[Editor's Note: This entire story was written by Dirq, but he's been taken off of our possible authors so this is under my name. Other than what is written in here and a slight formatting change, this is all Dirq. As promised, here is the stunning conclusion of The Last Bell. I'd tell you I waited until the latter part of the day to post it just to make you wonder whether or not I was gonna post it, that'd be a lie. Truth is, it's just been a long day without internet connectivity. Anyway, enjoy it!]
As Gerry was blasted into smithereens, Dan Nice led the main charge into the auditorium. He immediately spotted Steve’s group, spreading out across the stage. “Onward to the stage, men! And women!” Dan shouted heroically, rushing forward and holding aloft a mighty bomb. “Take this, vile heathen!”
He hurled his bomb, but it detonated harmlessly a few feet ahead of him. “Okay, no harm done!” he shouted. “I’ll get ‘em with the next one!”
The battle lines quickly formed – Steve Obeng and his group assembled on the stage and first few rows, while Dan and his men were attacking down the main isles, using cover from Josh in the balcony. Smoke and fire filled the room as more and more bombs went off. The situation began to become very confused.
“We have to do something about their sniper up there!” Steve Obeng declared. “Steve… take care of him!”
Steve Beneke rose from behind a table that was serving as his shield and nodded. “Leave everything to me, sir!”
Immediately he grabbed a long chain that was hanging backstage and gave a mighty tug on it. The chain came tumbling down, and Steve quickly tied it into a lasso and charged toward the main part of the auditorium. The room was so filled with smoke and dust that none of the other group saw him approaching. Steve halted right beneath where he had seen the shape of the sniper. Gazing up, he saw that it was none other than Josh Yerk merrily throwing bombs into the auditorium.
“It’s time to bring you down, Josh!” Steve cried. He swung the chain/lasso around his head and then, with a grunt of effort, hurled it upward. The loop came down around Josh, who immediately stood up to see what was going on. Steve laughed at his triumph and yanked with all his strength. The lasso tightened, pinning Josh’s arms to his sides and preventing him from dropping the bomb that he had just lit. With a scream, Josh tottered and plunged over the balcony railing.
Steve Beneke, quickly spotting the flaming bomb in Josh’s hand, dove away. He was pushed into a wall by the force of the blast, which tore Josh in half and sent his body spinning away in two bloody hunks.
“Eeeew!” Steve exclaimed, struggling to get to his feet. He was dizzy, disoriented. And then he saw Emily and Erin running toward him.
“There’s one of them!” Emily shouted. “Take him prisoner! But just pray that we aren’t killed in the attempt!”
“Okay!” Erin shouted in response. “I sincerely hope that we aren’t killed while taking Steve Beneke prisoner!”
Their words turned out to be horribly prophetic. Just as they were approaching Steve, someone stepped out of the smoke right next to him, holding two bombs. Steve looked up and saw Jill – albeit a blurry and distorted Jill – standing over him.
“Mommy?” Steve asked, bewildered.
In response, Jill chucked her two bombs at Emily and Erin. The two attackers skidded to a halt and raised their arms to defend themselves, but their bodies proved to be a pitiful defense against the power of the explosives. They were blown backward to land in two smoking heaps a few yards away.
Jill paid them no more mind. She stooped down over Steve and shook him. “Steve! Steve Beneke! Are you all right? Can you hear me?”
Steve’s vision slowly cleared, and he nodded weakly. “I’m okay. I can make it.” Jill helped him get to his feet and steady himself, and then she gestured back toward the stage.
“Come on, let’s get back to the lines!”
Steve followed behind Jill, a smile on his face. This was certainly a change from being kneed in the groin just a few days before, he thought.
Across the gym, Dan and Kate were pinned down by heavy bombardment from Pat Metz, Bill Porter and Matt Landis.
“What’ll we do?” Dan demanded. “I’m too tall to die!”
Kate’s brain worked furiously. “I’ve got it,” she said suddenly. “We’ll make a distraction.”
“A distraction?” Dan asked. “Is that the best you can do?”
Kate nodded, a crafty smile crossing her face. “What’s the best way to get a boy’s attention?”
Dan raised his eyebrows in shock. “You wouldn’t!”
“I most certainly would,” Kate confirmed.
—
A few yards away, Bill, Pat and Matt froze in the act of throwing their bombs as Kate jumped up from behind her protective barrier. They couldn’t believe it. It was amazing. They never thought they would see it in a million years.
