Sponge: Welcome back! The title of the last chapter, "Brave" is a song by Sara Bareilles. Congratulations to the reviewers Terrence and IrishLassWithSass23 for guessing correctly! I've split this chapter into two parts, so enjoy the first part of chapter 15! Warnings: language, peril, and mentions of violent assault. Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Scooby Doo characters. They belong to Cartoon Network, Warner Brothers, and Hanna Barbera.
Chapter 15, Part 1: Where are You Now
"Walk," Leon snarled, gesturing with his knife towards the door to the hallway. He stooped down and picked Velma's phone up from the ground where she'd dropped it and put it in his pocket.
Velma watched him, breathing shallowly. Not taking her eyes off the knife, she did as he asked and walked past him towards the door. Leon followed. Once they were in the hall, he took hold of her arm and pressed the dull edge of his knife up to her. She couldn't help her gasp.
"Shh," Leon warned in an ominous hiss. "Stay quiet, or else. Don't make me do something I might regret later." He pressed the edge of the knife against her again, and she stifled her whimper as he led her silently down the hall towards the kitchen. Velma could hear the muffled voices of the band members coming from the garage on the other side of the house, behind them. They weren't going to pass the garage, and the band members wouldn't see them leave.
Velma wanted to scream, to call for help, but she didn't dare. She was afraid that if she did, it would be the last thing she'd ever do.
The rain was starting to pick up. Velma blinked water out of her eyes as Leon, still grasping her arm, guided her back across the street to campus. They ducked into the fine arts building and found themselves in a hallway off the student art gallery. Faintly, Velma could hear her phone buzzing in Leon's pocket. Marcie must be calling her again.
"Let's turn this off," he muttered, depressing the power button. Velma felt her muscles tense with anxiety as she watched Leon remove his glasses with the hand that wasn't holding her arm. He rubbed the lenses a few times on the hem of his shirt, then put the glasses back on his face to take stock of their surroundings. He seemed to be trying to decide where to go. "Right. This way."
He took her arm again and led her down a short hallway into a stairwell, where they descended two flights. Then they came to another hallway with a door off to the left, which Leon pushed open and shoved Velma inside.
Velma glanced around. She vaguely recognized this room. Last summer, when she and the gang had been here on their prospective student tour and she and Shaggy had gotten lost, they'd wound up in here. It was a huge, oval-shaped room, with small paper books lining the shelves built into the walls. A computer sat on an L-shaped desk near the door they'd entered from, with a few closets built into the wall behind it. Aisles of file cabinets winded through the room like rows of huge metal dominoes. There were a few tables with chairs scattered around, and a short staircase across the room led up to the surrounding balcony above them.
"What is this place?" she whispered, finally finding her voice.
"The fine arts library," Leon replied casually, leading Velma to the L-shaped desk. "The theater department keeps scripts in here for their classes and performances, and there are some art and music history textbooks up in the reading room." He gestured vaguely towards the upper balcony, still keeping a firm grip on Velma's arm. "There's some sheet music in these closets behind the checkout counter, and the file cabinets are full of archives."
Right, Velma thought. Julie had mentioned that Leon worked here.
He gestured to the chair behind the L-shaped checkout counter. "Sit," he commanded. Velma did so, still afraid of incurring his wrath. Leon opened a drawer in the desk and took out a roll of duct tape. He glanced at Velma and smiled, though there was no mirth in his face. It was that same ominous grin he'd given her back in his room.
"Put your arms behind the back of the chair," he murmured, kneeling behind her and firmly taking her wrists. "Just a precaution, I'm sure you understand." He winked evilly and Velma felt a chill run down her spine. Leon began tightly wrapping the duct tape around her wrists, then looped it through the slats in the back of her chair.
Velma glowered at Leon, remembering how Julie had stared him down several weeks ago when he'd lunged for her. She hadn't been frightened then. Velma was determined not to seem frightened either, even though she was terrified down to her very bones.
