Trapped

Chapters 1-2

Chapter 1
Emi Kofuku
"Emmi," I heard my mother yell from the downstairs hall. Her voice was cracking. "Are you ready to leave yet? Sakura is waiting outside for you."
Mother has been sick for a little over a year now. The doctors don't know if she will get better anytime soon. She may end up dying. Since she is always so sick I usually stay home to help her around the house. I want to help her as much as I can. If she works too hard I'm afraid she'll get sent to the hospital again. I never go anywhere away from home, except for school. I don't even like going to school. I'm afraid that when I get back she could be gone. I used to not be as serious. I used to actually never take anything seriously, but then mom became sick. I act normal around Sakura and other friends though.
"Almost," I said stuffing the remainder of my clothes into my bag. I grabbed my bag with my clothes that were almost falling out and ran down the stairs, putting on my shoes as I was about to walk out the door. Mother walked over to me. "I'm leaving," I told my her, hugging her tightly. "Will you be fine?" I asked.
"Don't worry about me. I'll be just fine. Go, have fun."
I ran outside the door and saw one of my closest friends, Sakura.
But before that, let me tell you a bit about myself. The year is 2028. I live in Kyoto, Japan. I am 15 years old. I am a first year in high school. I often get in trouble at school, even though I am so serious at home. Most of the things that I find enjoyable often end up getting me into trouble. My blood type is B. Most people with that blood type are described as creative and wild. I am not creative, but I can be pretty crazy at times. I am also kind of mean at times but hate admitting to it. I have light brown hair, mid length, that I often tie up into two ponytails. I have pale skin; I am pretty much an average girl and am very plain. I have two very good friends, both of them older than me. Sakura is one of my friends, and is the closest to me. I met her when I was a first year in Jr high school. Sakura is a second year in high school, she is 16. Sakura is very confident, in some ways. She is often very shy towards others her own age. Sakura is not only my friend, but is also my senpai. If you are a westerner reading this, you may not know what a senpai is. A senpai is someone whom is in a higher position than you, this term is usually used in schools. Sakura is amazing. She has outstanding grades, unlike me. She also spends most of her time reading, which I sometimes find annoying. She is very pretty and has long, dark hair. She wears glasses also. She is a very quiet person, but once you get to know her she shows more of what she is like. I also have another friend, who which I will talk about later.
"Hi, Sakura," I said running up and hugging her.
"Hi, are you ready to go?" Sakura said with a smile. Sakura almost always smiles no matter what the situation.
"Yep, I have all of my things right here," I said patting my bag.
We walked down the streets of our town. I looked at all of the trees which we passed. I could see the cherry blossom trees. Which were blooming. We walked over many bridges, that were very beautiful. I have never got to look at the bridges often, the bridges were in the old part of town. I have always been inside, or at school. I rarely get outside to see the old part of town, which was filled with cherry blossom trees,bridges and geisha districts. Along the way we passed old geisha districts, which were no longer used. Kyoto used to be a geisha district in the 1900's.There are some places where geisha will perform, however geisha only perform at night. We even passed some foreigners, who were most likely looking at the bridges or looking for geisha. Some people even would stop us to ask about some of the sights. The people's Japanese were very poor. For example, this man who seemed about the age thirty, told us to wait and instead of saying wait, he kept on telling us, "Until, until," at first both Sakura and I ignored the man, not understanding that he was trying to get our attention, then he tapped on Sakura's shoulder, asking where the geisha were. I told the man that the geisha don't come out during the day, and I hope he understood this, because his response was simply a nod.
We passed many exciting places and people, but after about half an hour until we reached a wide building. This building was a school, in which we were visiting for a camp. The school was very large, yet old. The building was so old that it was made of wood. The wood was a deep brown color. Surrounding the outside halls of the building was railing. Some of the railing was worn and falling apart. The building was decaying. The building was doing fine, considering how old it was. I've heard that the building was used for special occasions, such as the camps that high schoolers attend. We are going to one of these camps today. But, not everyone gets to attend the camp. The price is very expensive. Rarely anyone ever gets to go. We walked towards the front of the building to find our other friend, Rei, whom was the same age as Sakura.
