A/N: I've been off school again (but this time because of flooding). The fire brigade's been down here and everything! Omg and we had to get off the school bus barely an eighth of the way there and walk home because they couldn't get us into school and ahhh! Excitement. You guys have no idea how glad I am to have a day off school today, and it's probably gonna be the same tomorrow! – Without the no school...it's Saturday :/ (Slightly worried though – my house wasn't flooded (barely) and loads of other houses were so this one might just flood my house...I'll probably update you next week :)
Haha I bet no one reads that ^^
Sorry for the (day) late update!
Review for more!
Discalimer: Of course I own them! That's why I'm writing fanfiction.
"Are you guys telling me you didn't hear anything yesterday?" asked Mikey, his eyes wide.
"Yes, Mikey." said Donnie. "For the fiftieth time, we didn't hear anything!"
"But it was so loud!"
"Maybe whatever it was only wanted you two to hear it." suggested Leo.
"Maybe it was the ghost!" said Mikey, dramatically clutching his pillow close to his chest.
"There's no proof of a ghost, Mikey." said Donnie.
"Yes there is!"
"There's proof that this place is creepy, but there's no evidence of a ghost being the cause of that."
"Raph's gone missing, and I was there, Donnie! The door just shut in my face, and when I opened it, he was gone! There's no way a human could have done that."
"Look," said Leo. "Let's just focus on trying to find Raph, okay?" he took the pillow from Mikey and laid it on the bed. "I think first we should pay your friend Alyssa a visit to see how she knew about what happens."
"She said it happens every Thursday, but people have been disappearing all week." said Mikey.
"We'll ask her about that too. She's just a kid, Mikey. There's no way she could know about everything."
"Actually she's been here –"
"We should go to class; we'll ask her when we're with Casey and April." said Donnie, interrupting Mikey.
Mikey sighed, "Sure."
"Hey Mikey," said Alyssa, approaching Mikey. He was sitting at one of the tables in the common room with April, Casey and his two remaining brothers. He had asked her to meet him there earlier in the day during English, and the girl had clearly been delighted. "You wanted to see me?" she giggled and twirled one of her bunches around her finger.
"Uh, y-yeah." replied Mikey, inwardly groaning. "I wanted to ask you about last night."
Her expression immediately dropped, and she let her hair fall back to her shoulder. "What? You didn't go out, did you?" she asked in concern, seeming to check him over.
"Huh? No, no I didn't." He replied, and she sighed in relief.
"Duh, of course you didn't – you're still here!" she lightly hit the side of her head and beamed at Mikey.
"It's my brother...he went out." she paled as he continued. "And I tried to stop him, but he didn't come back, and we've looked but we couldn't find him anywhere!"
"Oh..."
"Alyssa," said Leo. "How did you know about what would happen?"
"Oh I just...err...experience!"
"But students have been going missing all week!" said April. "How come you only mentioned Thursday?"
"Well, I don't know, I just – "
"And how come you haven't gone missing if you speak from experience?"
"Why did you only warn Mikey?"
"What's going on?"
The questions came thick and fast, and Alyssa stuttered, looking around the group in panic, trying to answer them all.
Seeing this, Mikey stepped in. "Guys!" he said. "She doesn't know everything." He turned to the girl standing before them. "Just tell us what you know Alyssa."
"I have to...go, like, now!" she blurted, and ran out of the common room.
"Wait!" Mikey jumped up and ran after her, but came back in a couple of seconds later, scratching his head in bewilderment. "She's gone."
"Huh. Weird." said Casey.
"Well, that didn't work," said April.
"Why don't we go to the library?" suggested Donnie. "I wanna check and see if I can find any more books."
"I can't find anything!" said Donnie, putting back yet another book. The five of them were spread around the huge room, scanning the bookshelves for anything else they could find on the school.
"Me neither." said Mikey. "This is a total bust."
"Wait, I think I've found something!" said Leo. He pulled out a huge book from the corner of the room, and made his way over to one of the tables. Everyone crowded round him as he opened the book, a cloud of dust rising as the pages settled. Donnie coughed and waved his hand in front of his face in an effort to disperse the dust.
"How old is that thing?" he asked.
"Dunno," replied Leo. "But from the looks of it, it's pretty old."
April suddenly shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. "Do you guys feel cold?" she asked, looking around the creepy, old room.
"Yeah," said Mikey. "It's, like, suddenly dropped a million degrees in here!"
"Not quite that much, Mikey." said Donnie, also bringing his arms around himself.
