CHAPTER 154: THE SCHOOL MONSTERS

Clark POV:

That sentence did more than shake me.

It broke the spell that had frozen me in place.

I turned.

And ran.

But I didn’t get far.

From the shadows of the room — those corners I hadn’t dared look at before — something moved. No, leaped. A blur of snarling, growling muscle, all fur and fangs and pure nightmare.

A shadow dog. No, not a dog — not really. Something worse. Bigger. Thicker. Made of fur and long fierce jaws filled with sharp teeth and something even deeper, like it didn’t exist entirely in this world. The thing slammed into the wall just inches from my head, claws gouging through the concrete like cardboard.

I screamed. My legs almost gave out.

Another one followed it. Then a third. They were crawling out of the darkness like it was a door.

Three in total. Each had the outline of a hound but the wrong anatomy. Their joints bent the wrong way. Their eyes didn’t reflect light — they drank it. Their fur shifted unnaturally, like smoke clinging to a shape that didn’t want to be seen clearly.

One opened its jaws and let out a low, unnatural growl. The sound made my teeth hurt.

Nope. Nope nope nope.

I turned back and bolted into the hallway. My shoes slapped hard against the tile. My breath came in harsh gasps. I didn’t look back. I couldn’t.

They were behind me.

I could hear them — the scraping of claws, the deep, almost wet-sounding snorts as they sniffed the air behind me. One howled. It didn’t sound like a wolf. It sounded like a dying child wrapped in a bear’s growl.

I shot through the narrow hallway, barely dodging fallen scaffolding and busted tiles. My shoulder clipped a doorway, and pain flared, but I didn’t stop. I couldn’t.

I didn’t know where I was going.

I just knew I had to get out.

Had to survive.

Had to tell someone—anyone—what the hell I’d just seen.

Except... who would believe me?

"I walked in on werewolves doing God-knows-what to a girl in a sealed building" wasn’t exactly going to get me anything other than a padded room.

And what if that girl had wanted it? No... no, Clark, stop thinking like that. You saw her eyes. You saw her face.

It wasn’t lust.

It was terror.

I rounded a corner and nearly crashed into an overturned desk. My shin hit the edge and I went sprawling.

"FUCK!" I shouted, barely catching myself.

There was a locker door ahead. I didn’t think. I dove toward it, yanked it open, crawled inside — knees tight to chest — and pulled it shut.

Darkness. My heartbeat slammed in my ears so loud it drowned out everything else.

Then... footsteps.

Not the padded ones of the creatures. These were... barefoot.

Deliberate. Slow. Echoing.

A shadow passed the narrow slits of the locker vent. It was tall. Too tall. The hallway light flickered, and for one brief second, I saw a silhouette — hunched over, arms too long, neck too thin. Not human.

Something dragged its fingers along the lockers. Not claws — fingers. Fingernails.

It knew I was there.

The creatures from the lecture room? Had they sent this one?

I covered my mouth with both hands, praying to a God I wasn’t sure even worked on this part of campus.

The scratching stopped.

Then a whisper — right at the locker door:

"You smell like fear."

My blood turned to ice. I squeezed my eyes shut and prayed harder.

A long pause. Then slow footsteps again, fading. A beat passed. Then another. Then a minute. Two.

Was it gone?

Was it—

SLAM!

The locker door burst open and I screamed, falling out. I thrashed wildly, expecting claws, teeth, death—

"kid?"

My eyes snapped open.

Reed.

He stood over me with an annoyed look, arms folded, his yellowish-ringed eyes glowing faintly in the flickering light.

"Oh for fuck’s sake, you are a magnet for trouble," he muttered, grabbing me by the arm and yanking me to my feet like I weighed nothing.

I tried to form words, but they wouldn’t come out. My mouth opened and shut like a fish on a dock.

"Did you seriously go into the old wing?" he asked. "You really are trying to die."

"I... I... saw them," I choked out. "There were these—these things—wolf-faced guys. And then dogs—huge dogs. And—there was a girl. A girl and they—"

He gave me a sharp look. "You saw too much."

"No—No! I didn’t mean to! I was looking for Sara and—and she disappeared and that redhead from registration was all weird and—"

"Shut up," Reed said. "You’re panicking. Stop breathing like that. They can still hear you."

I blinked at him. "They—what?"

Reed leaned in. "You think this place is just some ordinary university? kid, there are corridors on this campus that you shouldn’t exist. Rooms that were never built for your eyes."

He turned his head, listening. The hall was quiet again.

Too quiet.

"I shouldn’t be helping you," he said. "But lucky you, I’m sentimental when it comes to clueless newbies."

"You knew about this? You—you knew they were in there? What the hell are they?"

Reed gave a dry laugh. "You’re not ready for the answer to that. But I’ll give you one hint, Clark—this university isn’t a place for people like you. You were supposed to blend in. Stay in crowds. Keep your head down."

He grabbed my shoulder tightly, his nails digging in ever so slightly — not enough to break skin, but enough to send a message.

"You can’t keep doing this. They’ve seen your face. They’ve smelled your blood."

