Fan Fiction ❯ Terror High ❯ The mist and the room ( Chapter 2 )

Ella walked out into the hallway from her phys ed class, exhausted. Ms. Bultitude had just tortured them with the beginning of the year fitness exams and she was sweaty and sticky. She grimaced and held onto her gym strip tighter as she walked down the deserted hallway. It was only quarter to three but the school was already almost completely empty. She sighed. She would never get used to high school.

 

Walking down C wing, Ella couldn't help but feel the hairs on her neck stand up. She inhaled slowly and walked a bit faster.

 

There was a ruckus and Ella swiveled around to face the library door. The boy that she had met outside in the hallway the previous year tripped out the door and stopped right in front of her. She blushed with the vivid memory of meeting him still on her mind.

 

“Hey,” he said awkwardly. Ella could tell he recognized her too.

 

She smiled awkwardly and Aaron extended his hand out towards Ella. “The name's Aaron Preston…”

 

“Oh, hey…I'm Ella Street…” She shook his hand.

 

Chloe walked out of the band room with her saxophone and could hear hurried footsteps behind her. She slowed her pace a bit and Rory Winston ran up to her, panting.

 

“Hey…” he said breathlessly.

 

“Hey…” said Chloe awkwardly.

 

They walked down the hallway, immersed with talk of their new teachers.

 

Chase Warner tiptoed down the hallway, peering into a room - Madame Groom's according to the sign on the door. Her short chestnut-brown hair fell into her face and she blew it away impatiently. She could hear muffled voices in the room and she sighed deeply. The noise had stopped. Suddenly the sound of footsteps came up behind her and she turned around quickly. Aaron and Ella were walking down the upper hallway and Chase swiveled around violently, with her ear pressed to the door.

 

Chloe and Rory walked up the stairs to Chloe's locker, still chatting animatedly. She opened her locker and stopped. The sound of yelling made her stand up again and run down the hall. Rory followed closely behind.

 

Chloe and Rory ran down close to the classroom when she stopped abruptly. Rory crashed into her and they both stayed sprawled on the ground watching the surreal scene unfold.

 

The door opened and slammed against the wall as a teacher ran out of the classroom. She had a look of terror on her face. Aaron, Chase and Ella stood there, frozen. The classroom was shrouded in darkness. A black mist was coming out of it, fast. The three of them backed away quickly but were soon encased in darkness. There were five different screams and the sound of hurried footsteps. No one knew where they were going. They were all hopelessly lost in the mist.

 

Chloe squinted in the mist. She could see two red, bloodshot eyes in the distance. Chloe ran towards it and was instantly thrown into the light.

 

She found herself downstairs in the C wing. There was distant screaming and she looked up the stairs.

 

Ella screamed again. It was immediately followed by three other screams. She wondered where the other person had gone.

 

There was no sign of the teacher that had run out of the class in the first place. Aaron heard a whimper and felt instantly paralyzed with fear. He didn't know what to do. If these people couldn't hold it together then that meant that there was no hope. He tried escaping the mist and was greeted with a hard hit in the nose. He went dizzy and hit his head on a banister.

 

Chase screamed again, this time frantic. She couldn't find a way out. Suddenly, she saw a dark figure and she tried to get away. Chase tripped and her fist met someone's face. The body fell nearby and she screamed once more. She was scared that she killed the person. She didn't move. She was paralyzed. She stayed on her knees and let out the occasional sob or whimper.

 

Rory felt trapped. Someone screamed and he heard a thud.

 

That can't be good, he thought.

 

Someone crashed into him and he toppled sideways. The person screamed. It must be a girl. He groaned and then felt a twinge of fear - he hadn't even seen the girl who ran into him. The mist was too thick. And as suddenly as the mist came, it evaporated and they were embraced with the light once more.

 

Chloe ran up the stairs to see if everyone was all right. She didn't know the three people who were at the door before they were engulfed in obscurity, but she felt concerned about Rory.