He was very popular at school. He would often find confession letters inside his shoe box. Some girls even went up to him and confessed their feelings. All of them in which he refused. I have a feeling that he might like Sakura. I often tease Sakura about Rei, but she often changes the subject. Rei can be relaxed at most times, but often gets embarrassed. Rei's hair color is a light brown. His hair partially covered his eyes. He often wears his uniform unbuttoned, revealing his white shirt underneath and his tie. That is how he is wearing his uniform right now. We have to wear our uniforms to camp. Rei's uniform had a grey button up jacket, in which had four buttons and a collar. He wore a blue tie underneath and a white collared shirt. Mine and Sakura's uniform was very similar. We wore almost the same jacket as Rei, except that the buttons were on the opposite side. We wore soft pastel pink colored skirts that were a little above our knees. Lastly, we wore long grey socks that passed slightly above our knees.
Sakura reached out her hand and tapped on Rei's shoulder. Rei then turned around and smiled, blushing. Sakura waved her hand towards Rei.
"Hi Rei," I said in a cheerful voice, running up and hugging him.
"Hey," Rei replied. he said this not looking at me, nor Sakura. He often does this. I think he does this so he won't feel like he is being rude for only making eye contact towards one of us, and not the other. However, when he is talking to one of us he will usually make direct eye contact.
The three of us walked into the huge building.In which I am amazed hasn't fallen apart yet. There were not many people here yet, but there was one man sitting behind a table. The man was wearing a suit, in which many men in Japan wear at work. The man also had a mean look on his face. Which was noticeable by the way he had his eyebrows scrunched inward. The man has dark brown hair that covered part of his eyes. When we walked towards the man he smiled, making him appear friendlier.
"Hello, I am the camp director, Mr.Dai and am in charge of the camp. I'll be assigning you to your rooms." the man said smiling. "You three are all friends, huh?"
"Yeah," Sakura said.
"Well, I can put you two in the same room," he said pointing towards me and Sakura. "But I am sorry, I will have to put you in a separate room," he said to Rei. "We have a strict rule about boys being in girls cabins or girls being in boys cabins.That rule is, It is not allowed. But you can see each other any other time. Have fun. Here is your room keys and room numbers." Mr.Dai handed us a key and a paper with the number A-12 written on it. I am guessing that that was our room number. I looked at the small piece of paper in Rei's hand. The paper said B-10 which should be fairly close to our mine and Sakura's room.
"We are going to go to our rooms," Sakura told Rei. "We'll meet you here soon."
We walked down the hall and found the room A-12. The room was large. The room had a bunk bed on the right and a small, twin sized bed on the left, leaving the rest of the space completely empty. I took the bunk. Sakura took the twin bed. The beds were very dusty, and partially covered in cobwebs. I grabbed a t-shirt from my bag wiping of the dust. I decided to look around the room some more. The room looked like a normal room, but very spacious. One thing that was odd was that the room had no windows. I ignored this. The room is very old anyway. But, even old classrooms still have windows. I looked around the room more. To find a large clock on the left side of the room. I looked at the clock and the time was 6:00. I wonder why there is so little of people here. Wait, why haven't we been supervised or told about any activities or where to go?
"Senpai," I said. "Do you know what to do? We haven't been told to do anything yet. There is also no one here yet that I know of. All I seen was that creepy old man. Mr. Dai is his name. Or at least I think it is. I dunno."
"We haven't been instructed to do anything? That's weird. We did promise to meet Rei in the hall though. So I guess we should do that." Sakura said while continuing to put away her things. As I watched her put away everything, I saw her pull two large books from her bag. She loves to read and normally keeps to herself so this doesn't surprise me. I really never get to spend time with her. She is usually reading or in class.
Once Sakura finished putting away her things we left our room to meet Rei in the hall.
We found Rei standing next to the table where Mr.Dai was sitting before.
"Hey," Rei said looking at Sakura. " I don't know what we are supposed to do, because it looks like no one is here. I don't know where Mr.Dai is either."
"That's weird,I haven't seen anyone also." I said. I thought for a moment. "Well we can adventure." I raised my hand in excitement. "C'mon Senpai," I said linking arms with Sakura.
"Okay," both Sakura and Rei said in quiet voices.
We wandered through the halls of the old school. The school was older than I thought. I even saw some of the floorboards were missing. When we wandered into one of the rooms, we found a bathroom. The bathroom was an old style bathroom. The toilets were like huge holes in the ground, but they were still made of porcelain. These kind of bathrooms are not common in Japan anymore, you can usually only find them in stations.
"Look at this," I said pointing towards one of the stalls. "This school must be really old if they have these kinds of toilets."