Kate was pointing behind them and shouting, “Look! A naked woman! A naked woman!”
Unable to resist that universal male lure, the three young gentlemen whirled around, breaking the first rule of combat by turning their backs on the enemy. Dan jumped to his feet beside Kate and tossed a couple of bombs at the trio of tormentors. Matt Landis seemed to vanish in a rain of bones and blood as the bombs went off. Pat Metz was thrown forward with tremendous force, and Bill was merely tossed around a bit and survived with only a few cuts and bruises.
“Oh, God, the pain, the horrible agony!” Pat howled. “I feel as if a thousand knives have been stabbed into my body!”
“Think we should put him out of it?” Dan asked.
Kate considered Dan’s question for a few moments, and then shook her head. “Nah. I never really liked Pat anyway.”
Dan shrugged. “Okay.”
They walked away to leave Pat writing in pain on the floor.
—
The explosions, smoke and screams didn’t bother Dirk very much – he had sat through an Olsen Twins movie one time and heard a lot worse than that. He made his way slowly through the battle, steering clear of the most intense action and heading for the stage, which seemed relatively safe. He held only two bombs – one for Steve Obeng and one for anyone else he ran into along the way.
As he neared the stage, he spotted Adrienne standing behind some curtains, intently observing something that was happening on the other side of the stage. Curious, Dirk approached and stepped behind another set of curtains to see what was going on.
—
Jill and Steve stood away from the rest of the action. Steve still couldn’t walk very steadily, and Jill didn’t want to leave him alone with all the fighting going on. She stood in front of him, keeping a close watch for anyone approaching.
“I’m okay, really,” Steve protested. “You can go back out there.”
“I’m not going to leave you alone,” Jill said, shaking her head.
Steve nodded. “Thanks.”
Dirk watched the scene curiously. Then he turned toward Adrienne. To his surprise, he saw that there was a bomb in her hands which she was starting to light. Dirk watched with curiosity that slowly turned to horror as he realized what she was going to do. Before he could shout a warning, Adrienne hurled her bomb toward the center of the stage.
The blast shook the entire room. Jill screamed and stumbled back, temporarily blinded by the explosion. Up above her, a large rack of lights shook violently and, suddenly, came loose at one end. It swung almost lazily downward, heading right toward Jill.
Steve saw the danger and knew immediately what he had to do. “No!” he shouted, and jumped to his feet. He leaped through the air, his arms outstretched. Steve struck Jill from behind, pushing her onto the floor and out of the way of the deadly pendulum. Steve paused and let out a breath of relief. Jill was safe.
The he looked up and saw the lights swinging down toward him. They cracked into his head and sent him sprawling away into a mass of curtains.
Across the stage, Dirk stared with horror as Adrienne smiled in satisfaction. I finally got him, Adrienne thought as a mad pleasure rushed through her body. I finally got him. Her anger was released, and no one would ever know about what she had done. Nobody…
Shakily Jill rose to her feet. She didn’t understand what had just happened – Steve Beneke had saved her life! But why? For the past several days she had been rejecting him. Why had he risked his own life to save her?
Suddenly the realization hit her. He liked her. He really, really liked her. And more surprisingly, Jill realized that she liked him too.
She turned to look at Steve, but to her horror she spotted him lying in a bloody heap just offstage. Dead… Steve was dead… the whole world was dying around her, and now Steve was dead, too. It seemed as if there was nothing left. Nothing left at all.
Jill reached into her pocket and felt the lead pencil that she always kept there. Steve was dead… everyone else was dead or dying… wouldn’t it be wonderful to just die, she suddenly thought? To end everything? With a look of resignation, Jill pulled the lead pencil out of her pocket, positioned it over her heart, and toppled forward. As she hit the stage, the lead pencil drove through her heart. Her last thoughts were of Steve as she drifted away into the soft, beautiful darkness. Then suddenly there was a blinding light and Jill smiled as the auditorium in front of her began to turn into something unimaginably beautiful…
—
A few feet away, Steve Beneke opened his eyes and pulled himself to his feet with the help of a nearby curtain. Jill, he thought. Where was Jill?
There she was, lying on the floor just a short distance away. Steve stumbled that way, ignoring the pain in his head, and knelt down next to Jill’s still body. He shook her gently, but she didn’t respond. Probably unconscious, he thought. Steve rolled her over onto her back and his heart almost stopped beating.