 

Ella's eyes re-adjusted and she looked around the hallway. The person that she had run into looked pissed. She apologized and tried to stand up. She felt her knees go weak and tripped. She fell near an unconscious body.

 

Chase felt relieved that the mist was gone but then screamed when she saw the body before her. A girl fell down behind her and she screamed again. Chase whimpered and stayed on her knees.

 

Rory looked at the girl, fuming. She apologized and he rolled his eyes. She fell over and he felt a little less pissed.

 

The hallway was trashed. There were chairs thrown on the ground and there was a little trail of blood on the ground. He looked down the hallway and about ten feet away was a girl on her knees beside an unconscious body. The boy stirred and Rory stood up. He walked over to the guy and kneeled beside him.

 

Aaron's head hurt. He looked around and could see a girl on her knees, whimpering, and a boy walked over near him and grimaced.

 

“Man, you got hit hard, didn't you?”

 

Aaron felt puzzled for a second and then put his hand to his head. His hair was wet and when he pulled his hand back, it was covered in blood. He sighed and looked at Ella, who looked pale. He felt a little comforted that someone he actually knew was there. She took off her bandana.

 

“Here…” she said, holding out the bandana. Aaron looked a little confused and she rolled her eyes.

 

Ella wrapped the bandana around the bleeding spot. Aaron muttered what sounded like thanks but Ella wasn't sure.

 

“Your nose is bleeding too…” Ella said, “Who hit you?”

 

The girl with the chestnut-brown hair blushed. Rory pointed to the girl and she got even redder.

 

“Sorry…” she said. Aaron nodded and tried to stand up. His head swam and Ella caught his head. He blushed and rested his head on the floor.

 

Chloe ran up to the four of them and looked worried when she saw the state that the group was in. Ella was bruised, probably from running into things, and Chase's hair was all messed up, but Aaron looked the worst.

 

“You're lucky you didn't get a concussion…” Chloe said softly. The four of them looked up at her. She smiled weakly and looked at Rory.

 

“Are you okay, Rory?” Chloe asked. He nodded and she saw a little blood trickle down into his shoe but then looked back at everyone else.

 

“I wonder why it got so dark like that,” Chase muttered. Chloe sat down.

 

“Yeah…” Rory and Aaron agreed.

 

“It was so weird…” Ella said, nodding.

 

“I saw red eyes.” Chloe blurted out.

 

Everyone looked at her. She blushed.

 

“Come to think of it, the whole reason I was in the doorway was because I heard a buzzing…” Chase said, her voice shaking. “When it stopped, I ran into you guys…”

 

Ella, Rory and Aaron looked a little scared. Chase shivered.

 

“So…someone might have planned this or something?”

 

“W - what's going on here?” Evan Campbell asked, looming over the students.

 

“We…everything got dark and when we could see, we sat over here, to take care of Aaron…He got hit in the head…” Ella said, her face to the ground.

 

“Well, then, we're going to have to attend to him…after you all come and visit my office.”

 

The group shivered. There was something odd about the way he was speaking to them. He had a ghostly air to him.

 

Evan beckoned to the students, his hand squeezing Chloe's shoulder tightly.

 

Ella stabilized Aaron and they all stood up.

 

They walked down the hallway in complete silence. Aaron checked his watch. It was already three-thirty. He looked next to him, where Ella was still stabilizing him, averting his gaze. Which was probably good, because they would have burst out laughing and ruined the mood.

 

Rory kept on looking back at the principal, who was leading Chloe. She shot him a desperate look, and he wanted to say something but he held his tongue. It wasn't a good time to say anything.

 

When they walked into the principal's office, the group shuddered. It was dark and musty in the room. Not to mention that it was almost as dark as the mist had been. Evan Campbell sat down in his chair and motioned to the three chairs in front of his desk. He obviously wasn't going to get up to find more chairs.

 

Chloe stayed standing, letting Ella take a seat. Aaron sat down beside her and Chase sat down in the last chair. Rory sighed and he stood as well.

 

“What you kids saw…it wasn't anything…it had no importance…” Evan said, receiving puzzled gazes from all five students. “It was just - that the - lights went out…it took us a while to fix them, that's all.”

