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Collinsport was a quiet town; it was entirely uneventful, driven by tradition and order. It was the kind of place where nothing ever happened, and no one expected it to. But Blackwater college, was soon to find itself the site of a most unusual occurrence, surfacing as such terrors often do, in the seemingly most innocent and unlikely of places.
At only sixteen or seventeen years old, the sixth form students began trickling into the classroom, a cacophony of seats scraping against ages-old linoleum as they settled, dropped their belongings and dragged their textbooks from their bags. Thud after thud of heavy books against the wooden desks, and the soft murmur of students milling about their morning lessons before their professor arrived.
Mr. Allen was never a very punctual person, infamous at the school for being one of the few precious classes where the students were given a short reprieve, the minutes ticking by before he arrived. When he did, it was almost always in a flurry, dropping a suitcase into the corner by his desk and rushing about like being tardy was an oddity for him. It was the same thing every morning, a routine built in a town of routines, and as Mr. Allen took to the head of the class and beamed down at the tired, uninterested students before him, things were the same as they ever had been.
"Good morning, class. Welcome to human math." There was a pause, and he cleared his throat, giving the children a beaming, empty smile. "I mean maths."
It was early in the morning, most of his students sluggish and desperately wishing they could go back to sleep - some even considering it right then and there. His remark got little response, except for one odd look and the most mechanical of formalities, echoed by the class like a hive mind, a boring routine they had resigned themselves to from the first day of class.
"Good morning, Mr. Allen."
The room was dark - which didn't do anything for the students desperately trying to keep their eyes open - as Mr. Allen set up the projector. There was a lesson plan, sure, but as he shuffled through the laminate cards, he couldn't help but let his mind wander. The numbers and words that stared up at him meant nothing, weren't important and never would be. The only thing that he could focus on was how hungry he was. It felt like he hadn't eaten in days. How he was supposed to focus on teaching a class full of children on an empty stomach like this?
But he hadn't had the chance to eat yet. All he could do was smile and try to suppress the rumbling that came deep from his abdomen. He knew he was going to suffer through class first; that was simply how it was, here. Neither students nor teachers were free to eat when they pleased, and the longer Mr. Allen suffered through such a strict schedule, the more he found he despised it.
His focus was elsewhere, and while he straightened the morning warm up onto the projector, bringing it into focus against the screen, he could feel his stomach shift and protest. He wet his lips, swallowed thickly, and let his hunger run away with him.
"Today we'll start class by learning about the torso." His voice was soft and velvety as he spoke, and the sound of enough to send a chill up your spine. There was something wistful about it, about the way he let his attention wander for a moment as he scanned across the classroom, taking in every aspect of the room, the students in the dim light of the projector.
There was a hand raised, and Mr. Allen's attention snapped back like a rubber band against his skin, discipline returning to his eyes as he squared his shoulders. "Yes! Mr. Bouchard! Your question?"
Barnabas Bouchard was a bright young man who sat in the second-to-front row, never afraid to ask questions, never afraid to participate in the class and almost always, indisputably right. Maths was his strong suit, and he was always at his most confident in Mr. Allen's class.
"Mr. Allen, weren't we supposed to be learning polynomials today?"
There was a groan of disappointment from the class behind him. There was always the one student who would remind the professor what they were supposed to be doing, and somehow it always seemed to be Barnabas.
"Ah, yes! Polynomials. Yes, you're right." His voice fell flat, unenthused and distracted as he went back to the projector, straightening the sheet once more, utterly too particular about its placement, intent on giving his hands something to do as he sorted through his own thoughts.
"Alright, class. Let's get started with these problems. You have ten minutes, and I want you all to show your work this time - Victoria."
There was a snicker throughout the class that quickly faded, replaced by a ringing silence that was only cut by the soft scratching of two dozen pencils against their papers. Class was in session.
"You don't think that Mr. Allen was acting strange this morning?" He couldn't help but feel the instinctive urge to keep his voice down, even among the hustle and bustle of the halls as they all shuffled to their next classes from lunch. Barnabas hadn't seen Victoria at all since their morning class together, and he was eager to have a sounding board, someone that might be able to validate him. Mr. Allen was nowhere to be seen, but there was this awful feeling crawling up his back, like a thousand beetles creeping towards his neck, little pinpricks that he couldn't seem to shake.
