Anatomy of Failure
Chapter 3: The Awakening
“…mummah…? Chirp. Hab huwties. Nee’ huggies…"
Emma stopped mid-note, pencil poised uncertainly over her notebook.
Cole looked up, eyes narrowing.
Jasper, at the next table, dropped his forceps with a sharp clatter that echoed louder than it should have.
“Did…” someone whispered. “Did it just talk?”
A low, gurgling whimper echoed from Table Five.
I moved quickly towards the table. Lacey McBride sat frozen, her face drained of color, pale and ghostly under the harsh classroom lights. Before her lay a sickly pink filly with a matted white mane, no longer still. Its half-lidded eyes fluttered weakly, scanning the room with the barest flicker of awareness. The chest rose and fell in frantic, uneven spasms, ribs fully exposed from a brutal midline incision. Flaps of skin had been peeled back like parchment and pinned flat against the wax paper. The foal’s body convulsed against its own restraint, trembling violently on the tray. Its tiny mouth opened again, jaw quivering, and from deep inside came a faint broken sound, something caught between breath and plea.
“Pwease nu huwt fwuffy… chirp… fwuffy be gud… peep… nu wan foweba sweepies…” Blood pooled thick and sticky around its ragged wounds. The foal was looking directly at Lacey.
Lacey screamed. It was raw and piercing, the kind of sound that silences a room before it even registers as human. Her stool scraped backward with a screech as she recoiled, arms flailing, knocking into Table Six behind her. Metal clattered against metal. A tray flipped end over end and hit the floor with a crash. A second foal, a lavender filly with a limp green mane, spilled from the tray and landed in a crumpled heap on the tile. Its legs twitched in slow, useless circles, as if swimming through the air. A smear of dark sludge streaked across the floor where its opened belly dragged. Someone gasped. Someone else shouted. A chair toppled.
The first scream had cracked something loose in the room, and chaos erupted behind it like a flood.
Across the room, other trays began to twitch. At first it was subtle, a shiver in a limb or the scrape of a scalpel nudged out of place, but then the movements escalated. Limbs spasmed. Heads jerked. Cold little bodies convulsed beneath trembling gloves. Some arched against the restraints, others flailed blindly in place, wet fur smearing against the metal. Then came the cries. Not screams exactly, but broken sounds, choked with fluid and confusion. Words fumbled their way out in high, garbled tones, strung together in a slurry of half-formed speech and struggling breaths.
“Whewe… peep… mummah?”
“Why hab ouchies?”
“F-fix fwuffy… pwease… sowwy… sowwy…”
“sssSSCREEEeee!”
“Huu huu hu…”
Emma Halberd remained frozen. Her eyes never left her filly’s face as it gagged and writhed beneath the pins holding it down. The animal’s eyes rolled back, then fixed on her with sudden, desperate clarity. “M-mummah…? Nu… nu huwt pwease… fwuffy be gud… be su gud…” a fresh spasm racked its tiny frame. Viscous green bile leaked from its nostrils. Emma’s mouth opened, but no sound came. She dropped the scalpel. It clattered against the tile, vanishing underfoot. Her knees buckled and she sank slowly to the floor, arms crossed protectively over her chest as if that could shield her from the sound.
Jasper stumbled back, nearly tipping over his own stool as the foal in front of him shrieked again. Its ribs were splayed open, pinned apart by cold steel, lungs fluttering like pink insect wings behind the arc of its sternum. Frothy blood bubbled from the incision as it spasmed violently, hind legs kicking at the air like it was drowning. Jasper made a strangled sound and reached instinctively to stop it, only to slip in the pool of fluid collecting at the edge of his tray. He caught the edge of the table with both hands, knuckles white.
Cole, ever the class clown, shrieked with laughter and hoisted his foal by a limp back leg, “ZOMBIE MODE! THEY’RE IN ZOMBIE MODE!” I snapped at him to sit down but the moment was lost.
Caleb, who had been grinning moments ago, now stared wide-eyed at the colt in his grip. It dangled upside-down, but its limbs jerked in arrhythmic pulses, mouth stretching open to release a thin wail. The sound was wet and broken, like air being forced through torn plastic. “P-pwease… n… nu wike bad uppies… hewp fwuffy…” Blood ran in thin rivulets down its flank, splashing against Caleb’s arm. He dropped it suddenly and the foal crashed onto the tile with a sickening thud. The impact ruptured its fragile bloodied abdomen and a thick splash of gore and pulp erupted like a burst water balloon. Dark coagulated blood mixed with thick gelatinous fluid splattered across the floor. The exposed insides oozed and slipped against the cold linoleum as the foal let out a raw pitiful cry. Its wet ragged mouth gasped helplessly before going still.
“Fuck that, fuck that, fuck that,” he shouted, backing into the row of cabinets. His elbow struck a container of spare gloves and sent it flying.
