The Phantom School

"What is it?" Mr. Kenan said.

"I have seen this exact same notebook somewhere else." I replied.

"Eh?" Mr. Kenan said.

"Let me have a look at it." Idil said.

I turned around and gave the notebook to Idil. She held it with both hands and started turning the pages, looking at each of them for just a few seconds.

"This is full of phone numbers." she said.

"What?" Mr. Kenan replied. "That"s all?"

"I don"t see anything else." replied Idil, still turning the pages.

"So, where else did you see this notebook?" Mr. Kenan asked me.

"This same notebook was standing on the table, near the phone in the princ.i.p.al"s room." I said.

"Interesting..." said Mr. Kenan.

"If I am right, the completely intact version of the notebook must be still there." I said.

Idil stopped turning the pages and closed the damaged notebook.

"If so, there is no reason for us to wait here. Let"s go get it!" Idil said.

We got out of the cla.s.sroom, heading to the princ.i.p.al"s room once again. While we were on our way, Mr. Kenan activated the intercom speaker nearby.

"Slow down!"

We came to a stop in the middle of the hallway. There was about ten meters between us and the princ.i.p.al"s room.

"They are around here. Be careful." said Mr. Kenan.

Just after that, we started to observe small, yet disturbing transformations of the school building in front of us. I wanted to slowly walk towards the princ.i.p.al"s room, but Idil held me.

"No, it"s not a good time to face them." Mr. Kenan warned me. "I bet they won"t be playing around anymore. We got on their nerves pretty badly the last time we met."

We have been standing still for a while when we heard something downstairs.

"What was that just now?" asked Idil.

"I have absolutely no idea." I replied. "Maybe the transformations are causing things to get out of place."

"So you DO have an idea." Idil replied.

We heard something downstairs again, but it was much louder. It sounded like someone was throwing things around.

"I didn"t like that." I said.

"Mr. Kenan!" Idil said.

...

There was no response from the intercom.

"Mr. Kenan!" I yelled.

"Oh, well... At least he could tell us when he goes away." Idil said, jokingly; but she was trembling. I thought of continuing to walk towards the princ.i.p.al"s room, but the transformations around that place didn"t seem so welcoming. We were stuck there, without guidance.

About half a minute later, we heard something from the stairwell on our back. Idil held my arm as I turned around to look at the stairwell. We had a lot of reasons to panic. If Mr. Kenan was away, we had to take action by ourselves.

After some time, the sound from the stairwell got cleaner. They were pretty slow, but rythmic footsteps. Someone was walking upstairs to the floor we were standing in the middle of.

I was watching the end of the hallway without moving when something emerged from the stairs. Someone walked into the hallway.

"Ata!?" I yelled.

He couldn"t walk properly, and his body was covered in crimson blood all over. The wound on his neck was no longer bleeding, but it was still wide open. His body was making weird sounds as he was approaching with slow steps. As he walked, his arms were swinging back and forth freely, with no muscle movement to counter.

"We thought you were dead!" yelled Idil.

"You wouldn"t believe me... if I told you... what I saw." Ata spoke hardly, still trying to walk towards us.

I stepped towards Ata to help him out, but I stopped when I heard something from the other end of the hallway.

"As you refused to believe it... when you were told about us." It was a girl"s voice.

I turned around to see who it was. I couldn"t believe my eyes when I saw the owner of the voice... Melis" body were walking to approach us, with many of her internal organs and some of her skeleton visible.

"No way!" I said and stepped away from Ata, back near where Idil stood.

"It would be much easier if you just listened." someone said.

I turned around again to see who else were there. Mr. Kenan"s body were walking towards us from Ata"s direction.

"Mr. Kenan!" cried Idil, desparately calling for help.

We were trapped right in between Melis, coming from the direction of princ.i.p.al"s room; and Ata and Mr. Kenan on the other side, approaching from the stairwell.

"There is no way you are alive." I said.

"There is no way YOU are alive." Melis replied.

"It took you long enough to realise..." Ata said.

"...that we were destined to fulfill our quest." Mr. Kenan completed the sentence.

That was it: "the community" was in control of dead bodies laying around the building, and they have made their way here. We had to take action to survive. If we ran towards Melis, we could get past her greatly damaged body, but the princ.i.p.al"s room was probably not the best place to run towards. On the other hand, we could run to the stairs, but getting past both Mr. Kenan and Ata"s bodies seemed almost impossible.

"Would you ever understand?" an old woman"s voice echoed through the intercom speakers.

"You can"t avenge your past by ruining our future!" I yelled.

"You"ve got this story entirely wrong... We are already beyond that part." the voice replied. "We no longer want to avenge our tortured souls. We make the future. We ARE the future. We will create a better future for all." she said, and laughed. "And we will be waiting here to forgive the people who tortured us for countless years... Unlike you, who refuse to see the truth that we put right in front of you. If only you knew..."

"If that"s true, we are already destined to join you one day." I replied. "But let the living people reside in their reality in peace, and find the truth themselves."

"No one is about to find the truth by themselves... Not anymore." the voice replied. "Your ignorance is the greatest sign and symbol of your failure... as it will be of many other people we are about to see in the coming days. You have already blatantly refused our offer to lead you to a better tomorrow."

I was lost in the conversation when I heard a high-pitched screeching from Melis.