What's Happening?

Chapter 1

Virgil felt like the world was on fast forward as he hovered in the tiny shadow of the mysterious man's clothes. The man seemed to be able to run at almost the speed of light, which would've probably been at least slightly fascinating to experience if he actually physically existed at the moment.

A few seconds later, it stopped. Virgil felt his small spot of existence grow larger, which meant it was darker wherever they were now. He stayed in the shadows where he was for now, though, as he didn't know where he was.

Suddenly, he could hear a muffled cheerful but cheerful sound coming from somewhere. The area got lighter and the shadows grew smaller and smaller until it was too small for him to be in and he was pushed outwards.

<———•♣•———>

Roman stopped in front of the building he usually resided in when he wasn't out saving people's lives. He walked in the door and through the dark entryway, sighing. That had been a pretty strange experience, even for him. He'd felt a chill from the man he'd just saved, both figuratively and literally, and he want sure why.

He slowly opened up the door to the blindingly white room, to be greeted by Patton. "Hey, welcome back Roman!" the cheerful man shouted, running over to him and dragging along their other friend Logan.

Once Patton had gotten within talking distance of him, he stopped. "So, how did—"

Patton was suddenly interrupted by a loud "oof!" behind Roman. He turned around to see the man from earlier on the ground, coughing.

"What the heck?!" Roman exclaimed, jumping in surprise.

The man looked up at him. "Dammit, I shouldn't have done that..." he mumbled, looking around. "What is this place?"

<———•♦•———>

"What is this place?" Virgil asked. He seemed to be in a circular, white room. It was large—about the size of a high school gym. There were a few doors with a letter on them. One had an R, one had a P, one had an L, and one had a faint V on it.

"First, what are you doing here?" the man from before shouted.

"

Well, Prince Charming," Virgil responded with a sarcastic tone, a bit mad at how rude he'd phrased his question. "After you obliterated that shadow thing, I grabbed your shirt and was dragged here with you."

"If you grabbed my shirt, why didn't I notice you until now? I stopped running at the entrance. Plus, you would've fallen off if you were only hanging onto my shirt. How would that work?" he interrogated.

"Simple," Virgil stated. He took a deep breath and decided it was okay to say it since the man obviously had some strange powers as well. "I hid in the shadows in the folds of your clothes."

The man and the two others in the room stared at him, confused. After a few seconds, he said "Wait, what?"

Virgil sighed, annoyed. He walked up to the man and touched a fold in his clothes, suddenly being sucked up into them. He then exited the shadow and walked away, putting his hood over his head and his hands in his pocket.

After they stared at him, surprised, for a little more, Virgil sighed again, nervous because of their silence. "What? You obviously have some kind of super speed, do you really need to gawk at me like that?"

The smaller man shook himself a bit and ran over happily, bringing him into a hug. "You're one of us!" he shouted happily.

Virgil stared at him, confused. "Huh?"

The tall one in the back adjusted his glasses. "It seems that the forth room the building has wasn't a mistake after all," he said. "That is, if your name starts with a V."

Virgil looked at the door that had had the faint V, to see that the letter was suddenly the same shade of black as the other letters. He looked back at the man with glasses. "Uh, yeah. My name starts with V."

The one hugging him let him go. "That's great! I'm Patton, the tall one is Logan, and the one whose clothes you hid in the shadows of is Roman."

Virgil perked up at the sound of the name "Roman." He looked at the man who the name belonged to and observed his facial features. He did look a bit like the drawing he'd done earlier...but it couldn't be. His Roman was probably dead, and even if he wasn't dead, the rude man in front of him couldn't be his childhood friend.

After looking at him for a little bit, Virgil noticed that Roman was staring back at him with a surprised, yet confused, look on his face.

"So, what's your name?" Patton asked him, snapping him out of his apparent staring contest.

"I, uh," Virgil started. "Just...call me V." His name was pretty embarrassing, which he hadn't really noticed until he was made fun of for it in his freshman year of high school. He decided to share it with them later, if there was a later.

"Oh. Alrighty then, V!" Patton said cheerfully, adjusting his glasses from the side instead of the middle like Logan had done earlier. "Let's get you to your room, shall vee?"

Virgil looked at him, confused. "Did—did you just make a pun?"

Patton grinned. "Absolute-vee!" he said.

Virgil put his hand over his face, cringing a little. "Wow."

Patton dragged Virgil over to the door marked with a V. "Here ya go! Only you can open the room, that's why we haven't explored it yet."

Virgil opened the door to see a dark room, decked out in cobwebs and purple-tinted lights, with a bed that had spider-patterned bedding, and a black furry chair in the corner. There was a dark wood desk against one of the walls with a mirror on it and a black office chair, as well a bookshelf made of the same material next to the bed. The walls were almost black, with stars painted on them, and the carpet was the same beige color as his apartment.

"What the—"

"Welcome to your new home!" Patton said. He looked over at the bedding and jumped away. "AAA! SPIDERS!"

Virgil chuckled a little bit, then stopped. "Wait, did you say 'new home'?"

"I sure did, kiddo!" Patton replied.

"What?" Virgil said, a panicked tone in his voice. "But I already have an apartment!"

"Well, you get to live here for free! Patton said.

"I have a lease, you know!" Virgil argued back. "I still have to pay the rent, even if I'm not there!"

"That can be taken care of," stated Logan, who was suddenly next to them.

Virgil looked at him, mad. "So I'm just expected to live here, wherever the hell we are?"

"Indeed."

Virgil was frustrated. "That's not fair! I have important things back at my apartment! Plus, what would I tell my moms? 'Oh, I have to live in the middle of nowhere with random strangers because they said so? Sorry you can't visit because I have no idea where I am'?"

"If you want, Roman can take you back to where you live so you can get your belongings?" Logan offered, adjusting his glasses again.

"Ugh, fine," Virgil said, still sensitive to the name. "But he better be quick."

<———•♥•———>

(A/N: This chapter's a bit longer, as you can tell. 1231 words! I'm going to work on chapters 2 & 3 tomorrow if I have time to. I honestly did this out of pure boredom. Plus I need to work on my writing skills. I use the word "suddenly" way too much. If you spot any grammar or spelling mistakes, make sure to let me know! Thanks! Peace, peeps)