Chapter Three

Thanks to Quinn's foray into garbage chic, most students avoided her in the hallway. She got to miss her first three periods as the nurse looked her over and pronounced her injuries to be minor, then when the police -- or "Lawndale's Finest Incompetents," as Daria called them -- arrived for questioning. Quinn got to sit in Ms. Li's office and recount what had happened, which was sort of a thrill because even Ms. Li was consumed by her tale. Only after the police had filed their report and left did she give Quinn a detention for being tardy.

One thing about the accident bothered her -- she never saw who caused it. She hadn't even seen the car. It was almost as though that shiny metal bumper had appeared out of thin air. Quinn recalled that she had been running on the sidewalk, with a fence on one side... yet the car bumper had been able to get a clear shot. That car had been after her. It had been trying to run her over. It had been trying to kill her!

Standing alone in the girls bathroom, Quinn shivered violently and fingered a fresh bandage. Now one period lay between her and Phelps's class. What would it be like? Would everything be the same, save the little secret between her and her math teacher? Should she speak to Phelps about what had happened and come forward with her suspicions of Mr. DeMartino?

"Quinn?"

Quinn jumped three feet and let out a little gasp. Then, through the mirror she saw the image of her friend, Stacy.

"Stacy! Oh thank God it's you!" Quinn ran over to her, just as Stacy had come all the way through the door, and smothered her in a big hug.

"Uck! Quinn, you smell like you got sprayed by a skunk!" Stacy recoiled from her friend's embrace. Meekness then got the better of her. "I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have said that!"

"Don't worry, Stacy. I'm just glad to see a friend."

"Quinn, word around school is that something awful happened to you this morning. Jeffy said that he saw you with a police officer, and Tori said that you were dripping blood!"

Leave it to her wonderful peers to blow everything out of proportion. "It really wasn't that bad. Kind of gross, but nothing to worry--" Just then, Quinn's stomach tightened.

"Quinn! Omigod! Internal bleeding!"

"No, Stacy! I just remembered my cous-- my sister, Daria. Was she around when everyone was trading rumors?"

"I don't know. I didn't see her."

Quinn felt the blood rush to her head. She didn't want her sister to think that she was seriously injured.

"Quinn..." Stacy looked at her with nervous, imploring eyes. "Something bad did happen to you, I can tell. Please tell me: I'm scared. Something weird is going on."

So it wasn't just her. Quinn exhaled with relief, and felt a need to share her burden that overwhelmed her sense of caution. After checking each of the bathroom stalls to make sure they were empty, she turned to her friend.

"Stacy, someone tried to run me down this morning," she said in a hushed tone. "And I don't know, but somehow I think it has to do with the fact that I found out yesterday that Mr. Phelps is an alien."

Stacy's eyes widened. "You mean he really is from England?!"

"No!" Quinn slapped her forehead. "Not alien-immigrant! Alien from another planet."

"Oh. Whoa..." Stacy's expression was quiet and shocked. "What are you going to do?"

"I don't know," Quinn whispered. "Why did he have to tell me?! It's not like he needs my help tracking down that evil alien creature in the school -- which I'll explain in a minute."

Stacy nodded numbly. "I mean he says he needs me to calculate the path back to his home planet," Quinn fretted. "But I don't know anything about extraterrestrial life. All I know is that they're usually really ugly with scaly green skin."

Stacy nodded as her friend paced the room. "I mean they tried to pass off E.T. as cute, but who were they kidding?! It just..." Quinn's face grew bleak. "It's just... also... Mr. Phelps was almost my friend, and the thought that as soon as he gets what he wants, he's gonna woosh off into outer space just makes me kind of sad. Calculus won't be the same without him."

Stacy nodded. Quinn turned and looked at her friend expectantly. "So what do you think I should do? I mean it'd kind of be nice to get an outsider's perspective."

Stacy stopped nodding and looked at Quinn, her face frozen. Quinn's brow creased with concern. "Okay Stacy, I get that this is freaking you out. It freaks me out. But you'd better start hyperventilating or something soon, or you'll pass out."

Stacy remained silent, her face very still and white. Quinn's heart started pounding. She touched her friend's arm. "Stacy? Are you all right? Answer me!"

Stacy's eyes widened. Then they kept growing wider, and wider, until they were wider than any human's should be. All at once they burst out of their sockets and flew across the room.

