Trenton

I got up in the middle of the night to grab a glass of water. As I left the room, I heard two hushed whispers coming from the dining room. I peered into the kitchen from around the corner. I saw Serena and Eric sitting at the table. Eric was holding something out to her.

“…don’t ever take it off,” I heard Eric say.

“I won’t,” Serena replied. I peered out farther and saw him putting a necklace around Serena’s neck. He whispered something in her ear then got up and went back to his bed. I stood flat against the wall. He walked by and went into his room. I heard the rustling of his covers and his soft breathing told me he was asleep quickly. I walked into the kitchen and saw Serena sitting with a cup of hot chocolate. She looked up as I pulled up a chair.

“Hey,” she says.

Hey,” I reply.

“What’s up?”

“I was thirsty, so I came to get a glass of water. Then I saw you and Eric talking.”

Her cheeks turned red. “You heard that?”

“Yeah. Not very much though.”

“Yeah. He gave me this necklace.” She showed me the necklace. “We were both up, and we got to talking. He’s a really nice guy. He’s pretty cool. I hope he can come with us.” I studied her face for a second.

“I see.”

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“You like him, don’t you?” Her face turned a deeper red.

“Maybe just a little. He’s a nice person. And he’s kinda cute.”

“Whatever. I’m not gonna get involved in this.” I get up and grab a glass of water. I drink it and walk down the hall and go to bed. A minute later I hear Serena go to bed.

The next day, we have a “meeting” in the living room. I sit next to Kylie, and Serena conveniently sits down next to Eric. I sneak a glance at them and Serena looks back at me. I start by explaining everything to Nick and Jordan. They think about it for a while.

“Okay Eric,” Nick says, “you can go with them.”

“Really?!” he said excitedly.

“On one condition. We come with you.” Eric looks to me for confirmation.

“Okay. Just know that you might not come out of this.” We gather supplies and leave to search New York.

“Where should we look first?” Eric asks.

“What is a popular place for tourists in New York?” Serena asks knowingly.

“The Empire State Building!” Nick and Jordan say simultaneously.

“Exactly,” I say. “We’re gonna split up and search every floor. We’re gonna go in pairs. Pick a partner.” Serena and Eric instantly pair up. Jordan and Nick go together. Kylie comes and stands next to me. Dawson stands alone.

“Dawson. If you want, you can come with us,” I offer.

“No,” he replies. “I’ll go alone.” We split up and enter the building. Kylie and I enter the elevator and go to the top floor. We then go on top of the roof. We search around, when suddenly I get dizzy. I realize thoughts that are not my own are entering my head. I see glimpses of me on another floor, with Eric walking next to me. My thoughts are something along the lines of “He’s so cute. I’m so glad he came. I wanna hold his hand.” I shake my head and am back to myself. I realize I sat down and stand back up. I get up and keep looking around. I climb to the top and find a sheet of paper. On it is scrawled “ALWAYS WATCHES, NO EYES”. In my head, I tell myself that we only have three pages left. I tell Kylie that I found the note and then we head back down to the elevator. As we get on, the elevator starts shuddering and the lights start fading. I pull out my phone and turn it on for light. We were still moving down, but I could sense something is wrong. The elevator lurches to one side and Kylie and I are thrown off of our feet. I look for the emergency hatch, and, finding it on the ceiling, open it. I pull myself up on to the top, then help Kylie up, when I suddenly get another dizzy spell. I collapse, and Kylie grabs me. I close my eyes, but when I open them, I'm not on the elevator. I backed into a corner, staring at Eric lying on the ground, blood welling around his head. I look up and see the slenderman standing in the doorway of the room. My vision dims, and I pull a pair of sunglasses out from my pocket and put them on. Instantly, I feel better. I stand up and look around. My eyes land on a jar of thumbtacks and a flashlight. The lights have failed and I lunge for the jar and light. I feel my hands close around both. I throw the jar at the slenderman and hear it shatter. I turn on the flashlight and I point it at slenderman.

As he advances towards me, I yell, “DAWSON! NOW!” He steps from around the corner and focuses on the thumbtacks lying on the floor. Nothing happens, but as slenderman advances towards me. His image starts wavering. I see him not being able to come closer and staggering as he steps on the tacks. I close my eyes and suddenly I'm back in my own body. I look at Kylie and nod to show I'm all right. I stand up shakily, when I suddenly hear maniacal laughter reverberating through the elevator chamber. I look up and squint, trying to make out discernible shapes. I see nothing, but feel the elevator shake as though something has fallen onto it. I turn around and see one of the zombies has landed nimbly on the elevator. I stand between it and Kylie as it growls at us. It leaps at me and I swing at it. I make a solid connection and hear it collide against the side of the shaft. I hear it scraping against the side of the wall to find some sort of handhold. Apparently it finds one because there's a sudden silence aside from heavy breathing. I peer over the edge of the elevator and see it about twenty feet down. Grasping the wall like it was life. Which it technically was. It stares back up at me with dark eyes. They reminded me of a black hole, sucking in all happiness, bringing a chill over my limbs. I tried to pull away. I couldn't. My eyes were locked with his. I feel a hand in my pocket, but I don't care. I feel sunglasses slide over my eyes, and the haze disperses from my mind.

“What were you doing? Why were you talking to it?" Kylie asks suspiciously.

"I wasn't," I reply a bit tentatively.

"You definitely were," she responds. "You were saying something about breaking a circle and ending the song." She looks at me strangely. "You don't remember that?" When I shake my head, she starts backing away from me. I turn around quizzically as see the other zombie standing behind me. I duck as it swings its extended claws over me, and I smash the pipe into its knee. It howls in pain and I kick it over the edge. It collides with the other one and they tumble together down the shaft.

“Kylie. Go into the elevator and press the help button. I'll try to see what's wrong up here." She jumps down into the elevator. I take a look around the top of the elevator. I see all the cables still attached. I look around and find the gears. There’s a crowbar lodged in each one to stop it from moving. I reach down and pull my phone out to text Serena.

“Stuck in elevator. Get out of the building now! We’ll rendezvous in Central Park.” I hurriedly send it and slip my phone back into my pocket. I slide down into the elevator and explain the situation to Kylie. We both go back up into the shaft and try to pull out the crowbars. After struggling over them for a while, Kylie gets the genius idea to reverse the elevator and go up.

“This will push the crowbars out,” she explains to me. I climb up again and she presses the button to go up. The elevator shudders and the crowbars come free. I throw them off and climb back down into the elevator. We hit the ground button and start descending.