Leon chuckled at her look and stood in front of her, continuing to idly play with his knife.
"What do you want?" Velma asked, feigning as much bravery as she could.
"I'll answer your questions if you answer mine," Leon responded. He smirked and leaned back against the counter. "How did you finally figure out I was the one leaving you notes?"
"My friend Marcie," Velma replied. She figured it was in her best interest to tell the truth right now. "She was with me this morning when I found your newest note, and she told me that she'd been the one leaving them at first. She'd stopped when she learned that I was dating Shaggy."
She wished Shaggy were here. She wished the whole gang were here.
"It explains why the content of the notes changed so drastically, and why there was such a long gap between her last note and your first one," Velma went on, determined not to let Leon see how scared she was. "You were practicing her handwriting, weren't you? So you could make me think they had all come from the same person."
"I knew you were smart," said Leon, still grinning maddeningly at her. "All you Dinkley's are smart. It's a family trait."
Velma had said almost this exact thing to Daphne a few months ago. The eeriness of this unnerved her. "But there are a few things I don't understand," she continued. Leon's smile was terrifying. Her voice was still shaky, but she kept going. "How have you been getting into the school to put notes in my locker?"
"Not hard to pick a lock," was his cryptic response.
"Why did you set a deadline? To figure it out before prom?"
Leon shrugged. "I was getting tired of waiting."
Velma took a deep breath. She needed to cut to the chase. "This whole thing...it has something to do with my sister, right? Dottie?"
Leon said nothing, just smiled that horrible grin.
Velma stared at him. "Is she the pianist you were in love with in high school?"
"Right again," said Leon.
"How did you find out we were sisters?"
"Your faces are similar," Leon told her. "When we met at the concert hall, I thought you looked like her – though of course, she dyes her hair blonde, and she doesn't wear glasses. When Fred introduced you and I got your last name, I realized I was right." He shrugged and jerked his chin in her direction. "And if that wasn't enough confirmation, you showed up at our first band meeting wearing those magnetic earrings. Her earrings."
Velma tried to touch her ears, where the earrings sat unassumingly, but remembered that her hands were restrained behind her back. She swallowed. "They were from you, right?" she whispered. "You gave them to her as a gift, but she rejected you?"
Leon's smile wavered ever so slightly, and Velma saw a flicker of real rage in his eyes. But it evaporated as quickly as it had arrived, and suddenly that scary, conniving smile was back.
"Like I said," he murmured. "This was never about you. It was always about her. But now that I have you...it'll be easier than ever to get to her."
Cold dread flooded through Velma's entire body, and it seemed as though the rain on the roof high above was pounding in time with her heart.
x.X.x
The rain was coming down in earnest now. Storm clouds had darkened the sky, even though it was barely four-thirty in the afternoon. Thunder rumbled, and lightning sporadically flashed through the sky, illuminating FitzSimmonds Court and the Rogers' otherwise dark living room. The only other source of light was the TV, where a Vincent Van Ghoul movie was playing. Shaggy and Scooby were sitting on the couch, curled under a blanket and watching the film through their fingers (or paws, in Scooby's case).
They'd seen this one before, it was one of their favorites. But the jumpscares still got Shaggy. Especially since they were the only ones home – Shaggy's parents took a painting class in Lyonsville on Fridays. Being alone in the house, watching a scary movie while a thunderstorm rumbled outside only added to the spooky atmosphere.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK
"AARRGGHH!" Shaggy and Scooby both yelled in fright at the sound of someone pounding on their front door. When he'd gotten his heartbeat under control, Shaggy reached for the remote and paused the movie. Whoever was at the door hadn't stopped knocking – it was incessant, insistent, and now they were ringing the doorbell too. Shaggy and Scooby glanced at each other, then tossed the blanket away and walked to the front door together.
Marcie Fleach stood there, her car parked a bit haphazardly on the curb in front of the mailbox. Her hair and clothes were wet from the brief time she'd been outside between her car and the porch, and she looked worried.
