The three boys followed the trail into the forest, deep, deeper, until the light of the campfire was no longer visible. Sydney's body had been dragged over logs, through bushes, and even across a shallow, frozen creek. Water-rounded rocks protruded from the ice's smooth surface like warts.

On the other side, Henry, who was in the lead, suddenly stopped in his tracks. He listened to the woods as Wikman and David crossed behind him. “You guys hear that?”

Wikman and David listened as well.

They heard it. A sound of a girl panting. And grotesque, wet noises of something juicy being ripped...torn...pulled apart...

It was almost like the sound of eating an orange. The sound of sinews tearing as peel separated from the fleshy innards...

The sounds were coming from the other side of a small rocky outcrop. Slowly, fearfully, drymouthed, Henry crept around the rock.

He cast the light at the sound.

There was Sydney, lying on her back on the snow. Her mouth was open, frozen in a scream. Her eyes wide and glassy, staring right at him. Not seeing him. Not seeing anything, ever again.

Her stomach was opened. A length of intestine was hanging out of her, the end of it oozing blood on the snow. Behind her was the faceless Venice. Her blood-streaked skull gleamed under the flashlight's glare.

And there was Chase between the two, at Sydney's side in a feral crouch. She held Sydney's liver in both hands. Her teeth were in it, head and hands twisting to tear off a bite. She ripped a piece free, chewed it, swallowed hungrily. Her blonde hair was disheveled, and her front and chin were red with blood.

A flood of fear and disgust filled Henry. His head swam. One second he was looking at Chase, then the next, he was doubled over, vomiting.

“Oh my god,” said David, staggering backward. “What the fuck. What the fuck.”

“I told you...” muttered Wikman. “I told you...”

Then, Chase noticed them. Her eyes locked onto them with a suddenness that gave all three boys a start. The cheerleader stood up, Sydney's liver still in her hand.

“Hi,” she said.

“She's...she's fucking eating her...” rambled David. “Oh my god...Oh my god...”

Chase looked down at the liver. “Not eat since lunch of past day. Need food. But not much time for eat, much to do. So just eat liv for now. Much strong and full from liv. Get most from. More than just meat.” She took another bite.

Henry wiped his mouth and straightened. The taste of acid-washed pizza was on his tongue. This had to be a nightmare. He was dreaming. Wikman was just staring at Sydney, meeting her wide-eyed stare with his own. His hands were clenched into fists.

“Okay, look,” Henry told Chase. He was shaking as he opened his arms to show he wasn't holding a weapon. “Chase, right? Just calm down. Calm down. It's okay. Just put the...put that down and let's talk.”

“Dude, you can't talk to her. I've heard of shit like this,” said David. “She's eating Sydney's goddamn liver. She's gotta be on fucking bath salts or something. She's fucked up on something even Sydney would never touch.”

Then, Wikman snapped. “Who gives a shit?” he asked. The other two boys looked at him, surprised. “I ain't scared of some cheerleader bitch!” Whether it was the alcohol still in his system, or simply the horror of the situation pushing him beyond rationality, he charged at Chase in an impassioned burst of fury and hatred. “RAAAAAH!”

Chase jumped out of the way. Wikman reached for her with his long, muscular arm, but she just escaped his considerable reach.

He turned toward her and threw a punch. Chase jumped upwards, alighting on a tree branch. Wikman looked up at her and cried, “You're gonna pay, you murderer! You hear me? You're gonna pay!”

Chase listened to him. She closed her eyes and thought about this. “You right,” she said, after a moment's consideration. “Will pay for what do. Kill make kill. Choose to kill, means choose to pay.” She opened her eyes, and looked down at him. “But that time not now. This night, you pay. You, voll girls, those two guys. You pay for kill Beck, and for kill those more too. Not let you hurt more cheer, not let hurt Cait. One day, some one make me pay. But that one not you.”

Only half-understanding what she was saying in his present state of clouded mind, Wikman roared in frustration and rammed his shoulder against the tree. Chase leapt off the branch. Wikman spun around and craned his neck at her, saw her twist acrobatically in the air...and caught a glint of metal in the darkness before his eye exploded in pain.

“Aaaaah!” he screamed. He dropped to one knee, and his hands flew to his face. They felt warm blood there. His right eye was throbbing with pain, and had gone totally dark. With shaking fingers, he explored that spot. He felt a small piece of cold, hard, flat metal protruding from it. Sydney's razor.

Chase landed facing him. He charged at her in a fury, arms outstretched to grab her.

Able to see that she would not be able to outreach the large boy, Chase dodged him, juking to the side and spinning a kick against the back of his head.

