What's happening

Everything is black and nothing makes sense. The silence grows stronger as the seconds go bye. Tick, tick, tick. Time is running out. The breathes of everyone is echoing in everyone’s ears and throughout the room. The lights flash back on as everyone’s eyes are being blinded as they tried to adjust towards the flames burning into their pupils. A scream is let off to their right as everyone turns their head in horror.

                                               1 day earlier

All five friends are staying over at clovers house for two nights doing a movie marathon. Her two best’s friends Zoey and stella came a day earlier to discuss certain things that had been going on. Josephine and the rest joined the day after to begin the movie marathon. Quinn and Liam have been dating for two years now and sometimes it’s a bit annoying how lovely dovey they are. They got all set up with their stretchers and snack for the spare room. Her older brother was still home and had a few friends over. Clover had a crush on Willaim but never said anything.

Her older brother Lucas and his three friends, John, James, and William joined them in the pool. They started to play water volleyball as a group and William was on her team of course. Things were going great and constant smiles were going back and forth between them. Everyone stopped and turned their heads towards the front door in which flew open as someone walked on in and suddenly dropped to the floor. Everyone screamed as John ran out right behind Zoey. Zoey screamed as her heads covered her mouth in shock and fear as she leaned her head against John’s chest. Everyone joined them inside as they all looked stunned at the body, blood was seen dripping from the back of the person's back.

“What should we do?” Everyone stared at Stella as she looked back down at the dead body. “We must call the police!” “We are not calling the police! We don’t really look so innocent. What are we gonna do, tell them some random stranger just walked into the house and died in the front door.” Everyone looked at one another and then back at William as they all shouted towards him. “Yes!”

They all stood there in silence. The longer they spent just standing around the more the anxiety kicked in. A man stormed into the house and bent down to examine the person’s body. “Who are you!?” Lucas yelled at the man as the man sat there unresponsive.

The man looked back up at the nine teenagers standing around him as they stare down in confusion. “My name is Houston and I’ve been sent here by the FBI.” He paused to keep up with what he was saying as no one said anything. “We have a department for undercover operations and your parents have become our new case.” Clover and Lucas shared glances towards each other. “What do you mean our parents are your new case?” “Your parents worked in our undercover service and suddenly disappeared.” Lucas intercepted before anyone could say anything else. “But they told us that they were going to Paris with their friends.”

The man shot up and marched over towards Lucas as he grabbed him by the shirt as everyone took a step foward. “They told you that they were leaving?” Lucas swallowed as he looked over at Stella who was in closest eye shot. “Yes sir." the man lowered Lucas back to his feet as he fell into Johns arms.

Clover stood forwards and asked the obvious question. “What is going on here, can you just please explain what you are doing here and why there’s a dead body in my house!” “My job is to keep all undercover cases in control. Yesterday I didn’t get any report back from your parents and sent the person that’s dead to go find them. Clearly there’s something bigger to this case then I thought." Eyes where now on Liam as he leaned his left arm against the wall as it slowly creaked with every piece of pressure. Houston walked out without another word as everyone raced through the door after him. They were speed walking next to him to keep up as they walked down the driveway towards a black limousine parked right outside the front of the house.

“Hang on, you have to help us. I want to know what happened with my parents and how to get rid of this dead body without being arrested.” Houston stopped and looked back at the group as they all came to a sudden stop clashing into one another. “I will send someone straight away to clean this up. I’m very sorry about this but I’m gonna have to take you with us.” All the girls screamed as everything went pitch black. They could feel people pulling at their shoulders and arms as they were forced through a small compartment assumed to be the car door.

The panic started to build up inside of James as he kicked around hitting Stella right in the shin as she winced. They started to shake and sway as the car drove away. Everyone was struggling to breathe as the masks stayed on tight and itched at their faces. The car came to a sudden halt as everyone want flying across the sides of the car bashing into one another. Their masks were taken off and the world flashed across their eyes as they squinted away from the light. 