"Uh...like, hey," Shaggy said, feeling puzzled. What was she doing here?
"I'm so sorry to drop by," Marcie told him. "I would have called, but I don't have your phone number."
"But you have my...address?" Shaggy was still confused.
"I drove you home from Caleb's party for Tony, remember?"
"Oh, right." Shaggy had forgotten. That party seemed like it had happened in a whole other lifetime. "Uh...do you wanna like, come in?"
"No, I actually need you to come with me," Marcie told him, her tone a little frantic.
"What? Why? Where?" asked Shaggy.
"Tony's," Marcie replied. "I already called him, he knows we're on the way."
"Why?" Shaggy inquired again.
"It's..." Marcie hesitated, nervous. "It's about Velma."
Shaggy's stomach dropped at the sound of her name. He hesitated for a fraction of a second before he arranged his features into a stony expression. "No," he said flatly.
"Please!" Marcie exclaimed.
"I don't want to see her," Shaggy lied.
Scooby glanced up at him, incredulous. Why wouldn't Shaggy admit how much he missed Velma – and Daphne and Fred for that matter? It was driving Scooby up a wall.
"You won't," Marcie told them. "I don't know where she is. I just…Shaggy seriously, I need you all to come to Tony's, please."
Shaggy stared at her. "'You all?'" he repeated.
Marcie blushed a bit. "I might need you to call Daphne and Fred too."
Shaggy glowered at her. "Absolutely not," he said.
"Shaggy..."
"We're like, not friends anymore," Shaggy told her scathingly. Only Scooby could hear the pain in Shaggy's voice as he said this, and his heart twisted in empathy.
"Listen," Marcie went on, seemingly gathering her nerves. "I know you still care about Velma. That's why I came to you first."
"I don't care about her," Shaggy muttered. Another lie, Scooby knew, but the skinny bespectacled girl on their porch called him on it before the dog could.
"Oh, stop it!" Marcie shouted. "That's bullshit, and you know it!"
Shaggy and Scooby stared at Marcie, both slightly taken aback. They'd never heard her swear before.
"Shaggy please," Marcie implored him. "I know that you're all mad at each other right now, and admittedly, Velma would kill me if she knew that I came to find you, but...I'm really worried about her."
Shaggy knit his brows, confused. "Why are you so worried?"
"Because I don't. Know. Where. She is!" Marcie shouted, eyes blazing. "I've been calling and calling, but she's not answering her phone, and I think she might be in danger."
Shaggy flashed his eyes at her. That had gotten his attention. "Like, what are you talking about?"
"Rhat kind of ranger?" Scooby asked, speaking for the first time.
"Come with me, and I'll tell you everything," Marcie replied. "I promise."
Scooby looked up at Shaggy. He sighed in response.
"Like, okay," he conceded. "But Tony's calling Daphne and Fred."
x.X.x
Tony did call Daphne and Fred, who arrived within moments of each other. They ran into each other on the porch, and both of their hearts just about stopped when they realized their sudden proximity.
"…Hey," Fred said, his voice very quiet. It had been a long time since he'd looked into her dazzling eyes like this. He missed them. He missed her.
"Hi," Daphne replied just as softly. Her heartbeat accelerated slightly as she gazed at him.
They both turned red and averted their eyes as they entered the house.
Watching them reminded Scooby of two years ago, when Velma's younger sister Madelyn had gone missing during their first mystery. Fred and Daphne had been arguing then too, but Velma had forced them to make up so they could rescue her. Now, of course, they were all arguing, and Velma was the one missing – and the one who possibly needed rescuing, if Marcie was right about the danger.
The gang sat around Tony's kitchen table, as far apart as the space would allow, all a bit waterlogged from the rain. No one made eye contact, but Scooby watched all of them carefully. It was the first time they'd all been alone together in months, and he could sense their longing – especially between Daphne and Fred. He kept catching them glancing at each other out of the corner of their eyes, then hurriedly looking away, flushing deeper and deeper crimson each time.