"Wow, you never really see these except at older train stations," said Rei walking over to a sink. Rei tried turning on the faucet. Nothing happened. The pipes only gave a sound of rusted metal clanging together. We all tried turning on the sinks one by one, even Sakura. None of the sinks worked. They must of had the bathrooms blocked off, because none of the water in the bathroom was working.
I walked over to one of the mirrors, which was so scratched that my reflection looked as if I was looking into a funhouse mirror at a fair. At this I laughed.
"Ha, you look so weird," Sakura laughed.
Rei also laughed at this.
Soon after, I looked in one of the sinks. When I looked into the sink, which was covered in hair, I found a small pink compact. The compact was very dirty and the hinges were rusted. It might have been a student's from many years ago. When I pried open the compact, there were red fingerprints on the top mirror. Weird. I set the compact down and left the room. We searched more of the school. I've started many things about the school. Such as many broken floorboards, or rust on some of the door hinges.
I also noticed that the school was divided into four sections. First floor, east and west block, and the second floor, east and west block. On each side of the school were stairs. This was common in most schools. Once we found the stairs I got excited and wanted to see what was upstairs. I have no idea if we are even allowed upstairs, but there isn't anyone here anyway. We are on an "adventure" after all.
I dragged Sakura towards the east set of stairs.
"C'mon," I said with enthusement. "Let's see what's upstairs. It's not like we are going to get into any trouble. There isn't anyone here anyway. We are on adventure too. Remeber?"
"Okay," said Rei. "But I don't want to get into any trouble and I don't think Sakura does either. So, we'll have to be quick. This might be fun though."
"I don't really know," Sakura mumbled. "Can't we just go back to our rooms. I want to finish one of the books I'm reading. I also need to do my summer homework. We only have a week left to get our work done. Also, I really don't want to get into trouble. What if Mr.Dai comes to tell us that we aren't allowed upstairs and..."
"Oh, c'mon Senpai. You never do anything but school or read. It will be fine. I'm sure that we'll be allowed upstairs. They would've blocked off the stairs if we weren't allowed to go up them." I interrupted.
"Fine," Sakura said tilting her head downwards. "But, if we get into any trouble, we have to leave."
"It'll be fine," Rei reassured Sakura. "Nothing will happen." He smiled.
With each step, the stairs gave a creaking sound. When I think about it maybe this isn't a good idea. We could fall through one of the steps. I gave it a shot anyway. As we walked up the stairs Sakura tripped near one of the top steps. The step isn't broken, good.
"Senpai!" I yelled. "Are you okay?"
Sakura laid on the stairwell. She didn't look hurt though. She seemed to be trembling, as if she saw a reaper or a demon right before her. I've never seen her look like this. There was fear in her eyes. She lay there staring fixedly at a wall.
I looked over to Rei who seemed to have a similar look on his face. What are they so terrified of? I tapped Rei on the shoulder. All he did was stand there and stare at the wall as if in a trance.
"What the hell is going on?" I nearly yelled. I've never seen anyone act like this. I waited for about five minutes, before slapping both Rei and Sakura. Not even this worked.
"What is going on?" I yelled this time.
Finally, I broke down into tears. What the hell is happening? I looked at the ground and fell. Balling my hands into a fist. I put my face to the ground. I smelled dirt. But that didn't matter. What matters is that my friends might be in serious danger. I stared at the floor, crying. I grit my teeth grinding them together. This... can't be happening.

Chapter 2
Sakura Ameno
I lay on the staircase, staring at the figure in front of me. The figure was of a girl, whose skin was ghastly white, you could barely see her veins through her skin. The girl's hair was black. But, that's not why she was so unusual; her left eye was gouged out. You could see right through the gaping hole in her face that lead to the back of her skull. The color of where the hole was deep shades of red, purple, and black. Her pale face was partially covered in blood.The blood coming from the hole was dried by now and stuck to her face. The girl wore a bright white dress. Which was stained by blood. Her right eye was a bright silver. Similar to the color of a new coin. I've never seen anyone like this. I stared at her in astonishment and fear. I tried to look away, but it was as if I was under a trance. I didn't have any idea why I was so afraid of her. If I was acting as I normally do, I would of went and asked her if she needed any help. However, it was as if I was glued to the stairs. I couldn't move. All I could do was stare. Stare at the frightening figure before me. My whole body was shivering, like I was being shoved into the snow.