Jill’s hands were wrapped around a lead pencil that had been thrust into her chest. Her face was white as ivory, but a smile of infinite peace and happiness had taken it. In other words, she was dead.
Steve reached out numbly and pulled the lead pencil from her chest. He stood up, staring down at it, and closed his eyes. It was all over now, he thought. All of it had been for nothing. He placed the pencil over his own heart and threw himself forward.
A lightning-like pain stabbed through him, and Steve’s eyes opened. He wasn’t dead. He could feel his blood pouring through his hands and onto the stage, but he wasn’t dying. There was only an incredible pain, a pain like nothing he had ever felt before.
The lead pencil had pierced his heart, but it hadn’t killed him. Steve screamed in agony, and then he heard someone approaching. Looking up, he saw Adrienne Krum standing over him.
“Adrienne!” he gasped. “Adrienne. Please… kill me. Kill me!”
Adrienne smiled and sat down next to Steve. “I don’t think so, Steve. Not yet.” Steve gasped, unable to speak for the pain. “Not yet…” Adrienne reached over and grasped the lead pencil. She placed her thumb onto he lead mechanism and held it there, as if relishing the moment. “Not yet, but soon.” She clicked the mechanism once, driving a bit of lead into Steve’s heart. He gagged and squirmed as the pain increased tenfold. She clicked it again, and Steve squirmed even more. “Soon…” Adrienne said softly, and then clicked the mechanism fiercely, over and over again, and Steve screamed. His scream seemed to go on forever, and then suddenly he fell silent. Adrienne closed her eyes and took a deep breath, and then stood up. It was finished.
Then Dirk appeared, a look of shock on his face. “Adrienne… I thought we had a plan! I thought we were going to kill only a few people, only the leaders so that we could all unite again!”
Adrienne smiled sadly and shook her head. “I’m afraid not, Dirk.”
“But…” Dirk didn’t know what to say. “But we had a plan! What about the plan?”
“Sorry, Dirk,” Adrienne said. “The plan was a fake.”
“But I was going to rule the world!” Dirk protested.
“You wanted to rule all of this?” Adrienne asked, incredulous. “Some world.” She stood up and walked away, leaving Dirk standing stunned on the center of the stage. A moment later a bomb hit the stage. Adrienne turned back, and the spot where Dirk had just been standing was consumed by a dark plume of smoke.
—
The battle was reducing the gym to a smoking hell. There were no longer any clear battle lines, no clear “sides.” It was just one great serious of explosions and deaths. Students who had once been friends had become combatants locked in a mortal struggle for the fate of their world.
Dan, Kate and Kim had formed a tight defensive formation near one of the support pillars, lobbing bombs at any Obeng supporters they spotted through the smoke. They were successfully repelling any and all attacks from their enemies, but they couldn’t hope to continue forever. They were starting to run low on explosives.
Just a few yards away, Ashley Harbon and Ashley Muir were locked in combat. They had thrown aside their bombs and charged at one another down a narrow isle. It was like watching an episode of American Gladiators as the two vied for dominance. Finally Ashley Muir sent Harbon toppling over a row of chairs to land heavily face-first. Sensing victory, Muir launched herself over the chairs and after Harbon.
As she was in mid-air Liz Craig came sailing out of the smoke and, in a maneuver straight out of The Matrix, blasted Ashley Muir backwards. She slammed into the back of a chair and reeled, trying to maintain her balance. With a savage battle cry, Liz stepped forward, pressing Ashley against the chair. Then she grabbed Ashley’s shoulders and began to push her over backwards.
Ashley Muir felt a horrible pressure begin to exert itself on her spine as Liz began to push her slowly but inexorably backwards. She punched, she squirmed, she raked at her opponent’s face, but nothing Ashley did could ward off the attack. She opened her mouth to scream, and as her final wail filled the auditorium her spine snapped in two with a horrific crackle.
Liz, blood trickling from a dozen cuts and scratches on her face, neck and shoulders, stepped back. Ashley was bent over almost in two on the back of the chair.
“No better than she deserved,” Liz told herself, and then moved to make sure that Ashley Harbon was all right.
