A/N: Last chapter! :O Thank you so much for all your reviews! One thing: Does anyone play Words With Friends? I was playing the app, and I figured out a way to get the words "Zia" and "Ra" in one move. Of course, I was very proud of myself and rushed to play it, but you know what it told me? They aren't "acceptable" words. Imagine my outrage. Someone should write a strongly-worded letter to the producers of the app!

Previously: Sadie and Emma chased around for the squirrel while Liz tried to find Dylan's locker. As they lured the squirrel into Dylan's locker using some of Sadie's gran's biscuits, Liz braved her fear of squirrels. They rushed to run out after the deed was done and they had Dylan's knicker-like pants in their (Liz's) hands, only only to realize that the door was locked.

Disclaimer: I sadly do not own any part of the Kane Chronicles at all.

Why Did Dylan Quinn Have to Exist?

Chapter 4

"My poor friends. I'd never gotten them into this much trouble, not even when we got shut in the boys' changing room at school. (Long story, which involved a five quid bet, Dylan Quinn's knickers, and a squirrel. Perhaps I'll tell you later.)"

~Sadie Kane, The Throne of Fire, page 115

Liz started pounding her fists on the door. Her punches echoed around the gym, replacing the smashing from the squirrel, which had presumably tired out.

"Liz!" I said, approaching her cautiously. "Calm down."

"Calm down?" Liz screeched as her fists hit the door. "I will not bloody well calm down! We're locked in the boys' changing room! This is not a situation in which you calm down!"

"So you'd rather Dylan Quinn walk by, hear the noise, and come open the door to find you standing here holding his knickers?" I asked.

Liz stopped punching and looked at the knickers in her hand. "Pants. And we all know that's not going to happen," she said, and she continued hitting the door.

"Right, Liz, watch him come in two minutes," Emma muttered.

Liz made a face but stopped pounding on the door. Instead, she started kicking it. "It's"—kick—"gotta"—kick—"fall"—kick—"down"—kick—"eventually!" Kick.

Clearly, Liz was going mad.

"There has to be another exit," I suggested, looking around. "Like an emergency exit?"

"This is the emergency exit!" Liz screamed as she repeatedly kicked the door. Her face became more and more red as she used up more and more energy. "You don't have emergency exits in a changing room!"

"Calm down, Liz," Emma soothed. "This isn't the end of the world. Your freckles seem to know how mad you're acting. They're hiding from you!"

Liz glared at Emma, but her tiredness triumphed and she sat down on the bench, panting. She looked at Emma's smirk, glared, then got back up and continued trying to give the door bruises.

Meanwhile, I scanned the room. There had to be another exit somewhere! My eyes landed on the vents high up on the wall and I grinned. It worked on the telly, after all.

"The vents," I said.

"What?" Emma asked, clearly thinking that I'd gone crazy.

"We can escape," I declared, "through the vents."

Emma jumped up. When I thought she was going to praise my genius, she bluntly asked, "Are you mad?"

I bristled. I was genius, not mad. "No, thanks very much. It works on the television."

"Because those are shows!" Emma cried. "You know they aren't even actually in the vents, right?"

"Yes, they are!" I defended. "And they couldn't make that up without it being possible."

Emma raised her eyebrow. She was clearly just too astonished by my genius reasoning to say anything. She was probably going to get down on her knees any minute now and worship me.

However, the floor was really dirty. Poor girl. I saved her from having to grovel in the dirt, because, after all, besides being a genius, I was also the queen of generosity. "Well?" I asked. When she didn't respond, I continued. "What other choice do we have?"

Emma looked at the vent. "Whatever happened to breaking the window with a ball?" she grumbled.

From the door, Liz screamed out, "No! You are not smashing the window and having to pay for the fines and possibly getting glass into my skin!"

I gestured towards Liz in a there you go signal. Emma wrinkled her nose. Finally, she sighed.

"Fine. But you're mad."

"Says the girl who was pondering over whether Dean's locker would be conveniently open so she could marvel over his clothes," I shot back.

"Oh, shut up," Emma grumbled.

We walked over to where the vents were, sitting above the lockers, and I stood on top of a bench. I eyed the row of lockers in front of me and held out my hands. A squirrel was able to do this, after all. Sucking in my breath, I jumped off the bench and forward towards the lockers. My hands extended to the top of the row of the lockers and I clung on desperately. As I struggled to pull myself on top of the lockers, I made a note to myself to practice flinging my pillow around my room more for better arm strength. [It really does work. Don't look at me like that. See who's criticizing when I punch you.]

Liz stopped kicking the door and walked next to Emma. "We're seriously escaping through the vents?" she asked skeptically, craning her head back to look at me.

"Oh, like the door was going to fall down anytime soon," I huffed.

