The X Gene Chapter 3

Shawn reached the closet just in time to see through the crack in the door.

The boy — not a man, but a teenager, maybe a senior — fumbling with his belt, as the female teacher backs away crying.

Shawn’s mind screamed, Run. Run, you idiot. Run.

But his body didn’t listen.

With a burst of adrenaline, Shawn threw open the door and lunged forward. He tackled the boy, and the two of them went crashing hard onto floor.

The assault rifle clattered from the boy’s hands, sliding across the floor and out into the hall.

“Stay down!” Shawn gasped, trying to pin the older teen.

But the boy slammed his elbow into Shawn’s face with a sickening crack.

Pain exploded in Shawn’s nose, white-hot and blinding. Blood spurted down his lips as he was thrown off, rolling across the floor clutching his face.

Through blurred eyes, he saw the boy scramble toward the doorway, reaching desperately for the rifle lying just outside the hallway.

Shawn quickly got up and hurled himself forward again, smashing into the boy’s side. Both of them tumbled onto the floor. This time Shawn landed on top. His fists came down wildly, again and again, fueled by terror and desperation.

Bam. Bam. Bam.

His knuckles split open. Skin tore. Blood — his and the boy’s — splattered across the floor. Shawn’s hands stung and burned, but he didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop.

Until finally, the boy’s head lolled to the side. His face was a ruin of bruises and blood, knocked out cold.

Shawn staggered back, chest heaving, his own blood dripping onto his shirt. His arms trembled as he slumped against the lockers.

But then—

Another figure stood in the hallway.

Another boy, maybe seventeen, holding a pistol. His eyes widened at the sight before him: his partner unconscious in a pool of blood, and Shawn laying to the side of him, fists drenched and raw.

The boy’s shock twisted into pure rage. His face flushed red, and with a wordless scream, he raised the pistol and leveled it at Shawn’s head.

Shawn froze. The hallway shrank to just that barrel, that single black circle aimed at him. Too far to reach him. Too close to dodge.

His life flashed before his eyes — his mother’s laugh, the empty basketball court where he practiced free throws, the quiet mornings where nothing ever happened.

This is it. I’m dead. I’m dead.

The gun fired.

Click.

Click.

Click.

Three times. No bullets left the chamber. The gun jammed.

The boy’s eyes went wide. “What the—?!” He fumbled desperately with the pistol, slapping the side, trying to clear it.

Shawn didn’t think. He dove, blood-slick hands scrambling for the assault rifle lying just to the side of the boy knocked out on the floor.

His fingers curled around the cold metal, and before he could question himself, before he could stop, he spun it upward and pulled the trigger.

The hallway exploded with gunfire.

The second boy jerked as the bullets tore through him. Blood sprayed against the lockers as he staggered, coughing wetly, before collapsing to the floor. His pistol skittered across the tiles, useless.

The echoes of the shots rang out long after the boy stopped moving.

Shawn stood frozen, his chest heaving, ears ringing. His hands shook violently around the rifle.

“I… I just killed someone,” he whispered, voice breaking. His words barely reached his own ears.

But then he realized the screaming he heard wasn’t from down the hall. It wasn’t from anyone else.

It was coming from him.

Raw, ragged screams tore from his throat as the rifle clattered from his hands. His knees gave way, and he collapsed to the blood-soaked floor.

His body shook uncontrollably as tears streamed down his face, blurring the nightmare scene around him.

“I didn’t mean to… I didn’t mean to…”

The world tilted. Darkness edged his vision.

And as the wail of sirens began to cut through the distance, Shawn’s eyes fluttered shut. His body crumpled to the floor.

He fainted — broken, terrified, his mutation now fully awakened in the most violent way imaginable.