Victoria frowned as he whispered so low, she had to lean in just to hear him. "What's gotten into you today?" She had no such reservations about her volume, and Barnabas flinched. "I can barely hear you, speak up Barnabas!"
He glanced around, and repeated himself, only daring to raise his voice a single decibel. "You didn't think Mr. Allen was acting... strange, this morning?"
She snorted. "Not any more than usual, no."
Mr. Allen had never been the most conventional teacher. Always a bit eccentric and never really all there in the mornings, not unlike his students. But Barnabas had known Mr. Allen for some time, and what happened this morning was just too unusual, even for him. He couldn't get the sound of the man's voice out of his head, the distracted, wistful words he'd let slip during the morning. Something about it just didn't sit right with him.
"He tried to teach us about the torso, today. In maths."
"So he's been spending too much time in the science hall." She leaned in now, hushing her voice with a smile. "If you ask me, I think he fancies Ms. Collins."
"Ms. Collins..." he echoed, his attention wandering elsewhere as he realized that Victoria wasn't going to listen to him; he couldn't blame her, in a way. He had no idea what had been so peculiar about their professor this morning. It was there, but he couldn't put his finger on it. Just the odd behavior itself was enough to arouse suspicion in the boy, but there was something more, something deeper that Barnabas couldn't name. Something sinister, perhaps, but it didn't make sense. The man had been as pleasant and cordial as he ever was. He had no real reason to believe that there was anything untowards about the man except for his spotty personality.
"Did you see the way he looked at her during lunch? Couldn't keep his eyes off her."
Barnabas couldn't have really cared less about whatever forbidden romance story Victoria had constructed in her head. Two classrooms, both alike in dignity, In fair Collinsport, where we lay our scene. He almost snorted, a moment of reprieve amongst the mounting anxiety of the day.
He waved off the idea with a sigh. "I can see you're taking this very seriously."
"There's nothing to take seriously, Barney. Mr. Allen is just as he always was. Preoccupied, eccentric, silly old Mr. Allen. I don't understand why you're suddenly being so paranoid."
There was the brash chirp of the school bell, and the sudden cacophony of students all making a rush to reach their next class, not wanting to be late. Barnabas was eager to get today over with and go home. He knew already he wasn't going to be able to focus on any dusty old literature. His head felt fuzzy, his skin prickling since the first class of the day.
Victoria's class was one hall down, and she had gotten very good at rushing, always punctual within mere seconds. "I'll see you tomorrow, Barnabas. Try not to lose your head today!" She flashed him a grin, bright and beaming as he looked on, watching her go.
His shoulders slumped and he let out a breath, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes and groaning deeply. He was sure of it. He was sure of it, but he didn't know how to articulate it. "Fine," he grumbled, and something clicked. "What do you mean tomorrow? Aren't I seeing you on the way home?"
"Barnabas, you dunce, this is the third time I've told you! I've got tutoring on Wednesdays with Ms. Collins, now."
"Right, right - failing science." He hiked his bag further up his shoulder. More great news.
"If don't get my grade up by the end of the semester I'm not going to pass. Perhaps I could have benefitted from Mr. Allen's lesson on the torso, after all!" She gave him an amused smile, and he couldn't help but feel mocked. "Shame. Either way, she says I can be raised to a B if I do well on my benchmark, and I really need to pass this class. I'm sorry, but I'll see you tomorrow!"
Victoria didn't wait for his argument - because she knew he'd have one. She packed up her belongings, shoving books and papers and pencils into her bag and trying to prepare herself for what would arguably be the longest night of her life. There was nothing she despised more than science.
"Goodnight, Ms. Collins! Thank you again!" Victoria tried to hurry the pleasantries as quickly as possible. It wasn't that she didn't like Mrs. Collins, per se, but she was a bit of an exhausting woman who talked too fast and wore too much perfume. It made concentrating much harder than it should have been, and she'd gone over the same concept over and over.