 

The five of them nodded slowly, unconvinced.

 

Suddenly, Chase and Aaron went silent. So did Rory and Chloe. Ella looked down and saw the principal's foot, poking out from the side of the desk. His shoe had blood dripping from it and his sock was drenched in blood. The five of them shivered.

 

The principal looked down and quickly hid his foot behind his desk. There was a drop of blood left on the carpet.

 

“That's…yeah…never mind…” he said shiftily. “Just - oh get out of my sight…”

 

The five of them left the room in complete silence. Chase whimpered and that broke the trance.

 

“Holy shit! Did you see that?” Chloe said.

 

“I know…his foot was covered in blood,” Ella said, her face a little white.

 

“I'm scared…” Chase whimpered.

 

“Wait, before we say anything else…” Chloe said, “Why don't we get to know each other first?”

 

Ella, Rory and Aaron laughed. “You can't be serious?” Aaron giggled. When he saw Chloe's face, though, he sobered up a bit.

 

“Yeah…” Ella said, avoiding Chloe's piercing gaze, “I mean, we all sort of know each other…we all have the same band class.”

 

“Hey!” Aaron yelled, “grade nine here!”

 

“We still know who you are, Aaron,” Chase said.

 

Aaron pouted for a minute.

 

Rory looked at his watch and gasped. “Whoa! It's already three forty-five! I have to get home!”

 

They all agreed and Aaron turned to leave.

 

“Wait…” Ella called, after everyone had left.

 

“Huh?”

 

“A - are you okay? Chase hit you really hard…”

 

“Oh…yeah, I'm fine…”

 

“You sure?”

 

Aaron was surprised by the amount of concern Ella was showing. “Yeah…I'll be fine…”

 

Ella turned away.

 

“But…” Aaron began. “It would be nice if you walked with me…”

 

Ella smiled and they left the school together.

 

Across the rotunda, Chloe grimaced. “Oh, great…” She groaned and left through the door of the band room.

 

The principal walked once more into his office, his insides boiling.

 

“Those kids…if they find out anything else…I'll have to teach them a lesson they'll never forget…”

 

**

 

Grade 12 Sabrina Lionheart crossed her fingers in the dim light. Hopefully, they were doing the right thing.

 

She'd watched him go into his office a half an hour ago. After that, it was a waiting game. She held her cell phone in her hand and waited for Tyler Gray to text the all clear. Once he did, she would meet with the others in the rotunda, and they would go in, saying they'd been called down as a group and they needed to see him. The secretary wasn't stupid, but she wasn't smart enough to care about which students she let into the office. To be honest, any student could walk around in the office and do anything but mess with the computers - and Sabrina knew that even that was not so hard to do.

 

Sabrina had told the others the story only the day before. She knew there was something suspicious going on in that office, and she wanted to check it out.

Well, now she was.

 

Her phone vibrated suddenly, and she checked. The message was short: All clear. Let's go.

 

Sabrina stood up and walked to the centre of the rotunda, putting herself in clear view of the balcony. This was a signal to Melanie Marosa and Aiden Sarnecki, who were quietly patrolling the wings. Melanie and Aiden were both in the jazz band, and they were grade ten and nine respectively - which was why she'd chosen them to come along. She and Aiden had barely talked before the beginning of the year, and Melanie and Sabrina were only sort of friends. Tyler was a grade eleven, the drummer for the band. With them, she'd covered almost every grade in the school.

 

After Tyler had texted Sabrina, he had also signaled Damian Konstantinos to move from his lookout spot up in the balcony overlooking the foyer windows. Damian was a grade eight-trumpet player extraordinaire, and the last of the grades in this diverse group Sabrina had picked. He was a slight boy - quiet, serious, shy. He resembled a little kid, and when he was concentrating on something, he resembled the boy from The Omen. Ironically, they shared the same name.