"I don’t believe this," I muttered. "I don’t believe in vampires or werewolves or—or shadow creatures—this is insane, this is nuts—"

Reed leaned down close again, his lips barely an inch from my ear.

"Then let’s hope they don’t believe in you either."

Then again—like before—Reed yanked me by the hand and started dragging me.

Not gently. Not like a friend helping you through a panic attack. Like someone annoyed they were once again stuck babysitting a suicidal cat who kept wandering into traffic.

We moved through one hallway, then another. My legs tried to keep up, heart pounding so loud it echoed in my ears. The distant thrum of music told me we were headed back toward the party. That should have made me feel safer.

It didn’t.

Not even close.

The halls were quieter now. More abandoned than before. All the excited chatter had faded, replaced with cold silence and the click-click-click of Reed’s boots against the tile.

But then—

I heard it.

A sound.

Whimpering.

Low, soft. Coming from just around the corner behind us.

I froze. My breath caught in my throat. It didn’t sound human. Or maybe it did, and that made it worse. That breathy, wet sound of someone—or something—crying, or gasping through pain or hunger or both.

I turned slightly, just enough to glance over my shoulder.

The corner was swallowed in shadow. Too dark. Too quiet. Like the air was thick back there.

Reed didn’t stop. But he did look.

His eyes narrowed as he stared down the corridor.

If looks could kill, that darkness would’ve exploded into ash. He stared at it like he dared whatever was behind the corner to come out.

Then he yanked me again, harder this time, pulling me in the opposite direction. I almost tripped over my own feet trying to keep up.

"What was that?" I whispered, not sure I wanted an answer.

He didn’t respond.

Didn’t have to.

His whole posture said: danger.

The kind that wasn’t for human eyes.

He moved like a predator himself—shoulders tense, eyes scanning every shadow like he was expecting an ambush.

Something about him now felt even more dangerous. The way his energy changed...

He was angry. Not at me, I think. Or maybe at me a little. But mostly at something else—something hiding in the dark.

Okay, yeah. Reed totally didn’t look safe.

But better the devil you know, right?

At least he wasn’t one of those massive shadow dogs.

At least, I was pretty sure he wasn’t a werewolf.

Right?

I didn’t want to think about it too hard. If I started doubting the only person keeping me alive, I might actually lose it. Like—fully, completely, mental-breakdown lose it.

He led me through a maze of intersecting corridors, his grip still tight on my wrist. More than once, I felt like we were looping back around in circles, and I didn’t dare ask if we were lost. I had this creeping sense that maybe the school shifted when no one was looking—changed its shape like it was breathing.

Then suddenly, we emerged from the dim, winding maze into a long, straight corridor.

Bright light spilled from the end, warm and golden. The pounding of music grew louder. Laughter, too. Movement. Life.

The party.

Civilization.

I nearly sobbed from relief.

Reed let go of me so suddenly that I stumbled a step forward. His fingers had left red marks on my wrist.

"Go," he said flatly. "Stay in the light. Stay with the crowd. And stay the fuck out of the shadows."

I looked back at him. He wasn’t meeting my eyes. He was already turning to walk the way we’d come—back into the dark halls like he belonged there.

"Wait," I said. "What about you?"

"I’ve got important shit to deal with," he snapped over his shoulder. "Saving your stupid ass wasn’t on tonight’s to-do list."

His voice echoed slightly in the hallway. And then he was just gone, swallowed by the shadows, like he’d never been there.

I stared after him, the glow of the party lights warming my back, the cold of the hallway clawing at my front.

He wasn’t a hero. I was sure of that now. He wasn’t even really a friend. But he was the only person—thing?—on this entire messed-up campus who didn’t seem to want to eat me, drain me, or rip my spine out.

So yeah. I’d take the devil I knew.

Even if he could probably kill me with one hand.

I turned back toward the light. The bass of the music shook the air around me. I could smell sweat, cheap cologne, alcohol. Human things. Real things.

I stepped forward, into the noise, trying to forget the whispers, the hounds, the girl in the room with the wolf-faced men.

But I knew one thing for sure—this school was wrong.

And I was starting to think Lucas had been right all along.

No one ever really leaves this place.

I slid down to the floor, chest heaving, hands shaking like I’d just escaped death. And maybe I had.

My brain struggled to piece together what I’d seen. Werewolves? Real ones? Not in movies or some weird online fanfic?

It couldn’t be real.

It had to be drugs. A hallucination. Maybe that redhead back at the party had slipped something into my drink when I wasn’t looking—except I hadn’t drunk anything. Or maybe I was having a psychotic break. Great timing, Clark.

And still... I knew what I saw. My brain couldn’t invent that much detail.

Those eyes. That fur. The voice that sounded like it came from inside a forest of bones.

No. This was real.

Or worse—real enough to kill me.

I waited until my legs could hold me again, then slipped out of the room and back through the corridors, hugging the walls like some rat in a haunted maze.

When I finally reached the open hallway—the ones still used by the student body—I almost collapsed. Light. People. Music echoing faintly from the party.

I was still in the real world.

But something else was in it too.