Red Plan

the students went to the fourth floor after lunch. they ate the foods that were sold in the school canteen, they were lucky that there was still a lot of food left there that they had a good lunch. everyone was full and satisfied.

they sat on the neatly arranged monoblock chairs. they grouped themselves by their sections and courses. all in all, there were five groups. two of the groups were from BSBM course and the remaining three groups was from BSIT group, Nathan, belonged to that group.

as the students all sat, Nathan and Annie got up to the stage. there was a podium in the middle. it was made of wood and green in color, it has the logo of their campus displayed in the middle and was about four feet tall. as Nathan stood side by side with Annie, Nathan felt awkward. he didn't know how to start, he just looked at the students with uncomfortable expression on his face. Annie saw this and gave a faint smile. the she started the meeting.

"as you all know, the snow has stopped falling and the campus is already cleared. we can stay here indefinitely, we can scavenge for food near the campus. the market and grocery store is not that far though that is the case near and inside the campus, we still don't know what it's like beyond here. it might be still dangerous there. so were here to talk about who wants to leave and go home. of course we will not be able to assure your safety, but we will also not stop you. so if you want to leave just raise your hands"

Annie's voice was loud enough for the students in the back to hear her clearly. she had a firm and serious tone, making the students listen to here more carefully and full of attention. the students glanced and whispered at each other. then a student from BSBM raised a hand and asked.

"well, how can you be so sure that staying here will be a good idea? wouldn't it be better if we all travelled to look for evacuation center? because those shelters will be guarded by police and military"

the woman has a point. evacuation center will be heavily guarded by the authority and there will be much more chance to survive there. but Nathan disagreed.

"you're right, it's much safer in a proper evacuation center. but travelling there would be far more dangerous than staying here. also if there's too many people in a group, there is a high chance that you will attract those monsters attention. sure there's strength in numbers, but what if you encountered a group of those big hand monsters? trust me, you will not survive. and most of all do you even know where to look? as far as i know, there weren't any evacuation centers"

the woman stood there with her head bowed down. she realized that if she tried to did that with her friends they will definitely die. the woman sat on her seat again. the students started talking to each other again. another student raised a hand.

"how long can we stay here then? do you already have a plan to seize the market and grocery store?"

the man asked an important question. Annie answered him.

"it depends, if the goods are perfectly intact or at least did not get looted already, we can last for about half a year if we ration it carefully of course. we can also seize other convenience store for materials and weapons and yes we have a plan"

the man was convinced with what Annie said and sat on his chair satisfied. then Nathan added.

"we can also fortify the walls around the campus. if we all worked together, we can last here for a very long time. maybe by that time the rescuers might arrive. so, we have to make this our base and fortify it. how about that? if you still want to go, feel free to raise your hands"

"if you're all okay with staying here, were gonna have to first clean this place up"

Annie saw that no one raised a hand and said this. they talked about the roles of each student, rules to follow and jobs they have to do.

the meeting lasted for two hours, it was now two in the afternoon. after they left the fourth floor, they started cleaning each floor. one group on third and second floor and three groups on the first floor as it was the messiest of all the floors.

three hours later, the students finished cleaning their assigned floors. after that, the ones who knew how to cook started preparing food. they used the kitchen in the school canteen. some students ate at the hut houses some were in the student lounge while others went to their rooms. it felt like they were just camping like the Apocalypse never even happened, they chatted, laugh and felt normal again. after they finished eating the students took shifts patrolling the gate of their campus while others slept comfortably.

the next day came in a flash. it was 7:00 in the morning, Annie has always been an early bird. for some reason, she always wake up at exactly seven in the morning even without the help of alarm clocks she's already used to this. she took a bath but wore the same clothes. then made a coffee from the school canteen. while drinking her coffee, she went to the school fence. yes, a fence, although the fence still has stone brick on it, it was just the base. but the fence itself was quite tough too, it was made of solid iron square shaped iron bars. it was at least an inch thick each bar, seven to nine feet tall. the school only has one entrance and it was narrow enough to let two people pass through side by side. so the school was pretty secure for them. Annie looked outside the campus and saw parked cars and jeepneys in the middle of the road, just across the road was the cafeterias lined up. during lunch those cafeterias will be packed of students eating with their friends. even some professor used to eat there. next to the cafeterias, sari-sari stores, photocopying shops and wet market were located there, next to that was the grocery stores, there's even a 7-11 shop on the other side and a drug store too. a hardware was also located there. all in all, if they can really secure those places they can definitely last longer than a year. but Annie still frowned.