Tony cleared his throat. "Fleachy, do you wanna start?" he asked. "I don't know what this is about."
Marcie, looking a bit nervous, took a deep breath. "Um," she stammered. "I-I called you all here today because..."
Everyone looked at her. Marcie trailed off, slightly pink in the face. Wordlessly, she took out her cellphone and laid it on the table in front of them.
"Marcie," came Velma's voice through the phone. "I figured out who the other secret admirer is, but I think I'm in over my head with this. I don't know what to do…jinkies, it's a long story, so I'll just explain everything in person. I'm on my way back now. I'll see you in fifteen minutes."
Marcie took her phone back, leaving everyone staring aghast at the spot on the table where it had been.
"That was almost an hour ago," Marcie told them. "I've tried calling her back, and it goes to voicemail every time."
"In over her head with what?" Daphne murmured, confused.
"Where was she coming back from?" asked Fred.
"Hold on," said Tony, sitting forward. "She said 'the other secret admirer.' Does that mean…there were two of 'em?"
Marcie blushed. "Yes," she admitted. "One of them was me."
Shaggy stared at her, slack jawed. He was barely aware that everyone in the room was also gazing at Marcie in bewilderment – it felt as though his whole body had gone numb. Like through a tunnel, his mind sped back in time to his very first day at Coolsville High, and a question Fred had asked him.
"Have you ever liked a girl so much that the idea of her dating some other guy made you crazy?"
Fred had been talking about Daphne, but Shaggy had been thinking about Velma. He'd learned last year, during their time working on the musical, that the idea of her dating some other guy would indeed make him crazy – he was still jealous of Tony's former relationship with her. It was part of the reason why he'd suspected him as the secret admirer.
But Shaggy had never thought about how he'd feel if Velma was dating...some other girl.
Well, he was thinking about it now. And it felt just as bad.
Marcie looked at Shaggy mournfully. "I'm sorry," she apologized. "I would have never left the notes in the first place if I'd known the two of you were together."
Shaggy felt hot shame seep through him. That was exactly what Velma had said. "We both know that I wouldn't be getting these goddamn notes in the first place if people at school just knew that we were seeing each other!"
"It's fine," he told her with a shrug, seeming more nonchalant than he felt. "It's like, my own fault for keeping it a secret. And you don't have to apologize for liking her. I like…I get it." He felt his face go a bit warm, and he looked down, avoiding eye contact with everyone.
"Okay, so Hot Do – I mean, Marcie was one of the people leaving secret admirer notes," said Fred, quickly correcting himself. He had slipped back into using Marcie's nickname with his old friends, and a slight blush crept up his neck as he felt Daphne's eyes on him. "Who was the other one?"
Marcie shrugged. "I don't know. I told her I was the original one this morning at school, after she'd found a really creepy note in her locker. But it wasn't from me – it was forged in my handwriting, but I haven't left any notes myself since just after Valentine's Day."
"What did the newest one say?" asked Daphne.
Marcie squinted, trying to remember, "The person said she couldn't ignore them forever, and that it was never about her but he could make it that way if she didn't figure it out who they were."
"Well, according to the message she left you, it sounds like she did figure it out," Tony pointed out.
"She must have like, gone to confront them," Shaggy said. "That's where she was coming back from when she called Marcie."
"When did you see her last? Did she give you any indication of where she was going?" Daphne asked Marcie.
Marcie shook her head. "No, she just asked me to take her home after we stopped by Tony's after school."
Tony furrowed his brow. "You came by here? I didn't see you."
"We didn't talk to you," Marcie told him. "Velma got distracted by Julie on the front lawn, talked to her for a bit, then came back to the car and had me take her home."
"Relma talked to Rulie?" asked Scooby quizzically.