I pulled myself up to the top of the lockers and shakily stood up, but then got back down on all fours. It was probably a good thing that I didn't have acrophobia. I hated to copy the squirrel, especially since it liked Gran's biscuits and allowed itself to be stuffed into a weird locker, but… Eying the vent warily, I crawled towards it.

"Sadie!" Liz suddenly hissed, her voice urgent. "Someone's coming!"

I paused and strained my ears. At first I didn't hear anything, but then I heard the sound of footsteps. They steadily grew louder as someone drew nearer.

"Hide!" I cried.

I scooted down so I was sitting on the row of lockers, then used my hands to launch me off the row. As I jumped off, I winced as a pain shot through my ankle when I landed on my leg with a big force, but shook it off and ran around the room.

"Watch it be Dylan Quinn," Emma muttered to Liz, who pretended like she hadn't heard Emma.

I dove behind a row of lockers hidden in the corner and my mates followed. As I shook out my foot, Liz quickly stuffed the knickers into my bag, much to my disgust. We crouched down in silence and stared at the door. There was the sound of keys jingling, then the lock turning. The door slowly creaked open and in walked Carl.

You know how at almost every school, there's that caretaker or security guard that all the students worship? Well, Carl was the hero everyone wanted a high-five from at this school. I've always been quite fond of Carl ever since he gave me advice for how to get out the stain that someone made on my combat boots. (I won't say who it was as I don't fancy reliving that memory. All I'll say is that if you ever have the urge to suddenly trip and spill food over someone's shoes, make sure it isn't on the day when the cafeteria serves the messiest and most staining lunch and that you don't vomit at the sight of the spilled food afterwards.)

But I didn't fancy getting caught in the boys' changing room by anyone, not even Carl, and I didn't want to push my luck.

Carl propped the door open with his wheeled bucket and took out a mop. He walked over to the other end of the room and started mopping up a spot on the floor, humming whilst he cleaned.

Now was the perfect time. His back was turned to us. I slowly stood up and motioned for Emma and Liz to follow. We quietly crept towards the open door, towards freedom when...

Bam! Bang! Crash!

Noises boomed from a particular locker. The squirrel had decided to act up again. Carl's humming stopped short. We dove behind another row of lockers a split second before he turned around.

"Who's there?" Carl called.

The squirrel just ran around in the locker some more, smashing into the walls. We held our breaths.

"I know you're hiding," Carl said.

We stayed frozen as Carl's footsteps sounded the room. We kept our backs pressed to the lockers as we sank lower and lower. My eyes darted to my left and my right, but I didn't dare turn my hand.

"Sadie."

I nearly jumped out of my skin. Carl was at the other end of the changing room, but he knew we were here. Emma and Liz shot me panicked looks and I slowly stood up and walked around the row of lockers. Carl glanced at me with an amused—or was it annoyed—expression.

"What are you doing in the boys' changing room?" Carl asked.

I stared at Carl as thoughts raced in my head. "What...are you doing…in the girls' changing room?" I finally spat out.

Carl raised his eyebrow. "Last time I checked," he said, "this was definitely the boys' changing room."

I gave a nervous laugh. "Oh, silly me. No wonder my locker wasn't opening. Ha. Ha."

Carl just stared at me. His eyes shifted down towards the row of lockers I had hid behind and he said, "Emma. Liz."

There was a moment of silence, then slowly, Emma and Liz stood up and appeared around the lockers. That was just creepy how he did that.

"Oh, hi there, Carl," Emma said with a fake cheery voice, as if she just noticed Carl was in the room. She fidgeted around and gave him a small wave.

"Were you the ones hitting the locker?" Carl asked.

Go with it. "Yes!" I nodded.

The squirrel took that moment to start rampaging around in the locker again, and I quickly shot out my hand and gave the nearby locker a few whacks, trying to time it with the squirrel.

"Heh," Emma chuckled nervously as she reached out to hit the locker, too.

"All right, enough!" Carl said. "Stop."

We withdrew out hands from the locker, but the squirrel kept running around. Liz quickly stuck out her hand where Carl could see it and hit the locker with those amazing skills she used to also hit the door.

"Um, you see," Emma said as Liz kept awkwardly hitting the locker, "when Sadie couldn't open her locker, or what she thought was her locker, she started punching and hitting it."

"Yeah, I was really frustrated," I said, nodding innocently. "That had never happened to me before. I thought that maybe... Um, hitting it would help."

"Doesn't she think of the maddest solutions?" Liz asked.

I restrained myself from raising an eyebrow at Liz.

"I know, Liz," Emma agreed. "How does hitting something help?"

"Liz, I'll try not to hit a door in the future," I said. Can't say anything for you.

Carl just listened on, and I knew he wasn't buying our story.

"Aren't you girls supposed to be at lunch?" Carl asked.