Wikman felt like he'd been hit with a hammer. He stumbled forward, partly from sheer surprise. The amount of force behind this girl's kick was something he was unprepared for. Was this just a side effect of the drugs she was on? He'd heard of people on stuff like PCP unlocking an inordinate level of strength. Maybe that was part of it. But it seemed like she also knew how to fight.

That was fine. So did he.

He turned around just as Chase aimed another high kick at him. Focusing through the pain, gauging the trajectory of the girl's leg with one eye, Wikman blocked with his forearm. Blocked, moved inward, aimed a body blow at her side with his other hand. Connected.

Chase winced and backed up. Her guard was down, so Wikman aimed a punch at her face. Chase ducked underneath, came up with an uppercut. Wikman tilted his head back just in time, causing the cheerleader's knuckles to only catch his nose. There was an explosion of pain, and he knew immediately it was broken. He realized the punch was strong enough that if it connected squarely, it would surely have knocked him out.

This girl was hard hitting and fast. Faster than him. His biggest advantage was his size and weight. He needed to get her on the ground. If he did that, he could easily overpower her.

Her missed uppercut left her close enough to reach. He grabbed at her, but Chase was able to spin out of the way. She ended up on his left side, where she attempted to arc another kick at his head.

Wikman did not try to dodge. He'd meet her attack with an attack of his own. Lowering his head, he threw all of his weight behind his shoulder and rammed it against Chase's chest.

Standing on only one foot in mid-kick, Chase was easily caught off guard and knocked off balance. She fell to her stomach, kicking up a cloud of snow from her impact.

Her back was exposed. The perfect opening. Wikman threw himself on her. An ordinary girl might have passed out just from the impact of being crushed by this boy's mass. Instead, she just had the wind knocked out of her. Before she could recover, he reached forward from behind her and squeezed her throat in the crook of his muscular arm. A rear naked choke.

He put all his anger, frustration and loss into the pressure he was applying. He was so furious he could have pinched her head off in that moment. He could feel Chase's fear in the quickening of her pulse.

Chase's hands scrabbled at his arm. Then, she reached up to his face. Found the razor still protruding from his eye.

She grabbed it and twisted.

Wikman screamed. He screamed at the maddening feeling of his eye rotating in its socket outside of his control, in a motion it was never meant to take.

And then, Chase pulled. She pulled on the razor...and Wikman's eye wasn't letting go of it. It was coming too. Wikman continued to scream. His chokehold evaporated, but Chase did not let up. She kept going until Wikman's eye popped loose from his skull.

Chase grabbed his optic nerves with her other hand and yanked, severing them. Wikman rolled off her, clutching his bleeding eye hole and vomiting fractured cries. Chase calmly stood up.

She looked down at the wounded boy, then at the razor pinched between her fingers, and the glistening eyeball impaled on it. The way it caught the moonlight made it look quite appetizing. She slipped it into her mouth, held it in her teeth, and pulled the razor free, like biting an olive off a toothpick.

“Oh my god...” said Henry, as Chase chewed the eyeball. “Oh my god...”

Chase didn't realize how thirsty she was until her teeth ruptured the cornea and a burst of fluid gushed into her mouth.

After a thick swallow, Chase took a calm step toward Wikman, who was still groaning and writhing on the ground. Seeing their friend was vulnerable, and seeing Chase's back was turned to them, Henry and David jumped forward to grab her and hold her back.

Slash. Chase spun around, and her hand flitted through the air. Wounds opened on David's arm and Henry's cheek. The boys cried out and fell back. It was then they saw the razor pinched between Chase's pointer and middle finger.

The wound on David's arm was especially deep. Blood poured onto the snow. He put pressure on it as best he could, and the stunned, horrified Henry assisted him.

There was nobody to stop Chase from engaging Wikman again. She reached down, grabbed the hefty boy's collar with her razorless hand, and lifted him up to his feet. Distantly, Wikman was stunned. This girl was lifting him one-handed?

Chase hurled him against a tree. Wikman hit it back first, then fell to the ground. With a grunt, he shakily found his feet. He targeted her with his remaining eye then blearily ran at her in a final charge. “Raaaah!”

Chase did a flip over him. Her razor-wielding fingers darted downward as she passed over him. Her feet landed on the snow at the same time as Wikman's right ear.

“Graaah!” he cried, putting a hand to the place where his ear had just been. A river of blood flowed down his neck and shoulder.

Rage blinded him as surely as if the girl had taken both his eyes instead of just one. He charged at her again. Chase looked over her shoulder, and then her hand lashed out, like a biting cobra.

A thin red line opened on Wikman's throat. One that quickly widened. It began to ooze red, like the mouth of a hungry, drooling creature. Wikman coughed. He gurgled. And then he fell. Dying, and soon dead.

“Fuck. Fuck. Run. Run,” whispered David, realizing that with Wikman out of the way, Chase would turn to them next. So they ran.