Out the door and all the way up the stairs to the roof. In one corner there were three points of interest: a valve handle, an empty drainpipe, and another drainpipe with a key inside. Arelia inspected both pipes thoroughly before standing from her crouch.

"I thought we were going to the Library?" Bishop said.

"I have a feeling we're going to have to look all over the school for keys," she answered. "I want to get it over with now." The key could not be reached by hand, and neither Bishop nor Arelia had anything to get it out with. Frustrated, they retreated to the top of the stairwell out of the rain and sat against opposite walls, playing catch with the pink rubber ball Arelia had found earlier.

"So what now?" Bishop asked, catching the ball as it bounced off the floor and came to him. He bounced it back to Arelia, who also caught it.

"I don't know. There's got to be some kind of trick to it, right? Exchange something for something else? That's what it's been before." She bounced the ball back to Bishop.

"Well, what do we have to exchange?" Throw. Bounce. Catch. Arelia looked at the ball in her hand, smiled, and walked back up the stairs. Curious, Bishop followed her.

She placed the rubber ball in the empty drain pipe and turned the valve handle. Water poured out over the ball, now that it was blocking it from draining, and washed the key down the second drain. Bishop leaned over the edge of the roof and shined his flashlight down onto the wet grass.

"Courtyard," he said unhappily.

They went all the way back to the courtyard and searched carefully for the key, Arelia on her hands and knees, and Bishop sweeping small areas with his flashlight. After a few minutes of combing the grass, Arelia found it lying next to an outflow pipe in a puddle of muddy water. She held it up for Bishop to see and stood.

"Now we can go to the second floor."

The classrooms on the second floor were of little interest, but the hall where the music room was located harbored three zombie children. With Arelia's handgun and Bishop's shotgun, they were easily rid of. The music room door was jammed. They went instead to the locker room.

Arelia walked around the locker room curiously, inspecting a few lockers for anything of use. She tried not to look down at the bloodstained floor too often, but Bishop seemed very interested in it. He followed various trails of blood up the walls, to the ceiling, and then to some of the large splatters of blood directly under it on the floor. He shook his head.

"Lots of kids must have been killed here," he muttered. "Dragged up the walls and dropped from the ceiling. Gutted, I imagine. There's a lot of blood, so their major arteries may have been damaged, as well." From a locker across the room, Arelia looked up at him with an expression of distaste.

"How morbidly fascinating," she replied. Bishop didn't seem to notice. He was now interested in a thumping locker on the far right side, far right end of the last row. Something wanted out. She followed him and leaned against one of the lockers further away. "I wouldn't touch that, if I were you." He ignored her and tapped the locker with the base of his flashlight. The noise stopped, and the locker door swung open on creaky hinges.

"Nothing but blood," he said. He turned to leave. Suddenly, the locker Arelia had been leaning against opened, catching her in the ribs, and knocked her over. A corpse fell out on top of her. Its dead weight was pinning her to the floor. She kicked it off and scooted back to the wall, breathing hard as her heart pounded with fear.

"Fascinating," Bishop said. "I wonder how that one died." He looked at Arelia, who was staring wide-eyed. "Are you okay?"

"Yes... Yes, I'm fine. It just startled me. Sorry." She stood up and searched the corpse.

"How morbid of you," Bishop said with a grin. "Looting the dead, are we?"

"No," she answered, producing a key from the body. "Just getting what was left for us."

In the hall with the Chemistry Lab and Storage Room, Arelia found both doors to be locked. She did, however, find the Library Reserve door and unlocked it with the key obtained from the corpse. Looking over the shelves, she found the book in question and sat down at one of the tables to read it in peace. Bishop picked up a copy of the Holy Bible and looked it over curiously.

After a time, she set the book down and sighed. Bishop did not look up from his text.

"So, does the monster lurk?"

"Yes," Arelia said, leaning back in her chair. "Apparently, in adolescent girls."

"Well, yes, that's been explained by raging hormones that induce mood swings at certain times of the month."

"I'm serious, Bishop."

"So am I."

"Read this, will you?" She handed him 'The Monster Lurks'. He picked it up and shined his flashlight on the pages.


Chapter 3

"Manifestation of Delusions"


...Poltergeists are among these. Negative emotions, like fear, worry or stress manifest into external energy with physical effects. Nightmares have, in some cases, been shown to trigger them. However, such phenomena do not appear to happen to just anyone. Although it's not clear why, adolescents, especially girls, are prone to such occurrences...


When he was finished, Bishop handed the book back to her.

"Strange," he said. "I wonder why our bathroom friend wanted us to read that?"

"Maybe it has something to do with whatever's going on around here. Remember that girl on the phone?"

"She sounded much younger than the span 'adolescent' applies to. She sounded around six or seven."

"Look, the Library is right next door. Let's see if we can find anything further there that might help us figure it out, all right?" Arelia stood and motioned to the door. Bishop went through it and aimed his shotgun into the darkness, slowly filling the room with light from his flashlight.

"All clear," he said. He held the door for her and she entered and immediately began scanning through the spines of the books on the shelves. He went to the other side of the library and did the same. She looked over her shoulder at him and mentally sighed. Should never have dragged him into this. Should have told him to go home. Still, she was glad that somebody was by her side during the horrible ordeal.

On a table, Arelia found a book opened to the end of a chapter. She picked it up and read through it.


"...Hearing this, the hunter, armed with bow and arrow, said, 'I will kill the lizard.' But upon meeting his opponent, he held back, taunting, 'Who's afraid of a reptile?'

At this, the furious lizard hissed, 'I'll swallow you up in a single bite!' Then the huge creature attacked, jaws opened wide. This was what the man had wanted.

Calmly drawing his bow, he shot into the lizard's gaping mouth. Effortlessly, the arrow flew, piercing the defenseless maw, and the lizard fell down dead."


She looked up after finishing and called Bishop over, who read it through with her again. "I'll give you three guesses as to what we're up to next," she said. "And the first two don't count."

"What's this even from?" the sergeant asked. He closed the book and turned it over. "A Book of Fairy Tales".

"I remember reading this as a kid," said Arelia quietly. "I always thought it had the strangest ending. No finality in it at all. The hunter didn't ride off into the sunset. Evil was defeated, but there was no reward or mention of happiness for the hero in the end."

"Almost like a true story," Bishop said. He looked at her. "Think it'll end that way for us?"

"I don't know if we'll be that lucky," she said. She looked up at the wall ahead of her. "Of course, we could always end up like them."

Bishop shined his flashlight on the wall, illuminating two bodies that had been hanged in straight-jackets, arms over their bloody chests, swinging gently in the darkness.