"Something's going on outside?!" one of the students cried out, their voice trembling as they watched Merek burst into the living room, trailed by the other fighters.
"We're leaving!" Merek snapped without pausing, striding toward the exit.
But the door didn't budge, not because it was locked, but because a frantic crowd had gathered on the other side.
Students from the third house, now under siege, and others from the first, overwhelmed by fear, had barricaded the entrance. They slammed against the door, pounded the windows, yelling and pleading to be let in. Some had even begun climbing in through the side windows, desperate to escape the unknown horror outside.
Merek's jaw clenched. "Get out of the way!" he shouted, yanking his pistol from its holster and pointing it at the window frame, not to shoot but to warn. "Move!"
Panic and terror had driven these people mad. In their desperation to survive, they were trapping the very fighters meant to protect them.
