The sound of hurt and pain can be heard in the abandoned lab, a few yards away from the official school ground. Through the cracks of wood planks plastered over one of the windows, a student can be seen helplessly bullied by three people. He flailed around hoping to get a hit on one of them but he failed. Eventually, two of the bullies were able to grab his hands and locked him down. Now that he can't move anymore, the leader of the bully landed consecutive strikes on his body, head and limbs, not giving him even a glimmer of hope it would stop. After he was satisfied with his cruelty, his coup de grace was even worse. The student, who was barely clinging on to dear life, bleeding and gasping for air was made to sit on a chair and tied up. "Hah… Finally, this should serve as a lesson for you to not cross us again…" His head still looked down at the floor, unable to even look up. Until. One of the bullies pulled his head back by his hair as the leader stuffed an unknown material that had deteriorated inside the building into the students mouth.
A strong, burning sensation filled his mouth, searing his mouth from the inside as a strong, disgusting stench filled the air. It reeked of an unimaginable scent. The air was quickly filled with gas that escaped through his nose and mouth. The bullies quickly realised that the gas was corrosive, from the burning sensation they felt on their arms and like the cowards that they are, they panicked, scattered and desperate to escape. Unfortunately for them, the gas was strong enough to melt the padlock they used. Slowly, but surely, they died from the lack of oxygen while the victim was left weak, bound to a chair with his lips almost gone due to the corrosive nature of the gas. Finally, he passed out, and spat the element out but it's already too late, the damage's already done and there's nothing that could be done.
After a while, he finally wakes up, but instead of his first breath being cold clean air, it was a suffocating sulphur-like smell that filled his throat. It burns, but at the same time it gives him energy. He can feel that he now no longer has lips, instead just dry bones of his teeth protecting his already burnt mouth. Besides that, he also noticed bodies on the floor and tried to scream, but instead of his voice coming out, it melted more of the flesh around where his mouth originally was. The sound of flesh hitting the ground was enough to make his stomach twist but he couldn't even manage to barf out anything, he hasn't eaten for a whole day and now it's night time. He twisted his hands in hope it'll loosen the rope but it was suspiciously loose, contrary to how tight it was before he passed out.
That wasn't important at the moment, right now he needs to get back home as soon as possible to his younger brother. It's been a whole day since he last saw him. He tried to break through the door by ramming it using his body with his shoulder but to no avail. He noticed the keyhole on the padlock was melted shut, so even if he got the keys, it wouldn't have done him any good. Desperate, he tried using one of the chair's pegs to try to break the padlock but that also failed. Things were looking bleak for him, he sat on the dirty floor stumped and clueless until he noticed a tin can that was surprisingly unaffected by the corrosive gas. Suddenly, an idea popped into his head. 'The gas acidic nature is weak if dispersed, but when compressed maybe it'll be much stronger'. His heart theorized, he blew the gas inside the can, put it under the padlock and threw a heavy rock at it. The pressure was enough to blast the gas through the small can opening up into the padlock, finally, the metal lock that trapped him before is now just a lump of metal on the ground. "I'M FREE!" His heart screamed out of joy.
He runs to the school gate just to see police cars surrounding the exit. 'Oh.. They're here! They're finally here to save us all!' Full of naivety, he ran to one of the cops talking to the headmaster just for him to get tackled down by another police officer and getting his hands cuffed. "Alexander Johanson Green, we have reasons to suspect you've kidnapped three other students and held them in confinement for more than seven hours without their consent, you're under arrest and everything you say can and will be used against you in court. You have the right to remain silent." He was shocked, he just escaped a building from being ganged on, bound to a chair for hours and beaten up without rest and now he's the one being arrested?
He was dragged inside the police car, hungry, cold and cuffed. "Sir, please, this is all a big misunderstanding, I was the victim! I.. I was–". Before he could finish, the cop yelled at him, telling him to shut up and that his breath was stinking the whole car. Alex sat back down on the car seat, stumped. "How did that scrawny kid even manage to take down those three anyways? I heard one of them was a boxing prodigy." The other officer just shrugged and paid no mind to it, all he knows is that he's getting good money for this job and that's enough for him. In the shadow, in the backseat, Alex has finally learned that his breath, if not concentrated, has a hallucinogen-like property, which explains why he was knocked unconscious when he was stuffed with the unknown material. He has to be careful to not make it noticeable otherwise, his escape plan will fail.