—
The battle had begun to move out of the auditorium as Dan signaled the retreat of his group. Emily and Erin were dead – so was Yerk, so was Ashley Muir. He didn’t know what had happened to Dirk. Only he, Kate, Kim, Shannon and Abby were left out of their original ten. Dan had no idea how many of Steve Obeng’s group were left, but chances were they still had the advantage of numbers.
Dan led the way through the main doors and into the auditorium lobby. Kim, with an enthusiastic shout, tossed her remaining bombs into the auditorium as she left it. The explosions blasted out the doors and sent bits of glass flying through the air. Smoke billowed out into the lobby, but Dan and his group were already down the stairs and into the main lobby of the school, where they regrouped.
“Where’s Dirk?” Kate asked. “Is he here?”
Dan shook his head. “I don’t think he made it.”
Shannon pointed up toward the auditorium lobby. “Here they come!” she shouted.
Through the door rushed Dave Moyer and Bill Porter, carrying the mangled form of Pat Metz between them. They swerved aside as they spotted Dan’s group down below, allowing the second wave of Christy, Liz and Ashley Harbon to sweep forward.
Dan raised his final bomb, lit it, and hurled it at their oncoming foes. The bomb fell short of its target, but its effects were still devastating. It landed underneath a section of railing and went off, sending a long and jagged piece shooting through the air. As misfortune would have it, Christy was standing directly in its path. The jagged shaft of metal caught her in the neck, lifted her off her feet and sent her flying through the air, pinning her to the wall just above the auditorium doors. There she hung like some ghastly decoration, blood dripping steadily from the open end of the shaft.
“Nice shot,” Abby said to Dan.
Dan shrugged modestly. “I do the best I can with the tools I have.”
Then Steve Obeng appeared at the top of the stairs. In his right hand was a bomb. In his left was the tattered but still recognizable picture of Bill Cosby. He grinned down at his opponents. “Surrender!” he shouted. “Or we’ll destroy you all!”
Dan gritted his teeth and took one of their few remaining bombs from Kim. “Never,” he said.
Steve Obeng began to advance down the stairs. Behind him came Ashley and Liz. Behind them came Dave and Bill, still carrying Pat but holding bombs in their free hands. Bringing up the rear was Adrienne, who had just emerged from the auditorium.
“Don’t come any closer!” Dan warned, but nevertheless he gave up ground as the rival group advanced. Now each person (except Pat) was holding a bomb and was prepared to light it. It was a Mexican standoff. If one person threw a bomb, everyone would throw, and chances were not many of them would survive. The question was who would back down first.
“You won’t win,” Steve declared. “There are more of us than you. One of us is bound to survive, and as long as we have one more man than you we win.”
“True,” Dan allowed, “but my bomb’s heading straight for you, Steve.”
Steve winced. “I see.”
“Just put down your bombs,” Ashley pleaded. “Haven’t enough of us died? Steve, just let them surrender.”
Steve Obeng glared at Ashley in fury. “Surrender? THEM? Never! We’ll fight them to the last man! Or even to the last woman! Stand firm!”
Kate shook her head. “This is crazy! How many of us have to die? We can all live in harmony, can’t we? We can make changes!”
Dan shook his head. “Bill Cosby won’t allow any changes, isn’t that right, Steve? You’re insane, you know that? I mean, who takes advice from a sit-com personality? You’re out to lunch, a few peanuts short of a jar. You’ve got a few screws missing, something isn’t right upstairs!”
“Silence!” Steve roared. He pulled his bomb back and prepared to light it. “All right, I’ve had it! Prepare to die, all of you!”
“If I go you go with me!” Dan shouted, raising his own bomb.
Dave and Bill held their bombs at the ready. Pat raised a feeble hand to protect himself from the coming destruction. Liz and Ashley stepped forward next to Steve, prepared to follow his orders to the last. Only Adrienne remained behind, not really caring who came out on top. Her job, as far as she was concerned, was finished.
Dan’s group formed a line centered around him. “Okay… if this is the way you want it, Steve… ready your weapons!” His group prepared to light their bombs. So did Steve’s. “On three!”
“On three, you guys!” Steve Obeng shouted at his supporters.
“One!” Dan bellowed.
“One!” Steve echoed.
“Two!” came the shout from Dan.
“Two!” seconded Steve.
“And…” Dan paused before uttering that final, apocalyptic word.
“And…” Steve, too, paused, not quite wanting to be the one to say it.