The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell.
The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell.
The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell.
She was fairly certain, at this point, that that phrase was drilled into her head for the rest of time, but she supposed that was sort of the point, wasn't it? At least she wouldn't get that wrong when she took her test.
Stepping outside of the school was - quite literally - a breath of fresh air. It was cool and crisp in the evening, and the last vestiges of sunlight were struggling to hold onto the horizon. It felt good to finally stretch her legs, sitting in the same sort of cramped school desk all day, moving from one to the next for eight hours straight. At this point in the day, the walk home was more than welcomed.
She did wish, though, that it was just a bit lighter out. The street lamps began flickering on around her as the night settled in, and she yawned, shoes pattering against the blacktop with every step. Step, step, step, and the monotony of the sound echoed in her ears. She found herself counting along with them, stepping in a steady rhythm as she went. Step, step, step. The fall of her heel against the ground, the toe of her shoe tapping just a beat behind.
The sound was easy enough to drown out during the day - the campus was swarming with students, all walking and chattering and causing a din that masked the sound of her own footsteps. But now she was leaving on her own, heading home long after the other students had all returned home, and it was starkly different. The din was gone and the campus was quiet, nothing but birds, her own footfalls, and the footfalls that had fallen into step behind her.
Victoria felt a chill run up her spine, goosebumps rising against the back of her neck as her breath caught in her throat and her heart stopped in her chest. There was a spike of fear, the rush of adrenaline as she spun to face her attacker, ready to beat them to death with her bag, gripped tightly with both fists so that she could swing it from her shoulder--
"Oh!"
"Everything okay, Miss Hoffman?"
She let out her breath in a huff, letting the tension release from her shoulders as her fists loosed from her strap. "Oh, yes, sir. My apologies. I - ha, I thought you were someone else. A stranger, perhaps."
"Well - then it's a good thing it's just me. I didn't mean to startle you."
"No - no of course you didn't." Victoria cleared her throat. "I suppose the dark just has me a little skittish, is all. I'm not used to walking home on my own quite this late. I had to stay after school for tutoring, you see, and Mrs. Collins hasn't left the building yet, I don't believe. I'm expected back home soon, so I couldn't wait for her to leave with me." There was a pause, and she let out a breathy, nervous little laugh. "I don't mean to hold you up, you must be eager to get home, too."
"Well, I'd be happy to walk you, if it'd make you feel a bit safer."
Victoria felt a disproportionate sense of relief when the offer was made. She didn't mean to be a nuisance, but with the night falling fast, she knew she certainly would feel much safer were she to have an escort home. She was barely seventeen, small, and alone. It would make anyone at least a little paranoid. But walking home with someone she knew - someone kind, trustworthy, and mostly responsible - was an invaluable assurance that she'd make it home safe and sound.
"Yes - yes, please, I would appreciate that very much." She wrung the strap of her bag between her hands, knowing that she was being a bother but too nervous to turn down the security that an escort would bring.
"My pleasure, Ms. Hoffman. Come along, then. It's been a long day for the both of us, and I'm dreadfully hungry."
Victoria Hoffman hadn't missed a single day of school since she was six. Barnabas knew this, because she was constantly lording it over him. He was a bright student, of course, his marks just as good as hers (better, if you're counting science) but he was rather spotty on his own attendance. He was the type of child who, throughout his life, had managed to contract every single disease that had ever made the rounds through the school. He got the flu one year - twice. Back-to-back! Surely she didn't expect him to come to school through all that. But he'd never let it affect his grades.
Victoria, on the other hand, simply refused to miss school.
Which is why, when the bell for their first class rang, marking any straggling students tardy to their morning class, and Victoria's seat was still empty, Barnabas couldn't help but stare. It felt like a cold absence, something not quite right about seeing her seat empty, not after twelve years of school together, seeing her sitting in the same seats every day as they progressed through their levels together.
