumping into the nurse's desk. Noe's half-lidded gaze does not waver in the slightest.

However, though it was not raining, Noah still built the ark.

Although Noe was at peace, disaster still planned to strike.

A sudden agitation erupts amongst the ghosts. They begin to sprint, crashing into each other and pulling away their own flesh. Hundreds more ghosts imminently crash through the door and form a circle around Noe, grunting, groaning, and knawing their black teeth together.

The ground begins to quake. Fearing the worst, Noe taps Mr. Henderson's shoulder to ensure he is able to protect himself. He believes an earthquake is fast approaching.

"Nehruma," the ghosts begin to whisper as they sway in unison, loose, grey clothing leaning, arms limp, eyes terrified.

As Mr. Henderson awakes, he gasps and sits up.

A thump is heard in the distance. A ripple passes through the establishment.

Half a minute later, another thump, much louder and intimidating, burgeons. The school's walls lean.

BOOM!

Students begin to yell and shout as they stream into the halls.

"Get back to your rooms! It's past roaming hours! Silence!" Sir Renner bellows but his voice tumbles into deaf ears.

That is because a foot as colossal as Noah's ark has materialized a meter away from the establishment. Composed of tiny, devilish minions with extended ears, maroon-colored flesh, and puny, beady eyes, gush out of the foot's structure, cascading in Noe and Mr. Henderson's direction. Black talons wait to plunge into bone and yank out intestines.

Mr. Henderson is stunned. In all his past life of delinquency, he had never encountered such a gobsmacking and truly life-threatening event. No school protocol covered 'Monster Attack'.

Noe regards the situation with stoicism. Needles, syringes, and bandages clatter onto the floor as he hands Mr. Hederson two nursing trays stacked atop each other.

"Mr. Henderson, we have to go. Use these when necessary," he pulls Mr. Henderson off the stool as his school shirt sheds away to reveal a sculpted chest and fine-lined abdominal muscle.

As if commanded, the ghosts form a barricade between the monsters marching onward and the two living staring toward them in agitation and determination.

As they rush out of the infirmary, the monsters' footsteps pierce the glass. Ghosts shriek. Glass shatters.

Shards brush past Noe's ear as he shields Mr. Henderson's body with his own. Noe violently shuts the door as a wave of monsters crash into it.

"Follow me. I know a safe place to go," Mr. Henderson grabs Noe's hand and they sprint up a nearby staircase. Lines of brick after brick fly past them as students run in the same direction.

The door to the infirmary shatters as they arrive at a hallway lined by tiny, metallic cells. Mr. Henderson leads them to one at the farthest end of the hall and says, "Stay in here and keep the door locked. There is no safer or stronger place to stay than in here."

No windows line the walls; only merciless surfaces.

Mr. Henderson stops.

"You're not coming in?" Noe asks.

"I have to ensure everyone has evacuated to this place. Remain in here," Mr. Henderson instructs and peers around the hall as doors hinge shut.

"Please, stay," Noe pleads and lightly pulls Mr. Henderson's arm into the stifling, lightless room. Mr. Henderson looks back at Noe for a moment. Noe's eyes are almost glowing.

"I can't." Mr. Henderson pulls his arm away and convictedly hurls the door closed.

Blackness surrounds Noe as heavyweight fear sits on his head and heart, curling his throat into a straw. He hears Mr. Henderson's footsteps fade.

Attempting to wrench the door open, something keeps it in place. Noe did not hear Mr. Henderson place anything against the knob.

Suddenly, it dawns on him. Noe must fight against the power of Mr. Henderson's command.

Monsters emitting gurgles and hearty chortles ignite Noe's purpose: He must save Mr. Henderson. His eyelids flutter closed.

Inhaling sharply, Noe lets all that floods his mind, from thoughts of Veren to the millions of 'NEHRUMA' screaming in repeat, and places his palm onto the metal door. As he exhales, he pushes all his fear and pain out through his skin.

An evil scent fills the air as sulfurous gas is released.

Opening his eyes, he is shocked by the glowing, burning, orange-red metal that is melting beneath his touch.

Desire to leave the confinement the world had put him in under the term 'autistic', power propels itself into Noe's limbs for the first time. A sense of purpose builds up in his throat. Raising his other hand onto the metal, he releases the tension.

"AHHHHHHH!"

The door flings across the hallway, explodes through the brick, flies out into the atmosphere, and lands among a green pasture long past the fences of Sympathy.

Night has fallen yet light streams through the opening as Noe wastes no time bounding out the prison cell.

He returns the way they came.

Two trays stacked atop each other lie on the floor at the foot of the barrage. Hundreds, no, thousands of monsters piled onto each other populate the hall forming a suffocating circle. Shiny black talons bared, they point towards Mr. Henderson and the unconscious Jinn lying in his arms. Mr. Henderson descends onto his knees, body covering Jinn's, head bowed in prayer.

Observing the scene from above, Noe's breaths are released in pants of fury. Catastrophic triggers set off alarms that blare against his skull. Mutation bubbles through him.

Like a demon of destruction, Noe snaps.

Vision blurs and dissipates.

When he comes to, he is no longer watching the scene but is at its epicenter, soaking in a pool of purple blood, maroon cadavers strewn across the ground. Every centimeter of the hall is covered in gore - except for Mr. Henderson, whose eyes, wide-blown in astonishment... and horror, are captivated by Noe's neck.

Looking down at himself, Noe sees thousands of black feathers have sprouted out from his own flesh. They tingle at the root and shudder as he breathes, as if leaves clinging to a tree in winter. Blood coats his every morsel.

Ghosts jump onto the scene, yelling, "NEHRUMA," as they come.

Springing his now grey fingertips onto his neck, Noe perceives what feels like the head of a purple hyacinth wrapped around it, its ribbon-like strands interlocking and jetting as if growing from his voice box.

Touching his face, porcelain-smooth, painted by blood, marble skin appears unbreakable.

Something within him has awakened.