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Slaughterhouse High

Then Adora gasped and Futzy resolved what he was seeing.

Not two but four bodies.

The zipper-mouthed boys zipped together, clothed and bloody.

And the girls who went crazy over them, naked, broken-limbed, somehow joined at the crotch. Bloody gleams of zipper. The rumors about them were true.

Adora gripped him from behind. She bit his shoulder through a thickness of suitcoat, saying nothing. Then her sobs took on volume, and the depth of her fright set his own mood plunging.

*****

Matthew Megrim had never been the designated slasher. But he knew, as did most teachers, the location of the unassuming, vine-hidden, slightly rundown garage a block east of school.

It was tucked into a quiet residential alley. A punch code that ought to have changed each year, but never did, secured the garage. The teachers knew it and kept it secret to avoid the inevitable student pranks.

Rolling down his window, Matthew punched in FUTZYB. The garage door opened. His mind dwelt on the unknown slasher, on his daughter, and on his drowned wives, fluxidermed in the vestibule of his home.

Cam and Arly's death had been terrible and swift, an act of God.

Tweed's death, if indeed it had happened, would be a perversion, the assumption of godlike power by mere mortals.

Inside, a bend of lights lit a ramp that corkscrewed down out of sight. To hell with the law, thought Matthew, and drove ahead. In the rearview mirror, as his descent began, the garage door rumbled shut.

The dirge once more filled his mouth, wordless, full of ire and regret, an opera hero, treacherously murdered, gone down to death. The song, as did his mind, danced with fire. Someone must pay, it said. Wrongful death must not go unpunished.

But hope burned strong as well.

On the phone, the woman's voice had spoken of possible salvation, as if she, whoever she might be, would do her best to stop it.

Matthew had passed the school, its skull-flag flapping in the night breeze.

Now, parallel fluorescent lights led the way down the ramp, affixed where the damp gray cement walls met cement ceiling. A slow steady half-block of driving drew his car beneath Corundum High.

The ramp widened onto the slasher's parking area. There sat a bulky powder-blue car waiting for its owner.

Whose was it?

On school days, Matthew tended to arrive early and leave late. So his knowledge of other teachers' vehicles was spotty.

No time to rummage. It would be clear once he met the slasher, and there'd be only one such roaming the backways.

Matthew parked beside the powder-blue car, yanked up on his handbrake, and killed the engine.

"I'll get them."

On the driver's side of the slasher's car, in harsh light, stood an elevator.

What a joyless grimy hellhole this was. It ought to have been more inviting, a dark version of the faculty lounge perhaps.

What was he thinking?

More societal indoctrination. Years of it drummed into him, into them all.

They ought rather to shut down this vile place, bulldoze earth into it, strike flat the garage, close off the backways at school, close off all backways everywhere at every last high school in the Demented States of America.

It was nothing short of barbaric, this ritual slaughter of the young.

Matthew stared at the hatchet on the passenger seat. Fool thing wouldn't be needed. The anger had drained from him, leaving urgency, yes, and regret. What was done was done, though he much feared what that might be.

Leaving his car, he approached the elevator, its metal surface scarred and dinged red with age. He punched a battered silver button.

Nothing.

He tried it again, held it down.

Something connected. Motor sounds, rumblings from above. Would they betray his coming?

What did it matter?

He would find the slasher, verify the phone lady's story, milk his colleague-assuming said colleague hadn't died at Dex's hand-for details about Tweed's murder, details he would then use to shame the promgoers.

There would be no animosity, hard feelings, nor thirst for revenge against the one chosen to carry out the slash. That was an impersonal task. An honor. One did the deed, then let it fade into collective memory. To some, it was a revered act of heroism.

To others, it was a scandal.

Krantor Berryman, the earth science teacher, had been routinely shunned for years.

He had been chosen once.

Rather than take part in what he called the country's shame, he had paid his fine and served a year in prison.

Now, Matthew, as the elevator door opened and a blast of rank air billowed forth, vowed to join forces with poor Berryman.

He had gone along with the others, shunning the outspoken anti, like the rest. But all that, he vowed, would change.

Do it, thought Matthew, the sound of those words trumpeting in his ears like a clarion call.

New waves of anxiety about Tweed flooded him as he ducked into the elevator and punched for ascent.