“Everybody say cheese!” Jon grins, clicking the camera button on his phone.

“Cheese!” we all smile, rolling our eyes at the irony.

We’re at Olio’s Pizza Garden, chowing down on some of the best pizza I've ever had in my life. The friendly ambiance of the restaurant paired with the delicious food makes for a very wonderful meal. Around us, satisfied customers enjoy their cheesy pies- just as we are.

“You have tomato sauce on your face,” Key informs Amy stoically. She hastily fumbles around for a napkin and wipes her face, before she notices the sly grin on Key’s face.

“You liar,” she says, slapping him over the head with the napkin. Emily, Jon, and I start laughing, and soon Amy's hitting us all over the head with a napkin. 

Suddenly, the door slams open.

A weeping girl stumbles into the restaurant, guided by several of her friends.

She must be 14 or 15… not much younger than us.

"It was terrible,” she blubbers, speaking to no one in particular. “It felt like- like everything was being drained from my body.  I wanted to puke.”

I exchange glances with my friends.

What happened to this girl?

One of the boys that is helping the poor girl to a table catches sight of my friends and I. He quickly runs over to Amy. “Do you know what happened?” he tells her.

“Obviously not,” she replies. “What happened?”

“Okay, so we were at the library working on a school project, right?”

“Yeah, I dropped you off,” Amy says irritably. “Keep talking.”

“So all of a sudden, there’s this crazy… feeling. Like, everything goes pitch black for a second. It felt really creepy and scary. And then we all felt super sick. No one knows what happened, but we sure ran out of there pretty quickly.”

Amy stares at the boy. “That’s… weird.”

“Yeah,” the boy responds glumly. “Shannon got it the worst out of all of us. I don't know why.”

“Oh, I forgot to introduce you.” Amy turns to us. “This is my brother Derick. He’s a freshman.”

“I don’t have time to talk,” Derick says grandly. “I have to get back to Shannon.” And he hurries away.

“Boys,” Amy scoffs, rolling her eyes.

“Hey!” Key and Jon protest.

“That includes you two as well, idiots.”

Everyone cracks up again… except for me. My mind is still on the strange account of the happenings at the library.

Uneasily, I stand up. My Hado mark isn’t tingling… but should I go check out the library anyway?

“What’s wrong?” Emily asks.

“I forgot to go place my order for takeout for dinner tonight,” I say hurriedly. “I better go get that taken care of.”

“Oh… okay. You could always come to my house for dinner?” Emily offers, but I smile and shake my head.

“Thanks, but it’s alright. Well, I'll see you guys on Monday! Bye!” I grab my bag and hurry out the door, heading straight up to the library.

Taking out my phone, I quickly call Kris.

“What do you want?” he grumbles, picking up on the fourth ring.

“Kris. Meet me at the library. It’s urgent.”

“I’m on a date,” he replies crossly.

I roll my eyes. “I don’t care if you’re with freaking Kim Kardashian right now. Just get your over here. Apparently something really weird happened at the library. Bye.” I hang up.

When I reach the library, I’m surprised to find out that Kris is there before I am. “How’d you get here so fast?” I ask.

“I was at the park right across from the street,” he responds dully. “What do you mean by ‘something weird happened here’? I don’t feel anything…” He frowns, tilting his head. “Well, I don’t feel anything particularly strong-“

“Let’s just go inside and check it out.” I stomp through the entrance of the library, Kris right behind me.

As soon as we enter the building, a wave of nausea hits me. I buckle to my knees and clutch my stomach, wincing in pain. Twisting my head behind me, I see that there’s a pained grimace on Kris’ face as well. Unlike me, however, he isn’t writhing in pain over it.

“What is that?” I mutter. “I feel sick to my stomach-,”

“Okay, maybe you’re right,” Kris grunts. “Something's not right here.”

“Let’s split up and each take a side of the library,” I suggest. “If we find something, then we’ll call each other.”

“Okay. I’ll take left, you take right.”

“Got it.”

As Kris heads to his section of the library, I give him a sympathetic glance.

“It must having something strange like this interrupt your birthday.” I sigh.

I’ll make it up to him. 

A/N: Wow, I predicted this chapter to be filler, but I guess it really wasn't. I think I'll save that for a little later... possibly next chapter, or the chapter after that! Thanks for reading everyone!