Fred frowned. "I wonder what they talked about," he said, pulling out his phone. Everyone waited while he dialed a number. "Julie? It's Fred," he said, pressing a button on the screen. "You're on speaker with the gang, Tony, and Marcie." He felt a slight pang in his chest as he said the gang. How long had it been since he'd referred to them as such?
"Hey!" Julie's joyful voice came through the phone. "Does this mean you've all made up?"
Everyone glanced at each other, faces tinged various shades of pink. "Listen," Fred continued, ignoring Julie's question. "Did you talk to Velma this afternoon?"
"Yeah," Julie replied. "I ran into her in front of the Moretti's house while I was waiting for Joey to get his guitar strings. I was in the van and I saw her run up the walk and I wanted to say hi. I've missed her. I miss all of you."
Everyone shifted uncomfortably and looked at the floor, too embarrassed to admit that they missed each other too.
After a few moments, Fred cleared his throat and continued. "Did she mention anything about trying to find someone?" he asked.
"Not that I recall," said Julie. "Why don't you ask her? Isn't she there?"
"No," Tony replied. "Nobody's seen her since this afternoon. We're trying to figure out where she could have gone."
"Forgive me if this sounds obvious but…have you tried calling her?" Julie asked.
"It goes straight to voicemail," Daphne said.
"I haven't been able to get her on the phone since she called me about the secret admirer," Marcie added.
"Since she called about…" Julie trailed off, confused. "What are you talking about?" she asked after a moment.
"Velma like, figured out one of the secret admirers," Shaggy told her. "We think she may have gone to find them."
"Wait," Julie now sounded hopelessly bewildered. "One of the secret admirers?"
"There were two," Marcie explained. "One of them was me – the original one. We don't know who the other one is, but they've been leaving creepier notes and copying my handwriting."
There was a very long pause from the other end of the phone.
"Julie?" said Fred. "You there?"
"Where are you now?" she asked, her voice low and serious. "All of you, right now, where are you?"
"Tony's. Why?"
"Don't move. Joey and I are on the way."
"What?" Fred eyed the phone.
"I'll explain in person. We'll be there soon."
"What's going on?" asked Shaggy. Julie's anxious tone worried him. "Do you know where Velma is?"
But Julie had already hung up.
x.X.x
Julie not only brought Joey, but Felix and Priya as well. They all entered the house twenty minutes later, dripping from the storm and looking distressed.
Tension had descended upon the others after Julie had hung up the phone with her ominous parting words. Tony was pacing, Marcie fidgeted in her chair. Fred and Daphne sat slightly closer than they had been before, though still not looking directly at each other. Daphne played with her hair and Fred gazed solemnly out the window. Shaggy sat with his head in his hands, and Scooby simply watched the others glumly.
The moment Heavy Meddle entered the house, the others jumped up and rushed them, all shouting questions over top of each other.
"Okay, one at a time!" Julie cried over the cacophony. She shook out her wet hair and adjusted the messenger bag slung over her shoulder. "Everyone back in the kitchen."
They did as they'd been told as the members of the band followed them.
"What's going on?" asked Shaggy. "Do you know where Velma is?"
"Not exactly," Julie replied, still looking tense.
"Like what does that mean?" Shaggy exclaimed.
"Where's Leon?" asked Tony as he realized someone was missing.
The members of the band all exchanged glances.
"What?" asked Daphne. "What is it?"
"We can't find him," Felix said. It was the most serious anyone had ever seen him. "He disappeared in the middle of rehearsal, and he's not answering his phone." He gestured for Julie to step forward. "We checked his room – he wasn't there, but we found this."
Julie laid down the messenger bag, and Shaggy's stomach lurched as he recognized it.
"Like, that's Velma's!" he cried.
"Why was it in Leon's room?" asked Marcie.
The band members all glanced nervously at each other once again. Finally, Joey murmured, "We…we think he has her."
There was about three seconds of absolute silence before the yelling began.
"What are you talking about?"
