things are dangerous everywhere, to take the cars or the train now would be way more dangerous than staying here protected within the faculty.” Said Roberto.
“Hmmm, ok. But we leave as soon as possible.”
“Hey Guillem, do not worry. I will take care of you if they come! You just hide behind me little boy” Said Cristobal as he grappled Guillem and gave him a few playful punches.
Guillem called home and explained his mother about the situation and that they had decided to stay for a while until everything calmed down.
All of them kept calling every hour their homes to check how the situation was evolving, but it was just getting worst all over the city. There were already a few deaths, burned cars and houses and there was a huge group of troublemakers going to the city's east where usually the more wealthy people lived. There were armed groups formed by parents that lived in the wealthy suburbs patrolling their homes and guarding their families.
Occasionally a guard would pass by the tables to see what the group was doing and then he would go on his way.
It was close to 7pm and the situation was as bad as it had been the whole day if not worse. Some groups of scared people were congregating in the class rooms, sport courts and offices, they were getting into any place with a lock where they felt secure. By the tables in which they were playing they had not seen anybody the past couple of hours except guards, all of which looked very scared.
While they were playing, Xavier suddenly made them a signal to keep quiet. He got up and walked very slowly to the car gate that was close to the table. Guillem saw him as he looked outside through the gate very carefully and then he came back very nervous.
“There is a group of ugly guys outside, they have a few ladders and are putting them against the wall to get in here.” Whispered Xavier.
“Let's go find the guards and tell them.” Whispered Maria.
Everyone agreed so they went toward the guard shelter, it was located on the far end of the faculty, just next to main entrance, so their race there felt endless. The faculty corridors were completely deserted, sometimes they managed to see some people peeping through doors and windows, but they quickly hid trying to avoid being seen.
Finally they came out of the building and could see the guard shelter. The faster and first two to arrive where Xavier and Guillem, but what they saw made their hearts shrivel. A huge crowd was about to overpower the guards, most of them were being beaten and some were already unconscious.
“Fuck, we have to hide!” Said Guillem.
Looking back at the corridor from which they came, they saw many flashlights and torches coming just behind their friends so it was impossible to get back that way.
“Let's go to that construction site!” Yelled Roberto while pushing Xavier and Guillem toward an old building that had been under construction for the past few years.
That building was supposed to be the new laboratories for biology, but they were never completed. They just finished the main structure of four levels including columns, floors and staircases, but it was still missing its walls and any sort of finishes.
Reaching the building was just a matter of running a few more minutes, in the way Cristobal picked up a sledgehammer he found laying in the floor, it was a huge tool which looked just in place between Cristobal's huge hands and the others followed his example by picking up some useful tools or building materials that they could use to defend themselves. Roberto in particular found a deteriorated, but still functional portable nail gun.
The first to reach the top floor was Xavier, as soon as the others where arriving he sent them to different locations in the floor as he was saying.
“Spread yourselves and watch the surroundings, but please stay within sight of someone else, it is very important. Maria, please can you stay here at the top of the staircase and see if anyone is coming up. I am going to pile up some bricks next to you so you can throw them just in case anyone comes up.” The others distributed themselves over the floor as Xavier suggested.
“You seem to have been in this sort of situation already.” Said Maria with a very sad expression.
“Me? Thank God no. But through out the years I have seen this happen many times.”
From upstairs they could see how the crowd entered the faculty while the second crowd closed in from the building, the guards were all unconscious or were being beaten. The crowd coming from the inside of the faculty were bringing many restrained people with them, there were both women and men, most of them were still conscious and trying to break free, but they all looked very hurt.
The prisoners were being put together close to the entrance of the construction site terrain, a group of 10 troublemakers stayed with them while the rest went into the faculty once more to check the place.
On the other side of the construction site was a huge land in which students used to play Rugby, it was completely deserted and on the other side of it was the main street of Los Chaguaramos. There was a lot of activity on the street, they could see many flashlights, torches and car lights moving around and even a few cars on fire. They could hear many women screaming and some from men as well, their sound tore their hearts apart, people yelling slogans against the oligarchy, something they called the 'emaciated' people and quite a few gun shots.
After the majority of the troublemakers went out of the faculty the group decided to get together at a point of the floor from which they could see the held prisoners held below them.
“Ok, what do we do now?” Asked Tom.
“We could stay here I guess or we might be able to reason with them, I am a bit worried about those prisoners they are holding, we should help them if we can.” Said Guillem.
“We could jump the fence to the Rugby field, cross it, jump the other fence and go to the stadium to pick up our cars. There are plenty of places to hide in the way between all the rubbish left behind by this stupid mob.” Said Xavier.
“But you are still forgetting about something, what are we going to do about the people they are keeping prisoner down there? I mean, those women can at best expect to be raped multiple times.” Said Guillem.
“I am with Guillem. We must do something.” Said Cristobal.
“If experience on this sort of situation says anything, is that it is a very bad idea to play around in this sort of situation, there have been many cases of people getting killed for doing stupid things like saving others.” Said Xavier.
“Everyone has a time to die. Let's go and help them.” Said Lucio.
“Yeah Xavier, it is not stupid to help someone survive.” Guillem said.
“There is too much people watching them. What if we attract a group of them here while someone of us goes to the prisoner group and frees them? But that person would have to take care of anyone left there watching over them.” Said Maria.
“And then what? A group as big as that is going to attract too much attention. If we do as you suggest we will have to hide here and defend ourselves and I do not think we can do that for long.” Said Xavier.
At that point they heard a few excited male voices and a couple very panicky female screams. A group of 9 of the troublemakers were taking two of the women into the construction site while screaming things like “Let's go sweety, you will like it” and “What? I am more than enough man for you!”, the women were trying to resist as they could, but all 9 of them had the women immobilised, after a few meters one of the guys turned towards the women and hit one of them with all his strength leaving her unconscious. The other one stopped resisting and started crying without control.
They left the rest of the prisoners being watched by only one guy, but he was tying them all together back to back forming a circle with the prisoners.
“Ok, this is it. No more arguing. Take care of this group while I go free the rest of them.” Said Roberto while picking up the portable nail gun and a rusty knife. “Try not to let anyone escape and it might happen that we get out of here alive tonight. Take care of yourself Maria, plea
se.” He said to her.
“Let's go down carefully. Tom, Cristobal, Edward, you and me will go to the lower level and hide,” said Xavier “meanwhile Guillem, Lucio and Maria stay on the first floor and throw anything you can find to those sons of a bitch from there, do not worry for the prisoners. We will try not to allow anyone to escape or come upstairs to you guys. It is more important that no one of those bitches manages to get away, later we will take care of anyone of the prisoners that gets hurt.”
Xavier and Edward took each a small piece of timber while Cristobal took his sledgehammer and they all went down to the first floor. When they got there they searched for the place where the women were taken, they were about 2 meters away from the building, hiding between some trees and a lot of weed, as it was to be expected they were entertained undressing the women and themselves, one of the ladies was still unconscious and the other was in shock and crying uncontrollably. Xavier, Tom, Cristobal, Edward and Roberto went down to the ground level carefully and Roberto ran away toward the entrance to take care of the guard left watching over the bigger group of prisoners. He managed to hide between a small group of trees about 2 meters away from them.
Four of the troublemakers had already positioned themselves to better abuse from the women. Guillem and his group waited as much as possible to give the others time to hide properly, but