One Stormy Day Part 1

A Story by Kate Rivet

It was just a rainy old day, the junior class of Northeast Dubois High School were all in the cafeteria taking a career exam when people suddenly start disappearing.

It all began on that stormy day... my whole junior class was in the cafeteria for the career aptitude test known as ASVAB. It was dead silent, the only thing you could hear was the sound of the rain hitting the school roof and the radio in the kitchen. We were in the middle of our eighth section when strange things began to happen. Being as big of a test as it was, the administrators were constantly walking around making sure we weren't cheating. However, I began to notice the decreasing amount of footsteps. As I said it was a stormy day and they had just come in with wet shoes. They rubber bottoms of their boots squeaked when they walked around, something they tried to avoid, however it was pointless. At first, I assumed they had dried their shoes but when I looked up, there was no one in sight. I stood up slightly fearing that I would get yelled at but again I saw no administrator. Odd, I would've heard them leave. Pushing my thoughts aside, I sat back down and finished my section.
"Hey Susanna," a voice hissed at me. I looked across the table to see one of my classmates leaning towards me.
"What?" I whispered.
"Where did they go?" He asked looking around. I'm assuming he meant the administrators.
"Don't know, they were just walking around a minute ago," I answered as both continued to look around. We heard the first alarm going off indicating that there was one more minute left for this section.
"Maybe they had to go to the bathroom," he reasoned.
"Yeah, maybe," I said doubting that that had been the reason for their sudden disappearance. We both gave it another minute but when the final alarm went off and there was still no administrator in sight we knew something was wrong.
Everyone looked around waiting for the next set of directions but none came. After realizing that there was no one around, chatter slowly began to fill the room. I looked at the boy sitting across from me and he could tell I was thinking the same thing he was. We both got up and decided to poke our heads out into the hallway but when we got to the doors, they wouldn't open. That is especially odd because these doors don't even have a lock. I peered through the glass so see if anything was jamming it but there was nothing. It was at this point that I realized that the sound of the radio coming from the kitchen had also ceased. He decided to test out all the other doors while I went to investigate the lack of noise in the kitchen. I swiftly climbed over the counter and proceeded to the main part of the kitchen. I found that even the lunch ladies were missing. I was about to inspect some of the smaller rooms when the lights sudden went off. There wasn't even any light coming in through the window, something I found suspicious. Despite being a stormy day, there was still some light in the sky. There was a crack of thunder but it followed no lightning. Something was definitely wrong.
Relying on memory, I found my way back to the cafeteria. As soon as I made my way over the counter, the lights came back on. I looked around and noticed that there was a significant amount of people missing. There was a total of seventy-four kids in the room and I estimated that about one third of them were now missing.
I found the boy again and he told me that all the doors were locked. This both surprised me and didn't. I have not idea why they would decide to lock us in the cafeteria but if one door was locked they were all bound to be.
"Come on," I said tugging at his jacket sleeve.
"Where are we going?" He asked as I dragged him along.
"We're going to check out the rest of the school," I answered coming to a door in the back of cafeteria. I reached up to little a hole above the door frame and pulled out a spare key for the room. I put it into the lock and turned it until the door opened. The boy went first and I followed after I locked the door and returned the key to its rightful location.
The room is a back way into the band classroom and from there we were able to enter the rest of the school. We got out into the hallway and decided to check out the classrooms in the freshmen hallway. We began to walk towards the end of the hall but I noticed that outside was completely pitch dark. I ran to the doors and tried to push them open but they too were locked. I pressed my face against the glass and cupped my hands around my eyes to try to see a thing outside but there was nothing but darkness. It was like someone had put a piece of black paper on the door.
"Susanna," the boy called. I left the door and rushed into the classroom where his voice came from.
"No one, not even the teacher," he said looking around. The windows in the back also displayed the same darkness as the doors. The boy tried to open them but to no avail. We proceeded to check every classroom all ending in the same result. Even the office lacked the principal and her secretary. We decided to try to get back into the cafeteria but just as we were going to head that way, there was an ear splitting screech. Following that there was a deep sinister voice. "Hello children, it appears you two are the only ones left..." the voice paused. We were suddenly struck with a horrible realization that we were still in the office where the only access to intercom system is. Contrary to our previous observations, we weren't alone. However when we peered around the corner to see who it was, we found no one. I gave the boy a horrified look and the voice resumed, "don't waste your energy running, I will find you and then you'll be able to join the rest of your classmates!" The voice concluded its message with a sinister laugh and then the intercom clicked off. We both decided to high tail it out of the office. I lead the boy to the junior lockers.
"What are you doing?" He hissed at me.
"I know a way out, just trust me," I said opening my locker. I reached past my rain coat and pushed against the back wall. It opened and I motioned for him to go in first. The boy barely fit through the small opening. I was halfway in when strong arms suddenly pulled me back. I yelped when the the hand twisted my arm behind me and forced me down on the floor. The other hand held my head down keeping me from looking up.