"'Has her,' what do you mean 'he has her?'"
"Why? How?"
"Stop!" Julie exclaimed, silencing everyone. "We will tell you everything we know, but you need to let us talk."
Everyone waited with bated breath.
"I had a conversation with Velma this afternoon," she said. "She was asking me about the writing on the side of the van, which Leon did. I told her that his natural handwriting sucks, but he took a penmanship class two years ago, and now he's a skilled forger." Julie glanced at Marcie. "When you told me that there were two secret admirers, and one of them had been copying your handwriting, I started wondering if Leon had something to do with it. So when we couldn't find Leon after your phone call, I asked Joey some questions about him. They'd gone to high school together, so I figured he had more answers than I did."
She looked at Joey and cocked her head to the side. "Tell them what you told me."
Joey looked at the others and took a deep breath. "When we were teenagers," he began. "Leon fell head over heels in love with this girl. She was a senior and we were freshmen, but Leon tried everything to get close to her. He started taking piano lessons with her, and at the end of the year when she got accepted to a college out of state, he told her how he felt. But…she didn't feel the same way. I think she turned him down gently, but he never got over her. He's been hung up on her for years." He paused. "That girl's name was Dorothy Dinkley."
Shaggy felt ice flood his veins.
"Dottie..." Daphne breathed.
"Velma's sister?" Fred glanced at Daphne anxiously.
"Obviously, none of us had any idea," Priya told the others. "We all knew about this girl, but we only found out her name today."
"Row?" asked Scooby.
The band exchanged another glance.
"I didn't know her," Joey said. "I barely knew Leon in high school – he and I didn't really become friends till college. If you showed me Dottie's picture right now, I wouldn't be able to pick her out of a lineup. Leon had told us about her only once, early in our friendship. I'd forgotten her name until Julie asked about it this afternoon."
"Leon, of course, must have recognized Velma immediately," Julie continued. "From the day he saw her at the Coolsville Concert Hall after the Hex Girls show, the second he heard her name, he knew who she was. I thought it was odd that he offered to play your prom, but now I think I understand – he was trying to get closer to her. And thus get closer to her sister again."
"But he's been getting more and more unhinged," Priya went on. "You saw how he was the day you got your Coolsville U acceptances. After everything we've learned about Dottie, we think that being around Velma hasn't been good for Leon."
Daphne remembered the way Leon had rushed at Julie and shoved her against the wall. "Is he...is he capable of hurting her?" she asked, afraid to hear the response.
The band members shared another look.
"Like answer her, damn it!" Shaggy barked when nobody said anything.
"Yes," Julie admitted. "Leon could hurt her."
Daphne brought a hand to her mouth and looked at Julie tearfully.
Unconsciously, instinctively, Fred moved towards her and gingerly put a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"How do you know?" he asked Julie, not realizing until after he'd spoken that his hand was on Daphne's shoulder. But she had put her own hand on top of his, and he had no plans to let go of her. Not when they were finally so close after all this time. "Has he...hurt someone before?"
All the band members turned to look at Julie. She closed her eyes and a tear leaked out. Joey brushed it away with his finger.
"It's okay Jules," Joey whispered, wrapping an arm around her.
Julie took a shuddery breath. "Leon attacked me once," she murmured at last. "When I was a freshman in college. I told Velma this afternoon that Leon and I never liked each other, but I didn't tell her why. This is the real story.
"It was the day he'd told me about Dottie, though he didn't use her name. He'd just told me that he'd had a crush on a senior girl when he was a freshman in high school. I thought we were joking around…I teased him, asked him what had possessed him to think that a senior would like him back. And then I told him he should get over himself and…he didn't take it well." She exhaled. "It happened while Joey was in rehab, which is the only reason no one found out about it till now. I didn't tell anyone until today, when I figured out that Leon might hurt Velma to get to her sister."
"Rhat rid he do to roo?" asked Scooby, horrified. One look around at the others told him they were feeling the same way.
