There is a shift in temperature as he steps down the chilled cement steps. A shock a pain runs up his burly leg as he steps over a small piece of glass. He swears loudly before covering his mouth, and he internally scolds himself for producing the echoing sound. He does not want the others to wake. Once he reaches the bottom of the surprisingly, poorly crafted stairs; he hops down and flickers on the switch from the side.
Light fills the rather large air-conditioned space. Hairs rise on the boy's back when he entered and goosebumps forms on his arms. He searches for an idea, a clue, something that could possbly help him in deciphering the mystery that is the murders of the Indianwood Mansion.
The basement has been sporadically adorned with various forms of large movable equipment that are also referred to as furniture. His eyes rarely focus on the material things such as couches, or the useless television; his eyes wandered to the scrapbook album on the coffee table.
Michael is drawn to it because of it's disturbingly childlike cover. A baby blue with pale pink stickers on it. The stickers are aged and peeling, but are still readable. He presumes it to belong to Raven and feels obligated to open up the book to the first pages. The two page spread covers news of a mass murder in Indianwood Mansion. Jade eyes grow wide. 10 people were killed here, 10 decades ago, in 1914.
Several headlines have been torn out of newspapers and placed in the scrapbook.
INDIANWOOD MURDERS REMAIN A MYSTERY
INDIANWOOD MANSION TO BE TORN DOWN
LOVELY MANSION, OR VICIOUS SLAUGHTERHOUSE?
WHO KILLED THE INDIANWOOD MURDER VICTIMS?
One article has been preserved, and Michael scans through one of them titled, "The Mystery of the Indianwood Murders."
It involved the said victims and how each of them died. Each having fallen to a similar fate: having been cut off from the outside world, and being killed off one-by-one. Michael's body shivers from the gory descriptions and browse through the list of those who had fallen. Any one of them could've killed the others, but here's the thing:they all died. How could they kill eachother, when they were dead themselves?
Each of them, died the same way as his friends did. And that is quite terrifying. Why would Raven keep something like that? He slips the page out of its protective cover and plaaces it carefully in his pocket. He flips through the family memories and stops when he gets to a page from elementary school days. Little Raven is in a class picture with the rest of her classmates; however, a few of them look awfully familar. He is able to pick out Simoné, Stephanie, himself, Calum, Max, and Luke out of the class. He is not able to bash himself for looking like the geekiest little child on the planet, when he notices a flaw on Stephanie's face.
There's swelling.
Stephanie swings herself on the monkey bars and Luke pretends to look under her dress. Stephanie squeals in a girly manner before dropping down from the bars. She chases him around the playground. Raven's long raven hair cascades down her back as she is unwillingly pushed down the slide.
She lets out a scream. A devilish Michael grins mischeviously at his acheivement. Even at his wee young age, he knew he had a major crush on his classmate, and he has a wicked way of showing it. He teases her relentlessly, and never gives the poor girl a break.
Stephanie chases Luke until they reach the forest at the precipice of the playground. They stop when they hear buzzing.
"What's that?" Asks Luke and receives a shrug from Stephanie.
"I don't know. " Stephanie replied uselessly. "Bugs, " She added thoughfully as she saw a bee come out of the hive.
The striped flying insect makes its way over to the two and Stephanie swats it way, thinking it was a simple fly. The bee promptly stings her on the cheek.Stephanie lets out a pained wail while Luke just stares at her.
"It's just a bug." Luke grumbled before a bee stings him too. He starts to cry and the two of them run back to the rest of the group. Michael opens his mouth to tease Luke about being a baby, but sees the tears on his face.
Stephanie's face is beginning to swell..
"CLASS! TIME FOR PICTURES!" Calls their teacher. The kids go with the rest of the class to take a picture."
Michael stares at the scrapbook for the longest time.
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MY CHAPTERS HAVE BEEN VERY SHORT BUT THIS ONE IS ACTUALLY PRETTY DECENT IN TERMS OF QUALITY but it is still short (sigh) I'm trying to get back into my writing bc school has left me with zero time for life and zero energy and it's 10:40 on a school night can you hear my sobs?
OH AND I'M LOVING THE THEORIES ON WHO'S THE KILLER I AM LOVING THEM. (I'm thinking of changing it to make it less predictable..)
LOVE YOU ALL AND THANKS FOR READING THIS FAR MUHAHAHA
YOU ARE READING
ten // 5sos
Hayran Kurgu"we're all going to die, " (cover cred to calumsclique aka sabrina)
