The Fifth Element

♢Chapter 6

Shoutout to @M_Rainberry for making this awesome cover. Please go check out her other covers on her profile. She does some incredible work!

AN

So this chapter is kind of a filler chapter so if it's a little boring, but something important happens at the end so bear with it. I'm so happy that people like this book(: I have fun writing it! Also, I dedicate this chapter to the first person who voted on this story and left really nice comments. Thanks, girl or boy, I'm not really sure cause you aren't in your profile picture. Don't forget to vote or comment if you like. Thanks for reading<3-Sam

The next morning I got a good surprise for a change, breakfast in bed. My mom had made me my favorite, pancakes with strawberries on them. I savored their warm fluffy goodness as I took bite after bite. If I had to say one thing that my mom excelled at, it would be cooking.

After I had eaten enough pancakes to feed a football team, I took a quick shower and pulled on a t-shirt and a pair of leggings. I threw my damp hair into a messy bun before calling it a day.

My mom was too busy sweeping the kitchen floor to notice me as I cut through it and went into the den, where I spotted the Sunday paper lying on the back of our only couch. I picked it up and began leafing through it. I hadn't ever read a newspaper, but hey I'm sixteen now so yolo.

I started off with the community section. I skimmed the pages stopping once to read an article about a new playground being built at my old grade school, and again to read a juicy story about one of our council member's alleged affair with a girl twenty years his junior.

I was about to move on to the world section when a tiny picture of a girl around my age caught my attention. In the picture, she was smiling warmly at whoever was taking the picture and then laughing at something funny they said, before going back to smiling. Below the picture it bold print it said. "Jenny Hightide Still Missing After Five Days." I frowned; I never like it when something bad happens to someone, especially someone young. I read on.

When I was done reading, I was tempted to throw the entire thing into the fire burning in our small fireplace. How was this not on the front page of the newspaper? Right before Jenny had disappeared seemingly off the face of the earth, five other kids between the ages of 12-17 had vanished into thin air.  All the disappearances happened within weeks of each other, he circumstances of their disappearances had something in common; no bodies or any trace of the missing children were found, they were last seen going into the woods alone, and there was an abnormal reading of energy in the air. The most unnerving thing about the whole thing was that Jenny's disappearance had happened only two miles away from where Emily and I had been stupidly stumbling around the night before.

"Mom," I called from my seat on the couch.

The sweeping sound coming from the other room stopped. "Yeah?" she answered.

"Hey," have you read about the disappearances happing around here lately?" I shifted my body until I could see the door to the kitchen. My mom walked though it still holding the broom with a look of curiosity plastered on her face.

"No." She sat down on the cushion next to me and took the newspaper from my hand. Her frown deepened the more she read. When she was done, she held the paper against her chest. "Stay out of the woods," she said handing the newspaper back to me.

"That's easier said than done, in case you haven't noticed we live in the middle of one," I said sarcastically putting the newspaper down.

"Well that won't be such a big problem seeing that you're grounded," she looked at me smugly.

I gave her a look of disbelief, "You're grounding me on my birthday!?"

"No, your grounding starts tomorrow, today is going to be your last day of freedom for a while." She stood and walked back towards the kitchen. Before she reached it, she turned to me. "Get dress we have an appointment with the element teller at six, and I want to go out to dinner, happy birthday sweetheart, by the way."