“Welcome to the FBI. we are here to make sure that you stay safe and well away from danger.” people started to pull at their arms as they pushed them towards the exit of the door. “I know how to walk.” William kept pulling away from the man holding them as well as the others. “What the hell are my parents gonna think, I have school.” The man shook his head as he gestured the men to follow him inside. They could hear the cars zoom past behind them as the building stood taller than New York story buildings and wider than farmland. It had three massive letters FBI as its statue just outside the entrance.

The sliding doors opened as the cold breeze of aircon sent goosebumps up their necks and down their spine. The man stood and turned his body around, so he faced them all to answer William's question. “Until we know what danger we have to face we can’t risk your safety. The person could be watching us as we speak.” With that everyone fell silent. They came upon this desk with one laptop and a lady sitting behind the desktop. She asked Houston for his ID, and he pulled a card out from his front pocket of his suit. She allowed them through as an elevator door in their directions opened for them. They all waited, being crammed into the elevator with more than 20 people to fit. Once the doors closed and one of the guards pushed the button to level 15 John finally spoke.

“What are our parents gonna think?” The elevator started to move up as it clicked onto its hinges and swayed from side to side until finally getting into its sweet spot. “We will email your families any excuse we have to to make sure that there is no trace for anyone to track them down to find out where you are. We will give you your own rooms, but you are free to leave only on the one level, if we catch you leaving level 15 there will be no more freedom until you go back home.”

Clover looked over at William as somehow looking into his eyes made her feel calmer inside. He shared her glance and tilted the side of his right mouth into a smile as she felt her ears getting hot with embarrassment. The doors finally opened as people were seen running from one side of the room to the other staring at their paper or chasing down someone important. They all took a right turn when finally heading down a hallway, there was one flickering light as the silence echoed into the air as with every step was a new creak in the floor.

They were each put into different rooms across from one another either side by side or face to face. As everyone was forced past one another they each shared a certain nod that indicated they were going to talk. They were instructed lights out is 9pm and there are fresh clothes one of each size on the bed and the room was supplied with a toilet and shower in the back. Everyone looked around at their separate rooms as they went through and checked out the bathroom and given clothes. They all waited for 9pm to hit.

As soon as the clocks in their room reached 9, it was time to take action. Everyone opened their doors with force as they each saw each other sticking their heads out from behind their doors. They all started to laugh but quickly shooshed one another as Quinn waved her hands to show everyone to meet up in her room. Once everyone got themselves settled and comfortable Quinn closed the door. “So…. Let’s discuss what we need to do.” “There’s nothing we can do; I’d rather stay here and wait it out rather than risk my own and possibly others’ lives.” Everyone was stunned and didn’t know how to respond to Zoey. They started to think about it, and they thought that she might be right. Clover stood up and walked to be over next to Quinn to get everyone’s attention.

 “I say we do a vote, those who want to live can risk their freedom stay silent and those who want to stay please raise your hand.” She looked around as everyone slowly, one by one lifted their hands fully towards the sky. “So, I guess it's agreed then, we stay here and see what happens. So, what are we supposed to do now?” Lucas started to laugh as James's john, and William joined in. “What’s so funny?” the boys shared glances and burst out with laughter once more. “We might have made a plan. We are going to join this case and the only way to do this is to know specific information that we will be forced to join.” Clover looked as William kept laughing until he looked over at her. “Seriously guys! That is the worst idea in the world. We were told to stay put and I’m not going to risk my life to be a part of a detective case that you bone heads are too stupid to solve.” No one said a word as the boys kept their eyes facing towards the ground, clearly Clover had hit a nerve somewhere. Once all the boys left, everyone but Liam left, and Clover knew she wasn’t gonna stick around for this. She watched as each door closed with a slam as the one hallway light flickered once more. She found herself walking towards William’s door as her heart pumped blood throughout the whole body. “Hey.” There wasn’t a response as she closed the door behind her taking in the look of the room. As she went to sit down, she heard glass break from the bathroom.

She knew something was wrong. She reached for her phone from her right demon pant pocket and went through her call contacts. She called Stella and left it off speaker in case someone heard she was calling someone. “I just wanted to say sorry for calling you a bone head. I just don’t want anyone to get hurt.” She made her way towards the bathroom as the door was closed but a light was still on showing more than one shadow of someone’s feet.