Annie went to the guard house near the entrance. she checked if there was any gun that the guards left, sadly there was none. but it was not all unfortunate, Annie saw two walkie talkies. it was still working, Annie felt good on what she found.

'nice, this will be a help for the plan'

Annie thought of this and went inside the building.

"John, your father, he's a police right? does he have a stash of guns in your home?"

Nathan asked John. Nathan and John has been classmates since highschool so they really know each other. Nathan also knew that John knows how to fire a gun as he was trained by his police father. there was even a time that Nathan went with John and his father to a shooting range. John's father also taught him to fire a gun though it's just one time.

"yeah, but i don't know where he hides it and my house is pretty far from here, it takes ten minutes to reach my house even when riding on a jeepney"

John said bluntly. even though he really want to get the gun on his house, it was pretty far away and he can risk their lives for a single gun, plus he doesn't even know where his dad hid it or if the gun's even still there.

"you know there's a police station near here right? it's where my dad work. I've also been there one time and there's an armory in there. we might still find guns there."

fortunately enough, the police station was near enough for them to reach it easily. it won't even take ten minutes to walk from the campus to the police station.

"ah, yes. I nearly forgot that place hahaha"

Nathan felt dumb when he realized that he actually forgot that place. he smacked his hand on his forehead in embarrassment.

at that moment Annie came in holding two walkie talkies on each of her hand. Annie walked towards them. Nathan saw this and felt his heart beating fast, he saw Annie gracefully walking towards him. Annie reached her hands near Nathan's face and said while smiling.

"look what i found! i was originally looking for a gun though, but this still will help us right?"

Nathan stared at Annie's smiling face. he was in a daze for a bit then shook his head. he looked at the walkie talkies on Annie's hands.

"ohhh, this is nice! where did you find this?"

"it's in the guard house when i was searching for a gun"

"huh, but we searched the guard house the other day. we didn't find anything though"

"I'm just really good at finding things hahaha"

Annie let out a loud laugh. while looking proud of her accomplishment.

"tss, you bet, Campush Crush hahaha"

Nathan teased her and let out an even louder laugh. the students inside and outside the hallway heard their laughter and felt confused. John was even more confused.

'when did this two became some close?'

John knew for the longest time that Nathan had a thing for Annie. seeing them like this he can only feel proud of his friend. John let out a big smile and patted Nathan's back, got up and said.

"well, I'm going now"

when John passed Annie, he looked at Nathan while still smiling. he winked and gave a thumbs up with his both hands and looked at Annie.

'tsss'

Nathan saw this and rolled his eyes. he felt embarrassed and blushed a little bit. Annie had no clue what just happened.

"it just sucks that there's only two walkies though"

Annie said in a low voice. she already know the plan. even though they can accomplish their task with just their own phones as communication device, it's not instantaneous, the students still need to type what they're going to say and this could be fatal in case they encounter a fast red man if there even is one, they won't be able to report their situation and they wont be able to rescue them in time. but with walkie talkies, all this fatal shortcomings can be overcome.

"yeah, dammit. I'll be risking you're lives with our plan. I'm not confident enough. what if there is a monster more dangerous than the ones we killed inside one of those places?"

Nathan said while gritting his teeth with a solemn look on his face. Annie smiled at him and patted him in the back.

"don't worry too much, no one will die I promise you that. specially on my team. I will take care of them. John's team? I'm pretty sure he's also good at combat so there's no need to worry about them, and your team, with Ren and Joshua with your good strategy, I'm sure nothing bad will happen. trust us and yourself, be confident. you're our leader after all"

"heh, you're pretty good at comforting huh. what's with the 'you're our leader' thing? I'm no leader"

Nathan chuckled but soon wondered why he's considered a leader.

"hah, you're not confident again, tsk tsk tsk. anyway, when's the plan going to start?"