Chapter 5

"What the- ", was all that Fred managed to utter before a clawed hand swatted him away, and the figure in front of them stood up to reveal themselves as-

"Yow! A ghost!", cried Velma, fear freezing her in place.

The ascot wearer scrambled to get back on his feet, then hurried back down the hall, assuming Velma was quickly behind him. But the sweater clad girl was still frozen in fear as the blueish ghoul started floating towards her, moaning and groaning as it kept getting closer. When it was within a few feet of her, the ghost's moans started getting louder until they were practically wails. Trembling in her orange stockings, Velma did the only thing she could think to do in her state of panic. She handed her giant stack of books and papers over to the blue ghoul, who grabbed them.

"Hold these for a second"

With that, Velma took off after Fred, leaving the ghost both in the dust and confused. A puzzled expression on his cloaked face, it took a second to realize that he had been tricked. Dropping the books onto the floor, the ghost began chasing the two teens, wailing at the top of its lungs.

"Well, Ms. Blake, I'm glad that you came to me about this matter", said the balding principal with thick glasses.

"I'm glad you feel the same way Principal Ruby. I'm sure my friends and the other students here will be relieved to hear that Red Herring isn't going to be around to bug anyone anymore"

For as long as any of the teens of Coolsville can remember, there was always Red Herring. Ever since Red was a toddler, he would cruelly bully anyone that got in his way, from geeks and nerds, to even some of the cooler kids and jocks, all with an ugly sneer on his face. When he entered high school, the bully would often get sent down to the principal's office on a daily basis, only to be up to his old habits a day later. This time however, the staff at Coolsville High realized that Red had gone too far this time. Yesterday during practice, the bully had tried to sneak into the girl's locker room when they were changing into their cheerleader uniforms, only to be yanked back by a furious Daphne Blake, who then called down the hall for the coach. Principal Ruby had immediately suspended him for a week, then decided to meet with Daphne about what happened this morning to see if he should change Red's punishment to an expulsion. Which he did upon hearing it from the young woman sitting on the other side of his desk.

"Thank you for meeting with me about this Ms. Blake. Now, here's a note from me for your teachers so they don't mark you tardy. Hurry on, and don't worry about seeing Mr. Herring around this school anymore"

"Thank you, Principal Ruby,", the red head said as she rose from her seat, note clutched in one hand, and headed out the door. But not before her bag accidentally bumped the edge of a shelf, sending something falling off of the edge.

"Whoops!"

In the nick of time, Daphne managed to grab the object before it hit the floor. Putting it back on the shelf, she could see that it appeared to look like a gold nugget.

"Thank heavens you caught that. That was a present from my mother a long while ago"

Turning to face the principal, Daphne asked, "Is that real gold?"

The principal started chuckling a bit before shaking his head no.

"Oh no, that's just a chunk of pyrite, fool's gold if you will. If I had a gold chunk that large, I'd retire!"

With a quick wave of his hand, the principal sent the red head out of his office so she wouldn't be late for her class. Clutching the note in her hand, Daphne started to quickly jog to her first class so she wouldn't miss any more of it then she already had. A second later she took a sharp right to get to her class-

-where she collided with three people who were running straight at her from two different hallways.

Untangling herself from the mess of bodies and limbs, she could see a jock wearing a white sweater, a girl wearing a poofier orange sweater and glasses, and Shaggy. Once she got a glance of them, her fiery temper flared up.

"What were you all running from, a ghost?!"

No sooner that she said this did a blue, glowing green-eyed ghost coming flying down the hallway right at them, wailing at the top of its lungs. Fred turned his head towards the shocked red head, a dumbfounded expression on her face.

"That answer your question?"

The red head glared at the sarcastic comment delivered by the jock, before scrambling to get off of the floor, Fred doing the same. Shaggy raised his head from where it had collided with the hard marble floor, wincing as he rubbed it. Turning his head, he could make out what appeared to be-

"Zoinks! The ghost!", Shaggy exclaimed, his hair sticking straight out in every direction. Jumping to his feet, he grabbed the orange sweatered girl by the arm and yanked her to her feet, and the two began running from the screaming specter behind them.

The teens began running as fast as they could away from the spook that was following close behind. Daphne turned to face the blonde, who was ahead of her.

"What do we do?"

Quickly thinking, Fred noticed an old broom closet near the end of the hall. An idea popped in his head.

"Quick, duck in here!"

