Copwane

The Disappearance

Darkness fell on the youth group causing every little noise to seem heightened. Each person jumping or letting out a startled yelp every few minutes. The lights in this building didn't work and with little knowledge about the materials surrounding them, they didn't dare light a fire. It had been this way for the last few nights.

Daneliya heard sniffling in the dark and pulled her knees to her chest as she sat against a wall near a window next to Gavin. He was on his knees gazing out of it. The other youth members had separated themselves from these two and had began listening to Mitch who had taken the position of "Leader".

Over the last few hours, they had finished looking through the building and had found nothing else. Each room was empty, and every stomach was experiencing the pains of hunger and thirst.

Gavin looked out at the dark world beyond the window and sighed. Where are we? How does one get here? He looked through the dark at his fellow youth aware that he was now labeled as a crazy liar. And you know what? He didn't really care.

Slowly, he crept towards the door as he had done for the last few nights and walked through the dark halls. He was antsy and tired of sitting around waiting for something to happen. So, he adventured the building. He had a fairly good feel for it. The broken window from the bird boy was on the fifth floor and he was headed there now. The breeze that blew in through that window was always nice compared to the stuffy, moldy smell that followed him around everywhere else.

The floor had taken him a bit to get used to, but now it was just like walking on anything else. It had a little extra spring to it, and he couldn't help but wonder what it was made of. He looked at the window up ahead, the moonlight drifting in and causing the shards of glass to shimmer slightly. He looked at his hand, which had been cut by the glass and was now wrapped in a strip of cloth from the bottom of his shirt.

He gazed out of the window and breathed in the night air.

~

Mitch glared out the door he had heard Gavin disappeared through. He thought of following, but he didn't want to wake anyone, so he sat still with Renea sleeping soundly on his shoulder. The pressure of leading the group was getting to him and he began to wish he hadn't volunteered himself and had instead thrust it upon Gavin.

~

Gavin, looked around. The normal night noises were being interrupted by a clicking. In the inky blackness, he couldn't see what the cause was, but he felt the hairs on the back of his head stand up and he pressed his lower half against the windowsill and peered down the hall.

The clicking grew louder until it was a racket in his ears. He covered them and looked around still seeing nothing.

"Who's there?" He called uneasily.

He heard a large click and what sounded like scraping, "Your...worst...nightmare!" it said the voice like gravel through the racket.

His body tensed as what felt like electricity flowed through it. Gavin slumped to the floor, the last thing he heard was the scraping draw nearer...then stop.

~

None of the youth were aware of what had happened as they all drifted off to sleep. The scraping hadn't been heard by one. Not a single soul had a clue that right now, one of their own were being taken.