"Susanna!" The boy shouted. I felt all the pressure holding me down suddenly disappear and look over to find that the boy had tackled my attacker. He shoved him against the lockers and stood up resorting to every teenage girls' defensive measure by kicking him in the goodies. My assailant slumped to floor in pain and we took the opportunity to get away. Once we slipped inside, I closed the door and latched it shut making sure we couldn't be followed.
"Thanks," I said.
"Yep, no problem," the boy answered.
"You know, I don't think I know your name," I pointed out. I guess I got caught up in the moment and it's just now starting to dawn on me, but I had never seen this guy before.
"Really? I've been here all year," the boy said.
"It's odd how you address me in such a friendly manor when I don't even know your name," I said crossing my arms and leaning against the wall.
"Like I said, I've been here all year," he repeated.
"You're lying. I may not be the most popular person but I do know that the nice thing about going to a small school is that you know when you have a new student. I am positive you haven't been here long," I deduced.
The boy sighed and said, "alright fine, today was my first day here. The government sent me in because they were afraid something like this would happen."
"Something like what?"
"Have you heard of the recant shut downs in many schools?" The boy asked.
"Yeah does this have to with it?" I asked looking around.
"The schools were shut down because all the students and faculty went missing. The government hasn't released this to the public because even they don't know what's going on. That's why they sent me in," the boy explained.
"If you're with the government, does that mean you're not a teenager?" I questioned.
"My name is Shane Cortez and I am actually twenty-three," the boy finally introduced himself.
"I knew you looked a little old," I muttered. "Come on, we need to keep moving," I said.
"Where does this lead to?" Shane asked.
"A secret bunker. I found it a couple of months ago when someone shoved me into my locker," I explained as we walked down a stone staircase. The passage way was dimly lit by flickering lights in the wall.
"Is there another way out other than your locker?"
"Yeah, I can slip out through a storm drain."
"How many times have you been down here?"
"A lot, I don't keep track," I said as we made it to the end of the passage way. At the end, there is a small empty room. When we entered, Shane gasped.
"Susanna, this isn't a bunker, it's an old safe house," Shane said looking around.
"Really?" I asked.
"Yeah, I remember hearing about it during training. They said the entrance caved in and couldn't access it anymore."
"Wow, I had no idea. I just came down here to study," I said in awe.
"We need to get out so I can call this in," Shane said.
"Got it, follow me," I said heading towards the back wall. When I first came here, I discovered this secret exit out of sheer clumsiness. I had pushed back a stone and a ladder dropped down. So I followed it up and found myself in a storm drain. It was very big, in fact I could stand up in it. The drain spit me out at the bottom of the hill the high school resides on.
After following it all the way out, Shane and I stood at the base of the hill. He pulled out his phone and contacted the government. I heard the sound of kids laughing and looked down the road to see the middle school students outside for lunch. I looked at my watch and realized something was off. It was only nine thirty, way too early for the first lunch, and as I got closer, I found that I did not recognize any of the kids.
"Hey watch out!" I shouted when I saw a kid running after a football. He was trying to catch it but was getting really close to the fence. Instead of running into it, he ran right through it. I watched in shock as he ran through it a second time to get back to the field. I jogged back to where Shane was and found him impatiently muttering to himself as he tapped away at the phone screen. "What's wrong?" I asked.
"The call won't go through. It shows that I have service but every time I dial it says that the number is invalid," Shane said without looking up from the phone.
"You really need to see this," I said pointing to the kids. Just as we looked, we saw a red pickup truck come barreling through heading straight towards a kid in the middle of the road. Shane watched in horror as the truck ran through, and I mean literarily through, the kid. It kept speeding and the kid just trotted back to the field like nothing happened.
"What was that?" Shane asked utterly shocked.
"They're not real. I don't know how but I saw a kid run through a fence, twice," I said.
"Hold on," Shane said walking towards the middle school. I followed him and when we were on the edge of the fence, he said, "these are all the missing students from another school."
"No way," I gaped. Shane was about to say something but the red pickup from earlier came back. It veered off the road and headed straight for us. We both threw ourselves out of the way just in time. The truck missed us by a hair and slammed into the concrete dugout that was behind us. I stood up and looked to see who the driver was but there was no one behind the wheel.
"You okay?" Shane asked.
"Yeah, I'm good, you?"
"Yeah, let's take this. We'll drive to the police station," Shane said opening the door.
"Okay," I said getting into the passenger side. As soon as I sat down, I heard a faint ticking sound. "Shane!" I shouted getting up and pushing him out the drivers side. We both fell on the ground and I dragged him up.
"What the-" Shane started angrily but was cut short when the truck exploded. It threw us both back and we lay on the ground stunned. I looked over at Shane and saw that his mouth was moving but the buzzing in my ears drowned out his words. After a couple of seconds it stopped and I could finally hear him.
"Thanks," Shane said looking at the wreckage.
"Yeah, don't mention it. So much for transportation," I said dryly.
"What now?" Shane asked.
"We start walking. There's bound to be someone," I said shrugging. So with that, we began a long walk. We left the small town of Dubois and headed to Jasper, a small city with a police station.