Night School - Endgame by C.J. Daugherty Read Free Book Online Page A

them.
    The others were looking at her as if she should have the answers. She just stared back at them, panic rising in her chest.
    I don’t know how to do this, she thought. How can we even go on with just us? It’s not Night School anymore. It’s not anything.
    It was Nicole who came up with the solution.
    ‘I think Rachel should pair with Katie,’ she said, pointing at the two girls who were newest to the training. ‘Zoe, you pair with Lucas. I’ll pair with Allie.’
    Lucas punched Zoe lightly on the shoulder. ‘Come on midget, let’s see what you got.’
    ‘Don’t call me midget.’ Leaping effortlessly to her feet, Zoe swung a kick at him. This time he dodged the blow.
    Their sparring lightened the mood, and soon the group had arrayed themselves in pairs. While Rachel walked Katie through some basics, the others worked on the last self-defence moves they’d been practising before the parley.
    Within minutes the room had warmed up. They’d forgotten how empty it was, how few of them were left. They were really fighting – sweating from the exertion. They didn’t notice when the door swung open.
    ‘Uh… guys…’
    Something in Rachel’s voice made the others stop and look up.
    At one end of the room, a group of younger students clustered by the door, watching them with wide eyes.
    Slowly, they all noticed what was happening and stopped fighting. As a group they turned to face the new recruits.
    ‘What’s wrong with them?’ Zoe squinted at the younger students critically. ‘Why are they just standing there?’
    ‘I think you’re scaring them,’ Katie said. She waved cheerily. ‘Come in, little ones, come in. Welcome to Hell. Don’t be afraid.’
    ‘Oh great, Katie,’ Rachel said. ‘Scare them more.’
    ‘What’s going on here?’ Zelazny pushed his way through the crowd of new trainees. ‘Move along. Move along. Stop crowding the doorway. They don’t bite. Spread out.’
    With obvious reluctance, the youths moved a step or two further into the room where they clustered together, surveying this new world with suspicion. Most were twelve to fourteen years old, but a few were younger.
    Allie found herself staring at them. They looked so small.
    Eloise arrived a few seconds later, with Raj and a troupe of his guards. More teachers poured in, too.
    Allie and the senior students stood at the back of the room, arms crossed, surveying the increasingly crowded space as Zelazny and the other instructors took their place at the centre of the room.
    The history teacher was in his element.
    ‘Good to see the advanced students here early,’ he said, with a nod to Allie’s group. ‘And welcome to the new trainees. You’ll find we work very hard here. We will ask much of you, but we will also teach you how to keep yourselves safe. And to fight back.’
    He walked the length of the room, studying the new students, who watched him warily.
    ‘I think we should start by showing you what the senior students can do.’
    Crossing the room to where Allie stood next to Nicole, he spoke quietly. ‘The move you were working on last week – the spin and escape. Do that again but slowly, so they can see how it works.’
    They went through the steps with ease; Nicole performed the kick while Allie blocked the blows, catching her foot as it neared her face and twisting it, a move Nicole parried with a forearm to Allie’s throat.
    The new students looked impressed and terrified in equal measure.
    The other senior students applauded sardonically.
    ‘Now’ Zelazny had turned back to the new students. ‘We’re not starting with something as complicated as that. I think first we must work on your conditioning. We will start, as they say, at the beginning.’
    For the next hour, Eloise and Zelazny worked the new students through stretches and sit-ups, while Raj and his guards took the senior students through a complex krav maga and martial arts moves.
    Allie was glad to be moving. She was stiff from the fight