"Stacy?! AGH!!!!!"

Blood spurted from the now empty eye sockets, coating Quinn in shimmering dark red. Blood dripped from her hair and down her face, but still she was at her friend's side, her arms around her, trying to revive her from her unexplained stupor.

"Stacy, come back!" I'll get help!" Tears slid down Quinn's face, mixed with the blood. "Come on, I'll take you to the nurse right now!" Bloody tears dripped into her mouth, causing her to gag uncontrollably. "Someone... someone help me!"

The life left Stacy's body, and she collapsed to the floor, with only the strength of Quinn's arms preventing her from hitting it hard. Quinn laid her down gently and, dropping to her knees beside her, began to sob. She didn't know what had happened, but the only true friend she'd had at this school was gone. Who was going to compliment her clothes without sounding catty, or trade notes with her in homeroom, or join her when she refused to dress for gym? How would she explain this to Tiffany at lunch?

Quinn was so steeped in misery, she didn't think to look up until she felt the harsh light of the bathroom blotted out by a shadow. She then turned her face upward to see Mr. DeMartino standing just inside the doorway.

"I-I didn't. It wasn't me..." Trembling, Quinn stood up over the corpse of her friend. "She just... she just had an accident, and she fell."

Without a word, Mr. DeMartino stepped forward, eye bulging. It reminded Quinn so much of Stacy that she instinctively recoiled... but there was something about the way her teacher's eye bulged that seemed to be with purpose.

"You..." Quinn took a step backward. "It was you, wasn't it?" DeMartino came closer, and she stepped back again. "You did this to her... didn't you?" She took another step backward. "It was you!"

"Come with ME, Ms. MorgenDORFFER."

DeMartino reached forward to grab her, but Quinn screamed and fell backward into one of the stalls. Landing awkwardly on the toilet seat, she looked up to see DeMartino looming over her. He reached for her again, but somewhere in a dark recess of her mind, Quinn remembered her brief time on the cheerleading squad. Just as DeMartino was crouching down, he felt a swift kick in the chin, causing him to stumble back against the sinks.

Quinn jumped out of the stall and found him slumped against the counter. Then, skidding a little on one of Stacy's eyeballs, she raced out of the bathroom.

Quinn ran down the hall as fast as she could. She had to get out of the school. She had to find Daria. She had to find Daria! She had to get them both out of the school! Quinn didn't so much as pause in front of one of the classrooms to see if her sister was in there. She just wanted to keep going.

Suddenly something soft pressed against her. Glancing behind, Quinn saw DeMartino's bulging eye. Just his bulging eye.

She skidded to a stop and hit one of the lockers, then turned around and screamed. The eye was hurtling toward her in mid-air, attached to its owner by just a thin string of sinew. Quinn tried to fend it off, but it quickly encircled her wrist, so that it was now bound by the sinew, and began dragging her back toward DeMartino. Thinking quickly, Quinn dug her sharpest nail deep into the pupil, causing it to wiggle and writhe. It weakened so quickly, Quinn was able to release her wrist from its bonds and keep running.

She soon found herself bursting through the doors of the sparsly-filled cafeteria, her blood-soaked clothing inviting everyone's stare. Quinn tried to dodge the students on her way toward the double-door exit, but exhaustion was weighing down her limbs and stealing air from her lungs. After another quick glance behind to make certain she wasn't being followed, Quinn ran head-on into another student.

They both collapsed to the floor and lay there, dazed. Finally Quinn sat up slowly, every inch of her body screaming with pain. A firm hand clamped itself over her arm. She looked up. It was DeMartino.

Quinn tried to scream, but he smothered it quickly, pressing his other hand tightly against her mouth. He then proceeded to drag her, with unyielding strength, toward the emergency staircase.

Quinn tried to resist, but her body was so tired, each jolt produced a sharp pain. She felt herself being dragged downstairs into a dark room with no windows, then forcibly shoved into a chair. As DeMartino released his hand from her mouth, she found it within her to release a blood-curling scream.

"HELP ME! SOMEBODY HELP ME! HELP ME PLEASE!"

Mr. DeMartino stared down at her with near-exasperation.

"Ms. MORGENDORFFER, please don't YELL. I am NOT trying to HURT you! I am trying to SAVE you!"