Wrenching the door open, the jock hurried inside with the rest of the teens stumbling in after him, then shut the door. They all held their breath as they heard the ghost's wailing getting closer, only letting out a sigh of relief when they heard the ghost run right past them and take a left down another hallway. He must have thought they were still running ahead of him. Opening the door, the teens stuck their heads out to double check, grateful to find the hall empty. Daphne let out a sigh of relief as she and the rest of them tumbled out of the closet.

"Jeepers! What was that thing?"

Velma adjusted her glasses, her hand a little shaky as she did so.

"I think… that must have been a ghost"

Shaggy's eyes widened even further as he quickly turned to face the bespectacled girl.

"Like, you think? What else could it be?"

"What's going on here?"

Shaggy yelped and jumped in the air a bit before cowering behind Velma. An older man in a janitor's uniform scowled at the small group of teens before him. His uniform was a mess, the only thing clean on it being his shiny name tag, which bore the name, "Ken Spears".

"Like, a ghost nearly ran us over man! That's what's going on here!"

The older man narrowed his eyes as he looked at the tall paranoid hippy standing before him.

"Son, have you been smoking something?"

Fred decided now might be a good time to intervene.

"No, what he's saying is true sir. A blue ghost with glowing green eyes chased us all down this hall. It was wailing at the top of its lungs!"

The old man gave a grunt as eyed them suspiciously.

"I didn't see any ghost, nor did I hear any wails. Now get to class you delinquents!"

Deciding they couldn't convince the janitor, the group began to walk down the hallway back to their respective classes. Daphne turned towards the blond walking next to her.

"Should we tell the principal about this?"

Fred scratched his head.

"Probably not. I mean, if the janitor didn't believe us, odds are he might not either. Besides, it was a pretty strange thing to happen"

Daphne hummed in response before finding her classroom.

"Alright I'll see you after school…"

"Fred Jones. And the girl with me is Velma", the jock said, finishing her sentence.

"I'm Daphne. See you later"

Turning from the red head, Fred hurried to join the rest of the group, who had kept walking when he stopped briefly. Getting closer to them he realized they were in a heated discussion about what just happened.

"Like, I just don't get how you don't think it was a ghost!"

"That's because ghosts don't exist silly! It's a scientific fact!"

"Then like the ghost needs to fact check those facts!"

Sighing, Velma shook her head as she could feel a headache coming along just talking to the taller boy.

"Fred, will you try to convince scruffy here that ghosts aren't real?"

"Like, my name's Shaggy"

Velma blinked her eyes before her headache suddenly got worse.

"I was only referring to you based on your description- what kind of a name is Shaggy?"

"Shaggy" shrugged his shoulders.

"It's been my name ever since grade school- "

"Norville Rodgers!"

Jumping in the air yet again, the hippy found himself face to face with his math teacher, a strict, short, older woman who didn't look so happy with her slacking student.

"When I allowed you time to get your homework assignment from your locker, I expected no more than five minutes, NOT twenty!"

The taller boy nervously gulped as he reached into his back pocket and pulled out his slightly crumpled, yet completed, math homework.

"Like, here ya go Mrs. H. All done"

With a scowl, she snatched the assignment and trenched back into her classroom. Shaggy gave a sigh of relief before turning towards the girl next to him, who was trying to hard not to laugh. He sighed again.

"Norville?"

"Yeah, and like now ya know why I go by Shaggy"

Velma was about to make a comment before Shaggy's math teacher stuck her head out of her room in annoyance.

"Norville! Quit goofing around and get in here! The whole class is waiting on you! And Dinkley, I'm surprised at you, slacking off as well!"

The teacher again stormed back into her classroom. Shaggy raised an eyebrow at the now blushing girl standing next to him.

"Dinkley?"

"My surname. Velma is my first name, thankfully. Dinkley sounds more like a nickname such as yours than an actual surname"

Shaggy started to walk towards the door, but not before turning towards Velma one more time.

"Hey, if you ask me it's a pretty groovy last name. It could have been somethin' boring like Brown or something"

With that, the taller boy entered his math class, leaving behind a blushing shorter girl uttering a small "thank you", before heading off with Fred to get to their physics class.

Author's Note

Holy fricking mutant cow that took a while to write! Fun fact, the principal was inspired off of Joe Ruby and the janitor off of Ken Spears, two amazing people who helped create Scooby Doo. Also, I couldn't help but throw in a "Shaggy is a pothead" joke, even if he isn't an actual pot head in this story.

Anyways, review!