Then something totally unexpected happened. There was a hissing and sputtering sound from the main entrance doorways. All heads turned to see a short blue flame slowly cutting its way through the doors that had been welded shut since the explosion. Slowly, all bombs were lowered as the flame cut its way down to the floor and then across. The door gave a creaking groan and slowly fell inward, hitting the floor with a clang.
The students dropped their bombs. Through the doors stepped three men in radiation suits. One of them held a blowtorch, while the others held Geiger counters. The three men froze when they saw the students standing a few yards away from them, holding what looked like bottles of cleaning fluid.
“Radiation levels in here are normal!” one of the men said, his voice muffled by his radiation hood. “It doesn’t look as if anything got in here!”
The makeshift bombs fell from the hands of the students. They stared as the three men walked toward them.
“The building must have withstood the blast,” another man said. “Are you kids all right?” He held the giga counter up and passed it over each student. “Levels are normal here, too. Absolutely no contamination. How many of you are there? Where are the other students?”
Dan Nice blinked and turned to Steve Obeng. Slowly Steve let the picture of Bill Cosby drop from his hands. “So…” Dan began, addressing the man in the radiation suit, “so we’re not the last people on earth?”
The man took off his radiation helmet and smiled. “No, is that what you thought? God, it must have been horrible to be trapped in here! No, it was an accident, a horrible accident. We thought everything had been destroyed until the radiation levels dropped enough for us to move in. When we saw this building still standing here…”
Adrienne’s face went pale. “So it was just one bomb?”
The man nodded. “Just one. Were there any other survivors? Where is everyone?”
“Um… could we have a few moments alone?” Steve Obeng asked.
The man nodded his understanding. “Of course, of course. We’ll be here.”
The group shuffled numbly into the guidance office and looked at each other in bewilderment. After a few moments, Dan spoke. “Hey, Steve… sorry about the whole ‘trying to kill you’ thing. I guess we were all under a lot of pressure.”
“Yeah… sorry if I lost it there for a little while,” Steve said. “You know what we all thought…”
Dan and Steve shook hands to the smiles of the other students.
“Not to dampen the mood, but how do we explain the auditorium?” Liz asked. “Should we tell them that we were just about to kill each other when they walked in?”
Bill shook his head in the negative. “No way. They’d put us away for a thousand years in some mental institution!”
“Then what do we tell them happened upstairs?” Dave asked.
Abby had a suggestion. “Wait a second… I think I have a solution… something that will cover all the bases and solve a whole lot of problems… but first, let’s get out of this place.”
“I agree,” Pat Metz said weakly.
They walked out slowly to the main lobby, where the three men were still waiting. “We’re ready to leave, if we can,” Dan said.
“Sure thing. We can’t believe that you kids survived. It was a miracle!” One of the men smiled. “It just shows that in every disaster, a little bit of human good can come through.”
“Yes,” Steve agreed. “Yes, it does indeed.”
The three men produced more radiation suits, which the students quickly donned. Then they followed the three men out of the building. The world around them wasn’t glowing anymore – it looked like a barren tundra. A few twisted trees still stood here and there, but for the most part there was nothing, nothing for miles. The three men helped the students into a special vehicle, which then began to move away from the High School.
The students gazed out the rear windows of the vehicle and watched with a strange feeling of sadness as the school vanished from view. Then they turned away and didn’t look back.
“Well… what do you think will happen to us?” Adrienne asked.
“We’ll probably be celebrities for a short time, and then the media will forget about us and we’ll be reduced to a bunch of depressed, disillusioned alcoholics,” Dan predicted.
“So what’s this story you came up with?” Dave wanted to know.
Abby smiled. “Well…”
—
A few days later, the students relaxed in the comfort of a special government hospital reading the latest newspaper. The headline read, “HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS FOIL MASSIVE COMMUNIST PLOT… NUCLEAR ‘ACCIDENT’ PLANNED BY KREMLIN!”
“Good plan, Abby,” Steve said, smiling.
“Well, you know what I say about Communists,” Abby said, a sly smile spreading across her face.
“What’s that?” Bill asked.
“They’re ‘da bomb’!” Abby exclaimed, and laughed uproariously.
Dan Nice snorted. “Oh, that phrase was so 7th Grade,” he said, and quickly flipped to the sports section to see how the NBA playoffs were going.
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jasonhess
quikstop85
Oh my word… It is pretty hilarious that when I google my maiden name this is one of the hits. HA!