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I can’t get them off me, or even ask any of the panicked questions racing through my mind. I’m not only freaking out for myself.

There are fucking kids in this house!

The other thought that pops into my mind is that these are supposed to be harmless high school kids, but I’ve learned that Chesterfield Prep students are not fucking normal.

“How are we going to get her out of here?” a male’s voice asks.

I fucking despise there are people in my safe space, who probably touched my shit and has gone through it. I want with every fiber of my being for them to leave.

“Tina, don’t you have that karate move you can use?” Alexa hisses. “We have to be quiet or we’ll get caught. This is important! Quit fucking around.”

Alexa gives me whiplash with how mercurial her mood swings are. I don’t know what the fuck is going on, but a million possibilities are on the cards with this bitch.

“Is this really worth impressing Ciaran?” a girl huffs out. “He doesn’t even know we’re here.”

“It’s part of the surprise,” Alexa groans. “I have a sedative, but I’d rather not use it.”

No. That can’t be good for me or the baby, and I fight even harder while screaming around the gag. Alexa’s hand smothers the noises as she covers my mouth and I can see them clearer as the moon streams through my window.

I’m fully fucking awake now.

“The Devils did say they wanted all senior students in the woods tonight. Do we want to disappoint them?” a male asks worriedly.

I scream, “I don’t even go there anymore,” but it’s garbled by the gag. My anxiety is spiking as I fight them, but they’re using my blankets now to pin my arms and legs down.

“Okay, okay!” Tina exclaims. I vaguely recognize the six people in the room, though I didn’t interact with them much. They’re all theater kids, and therefore Alexa’s minions. “It’s just a pinch…”

I’m not sure if she’s trying to reassure me or herself as she squeezes her fingers along my carotid artery. It doesn’t take much to get me to faint on a good day, and I whimper as my eyes begin to roll back.

“There we go,” she murmurs. “Almost out. At least you’re tiny. It won’t take much to get you out of here. Alexa, you’ll need to take the gag out of her mouth once she’s out so she doesn’t aspirate on it.”

I’m already drifting away as Alexa says, “Well, it would be less competition.”

I don’t know what that means, but it doesn’t sound good.

ALASTAIR

I’m wearing a lit up mask, as are Draven and Ci. The Senior Chase is exactly that: a chase. The rules? If you’re caught, you’re fucked. Literally.

Everyone who comes to this event knows this, and there are quite a few virgins who are going to pop their cherry tonight. There are traditions that are passed along from the graduating seniors to incoming junior big dogs, and my friends and I have done everything in our power to be those people.

We’re ruthless, and our commands have power. We’re also the only ones wearing masks to show that we’re in charge of things. We’ve been looking forward to this shit all year, but now it seems pointless.

I know the reason for it, and it’s all Noor’s fault. She made us care, which means my friends and I will be pretending to chase other people tonight. Before the end, we’ll catch and fuck each other.

There’s a clearing with a bonfire already set up with booze and snacks afterward, and I expect it to get wild later. It’s become another hoop to jump, and something else to get through. I think the rest of senior year will become more of the same if I can’t shake off this funk.

“Are we ready?” I roar. The woods are creepy at night, and we spent hours hanging up battery powered lanterns in the trees, despite the full moon shining. They’re not super bright, but they add to the ambience and help keep people safer as they run through the woods.

Just because we’re planning to be very reckless, doesn’t mean we haven’t taken certain precautions.

We’re about forty minutes outside of Santa Barbara in the Los Padres National Forest. It’s perfect for our games, and we bribed the gatekeeper to leave the keys for us. We even promised to clean up after ourselves, or rather a group of freshmen will. It’s a right of passage, and we were the ones who cleaned up when we were freshmen to show we could be trusted with the senior secrets.

Every step of our high school journey has been carefully choreographed, though none of it seems to matter now.

All the guys have condoms in their pockets, and the girls and guys who are queer have a bright fluorescent glow-in-the dark green band on their person.

It can go on their wrist, bicep, hair, whatever the fuck they want, as long as it’s on their body.