DEGREES OF DEATH

16. SACRIFICE IN THE DARK AISLE

"Welcome to my library."

The words hung in the damp library air, colder than the wind from the storm outside. The thin man with the human-skin book grinned, his insane eyes dancing in the trembling beam of Xavier's flashlight.

Daniel had no time to process this new brand of insanity. Dozens of student "dolls" with stitched-shut mouths stepped out from the dark aisles, forming a slowly tightening circle. They didn't growl like the mutants outside. They were silent, moving in unison with empty stares, which was somehow far more terrifying.

"That's… the kids from the literature club," Kimberly whispered in horror, recognizing a few faces among the puppet-like crowd. "What did you do to them, you monster?!"

The mad librarian chuckled softly. "I merely gave them peace. In a world full of screams, silence is a gift. They are my newest collection."

"Niel, what do we do?" Xavier hissed, panicked. He swept his flashlight around. There was no way out. The emergency door behind them was barricaded, and every other aisle was now blocked by the dolls.

Daniel ignored the librarian. His sharp eyes scanned his opponents. These dolls were slow and unarmed. They were just an obstacle. The main threat was the thin man at the front, holding a box cutter and clearly out of his mind.

"Alex," Daniel called out, his voice low but firm, never taking his eyes off the librarian. "Is your shoulder still strong enough to lift that bat?"

Alex, who had been slumped on the floor, looked up. The bite wound on his shoulder throbbed, spreading its poison through his body. His head was spinning, his vision starting to blur. But hearing the tone in Daniel's voice, the last embers of his fighting spirit reignited. "Yeah... I can still do it, Niel," he answered hoarsely, grabbing his baseball bat with his good hand.

"Good," Daniel said. A crazy plan formed in his head in a split second. "Listen to me. All of you. On my signal, we don't scatter. We push straight ahead, right for that lunatic. Ignore the dolls on the sides."

"You want us to charge him directly?!" Bianca asked in disbelief. "He's surrounded by dozens of people, Niel!"

"They're just walking corpses that can't bite," Daniel shot back. "We have one target. We break through, we take his head, and we get out of here. Ready?"

Chania and Bianca nodded hesitantly. Xavier gritted his teeth, raising his metal tray like a shield.

"Alex," Daniel called again, his tone more personal this time. "You're up front with me."

Alex was stunned. "Me?"

"You're bitten. You're a time bomb now," Daniel said, his words blunt, but his eyes held no malice, only trust. "So before you turn, give us one last good show. Take point. Can you do it?"

Hearing that, Alex no longer looked afraid. The despair in his eyes hardened into steel-like resolve. If he was going to die, he would die a warrior, not a crying victim. He stood up straight, twirling his bat. "Yeah, Niel. I'm ready."

The mad librarian seemed to be enjoying their drama. He opened his human-skin book, stroking a page gently. "Finished with the motivational speech? My collection is getting impatient to greet you."

He snapped his fingers. The dolls with the stitched mouths began to advance in unison.

"NOW!" Daniel roared.

Daniel and Alex charged forward together. They smashed into the first line of dolls like two raging bulls. Alex swung his bat left and right, not to kill, but to knock them down. Daniel used his teakwood beam as a battering ram.

Xavier, Bianca, Chania, and Kim followed right behind them, forming a tight, spearhead formation.

The dolls didn't fight back, but their sheer numbers slowed the group's advance. Cold hands grabbed at their jackets, trying to hold them back.

"Keep pushing! Don't stop!" Daniel shouted, shoving one doll so hard it fell into another, creating a domino effect.

They had broken through halfway. The mad librarian was still standing casually at the end of the aisle, smiling as he watched the chaos. He raised his box cutter, ready to welcome Daniel.

But then, something unexpected happened.

In the middle of the crowd, as Alex was swinging his bat, his foot caught on a pile of thick books on the floor that he hadn't seen.

Thud!

Alex went down hard in the sea of dolls.

"LEX!" Bianca screamed.