Julie swallowed and pulled the collar of her sweater aside.
A long surgical scar ran the length of her collarbone.
The teens gasped, and Julie gazed at them.
"He pushed me. I hit a desk on my way down and broke my collarbone." Her voice was barely a whisper. "He said it was an accident, that he hadn't meant to hurt me so badly, so I told the doctors at the hospital that I had fallen into the desk on my own." She shrugged at the scar. "They needed to perform surgery to fix it."
Everyone stared at her, aghast.
Julie took another shaky breath, and her voice was a bit stronger when she spoke again. "So... you can see why I'm worried about Velma." She pulled the collar of her sweater back up to hide the scar.
Shaggy felt his hands clench into fists so tight that his fingernails dug into his palms.
"So where are they now?" asked Marcie, who looked like she was about to be sick.
"We're not sure," Felix said. "He's not at home. We looked everywhere. He's not in the house and like we said before, he's not answering his phone."
"We do have a few ideas," Priya told them. "He grew up here, so he knows the area well. There's an empty shed behind his parents' house in the Oak Pond neighborhood. We used to rehearse there before we rented our own place. Or maybe somewhere on campus, probably the fine arts building – he knows it the best. Or…he could have taken her out of town." She looked reluctant to even bring up this last point.
Shaggy felt all the breath go out of him and he sat down hard in his chair. Scooby laid his head on Shaggy's knee, and both Fred and Daphne came over to place comforting hands on his shoulders. Shaggy could feel Daphne trembling with suppressed sobs, and he gripped her hand tightly. Fred took Daphne's other hand, and for the first time in months, all four of them were connected.
"What should we do?" asked Daphne, her voice shaky.
"I'm thinking..." Fred clutched Daphne's hand, his face contorted in concentration. He glanced from Scooby to Daphne to Shaggy and back several times in quick succession. "Okay. Here's the plan: We'll split up. The gang and I will go to campus and check out the fine arts building. The rest of you, go to Leon's parent's place. You know them better, so that'll be less suspicious than us knocking on their door. Once we figure out where Velma is, we'll rendezvous and set a trap for Leon."
"What if he left town with her?" asked Shaggy.
Fred clenched his jaw. "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," he murmured.
"What can I do to help?" asked Tony.
Fred sighed. "Call the sheriff," he said reluctantly. Scooby felt his eyebrows shoot up. Fred never called Sheriff Stone if he could help it. It spoke to the seriousness of the situation, Scooby supposed, that Fred wanted Sheriff Stone involved. "Tell him everything that's happened. We'll call you when we find her, and then you can bring the sheriff along."
Everyone nodded in agreement.
"Are we ready?" asked Shaggy, finally rising from his seat.
Daphne nodded. "Yes."
"Let's go, gang," said Fred.
Scooby said nothing, just followed the others resolutely.
"Fleachy, you want to come get the sheriff with me?" asked Tony.
Marcie nodded and made to follow him.
Suddenly, Shaggy stopped walking. "Like, wait a minute." He turned around and, feeling magnanimous, held his hand out to Marcie. "Do you want to come with us?"
Marcie blinked at him. "Excuse me?"
"I know you're worried about her too," he said. "And if I were you, it would like, make me crazy to sit around and wait for news."
Marcie fixed him with a gaze, seeming torn. But eventually, she shook her head no.
"It should be you," she told him quietly. "All of you," she said to the rest of the gang. "She was so upset with herself, for the things she said before spring break. She blamed herself for the break up. And she wanted to fix it, desperately. She'd murder me for saying this, but I know she misses you guys." She took a deep breath. "You should be the ones to rescue her."
Marcie gently touched Shaggy's arm, and a look of understanding passed between the two of them. He nodded once, then followed the others out the front door and into the rain.
Sponge: All right folks, that's the first part of chapter 15! Tune in next week for part 2. In the meantime, review if you please, and don't forget to guess where the chapter title comes from!