Langst: One Shots

31DoHF: Chapter Three

IG: shakesqueerbooks
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Lance watched as his mother's car pulled out of the front driveway, and he made sure to wave out of the window at her. He saw her wave back, blow a kiss, and then she was gone.

He was officially home alone.

An excited grin returns to his face, and he turned back to his computer as he started up a Hangouts call with his friends.

They had been just as enthusiastic about the idea of a haunted house, except for Hunk who said he was just in on it for the snacks and candy. Classic Hunk.

As the Hangouts tune chimed, Lance shifted anxiously in his spot and gnawed his lip. Keith was the first to pick up, who was side by side with Shiro. Then Pidge, and finally Hunk.

"Alright Lance, so what about haunted houses?" Pidge asked, appearing to be preoccupied with something she was doing off screen. Everyone was still in pajamas.

"Okay, so I have it all planned out. It's like this..." Lance started.

The outside of the McClain house was already thoroughly decorated with Halloween extravaganza, and now all they needed was the inside.

As the talked, the plan laid itself out.
Pidge would come over and she would set up any outside spooky mechanisms like making doors open or windows open by themselves.

Hunk would be the one in charge of sound effects like screams and creaking porch boards, and maybe even odd whisper sounds to spook trick or treaters.

Keith wasn't as entirely enthusiastic about the idea, only coaxed by Shiro, so he said he would just bring the candy. Hunk liked that idea.

Finally, Shiro was in charge of keeping them all in line. He was the oldest of all of them, and he said if he was taking a day off of work for Halloween he was going to use the excuse of babysitting.

Everyone had groaned at that but it was agreed that he was the oldest adult, next to Keith who had just turned eighteen a few days ago, so he could do what he wanted.

The call last hours, so many ideas scribbled onto their minds on how to make Lance's house look as haunted as they could from the outside.

If they achieved this, which they would, Lance could have the night of his life.

Final decision was to leave a bowl of candy on the front porch, and an 'Enter If You Dare' sign on the fence, threatening anyone brave enough to enter.

"Hey, I've got a long drive over there and I'm going to pick up Pidge too, I'll see you guys later?" Hunk said, his screen shifting around.

"Oh yeah, of course." Lance said, saying a quick goodbye along with everyone else. Pidge said a 'See you soon.' with a few instructions, and then Hunk left.

"When are you guys heading over?" The Cuban boy asked Shiro and Keith, the chat now falling into a small silence.

"I'll walk over in a few minutes, whenever Shiro leaves. I only live a couple blocks away and I don't want to show up first." Keith said, a tone in his voice that Lance scoffed are.

"Jeez, you better be bringing some good candy if you're going to be a grumpy pants the whole time."

"I'll show you grumpy pants---"

Keith and Lace bickered back and forth between each other for a few minutes.

Shiro tried but failed to be a bit of a mediator between them but with those two that was nearly impossible.

"Your Mullet is the scariest part of your costume, Keith. I bet---"

"Guys...?" Pidge finally spoke up.

She had been silent for a little bit of a while now, but everyone had assumed that maybe she was just busy.

Eyes shifted on their respective screens to the box that held Pidges image, and it could be seen that she was frowning.

"Who is in the chat?"

The computer nerd was met with blank stares. What was she talking about?

"In the chat, I didn't notice it before because I had my screen on Full, but look." She took over the Computer Sharing mode, so we could all see what she was seeing.

But that was unnecessary, because everyone else had already seen it. The thing she was talking about, that no one had noticed.

There was a long line of messages on the chat that spread out over the course of the few hours they'd all been talking.

None of it was legit, random letters and symbols, a picture or two of land. Nothing that correlated at all with what they were talking about, and made no sense at all.

"Oh my god, what?"

Shared sounds of surprise passed between all of them, scrolling through messages they didn't understand.

"This is from some anonymous account, not any that we know. It doesn't even have a name or profile picture." Pidge stated.

She could be heard typing away at her computer, everyone silenced in shock and unwilling to give ideas, but they were thought.

Hunk sitting on his phone.
Pidge goofing around.
Shiro trying to scare them.

Whatever it was, and whoever it was, had succeeded in creeping them out but now they tried to laugh it off a little.

But and underlying thought was in all of their heads, one no one could quite grasp.

Was it really just a joke?

Keith couldn't have done it because his keyboard was broken and he couldn't type with it. Maybe he'd slammed it a few times too many out of anger.

Shiro confirmed he didn't know it, which everyone believed because despite his complicated robotic arm he knew very little about technology that wasn't foreign.

Pidge was the one who discovered it, so she was out the question, and she explained she'd never do something so basic anyway.

Which left Lance.

And although it was a weaker argument, his was still playable. He'd been lying with his hands on his chin the whole chat, they'd seen it the whole time.

Hunk was the only one in question.
He probably had some other account he accidentally switched to on his phone and was butt texting them.

But moments later, that possibility was ruled out. Pidge had worked her magic.

"I traced the IP addresses best I could to this user. And I tried to make sense of its messages but it really is just nothing..."

Everyone was silent.

"Lance, I thought you said your mom went on her trip. Why would you add her to our group chat?"

The boy looked shocked, "What? Yeah, she did leave. But I didn't add her to our group chat."

Lance also mentioned that his computer and his phone were the only device in the house that were "smart".

And even so he had lost his phone.

There were shifting bodies in each little screen. Something was going on.

"Lance... I traced the messages. It's not coming from your computer but..." Pidges next words were chilling everyone.

About the same time, a knocking could be heard in the background of Pidges video feed.

"...it's coming from in your house."