More Than Human

Chapter 20

June 10

"Fay!" I grabbed her shoulders. Luckily, she had been standing right next to me. "Fay, Freddy is not going to eat you." I was glad Jess wasn't here. She loves freaking Fay out. Especially with Five Nights at Freddy's stuff.

Jamie made a ball of light in her hands. It lit up the room. Fay breathed a sigh of relief. "See? No Freddy. Or Bonnie," said Lea, patting Fay on the shoulder.

Fay pushed her away. "I wasn't scared!"

"Suuuuuure," said Gloria, smiling.

"It's great that you're not scared and all," butted in Taylor rudely, "but why the heck did this happen?"

"Maybe something just broke?" suggested Emily.

"I'm going to take a look," I said, and started towards the door.

"Wait!" said Jamie, running towards me, causing the light to bounce around. I turned around. "I'm coming with you!"

"No! Don't leave!" yelled Fay.

"I'm going too," said Taylor, joining me and Jamie. I was disappointed. I didn't really like Taylor's attitude. She reminded me too much of the popular girls back at school, the ones who think not caring about other's feelings is cool. Needless to say, I didn't get along with them.

"Okay, so who's all going?" I asked.

"Me." Jamie.

"Me." Taylor.

"Me." Gloria.

"There's no way I'm going." Fay.

"I'll stay with Fay." Lea.

"I'll do the light." Morgan.

"Okay, good. Come on, guys," I said, leaving.

Out in the hallway, Gloria asked, "So where are going?"

"I think we should explore some restricted places," said Taylor.

"Great idea!"

"What do you think?" I asked Jamie nervously. I wasn't completely on board with that idea. What if we got caught?

But Jamie just shrugged. "Doesn't matter."

"We could find a way out," said Gloria.

"Sure," said Jamie. "Let's go."

This research expedition that I was supposed to be leading had turned into Taylor and Gloria dragging me into things that I didn't want to do. But I followed them anyways, out of curiosity and peer pressure.

We crept down one of the dark, forbidden hallways. It was kind of creepy, the dead silence. There were no windows, so if Jamie turned off her light, it would be pitch black.

Suddenly Taylor whispered, "Woah, look in here." She was peering in a little window in one of the doors.
There was no need for Jamie's light because there were tons of little screens.

"Why are those on when everything else is off?" wondered Jamie.

I shrugged. "Maybe it runs on the backup power or something? A generator, maybe."

"How do we get in?" asked Gloria.

Taylor punched the window and cracks spiderwebbed across it. One more punch and the window collapsed. She reached in and opened the door from the inside.

We all filed into the tiny security office. Now it was more like FNAF than ever!

Gloria gasped. "This is Erica's mom's house!" she exclaimed, pointing at a screen. She saw another and went deathly still. "And my house..."

They've been watching us, I realized, as I saw a screen that showed our school. And one that showed my house. And one that showed Fay's house. And Lea's. And Jess's. And Rose's. And a strange house that I've never seen before.

I watched the screen with the strange house. I knew it was in Winnipeg because it had the Winnipeg city-issued garbage bins, but I had no idea where it was. Or whose it was.

Then I saw a figure walk out the front door with a garbage bag in its hand. She or he had long, almost white, blonde hair. Wait... There's only one person I know who has hair that colour.

"Grace?!" I exclaimed.

Suddenly Gloria was poking her head over my shoulder. "Is that Grace from school?"

"Yeah," I said, kind of confused, as Grace threw the bag in the garbage walked back into her house. Why she up so late was none of my business.

"They've been keeping tabs on you," noted Jamie. She sounded like she just realized that. "Waiting for a good time to strike."

"So they're going to take Grace, too?" I said, full of concern for her. She didn't deserve to be taken away from her family. I don't know how I did, but I must've deserved it somehow.

I got into a funk, thinking that I must've done something bad, and that I do everything bad and couldn't even stop those people from taking us that day during the hike and that I was a terrible friend for not being able to save my friends and that I deserved being here.

Funny how those chain reaction thoughts work.

I would've just kept on going in circles if it wasn't for Taylor, who pointed out another screen.

"Look," she said. I looked. "It's a map of the prison." By prison, I'm guessing she meant the Institute. "I wonder what all these little dots are." There were four dots in one room, two in another, and six in another.

Dang.

They had put tracking devices in us.

Gloria had come to the same conclusion. "Those dots are us," she said. Then she got panicky. "They know where we are!"

"Yes, we do know where you are," said a voice. A deep, male, voice.

Dang again.