"Yes, of course. I am feeling peckish, after all," I said in a robotic tone. I cleared my throat to try to get rid of it. No luck. "But then I realized I left my jumper in my gym locker, and it was a bit chilly outside, so I went to get my jumper. But apparently, I wasn't thinking and I thought that I was in the girls' changing room, but I wasn't."

I nodded while Carl just stood there with raised eyebrows.

"I get the feeling you girls won't tell me what you were really doing here," Carl remarked.

"But that's what we were doing," Liz said. "Sadie forced us to come with her, even though we didn't want to."

She wasn't just talking about my made-up story.

"Honestly, Liz, it's just getting a jumper," I said.

I wasn't just talking about my made-up story.

Carl interrupted us. "Were you girls getting anything else, by chance?"

We looked at each other. "Um, no," Liz finally said.

"Really?" Carl propped his mop against the wall, then walked over a few rows of lockers until he was covered by the towering rows. I considered trying to make a run for it and fidgeted on my feet, leaning towards the right and twisting around. But then he walked back, and he was carrying something in his hands. He held the objects out in front of him for us to see. "Should I just toss these in the dust bin, then?"

Dangling in his hands were Emma's atrocious platform shoes.

Emma made a small whimpering sound, her protest crawling up the back of her throat. She stared at the shoes and reached out her hands slowly.

"I guess seeing as you didn't come for anything else, these will have to be thrown away," Carl said, eyeing the shoes. "They're not yours, then. After all, they might have infections in them. You know, from whoever wore them. Feet have nasty stuff on them, you know—"

Emma broke. "Bollocks! They do not have infections, you—you—ugh!" Her hands flew to her hair, and she started pulling at it, as if she were going to tear out her hair. Her eyes were wide and panicked, but also offended. "What are you trying to say?" A string of expletives flew from her mouth.

Surprised, I looked at Emma, seeing her ranting and cursing. For a while I smirked and almost internally laughed, but then I decided it was time for her to shut up and elbowed her in the stomach.

"Ouch!" Emma grabbed her stomach and glared at me.

Eyebrows raised, Carl set the shoes on a bench in front of him, and Emma crossly stomped her way to the bench and picked up her shoes before slipping them back on.

"You realize I have to tell a teacher about this, right?" Carl asked as Emma clicked her way back to us as loudly as she could, stomping the heels on the ground. She stumbled a little and almost fell, but I caught her, shaking from silent laughter at her.

"Oh. That's fine. You should. Yeah," I was speaking quickly, knowing we had to leave now. "It's the right thing. Well, now that that's all sorted out"—I grabbed a hold of Liz's arm and pushed Emma with my other arm, all of us backing away—"we'll go to lunch. Bye!"

And we ran out of the changing room and out of the gym before Carl could force us to stay.

Oh, how innocent and naïve we were to think that we could get away.

— - — - — - — - —

"Is there a reason why you girls were in the boys' changing room?"

We were sitting in the headmistress' office, looking at the headmistress as she shot us a very fake smile and folded her hands on her desk. Carl had dropped us off at the headmistress' office a few minutes before, explaining the situation, before he bowed out, waving at us. Psh. Carl was rather overrated.

"No," I replied.

The headmistress' smile just grew wider. She pushed her short brown hair behind her shoulders, and then leaned down closer towards us. "Are you absolutely sure about that?" And the smile slipped off her face as she shot us a penetrating gaze. "You can confide your secrets to me, girls," she said in a deadly serious voice.

Liz shifted uncomfortably in her seat and exchanged looks with Emma and me. "Okay," Liz said, making the word sound like a question.

The headmistress was still giving us a piercing look, so Emma gave a dramatic sigh, put her hands to her face as if in shame, and said, "Okay. You caught us. We were always curious what the inside of the inside of the boys' changing room looks like. We've heard boys talking about it like it's chocolate or something."

Chocolate. Really? That just sounded really odd. I shot Emma a look and she smirked a little before finishing her story.

"And we were so curious that we wanted to see for ourselves."

The headmistress stared at us, then sighed and opened a drawer on her desk before bringing out a box and placing it in front of her. "You kids," she sighed, shaking her head, "and your attractions to the opposite sex." She lifted the cover off the box and tilted it towards us. Chocolate.

We raised our eyebrows at each other but didn't say anything. Before, I'd thought our headmistress was fine. Now… she was a bit creepy. Mad. Bonkers. Lunatic.

At our lack of response, the headmistress tilted the box towards herself and took out a piece of chocolate. "Ah, to be young again," she said dreamily, waving the chocolate in the air, "carefree, interested in exploring and figuring out—"

"Um," Emma interrupted. "Will that be all?"

We inched our chairs away from the desk and back towards the door in unison.

