Will Schuester sat, numb, on a small wall behind seven, maybe eight, police cars. The hoodie he’d pulled on for decency’s sake over his baggy sweatpants and oldest T-Shirt, when his phone had first rung an hour or so ago, now stuck to him in the heat of the evening. In the light of the streetlamps he saw the crowds of police officers milling about; over half of them he counted carrying huge weapons across their chests, walking up and away from the narrow gap which had been left in the cordon at the gates of the school. His mind refused to process the sight; this was a place for children, for young adults. He saw Figgins marching amongst them, waving his arms, demanding something. Answers, probably.

Since Will’s banged up car had reached the rear of the queue of flashing lights and police tape they had heard nothing, seen nothing. It was like waiting on the edge of a storm. Moving through the horror scene he’d at first been glad to see the paramedics waiting idly by their vehicles, but then the realisation that all the kids were still inside had hit him. In a blind panic he’d stumbled upon Emma and Figgins, both interrogating any officer who would listen. Emma…Emma, who was now standing slightly away to the side, in light summer pyjamas and a bright yellow cardigan, ruffled gently by the hot breeze, phone to her ear as she tried to reach the parents of those inside. As he looked over from his seat, Will could see the luminous tracks of tears down her cheeks, and he felt them reflected in anger on his own. Why were they not being told anything? Why was nothing happening?

After a few more tense minutes, in which Will began to try and recall the last words he’d said to each member of his club, trying to work out what it had been that had forced them to go back into school on this night of all nights, Figgins wandered over and sank down beside him, head rocking into his hands.

“Nothing. They won’t say anything. Only the same old line; that someone made a call from inside the school. I mean, William, what are we supposed to think, eh?”

He glanced over his shoulder at Emma, as she raised her hanky to her face and wiped furiously but delicately at her nose, still with her cell balanced against her ear.

“What are we supposed to tell them? The police didn’t want anyone to know at first, but I said you absolutely had to be here.”

“Thanks.”

It was all that he could master. The back doors of a large van near them were opened and an officer stepped down, handing over a sheet of paper to another uniformed figure. Inside the van was a bank of monitors and screens, burning with green and black lights.

Will looked over to what he could see of the school; a stack of dark rectangles, with no sign of life within. He winced physically; could he have picked a more indelicate expression? But it was true; no light came from any of the windows. He shuffled sideways along the wall to try to see round the trees which marked the gateway to McKinley High, but he knew there was nothing more to learn from this far away. In any case the choir room had no windows on this side of the buildings. His room. He should be in there with them. His heart pounded. If anything had happened to any single one of them, he would never forgive himself. He would resign. He couldn’t go on with that guilt on his head.

Will turned, about to express the same feelings to Figgins, when there was a first flurry of activity around the entrance. The two men stood up together, as a snake of heavily armed police ran, crouching, in the direction of the main building, heading for the quad and the back stairs to the cafeteria. In the moment of hushed silence which followed their movement, Will’s mind swore it heard the sound of breaking china and splintering wood drift from the windows of the ghost school. “Please don’t let them be hostages…” he begged inside his head, to no-one in particular. If praying was going to help, then he would pray all night. “Please let them be ok…” His fears redoubled as one team of paramedics moved forwards through the vehicles, stopping nearest the gate. To their side a female cop detached herself from her superior and came over, gently touching Figgins on the arm. With a quick word in his ear, of which his face betrayed nothing, she took him aside. Will’s head ticked backwards and forwards, trying to watch both events at once, squinting to see Figgins’ face in the moonlight. But then the conversation was over, with a swift gesturing towards the school, and the principle rejoined Will on the hard stone wall.

“What did she want?”

“Odd…She asked where the locker rooms were…where the boys’ one is. Nothing about the cafeteria or choir room, or wherever,” he flicked his hand in the direction the men had disappeared in, “they were going. I thought they’d know everything about where to go from whoever’d called them.”

“What…” Will couldn’t stop himself from speaking his terrifying mind, “what if they think they were forced to call? By whoever…”

He too was forced, running out of words, to wave his hand meaninglessly at the dark buildings.

Figgins didn’t reply.

A minute later the sound of gunfire rang across the empty concrete; one shot followed by another. The two men physically flinched at the sounds; Emma giving a whelp of shock and fear and darting up, startled like an animal, from where she’d been searching her bag for tissues. As one the sea of professionals reached to arm themselves and began to move into some kind of prearranged formation, with rows fanning out around the gates, ready for some kind of order. Will remained standing now, stepping forward, ready to run straight in after them. His overcome mind began to simply repeat the names of his kids, over and over again. Rachel, Finn, Mercedes, Kurt, Puck, Quinn, Tina, Artie, Mike, Brittany, Santana, Lauren…Thirteen names; thirteen lives that he felt completely responsible for. What would he give for them to swap positions with him?

Two shouts echoed up from the hidden courtyard; then a breath of silence before a third shot, and a fourth. To his ears they all sounded like they came from inside the building. Against every wish he had, every better thought and judgement, his mind unthinkingly subtracted four from thirteen.