"The greatest common factor for a polynomial is the largest monomial that is a factor of - that divides - each term of the polynomial." There was a faint tick-tick-tick on the blackboard as Mr. Allen cracked the chalk against the board with every sharp stroke. "If we're trying to find the greatest common factor for thirty-x-squared plus five-x-squared minus twenty-five-x, we first have to ask ourselves - are you paying attention?"
It was just another thing weighing on his mind, knowing that Victoria wasn't here today. He felt strangely vulnerable, without having Victoria to confide in. The day felt no less uncomfortable than yesterday had; even if Mr. Allen wasn't acting so unusual, even if that strange cold dread had disappeared from the man's aura, he still couldn't help but feel like something was very, very wrong. Barnabas couldn't remember ever being so horrifically paranoid like this. It wasn't like him at all! So why, this week -
"Are you paying attention, Mr. Bouchard?"
His attention snapped up to the front of the room, and if he pretended hard enough, he might even be able to convince himself that Victoria was still sitting right behind him, that her seat wasn't so unusually empty.
"Y-- uh, yes, sir."
"Brilliant. Let's try to keep it that way, hmm?"
There was a soft chuckle; Barnabas was not amused.
In fact, things remained uneasy throughout the day. He expected things to turn around once he was out of Mr. Allen's class, but once he was free of maths, things just seemed to get worse. Barnabas knew, logically, that Victoria wasn't there that day, but he was a creature of habit, expecting her in their lunch block. When she didn't show up, he was surprised, of course - and why shouldn't he be! She was there every single day. It was like waking up one morning and finding that the sky was no longer blue.
The final bell came, and the day just felt wrong. There was something inherently wrong about not seeing Victoria at school. He'd tried to shake it, but the overhanging expectation kept pitching him forward, like missing a step in the dark. Finally, he'd be free of the campus, able to go home and check up on her. If she'd missed a day of school, it was more than just a cold, and he hated to think about the possibilities. Were her parents okay? Had their home burned down? Had they been shuffled into the Protected Persons Service and had to leave the country under a new identity?
Okay, well, maybe he was getting a little ahead of himself - but it was a possibility!
Still, at the end of the day he found himself walking mechanically through the halls, all habit as he made his way to Victoria's last class. They always walked home together, and he always met her outside of her last class.
He knew it was a little foolish, but he went anyway, on the off chance that maybe she'd arrived after lunch block, for her classes later in the day. He figured it would be awful rude for him to just leave without at least checking to see if she was there waiting for him.
Barnabas Bouchard shouldered his bag, leaning against the classroom doorway and glancing inside, trying to stay out of the way of the two dozen students making a mad rush for the door now that school was out for the day. He waited, and watched each student passing, keen eyes trying to spot out his friend, a shock of red hair that set her apart from the passing crowd easily. If she'd passed him, he wouldn't miss it, surely, but as the students all filed out of Ms. Collins' final class, Victoria was nowhere to be seen.
"Afternoon, Mr. Bouchard!" The woman chirped; with no one to tutor, she too was packing up to go home. "I'm afraid Victoria isn't here today, if that's who you're looking for." She was a cheerful woman, all smiles and tight curls that bounced when she spoke with too much enthusiasm. Her eyes lit up, and Barnabas frowned slightly, noticing her gaze go off-focus, falling just past his shoulder.
"And hello to you, too!"
There was a sudden grip at his shoulder, and Barnabus' heart sank to around his knees, chest filling with ice-cold dread as Mr. Allen spoke, quiet and somber. "Mr. Bouchard. You're not in trouble, but I'm afraid I need to have a word with you."
He shrugged off his hand, turning sharply. There was something about having his back to his professor that made him feel sick. "A-about... what, exactly?"
Mr. Allen paused, looking up to Ms. Collins. "I'm sorry, Colleen, do you mind if I borrow Mr. Bouchard, for a moment?"
"Oh!" She gave a start, and began to bustle around her desk, gathering her things quickly. "No, no, don't mind me! I'll be out of your hair in just a mo." She laughed, straightening out her skirt and standing. "I was just on my way out, actually. You two have a good day, won't you?" She slid past them, beaming a smile up at Mr. Allen before she, too, closed the door behind her and disappeared down the hallway.