"No, no!" the headmistress gushed. "Stay. I feel like catching up with my inner young-self. Have some sweets. Tell me about your young life. Your activities, even your fancies, come on girls, really."

I couldn't take it anymore. She was horrifying.

"I have to go to the loo!" I spat out.

Yeah, I know, not the best excuse. But the headmistress was really creeping me out.

"Oh, well—"

"We all go together," Liz piped up. "Young girl thing."

And we got up and dashed off before she said anything even more disturbing.

— - — - — - — - —

"Here." Liz thrust her hand out at Danielle. In Liz's hand were Dylan's pants/knickers.

Scrunching her nose and squinting, Danielle stared at the knickers as if they might be fake. "These are knickers," she stated as she leaned in closer to them. I snickered.

The sun shone down at us, trapping us in its heat, and it seemed to grow brighter, as if it were snickering, too. We stood outside of the school after another long day, trying to find some shade under a tree next to the school. Liz looked annoyed and stomped her foot in frustration as she glared at Heather and her troop.

"Oh, for Pete's sake, they are not knickers!" Liz threw up her hands. "They're pants. They just… kind of look like knickers."

Danielle looked skeptical. "Are these"—she pointed to the knickers—"really his?" She shook her head. "You didn't really nick his pants. You're faking."

"We're not!" Emma exclaimed. "We did not dash into the boys' changing room, chase a deranged squirrel, get locked in the changing room, almost get my precious shoes thrown out, and get a month of detention just to fake something!" She clenched her fists and shot a death glare at Danielle.

Then, suddenly, the doors of the school burst open. The groups of talking people scattered among the grounds turned and looked at the doors. A chap with blond hair burst out of the doors of the school, screaming, and ran down the pavement as fast as his feet could carry him. Something small was following him and sprinting after him. Something small and brown, with a bushy tail and matted fur.

After the screaming faded away, Emma asked Danielle, "Is that enough proof?" She nodded in Dylan's direction.

Danielle watched Dylan run away, then turned to us and said, "But that only proves the squirrel part. Not the nicking part."

Was she kidding me? "Honestly? You just don't want to give us our five quid," I said.

"Then why did you bring knickers?" Danielle asked.

"They are not knickers!" Liz cried.

I leaned over to Liz and whispered, "Liz, hun, calm down. You're not winning this because those do look a lot like knickers."

Liz shot a glare at me. Then she perked up and dug her mobile out of her pocket. "I took a picture of his locker," she announced. "For proof. Look."

She thrust the phone out at Danielle, and Danielle squinted her eyes and studied the picture. Finally, after a few moments of silence, Danielle reached into her pocket and threw out five quid. "You win," she sighed resentfully. "Here. Five quid. Keep the knickers."

Never knew the day Liz's stalking skills would come in handy.

Liz opened her mouth to say "pants" but I interrupted her. "We don't want them, right?" Turning around to face my friends, I shot an extremely pointed look at Liz.

A small squeal emitted from behind Danielle. "Oh, give them to me!" Heather cried, thrusting out her hand. "I love Dylan Quinn!"

Liz shrugged, then handed the knickers over to Heather, and Heather snatched them away quickly.

"Heather," Danielle said, smirking, "you owe me a quid!"

"What?" Heather exclaimed. She looked around confusedly, then clamped her mouth shut. She opened and closed her mouth, but no words came out. Finally, she managed to say, "Drat. The bet."

As Danielle and her minions turned away, a loudly grumbling Heather following, we started in the other direction, laughing to ourselves.

"Come on," I said cheerfully, suddenly in a much better mood. "Let's go to Piccadilly. I need some more pictures from their photo booth. Maybe we can spend our five quid there. Fancy buying a stuffed squirrel to celebrate?"

Emma chortled while Liz rolled her eyes.

"They won't have stuffed squirrels for sale," Liz muttered.

"You know," Emma remarked. "I reckon maybe I could try out for the track team. Running after a squirrel is great training. I think that practice has grown on me."

"Well, we'll make sure to capture a squirrel for you every day so you can train," I said sarcastically.

"Do it," Emma said, deadly serious.

Liz and I exchanged looks with each other, our eyebrows raised.

"What are you waiting for?" Emma turned and ran down the pavement, heading for a forest of trees nearby the pavement. "Come on!"

"Weren't you the one who was worried that the squirrel might have rabies?" I grunted.

My mates were mad.

But, I admit, so was I. [There, you have it on record. Stop bugging me now.] So, shrugging, we ran after her.

Let another race for a squirrel begin.

When I was writing the headmistress, I kind of imagined her as Umbridge from Harry Potter. :P

Horrible ending, I'm sorry. I'm horrible at those. :P But I really do hope you enjoyed the story! Please review! Tell me what you thought of it! Again, I hope you liked it! Thanks for reading!