The lights began to flicker and the five teenagers gasped, looking around the room as the cobweb covered lights began to dim, before going off completely, leaving them in darkness, the only light coming from the grey winter sky through the misty windows.
"What's going on?" asked Casey, edging closer to the group. Leo gasped and Casey's head snapped to the older boy, who was looking at the book in front of him in shock. The pages were turning quickly on their own, as if they were being blown by the wind.
"Leo, what's going on?" asked Mikey, panicked.
"I don't know!" replied Leo, his eyes fixated on the turning pages in front of him. Suddenly, they stopped and the room's temperature rose back to normal as the lights came back on. It was as if nothing had happened.
"Guys," whispered Donnie. "Look." He pointed to the book, and Leo frowned as he read what was on the page.
"It's about the fire and the kids it killed." he said.
Casey leant over his shoulder and read, "'the ghosts of the children and the teachers still haunt the mansion to this day, trying to find a way to cross over'." He looked up at the others, "what does that mean?"
"It means this place is haunted!" said April.
"Don't be ridiculous!" said Donnie. "I bet –"
"G-Guys?" stuttered Mikey, pulling at Leo's sleeve. "Look at the painting!"
"What about it, Mikey?" asked Leo. April gasped as she looked at it while the others frowned, trying to figure out what Mikey had spotted.
"T-The man...he-he wasn't facing that way before. He was looking over there!" Mikey pointed to a window on the far side of the room.
"He's right," said April. "I remember – he was looking the other way!"
Leo gasped as he realised that the man in the painting was looking directly at them. "Let's go," he said, closing the book. The others agreed, and began to leave when Leo cried out in astonishment.
"Leo?" said Mikey, turning to his brother. "What is it?"
"The book – it won't budge!" Leo tried to lift the book, using every muscle he could, but it stayed flat against the table as if someone had nailed it down.
"Let's just go, bro." said Donnie, taking Leo's shoulder as they left the library, but not before giving the painting one last wary look.
"I think we should look for Raph," said Donnie. They had decided to return to Mikey's room, their unofficial hangout. "For all we know, he could have just been sleepwalking and gotten lost."
"Dude, I'm telling you – he was awake!" said Mikey.
"I suppose looking for him wouldn't hurt, Mikey." said Leo. Mikey sighed and nodded.
"So where should we start first?" asked April.
"We should split up," replied Leo. "April and Casey, you go and search the left side of the building. Mikey and Donnie, you search the right and I'll cover the centre. We should meet back at the stairs in an hour's time by the painting, okay?" the other four nodded and the group went their separate ways, thankfully not bumping into anyone as it was now after curfew, and they would have a lot of explaining to do.
"Did you guys find anything?" asked April as they met up again an hour later. They were standing underneath the painting on the stairs, the only light being the moonlight coming in through the dusty windows.
"Nope," said Mike, shaking his head.
"Neither," said Casey. "It's just like Mikey said – Raph's just disappeared!"
"No," said Leo fiercely. "No, he's not gone, he's somewhere, but he's not gone!"
"Look, Leo I didn't mean –"
"We're gonna find him, no matter what."
"What is going on here?!" a stern voice rung out from behind them, and the group spun round to look into the deep, piercing brown eyes of the head master.
"Oh, sir!" said Leo in surprise.
"I've been warned about all of you," he said, before looking at Mikey. "Especially you." Mikey gulped.
"We were, uh, just, uh..." stuttered Donnie.
"Going to the...the uh..." said Casey.
"Toilet?" Mikey tried with a hopeful smile.
"I will see all of you in the morning." He hissed, before spinning on his heel and walking away, his dark coat flowing behind him like a cloak.
"What's his problem?" asked Mikey after a couple of seconds of stunned silence.
"And why's he up so late?" wondered Donnie.
"What's his name?" suddenly asked Casey.
"Huh?" said Donnie.
"His name. I never caught it."
"He never said it," said April, narrowing her eyes at the spot where the head had been.
"So are we just gonna go to bed now?" asked Mikey.
"No," replied Leo, much to everyone's amazement. "We're gonna find out what's going on here."
"Wait a second..." said Donnie. "Does anyone else recognise him?"
"What do you mean?" asked Casey.
"Think back to earlier." Mikey gasped as he caught on, and was soon followed by the others.
"No..." whispered April. "That's...that's impossible!"
"Are you sure it's impossible?" asked Donnie. "After everything we've seen."
"A believer now, are ya D?" asked Mikey, raising his eyebrows and jabbing his brother's side with is elbow. Donnie subconsciously swatted him away and turned to Leo.
"What do we do?"
Leo narrowed his eyes. "We go."