CORONATION Street will be rocked by a knife crime horror as Mason Rafcliffe is brutally stabbed by his brothers.
The bully – who is played by actor Luca Toolan in the ITV soap – has been trying to escape his family’s life of crime for months, even going homeless to hide out.
But next week he makes a shocking discovery that proves his brothers were responsible for thee murder of Betsy’s mum Becky.
Mason makes plans to leave Weatherfield to escape his brothers.
When Abi catches Mason in Seb’s memorial garden stealing some heather for Betsy she tears a strip off him and sends him packing.
Betsy is scathing when Mason says he had nothing to do with Becky’s death and Sally tries to get through to Betsy about how hard it was for him to call the police on his own family.
Mason apologises to Liam for the bullying before heading back to the precinct with Dylan.
After being quizzed by Kit about the WWII Helmet, Matty and Logan come looking for their brother.
Finding Dylan and Mason the brothers give chase and catch Mason before viciously attacking him.
As Dylan makes his escape he screams at them to stop, but to no avail.
In horror scenes, Abi finds Mason bleeding from a stab wound in the children’s play area.
She pulls off her scarf and does her best to stem the flow of blood whilst shouting for help.
The ambulance arrives and Dylan explains to Asha how Mason has been stabbed by his brothers, Matty and Logan, using a zombie knife.
In the back of the ambulance, Betsy holds Mason’s hand as she and Abi do their best to reassure him that he’s going to be okay.
The stabbing is the talk of the street as news spreads that the police have found the knife, but Abi struggles to deal with what she witnessed and hearing a news report of the stabbing thinks it is about her murdered son Seb.
After hearing Asha telling Dev that a hoax call delayed them getting to Mason, Joseph walks into the police station and tells Kit that he made the call, sending the ambulance on a wild goose chase.
When Craig tells them about the hoax call to the emergency services, Chesney and Gemma are horrified. With Craig gone, Joseph admits that it was Hope’s idea. How will Chesney react?
Meanwhile, Abi is left struggling with what she witnessed and takes her eyes off Archie in the play area. Abi frantically searches the precinct for Alfie.
When she finally sees Toyah walking along with him she accuses Toyah of abducting him. Back at home Abi can’t tear her eyes away from Alfie and Kevin watches her with concern.
Later David Platt becomes embroiled in everything when he discovers Shona called Kit with a sighting of Matty and Logan.
Misunderstanding, David jumps in a car and races to find Kit – putting them both in harm’s way.
New Corrie boss Kate Brooks told The Sun: “It’s a really important story to tackle, because the statistics are so alarming.
“I think knife crime has gone up by 80% in the last ten years. We work really closely with the Ben Kinsella Foundation to make sure we’re telling the story right, and that the message is to not carry a knife out of fear, because that escalates everything.
“We know we’re tackling a sensitive storyline, and it’s going to be very hard-hitting.
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“We just felt like it was a subject that we couldn’t ignore. It has big consequences for people going forward, and it isn’t a subject matter that we tackle lightly.
“It’s an important one to talk about and let young people know that carrying a bladed article is not the way. It’s a real community story and a shocking story.”
