<em>Calvin Winslow</em><br/><br/>If he thought inside the school was bad, then what he saw outside was considerably worse. The student body had mixed it up with the rioters outside while he tried to crouch-walk through the parking lot. As he snuck a look through a car’s windows, he saw students engulfed by the rioters. A symphony of screams carried into his area, and caused him to cringe against a teacher’s Passat. As he stared blankly at the gravel beneath him, his mouth worked furiously as he whispered “Stay Strong, Stay Strong. You can make it, just Stay Strong” over, and over again. After some time behind the car, Calvin came back to his senses and stopped whispering. He had noticed that he’d been shaking, and it was a minor miracle that one of the rioters hadn’t stumbled into him while he was out of it. He was about to check the Passat’s doors when running footsteps made him jump back and ready his bat. It took a few seconds to recognize Winters, but once he had, his legs moved of their own accord, as they naturally gravitated toward the authority figure.<br/><br/>“Coach! Coach Winters!” his mind cried as he ran. Unfortunately, there seemed to be a temporary disconnect from his brain to his mouth, because he only really uttered a cotton-mouth gurgle. He saw the coach get into the truck and roar away. An all too consuming fear of being left behind had prompted the receiver’s already tired legs into full motion. The crunch of gravel and his ragged breathing was his world for about a minute before he saw the truck plow through some of the rioters. When he saw the coach step out the truck, Calvin angled to cover his back as he took a bat to one of the rioters. The coach hadn’t seen the other rioter that he only grazed with the truck coming for him, or his savage departure by Calvin. The Swing had all of Calvin’s weight into it, and he almost lost his balance despite connecting. The rioter laid still, the indentation of his temple much more pronounced than it should be.<br/><br/>He saw the coach get back to his truck, and followed the lead of a few other students that piled into the back of the truck. As they sped off, he managed to grab one more student, and helped to pull them in before the hard turn. As he crouched in the bed of the truck, he held on to the student that he helped and stared around at the survivors. He knew, despite how obvious it sounded, that this was the beginning of the end. He understood, as some of the students who couldn’t hang on fell by the way-side, that everyone would not make it through this and his eyes blurred. Anger, frustration, and helplessness fell from his eyes in warm drops, and he only felt worse because he didn’t want to let go of the other person. In the end, all he could do for himself, and the person he could barely see, was hang on and hope for something better. From the muffled sounds of crying around him, he knew even that hope was a fragile thing.<br/>