 

Sabrina began to wonder if she had been smart in picking her group. She'd deliberately chosen one person from each grade (that she knew) to help her find out what was going on inside that office. She'd had her suspicions since the first day - she'd felt the aura of insecurity in the school, even more than the welcome atmosphere. Now, though...now she had to get proof.

 

Damian ran down the stairs, his head barely visible above the banister. He reached the landing and jumped the last three steps, jogging to reach the group in the rotunda.

 

"We going?" he asked.

 

Sabrina nodded. "Come on."

 

The five teens went inside the office, where the secretary glanced up at them curiously.

 

"Are you looking for someone?" she asked.

 

"Yeah...My science teacher was going to help us with our project but I haven't seen her at all," Sabrina lied. "She might be back in the copy room - is it all right if we go and see?"

 

"Go ahead," said the secretary, turning back to her computer.

 

They walked past the desk and turned the corner towards the copy room...and towards the office.

 

Sabrina put her hand on the doorknob, hesitating.

 

"Ready?" she asked quietly. She felt a little guilty for lying about her science teacher...but they were investigating more important people than the science teachers.

 

The others only nodded, and she opened the door.

 

The office was completely empty, even though this was the only place that he could be. The computer was off, the lights on - it looked as it usually would at the end of the day.

 

Sabrina scanned the floor, and Tyler, Melanie, and Aiden began looking through his work. They were looking for anything - a key, a card, a lock -

 

"Over here!" Damian said.

 

Sabrina looked over and saw that he was pointing at a loose section of the carpet. She bent to lift it...

 

...and lo and behold. A keyhole. With the key in it.

 

Damian had found a trapdoor!

 

"Should we go in?" Melanie asked. "It seems kind of...I don't know, just...suspicious."

 

"Which is exactly why we're going in," Aiden grinned. He turned the key and lifted the trapdoor eagerly, revealing a ladder going down. "Who's first?"

 

Tyler moved between Sabrina and Damian and climbed down the ladder quietly, swiftly. They saw him reach the bottom and, glancing around, he signaled with a thumbs-up.

 

Aiden went next, and the others followed, Damian going last as they headed to investigate what was at the bottom of the ladder.

 

What they found...was a surprise to say the least.

 

It was a room like a mad scientist's lab.

 

All the metal in the room seemed garish under the lights. There were test tubes and other scientific equipment everywhere, and they could see a door on the other end of the room. Papers and books were scattered across the table, glaring harshly under the light above them. Tyler noticed a scalpel and other surgical equipment on a tray on a side table. Sabrina just wanted to get out - but she fought the impulse.

 

"We have to be quick," she said, "but take a look around. There might be something we could use here."

 

The five people spread out, investigating. Melanie pulled out a small digital camera and quietly took pictures of the lab in its entirety. Damian was looking at the papers, and he pulled one off the table. It might be important.

 

He noticed the titles of the books, too - ESP for Dummies, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde...what was he doing with an ESP book and a novel they'd probably end up doing in English next year?

 

They heard noises from the door. All of them froze.

 

Aiden reacted first. "Go!"

 

The five of them scrambled for the ladder, careful not to make too much noise. Not a word was spoken as they climbed up the metal rungs and shut the trapdoor in the office. Nobody said anything until the left his office.

 

"Find her?" the secretary asked.

 

It took Sabrina a minute to remember her lie, and the she shook her head. "No. We'll just find her tomorrow."

 

The secretary turned back to her work, and the five of them left the office quietly.

 

"That was close!" Melanie said as the door shut behind them.

 

"Yeah, well...now we know something's going on," Sabrina said. "And we know who's involved.

 

Damian folded the piece of paper in his hand and jammed it in his pocket quickly - just quickly enough to avoid the gaze of the man stepping out of the office they'd just been in.

 

As the five of them split up, Damian was careful to hide. While the others didn't suspect anything, Damian had the sneaking feeling that the man they suspected was behind the "freshman curse." Moreover, that ESP book wasn't so encouraging. Did anyone else notice it? Damian wondered.

 

Nevertheless, even if the ESP book didn't figure into anything, Damian was still a freshman.

 

He had every reason to be worried.