She took one more step closer towards the door, her heart was racing faster than before. “I hope there’s no hard feelings.” She looked back at her phone as the call was answered, she could just hear the slim voice of Stella saying ‘hello.’ She had to go in, and she had to do it now. She turned the handle and pushed the door forwards with all her might as she saw a glass of water on the sink next to the door and reached out for it. Once it was in her possession, she looked back up to see William in a neck lock by a man wearing fully black, even a ski mask over their face. “Let him go, or I will throw this.” all he did in response was laugh, he raised a pistol towards Clovers head as he tightened his grip around Williams throat. “If your hear looking for my parents your too late, no one knows where they are.” William coughed as he struggle for breath. He widened is eyes for a second as he looked down at the cup and back up at her. She assumed it was a signal but was too scared to act.

William lifted his leg and pushed it back into the man’s shin. As the man yelled he let go of his grip around William’s neck.. She raised her arm all the way back swinging it forwards and letting go of the glass with such force that it got the man straight in the face as he fell backwards into the tub behind him. They both sprinted for the door as Clover reached out for her phone just grabbing it in time to quickly get out the door with William. "Stella! stella can you hear me! Call the main office, there’s a murderer in William’s room!” Stella finally responded with ‘on it’ and hung up to go the main office. William started to stroke his fingers through his luscious blond hair as a massive red mark was visible around the front of his neck just above his Addams apple. She felt the man bashing into the door with his body weight and was pulling against to stop him. “What are we supposed to do!” Clover started to panic as nothing came to her. “I don’t know!” everyone came running out of their rooms as Clover started to bawl her eyes out. Her mouth was open so wide as saliva was seen dribbling down as her face turned red with tears.

“What’s going on?” Liam and Quinn where the first to get to them as Quinn held Clovers hands. “There’s someone in my room who’s looking for their parents, we can’t keep him in this room forever. Stella is calling the main office, but he has a gun.” John came out of nowhere and tried to calm Clover down. “Just breathe okay, it’s gonna be fine, we are surrounded by police and detectives who are on guard 24/7.” Clover started to slow down her breathing as she looked up at everyone else coming to join them. Clover started crying once more as the man screamed louder. “I’m going to go down to the desk and get more help, you stay here and if he gets out, hide.” Lucas sprinted towards the end of the hallways and turned left and was gone within seconds.

“James, look for something we can use against this guy, I don't care what it is.” Clover stopped crying as she came to an apophony. “Hey, what is we just connect a rope from this door to the other than we might be able to hold him off for longer.” William nodded and screamed orders to everyone. “Quinn go get some rope, anything that you can find. Liam help her and search through the other rooms. I can't hold this door much longer.” William kept his hands firm on the door handle as the door constantly opened inches before slamming once more.

Quinn came running out with a long trail of bed sheets being dragged across the floor behind her. “There were no ropes, but I was able to get all these bedsheets.” “Quickly do the other side first.” Quinn ran to the other door as she tied a double knot around the handle. She ran back to William and handed the other end of the sheets to him as they all took a deep breathe in before taking further action. He wrapped the sheets around just in time to pull the door back shut as he tied the extra knot. He let go and everyone took their steps back. “It worked. Everyone! Come back in here, we are gonna go down to the office, we will be safer there.” Once everyone was in the hall, they all ran and made their way towards the elevator when it opened showing Lucas and officers with shields and machine guns in front of him.

They spread out to let the men go past. They looked back into the elevator to see Houston standing next to Lucas. “Kids, get in now. You’re not safe here.” As the doors started to close, they heard gun shots coming from the hallway as the man screamed in agony. The doors closed shut and silence entered the air.

Before they could continue their conversation, the elevator came to a sudden stop throwing everyone off their feet until they hit the ground. The lights went out as everyone breathed heavily trying to bring themselves to sit upright. Clover felt pain shooting into her side just above her hip bone. It felt as though someone’s fingers where ripping her insides to become outside of her body as he whole body cramped up and lost all energy as the pain was unbearable.

She put her hand on her side as she felt liquid from where the wound was, something long was poking out from her side as she tried to pull it out. “Is everyone okay?” Clover screamed in agony once more. “Houston, we have a problem.”