Barnabas was suddenly very aware of how empty the school was.
His stomach flipped and his heart sat uncomfortably, ready to flee from his chest at a moment's notice. He didn't know why he was so afraid of Mr. Allen. The man had done nothing wrong, he tried to convince himself. His paranoia was completely unfounded, completely irrational; so Mr. Allen had been acting a little weird these past few days, that was no reason for Barnabas to jump to such drastic conclusions.
Still, he couldn't help but feel weak in the shoulders. Irrational fear was a tough thing to shake, and it was all he could do in that moment to take a deep breathe and steeled himself for a stressful conversation. "What's the matter, Mr. Allen?" His voice was tentative, and it was abundantly clear that he didn't really particularly want to know. He would be very content to just leave, go home, transfer schools, literally anything but stand here with Mr. Allen in an empty classroom.
His head tipped slowly, looking down at the student with empty eyes set behind a look of concern. "Why, didn't you hear? Poor, poor miss Hoffman..." Victoria. His blood ran cold, and without Mr. Allen saying anything more, he felt a creeping sense of sick rising in his chest, the taste of bile as his stomach revolted against him. "She was found last night, no more than a block away. They say that her body had been hollowed out. Everything inside her, just gone, with no sign of struggle nor incisions. Terrible, it's just terrible." He shook his head, tisking.
Indeed they were. Or, rather, they had been. Barnabus felt that sick vertigo creeping in on him as his head swam. Victoria, who he'd talked with no more than twenty four hours ago, was dead. Victoria, who has told him that he was letting his imagination run away with him, that he was being silly and paranoid, was dead. Hollowed out, he says. Those words buzzed in his brain. What did he mean hollowed out? What sort of killer could hollow out a woman's body without so much as a single cut?
If he dwelled too long on it, he felt ill. He tried to push it to the back of his mind, tried to collect his wits and pretend like this was all some kind of sick joke, that there was nothing wrong, that Victoria would be sitting in her seat tomorrow morning - third row, second from the left, just like always - and that none of this was actually happening.
"That's sick," Barnabus croaked out. His own voice felt foreign in his throat, sounded distant enough that it may as well have been someone else speaking all together.
"It is, and I'm deeply, deeply sorry that it came to this. I know you two were close." The professor kept his voice soft, sounded genuinely sympathetic - and for some reason, that struck a chord with Barnabas. He slowed, and watched his teacher with a keen eye as he moved across the room. He was quiet, reflective as he passed his student, and the child couldn't help but feel an acute sense of relief that there was space between them now.
He felt himself breathe easier. There was a nagging sense of paranoia tugging at the back of his brain; his sudden irrational fear of Mr. Allen combined with this horrible news, this unsettling murder - oh, God, Victoria had been murdered - well, hadn't she? No fight, no incision, no injuries at all other than how she'd been...
He felt bile rise in his throat, swallowed hard to keep himself from being sick right then and there. There had to be something else for him to focus on, there had to be other steps that he could take, mentally. One thing at a time. He took a deep breath, feeling his chest growing tight as he watched his maths professor brace himself up against the countertop across from him.
His mind latched onto this, willing to do anything to deny the reality of these last few moments. Deny that Victoria was dead; deny that she might have been murdered; deny that you are alone in a room with a man that makes your skin crawl, even though you don't know why. Focus on the false reality, that all these things were distant and benign; focus on the false reality that somehow, it was just all in his head. Focus on how badly he was trembling, how weak in the knees he felt. Focus on the desks, the flasks and beakers that littered the room; focus on how the door had been shut behind him; focus on his professor, who hung his head down, trying to gain his bearings.
Perhaps he was just as shocked and sick and appalled as Barnabas was? Perhaps this was a weight on his chest as well, the news that one of his students had died in such a horrific manner; perhaps that was why he'd come to share the dreadful news himself.
Barnabas took a breath, his voice far less sturdy than he would have liked, but he supposed it was only natural. He spoke tentatively. "Are - you okay, Mr. Allen? You don't look so good."