One of the foals, probably Danny’s, convulsed and hurled itself off the edge of the table. It landed with a sickening slap, its torn body folding in on itself as it hit the tile. The flap of teal fuzz and skin peeled back during dissection flopped outward, flinging a wet arc of blood across the floor. For a moment it was still. Then it moved. With a thin, broken cry, the foal began dragging itself forward on its forelegs, leaving a slick trail of gore behind. Its intestines unspooled with each lurch, smeared in a glistening line across the tile. Hoarse, choking noises spilled from its mouth. A thick string of saliva and bile stretched from its lips to the ground, trembling with each ragged breath. One eye lolled in its socket, glassy and unfocused, but still searching.
I raised my voice, trying to assert control.
“It’s only a reflexive neural misfire,” I said clearly and loudly. “The brain can remain semi-active in the early postmortem stage. They are not alive. Please sit down!”
It was a lie, of course. A shaky half-truth meant to plug the dam, to give them something that sounded clinical and safe. But I could see in their eyes that they weren’t buying it.
Those fluffies were coming back to life. Not just twitching. Not just some leftover signal in the nerves. This was different. I hadn’t expected it or accounted for it. The fluffies from the cooler must have been in some kind of hibernation from the ice, cold enough to shut them down but not kill them. I’d assumed they were frozen to death but the warmth of the room, the lights, the handling must have been enough to bring them back, just enough for their tiny bodies to react.
No one obeyed my demands. Half the class was crying, some whispering frantic prayers. A handful kept recording with their phones despite my repeated orders to stop.
And I stood there, pretending to be in control, as the realization settled like a stone in my gut. I had made a mistake. A terrible one.
At Table Fifteen, Jonah Reyes no longer looked amused. The sickly orange colt on his tray was no longer still. Its matted brown mane clung to its face in wet strands as it struggled upright, or tried to. One of its legs had been removed entirely, snapped off at the joint earlier when Jonah had laughed and posed it like a marionette. Now the raw, jagged stump pulsed against the metal tray, spurting a thin line of blood with each twitch. The foal’s remaining limbs scrabbled in circles, smearing fluids across the surface as it tried to crawl.
“Whewe weggie go…?” it whimpered. Its voice was hoarse, fragile, barely more than a breath. “Fwuffy nu bad… why weggie ‘wun ‘way?”
Its torso sagged and collapsed sideways. Blood oozed from the corner of its mouth, dark and clotted, and the side of its hip had split open where the bone had fractured. Pink intestinal loops bulged through the tear, glistening under the fluorescents. The colt let out another wet cry and tried again to move, dragging its exposed innards across the tray like ribbons caught on a hook.
Jonah stepped back, his mouth slack, eyes wide with disbelief. The edge of the table pressed into his side, grounding him in place. He did not blink. His friends were gone, long since bolted, their overturned stools lying scattered on the floor like wreckage. He stood alone in the growing stench of blood and bile, the colt’s broken voice rising in a cracked plea.
“Pwease nu weave fwuffy… suu scawwed… nu wan gu sweepies…”
Jonah gagged and turned, doubling over as he dry-heaved onto the floor. The colt tried to follow him, one hoof slapping uselessly over the tray’s lip, leaving behind a viscous smear of viscera.
At Table Eight, Samantha Lin had risen halfway from her stool, frozen in place as her foal convulsed beneath the overhead lights. The tray clattered with each jolt of its tiny, spasming body. The foal’s powder-blue coat was drenched in a mixture of blood and the murky residue of its own excretions. One of its hind legs had become trapped beneath the arms of the rib-spreader during the dissection. Now the twisted limb dragged uselessly across the steel tray with every seizure, trailing streaks of red across the surgical surface.
The foal’s face twitched. Its mouth opened and closed in a slow, pitiful rhythm, as if trying to scream. No words came. Its jaw worked feebly, tongue lolling out the side, coated in mucus and flecked with blood. The vocal cords must have been severed or perhaps it had never been properly wired for speech. All it could produce were strained gurgles and high, wet hiccuping gasps that bubbled up through the shredded mess of its throat.
Its eyes fluttered, unfocused but desperate, glassy and rolling. The exposed lungs inside its open chest cavity flexed in sharp, stuttered bursts, struggling to find air they could no longer use. The fragile organs swelled and collapsed, each breath more labored than the last. One spasm forced a glob of pinkish froth up its windpipe, which drooled down its chin and soaked into the padding beneath it.
Still, the foal tried to move. It reached out with a trembling foreleg, the muscles twitching violently beneath the flayed skin. Its hoof scrabbled against the steel, reaching in Samantha’s direction with blind instinct.
Samantha stared, face blanched, breath caught somewhere between a sob and a scream. Her fingers were trembling. Her eyes wouldn’t leave the thing’s face.