Daniel spun around, about to help. But Alex was already swarmed. The dolls didn't bite. They just piled on top of him, their collective weight pinning him down, their hands gripping his arms and legs. Alex struggled, but he couldn't get up.

"Niel! Get out of here!" Alex yelled from beneath the pile of bodies. "Don't worry about me! Finish that bastard!"

The mad librarian laughed. "See? My collection is so loyal."

He waved his hand. A few dolls dragged a rolling bookshelf from a side aisle. The cart was made of solid, heavy steel. They struggled to push it toward the still-trapped Alex.

"NO!" Chania shrieked in horror as she realized what was about to happen.

The dolls tilted the heavy steel bookshelf, and then shoved.

CRUNCH!!!

The bookshelf crashed down on Alex's body with a sickening sound. Alex's scream was cut off instantly. Fresh blood gushed from under the pile of books, staining the library's wooden floor.

Xavier froze. Bianca turned her head, unable to watch. Chania covered her mouth, tears streaming down her face.

Alex's sacrifice had created a gap in the dolls' formation. Daniel was now just a few feet away from the librarian.

A cold, burning rage exploded in Daniel's chest. He wasn't shouting anymore. He wasn't thinking. His entire world narrowed to a single point: the grinning face of the madman in front of him.

Daniel shot through the gap. The librarian tried to stab him with the box cutter, but Daniel slapped it away with the back of his left hand, letting the sharp blade slice his skin. He didn't care.

With that same hand, Daniel grabbed the librarian's thin neck, lifted him off the floor, and slammed him against the bookshelf behind him. Books rained down.

"This is for Noah." Daniel slammed his free fist into the man's jaw. CRACK!

"This… is for Alex." Another punch shattered his nose.

The madman struggled, trying to claw at Daniel's face. But Daniel's grip was like steel.

"And this," Daniel whispered hoarsely, "…is for making my day even fucking worse."

Daniel lifted the man's body and threw him to the floor. Before the librarian could react, Daniel stomped on his wrist, breaking it and forcing him to drop the box cutter. Then, Daniel picked up the thickest encyclopedia from the floor.

He raised the book high over his head with both hands (ignoring the pain in his right shoulder) and brought it down on the madman's head. Again and again.

BAM! BAM! BAM!

The sound echoed through the suddenly silent library. The dolls with the stitched mouths had stopped moving, as if their connection to their master had been severed.

Daniel kept hitting until he no longer felt any resistance. Until the man's face was an unrecognizable ruin. Until his rage subsided, leaving only a cold emptiness.

He dropped the blood-soaked book. He was panting heavily. He looked at the corpse at his feet, then at the pile of shelves and books that covered Alex.

"Let's get out of here," Daniel muttered, his voice hollow.

They walked past the dolls, who now stood frozen like mannequins. Xavier paused for a moment near Alex's body. He picked up his friend's baseball bat from the floor. "We're taking this. To remember him," he whispered.

They found an emergency staircase at the far end of the library. When Daniel pushed the door open, the sight beyond made them freeze.

The stairs led down. And from below, came the all-too-familiar sound of growling. The foul stench of fresh blood wafted up.

"Shit," Bianca cursed. "Turns out this library wasn't completely safe."

Daniel peeked down. On the library's ground floor lobby, dozens of Listener-phase mutants were gathered. It seemed they had managed to break through the front glass doors.

"We can't go down," Chania said. "But we can't go back either. The emergency door we came through is broken."

They were trapped again. On the third floor of a building whose ground floor was a monster-infested nest.

"There's another way," Kimberly said suddenly. Her voice was small but certain. She pointed to a large window at the end of the third-floor corridor. It overlooked the roof of the adjacent, shorter student center building. "Look."

Everyone followed her finger. Between the library window and the student center roof, several thick electrical and telephone cables were strung.

"You want us to… crawl across those cables?" Xavier asked, his face a mask of horror. "In the middle of a storm?"

"It's our only way out," Daniel decided. He walked to the window, gauging the distance and the strength of the cables. The plan was insane. Utterly insane. But in an insane world, only the insane survive. "We're crossing the cable bridge."