His professor remained still for a moment, gaze boring holes into the dirty countertops stained with pencil marks and old spills. For a moment, it looked like he was holding his breath, the rise and fall of his shoulders, the slow expansion of his chest coming to a halt as he stopped breathing all together. He was silent, turning the question over in his mind. He wasn't blind to Barnabas' paranoia, his discomfort in the last two days, and he found it a shame, really.
"All this hard counseling work has me famished." Mr. Allen swayed dangerously, palms planted against the desk. Barnabas couldn't help but blink, taken aback by the answer. A hand clutched at his stomach, hunger pains shooting through him. "Why, I'm so hungry, I could eat--" His voice came out as unsteady as his stance, until all at once Mr. Allen seemed to have turned to stone. Every muscle in his body was rigid, unmoving even in the slightest rise and fall of his chest. There was nothing, except the slightest turn of his head as he looked back at Barnabas. "--you."
He lunged, closing the space between himself and the student with one leap, and even as the student recoiled and jumped back, his back hit the desk and he came to a terrible halt. Glass shattered as beakers were thrown to the floor, a bunsen burner clattering loudly through the empty hallway just beyond the door. His heart already thundering in his chest, Barnabus felt it drop out from underneath him all together when his professor grabbed him. His grip was like a vice, nails digging into his upper arm as it seemed like - for a moment - the man was going to faint. Part of him prayed that he was. But as his eyes rolled back in his head, Barnabus witnessed something far worse.
Even in the dim light of the lab, he could see that there was something horrifically different about his professor. There was an unsettling quality about his features, the same sort of unsettling as the shadows in the corner of your eye. Bones popped and cracked as the man's jaw dropped far too low, dislocating as Barnabus felt a wave of sick and terror wash over him. It all happened so quickly, as something slithered its way up his throat, pouring from his mouth. There wasn't a moment's pause - not even so much as a shift in his movement as he towered over his student, who watches as the three tentacles climbed their was from his mouth. They were dark green and covered in some sort of discolored sludge. It smelled foul, and somehow Barnabus just knew, it was blood. Rotting, old, so old, how long had this thing been inside his professor? They writhed madly in the sudden fresh air, like the limbs of an eldritch abomination come to curse the mortal world.
Soon, Mr. Allen's hands were around his throat, fingers scrabbling for his jaw as he forced his head back, shoving his fingers into his mouth to pry it open. Barnabus gagged and choked as he tried to find his footing, tried to fight and shove and push against the thing that looked like his professor, but everything was moving too fast and suddenly he couldn't tell up from down as everything became a blur of panic. He felt his fists pound at the man's shoulders, then a dull, painful thud as he connected violently with his skull. There was a crack as his head snapped to the side, and Barnabus continued to fight, but it was like nothing he did could faze the man; there was no cry of pain, there was no flinching or recoiling. There was nothing but a cold determination to pry the boy's mouth open. It was like Mr. Allen could feel no pain, like nothing he could do could hurt him.
Everything was a blur as Mr. Allen loomed over him, and he only faintly registered, among the terror and adrenaline, that the thing writhing its way up the professor's throat was drawing nearer, closer and closer as the creature twisted its way past the boy's lips. It was vile, shoving itself to the back of his throat as Barnabus choked and gagged, trying to wretch the thing from his mouth, but it was already too late. The thing slithered down his throat, dropping from Mr. Allen's mouth like a dead fish, seeking refuge from the fresh air and settling itself in his chest. Barnabus gasped and coughed, his body desperate to expel the thing as Mr. Allen dropped to the floor. His body was limp, the moment the creature had wretched itself from him.
It was all Barnabus could do to watch as his professor - or rather, what was left of his professor - hit the floor with a sickening thud, his skull cracking against the tile as he stared up at the child, eyes glazed over with a dull, lifeless stare into infinity. Slowly, blood began to leak from his lips, the soft pitter-patter of crimson dripping down the side of his face, pooling below him.
Barnabus looked down in shock at the scene before him, coughing fiercely for a moment before he shifted, wiping his mouth and standing straight. He took a deep breath and wiped the blood from his palm, turning and opening the door.
He was hungry.