It clawed the tray again. Another gurgle rose from its ruined throat. A bubble of blood popped against its lip.
That was enough.
Without hesitation, she raised the scalpel in her right hand. The blade wavered slightly as she gripped it tight, then plunged it straight down, burying it to the hilt in the center of the foal’s throat just above the exposed trachea.
The foal jerked once. Its limbs locked, muscles tightening in reflexive agony. Blood sprayed from the wound in a violent arc, splattering her gloves and soaking into the fabric of her sleeve. The gurgling cut off mid-sound, replaced by a strangled wheeze and a twitch of the hind legs.
It took a few seconds longer to stop moving. Its eyes stared up at nothing, still fluttering, but fading. The hoof that had reached for her slid down the tray, leaving behind a red smear on the cold metal.
Samantha backed away, breathing in short, shallow gasps. She stepped on her own fallen stool and stumbled, catching herself against the edge of the lab counter. Her chest heaved. She stared at the lifeless thing before her, face drained, gloves dripping, arms trembling from wrist to elbow.
Her scalpel remained in the foal’s throat, angled slightly from the force of impact. The tip twitched with the last dying pulses of nerve activity, but the sound was gone.
Sophie Mendel clutched her foal like a baby. Her white gloves spattered with red as she pulled it off the tray and pressed it to her chest. The filly was crying softly now, its voice hoarse and faltering. “Nu wan die… nu wan go sweepies… pwease nyu mummah…” The damage was catastrophic. Its abdominal cavity was wide open, a tangle of pink intestine dangling from the incision site. Fluids soaked through Sophie’s front, but she didn’t seem to notice. She was crying too. Big, silent tears that ran down her cheeks and into her collar. “I’m sorry,” she whispered again and again. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know.”
Tyler Hughes stood frozen, hands slack at his sides, eyes fixed on the tray before him. The black and white pegasus filly lay on its back, its tiny wings flitting helplessly against the cold metal edge. One eye remained swollen shut while the other darted wildly, unseeing and frantic. Its chest was torn open, organs spilled across the small aluminum tray. Despite the brutal wounds, the filly continued to move. Frothy blood bubbled from its cracked lips with each uneven breath. Then came the voice, thin, broken, and trapped in a haunting repetition. “wan die… wan die… wan die…” The words looped endlessly, tangled in garbled syllables and soft clicks. Its legs jerked spasmodically as if trying to escape a nightmare that refused to end. The useless wings fluttered in a frantic rhythm, echoing the filly’s desperate confusion.
“Everyone stop! Return to your seats! Do not touch the specimens!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. Nobody listened.
A sudden, sharp movement drew my eye just as the chaos ran wild. One student, shaking with a reckless mix of fear and frustration, snatched up a limp foal from their table. Without hesitation, they hurled it against the whiteboard with a sickening thud. The creature’s body slumped against the smooth surface, legs flailing briefly before going still. A faint, wet slap echoed through the room as the impact sent a smear of blood and viscous fluid spreading across the board’s glossy white. The student stood frozen for a moment, eyes wide and breath ragged, caught between defiance and disbelief at what they had just done.
The Styrofoam cooler toppled as a panicked student collided with the side table. It struck the floor with a hollow crack and the lid snapped in two and skidded under the whiteboard. From the broken container, the remaining foals spilled out in a tangled heap, trailing a slurry of ice, runoff, and fluffy waste.
Slowly, the foals began to stir, shivering as their breathing deepened. Tiny heads lifted, eyes flickering open to the harsh classroom light. Weak whimpers and desperate scrabbles echoed as they crawled, dragging themselves forward and scattering in every direction, turning the sterile room into a chaotic maze of twitching, half-frozen bodies clawing their way to uncertain life.
As the foals scrambled desperately across the floor, a terrified student turned sharply and barreled past my desk. She slammed into a bucket of spare scalpels, sending it crashing to the ground. Dozens of blades spun wildly through the air, catching the harsh fluorescent light in cruel flashes. They tumbled end over end, sharp edges gleaming as they descended in a deadly rain.
The scalpels struck the struggling foals like shards of ice. Thin, precise blades punctured delicate flesh, ripping through fur and skin with wet, sucking sounds. Some landed deep in exposed muscle or shattered brittle bone, forcing new cries of pain that twisted through the room like a jagged thread. Others snagged on loose tendons or pierced soft eyes, turning glossy orbs into bleeding ruins. Blood pooled rapidly beneath the bodies, mixing with bile and partially digested tissue. It spread across the tiles in widening patches.
A small filly, her pale blue coat stained with slick patches of gore, convulsed as a scalpel embedded itself just below her shoulder blade. The metal slid cruelly between ribs, sending a shudder rippling through her fragile frame.
