Author's Note: Due to the setting of this chapter, I'd like to reiterate that all characters in this story are above the age of eighteen.
Lucy's heels clacked along the empty hallway. She trailed her fingers over the metal lockers of Pershing High like she had fifteen years ago. Fifteen years before she would become the Crimson Lady. Her picture still hung on the wall in a graduation composite somewhere. Glancing in the empty classrooms, she had to remind herself why the building was so hollow. Her tricks could even fool herself if she didn't focus.
Malcolm crawled behind her on all fours. She didn't tell him to, but he seemed to enjoy it. Malcolm went to his job as the school principal one day to come home and find his son, Nick, balls deep in his wife while his stepdaughter fed Nick her titty milk. The corrupted women pounced on Malcolm, but when Lucy offered to release his soul from the conflict of morality, he refused. Lucy left him to consider the choice for a weekend while she turned her attention elsewhere. When she came back to him, he still held a shred of strange resilience, despite drinking gallons of Aly and Helen's milk while watching his son pump the two harlots full of more cum than Malcolm had made in his whole life. It left him a little insane. Perhaps that's why he enjoyed being submissive, as a way of coping with the tattered remains of his humanity.
"
What is soul, Malcolm?" Lucy asked as she stepped into a classroom. "You know it when you see it, I guess. Can you even remember what your job was? Hell, what do you do when you come to work anyway?"
"
Mostly masturbate in the car, mistress," he answered, head facing down. "I take Aly's milk. In bottles. I drink it and use it to cover my cock. Nothing changes. No changes for Malcolm. Have to stay good."
Lucy eyed him. "I do admire you, you insane little pervert. To want what I have so much and still try to remain for your students. It's impressive, but as you can see, there aren't very many students left."
"
Some," he murmured. "Some you will take. The others...I can't remember the others..."
"
No, no one can. Unfinished souls thrown back into the cosmic roulette. Reality abhors a vacuum, after all." She began pushing desks off to the side while Malcolm watched. "As my reality asserts itself, it cannot take unfinished souls. But those unfinished souls can't exist in a void. So reality corrects. Isn't that amazing? All over the world, new people pop into existence and not a soul notices. They believe that person has always existed. Makes you wonder about your whole life, really. Maybe you and I started out somewhere completely different, but a thing like me comes along and causes the whole of existence to make way. It's like Dawn on Buffy."
"
I don't understand, mistress," he whimpered.
"Television show. They randomly added a character in one of the later seasons, going on to eventually explain her as being inserted into reality by monks or a god or something. Who knew
that
of all things would be accurate? Or maybe it isn't. Maybe that's how my own mind conceptualizes what I've done, rewritten backward into my memory so that I don't snap." She turned to look at him, "You should have offered more philosophy classes."
"
The state sets the curriculum, mistress."
"
Always passing the buck," she said. "How many are left?"
"
Eight, only eight," Malcolm answered looking at the room full of desks, books, papers, and chalk. "There were more...but gone. Eight left. Eight, and Malcolm can be free."
"
Yeah, bud," Lucy said. "Eight and you can go wild with Aly's milk straight from the tap. You know, without having to be tied down with Alice's spiked heel on your nuts. Somehow I think you might still want that part, too."
"
Yes, mistress," he answered.
"
This room will do," Lucy said. She snapped her fingers and all but the eight desks she arranged vanished in a puff of crimson glitter. "Been working on that one," she grinned. "Now, let's go back. It's a school night after all."
***
Katherine looked around at the other students. She knew them all, of course, as it was a small school, but she'd never seen them all in one class. Bryson spent his time in study halls, resting up for whatever big game would happen within the week. Nicole and Mason took art electives and rarely mixed with each other let alone the rest of the school. Claire and BreeAnn weren't an unusual addition to one of Katherine's classes, but usually not both at once. Claire wasn't the brightest after all, and BreeAnn was AP track like Dylan, who sat beside her. Most out of place of all was Blake, who started by dragging his desk further from all the others. Katherine didn't even think he was still enrolled.
"
Didn't there used to be more of us?" Claire said, as though it were the most profound thought to ever enter her mind.
All the others looked around and shrugged. "What do you mean?" Dylan asked.
"
Like, if this is a special health class for the seniors, shouldn't there be more than eight of us?"
Katherine did think the school had a lot of lockers for only eight students. "You're being silly, Claire," she said. "Who else would there be?"
Claire opened her mouth to object, but the thoughts slipped away. Instead, she leaned closer to Katherine, "So what's going on with you and Bryson, anyway? Dating again?"
"
No," Katherine hissed. They were all sitting too close together for any real privacy. Bryson even looked over his shoulder. "We're done," she said, in whisper. "I mean, look at him. He's actually wearing that letterman jacket. It's like 90 degrees outside."
"
You're wearing your cheerleading outfit, though?" Claire said, the confusion returning to her face.
Katherine blushed. She'd laid out a completely new outfit that morning, but some idea whispered in her head to dress with more school spirit. Looking around at the others, she noticed they'd dressed like characters in an 80's movie.
Claire had on a designer pastel dress that matched her eyes. She wore pearl earrings and a diamond stud around her neck. Everything exuded wealth in a way Katherine couldn't quite explain. Nicole's skirt rode higher than school code allowed, showing off a good bit of her pale flesh contrasted between the black, fishnet stockings and boots. As usual, she'd slathered on the black eyeliner and lipstick to accentuate the black t-shirt with a skull on it that struggled to keep those big knockers in check. BreeAnn wore the school uniform, even though seniors were exempt. Katherine seemed to think the uniform was supposed to be jeans or a jean skirt and the school polo. Instead, BreeAnn had on a knee length plaid skirt with a white, button up blouse. It might have looked sexy on any of the other girls, but BreeAnn's flat chest and narrow hips made her look bookish if not boyish. The knotted up curls and wide rimmed glasses didn't help.
The guys looked a little less like cartoon characters. Bryson did have on his jacket and a pair of overly tight jeans. Mason wore a pair of tight slacks held up with suspenders over a blue, short sleeved button up. Katherine would have considered him cute except for the bow tie and his overt homosexuality. Dylan dressed nicely, if plainly in a checked blue shirt with white pants. He'd always been gangly and awkward, but the outfit showed off his broad if not athletic physique quite well, while contrasting nicely with his dark skin. Blake looked like a drug dealer in his beanie and surplus store clothes, but Katherine figured it was because he was a drug dealer.