Another colt flailed wildly as a blade caught the webbing of his wing, slicing through sinew and cartilage with a sharp, sickening snap. His screams were broken, guttural, and desperate as they pierced the thick haze of fear and chaos.
One of the foals dragged itself across the cold tile on trembling forelegs, its movements desperate and uneven. From a jagged wound in its abdomen, a slick mass of entrails trailed behind like a grotesque second tail, leaving a dark, sticky trail on the floor. Each shuddering motion splashed more blood across the tiles beneath its battered body, a haunting reminder of fragile life struggling to persist.
The stink was overwhelming. It filled every breath, coated the tongue. It was the heavy scent of blood, ruptured organs, and excrement. Underneath it all came the chorus. Broken sounds from shattered voices, bubbling sobs and cries of hunger, pain, and confusion. A few still tried to form words, while others simply wailed in long, rising tones that sounded more animal than anything else.
Despite the carnage, no student had been seriously harmed. A few had scrapes, a couple more were bruised from the stampede, and at least one had nearly fainted against the lockers. The real injuries would come later, buried in therapy bills and quiet nightmares that lingered far beyond the cleanup.
I exhaled slowly, a cold knot tightening in my stomach. The surviving fluffies dragged themselves across the tile floor, slick with blood and fluids, their movements growing weaker by the second. Around me, students stumbled backward toward the exit, their faces pale and eyes wide with terror, some unable to tear their gaze away from the growing mess of dismembered limbs and shredded flesh.
The sterile order I tried to maintain had crumbled entirely. I watched the last of the students rush past me, their footsteps pounding relentlessly against the linoleum floor as they fled the wreckage of the classroom. Their panicked breaths echoed down the hallway, raw and ragged, a chaotic symphony of fear and desperation. The door slammed shut behind them with a definitive finality, cutting off the cacophony and plunging the space into a heavy, suffocating silence.
Alone, I stood in the center of the wreckage. The classroom was a disaster zone. Blood pooled thick on the floor. Desks lay overturned and splintered. A smear of pinkish gray matter was drying across the whiteboard. The cooler sat open and empty. Above it all, the projector screen flickered. It was frozen on an absurd slide from last year’s frog dissection unit, showing a cartoon frog cheerfully pointing at a bladder labeled “Step 3. Pin the bladder without popping it.”
Around me sprawled a grotesque mosaic of torn and broken foals, their delicate bodies twisted into a nightmarish tableau. Blood and gore slicked the tile, glistening under the harsh fluorescent lights. Limbs bent and twisted into unnatural, impossible angles. Fur was clumped and matted with grime and coagulated moisture. The soft pastels of their hides, faint lavender, pale yellow, sickly orange, and sky blue, were streaked with blood and bodily fluids, the original coloration barely visible beneath the grime.
Some of the specimens lay utterly still, truly lifeless at last. Others twitched and shuddered faintly, tiny muscles spasming with agonizing reluctance, clinging desperately to fragile remnants of animation before surrendering to the final stillness. Eyes that had once stared blankly now fluttered closed for the last time. The air hung thick and sour, heavy with the scent of blood and decay, pressing down on my lungs as the enormity of my failure settled over me like a leaden weight.
As the last echoes of screams faded into shaky sobs and the hollow thuds of retreating footsteps, I swallowed hard and took a slow breath. My eyes swept over the wreckage that filled the room. Cleanup would be an ordeal beyond anything I had faced before. Blood, sludge, and internal muck clung to every surface. They would soak into the tile and grout, cling stubbornly to walls and desks, and linger in the air like a ghost no amount of scrubbing could banish. The stench, sharp and sour, would settle deep into the fabric of the room, a lasting reminder of the chaos.
Beyond the physical mess, the paperwork loomed ahead like a storm cloud. Complaints would pour in. Investigations would dissect every decision and misstep. Lectures on proper protocols and ethical standards would be delivered by administrators and outside authorities. Questions would come fast and relentless. From parents demanding answers. From the school board weighing liability. From neighbors whispering rumors in the hallways.
But none of that mattered. At that moment, all I could do was stand alone at the front of the ruined classroom. My hands hung limply at my sides. My breath was shallow and uneven. The weight of what had happened pressed down on me like a stone in my chest. The broken foals, the frightened students, the spiraling loss of control was all a reflection of failure. A failure I could neither excuse nor deny.
I stared down the mess I had helped create. The sterile science room was gone, replaced by a grotesque tableau of suffering and neglect. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting a steady glare over the scene. The silence settled thick and suffocating. And still I stood there, hollow and silent, waiting for whatever would come next.
The classroom door stood wide open, revealing the ruined room to the outside. The next group of students lingered hesitantly in the corridor, their eyes wide with a mixture of curiosity and dread. Whispers passed between them like a current of fear. Some clutched phones poised to capture the aftermath, others stood frozen silent and pale. None of them moved forward.
The End.
