Missing

Missing

One sunny afternoon, in a place called Fort William in Scotland. Lochaber High School had just finished for the day. Samantha and her brother Lionel were cycling home when they noticed an abandoned building on the corner of the street.

‘That’s odd, where’d that decrepit building come from, it wasn’t there before and yet it looks like its been there for years’ wondered Samantha.

‘Hey sis, where are going?’

‘I just want to check out this building’

‘But why, it’s just a building?’

(Scoffs) ‘Lionel don’t you ever pay attention. Didn’t you notice anything odd about the building?’

‘Like what, that it’s old and about to fall down any day?’

‘No, it’s odd because we noticed it today and only today. This building was never here, so why suddenly can we see it now?’

‘Hmm okay sis, we’ll check it out if it’ll keep you happy’

‘Thanks bro’

‘Anytime, let’s just go.’

They entered the dark building, leaving their bikes just outside the door. A sign above a desk read:

Welcome to the Library

Samantha and Lionel exchanged puzzled looks before carrying on through the entrance hall. As they walked; the echoes of their footfalls could be heard ricocheting around the many bookshelves as they walked down a marble corridor. A few feet into the library the floor changed from a reverberating marble sound to the clank of wood. This part of the building was in more disrepair than the entrance. Then suddenly the floorboards creaked and split apart creating a cavern-like hole in the middle of the corridor. The floor gives way right underneath Samantha causing her to fall. Lionel throws himself down onto the ground as he tries desperately to pull his sister up.

‘Hang on Sam, I’ll get you up’

‘Pull harder Lionel’

‘I’m trying’

SCREAM

‘SAMANTHA! Whoa arghhhh.’

Samantha falls presumably to her death and so does Lionel. They both land with a loud thud upon the floor luckily suffering only minor injuries; they had found themselves in the library’s basement.

‘Sam, are you alright?’

‘I’m fine, let’s just get outta here.’ Lionel pulled a flash light from his jeans pocket, but not even his pocket torch could illuminate the darkness that now surrounds them.

‘Lionel, why did you have a torch in your pocket?’

‘Just be thankful that I did. At least we’re not wandering around in the dark, with our arms outstretched wondering if at any moment we’re going to crash into something’

‘Sorry I was just asking. Here pass the torch I think I see something.’

Samantha had seen something. At the end of a narrow corridor there was a book standing on a pedestal, Samantha shines the torch on the book as Lionel tries to wipe away the spiders, dust, and cobwebs from the cover. To their surprise there was no title, not even a picture. Lionel leaned in close to look at the spine but again there was nothing. They both leaned in close once again and as they both placed their hand upon thee cover, something bizarre happened. The book suddenly leapt off the pedestal and floated in the air for a second before opening up to reveal nothing but blank pages. Samantha and Lionel backed away from the book but not before they were sucked inside, their frightened faces now imprinted upon the first two pages of the book; each picture had a label underneath it. On the first page read in gold letters Lionel Williams aged eighteen from Fort William, and on the second page it said, Samantha Williams aged sixteen from Fort William. The two siblings were now trapped inside a book and no one knew where they were, so any chance of a rescue was slim at best.

The next morning brought panic and worry to the parents of Samantha and Lionel Williams. ‘Danny have you seen Sam or Lionel anywhere, they’re going to be late for school?’

‘No I haven’t dear, I’m sure they’re fine, they probably stayed at a friends’ house. Look if they don’t turn up within an hour we’ll go out and look for them.’

‘And what if we don’t find them’

‘Even if we have to search the whole town, we’ll find them.’

Days slowly drift into weeks, and still there was no sign of Samantha and Lionel. The police and he neighbours searched the whole town but they were nowhere to be seen. As the months went by with Christmas approaching; the parents all but gave up hope that they would see their children alive. One day on Christmas eve, Danny was walking home after searching the route the kids used that day, when they failed to return home from school. He had walked this route about a hundred times or more and nothing was ever out of the ordinary. Then he saw something on the corner of the street. An old building, how did he miss it, how come he, the police, and neighbours did not see it. Danny returned home to discuss with his wife Linda about what he had seen and what to do about it.

‘Are you sure you saw an old building on the corner of the street today? How many years have we lived here and there has never been a building standing on that spot?’

‘I’m telling the truth Linda. Come on, come with me, I’ll show you’

‘What now, are you mad, we can’t go chasing shadows. We have to face that our children are gone and they’re not coming back. Besides it’s dark and it’s snowing, heavily; you won’t be able to see a thing Danny.’ Danny stormed off, he grabbed his coat, hat, gloves, scarf, and torch and venture out into the snow to find the old building he saw earlier in the hope that he will find his children.

Linda stood, sobbing at the door as she watched her husband disappear into the cold darkness of the snow covered street. After pacing up and down the lounge, she dried her tears and she too grabbed her coat and left, locking the door behind her she went after her deluded husband to bring him back home.

Linda eventually caught up to him. There you are, I’ve been everywhere looking for you. Come on let’s just go home, it’s freezing. You can’t stand here all night you’ll get sick, please Danny come home.’

‘Do you see it? Do you see it Linda?’ Linda’s eyes wandered away from her husband as she turned to see what her husband saw; and there standing in front of her was the old building Danny had spoken to her about. Her terrified face continued to stare at the building before she collapsed in the snow. ‘Linda, are you alright. I’m sorry, we’ll go home’

‘No Danny, you were right, I see it. Our children may be in there we have to find them’

‘OK, we’ll go inside and take a look around when you’re ready.’

Linda and Danny tread carefully through the snow to find their children’s bikes outside the door. ‘Danny look, their bikes.’ They pushed open the door and entered the entrance hall. They grazed up at the exact same sign that Samantha and Lionel had stared up at when they first entered the library. Footprints could still be seen etched into the dust upon the marble floor.

‘Linda, it’s them I’m sure of it. These tracks should lead us straight to Samantha and Lionel.’

They followed the tracks that led all the way to the cavern-like hole in the floor where their tracks end. ‘They must have fallen?’ Linda cries.

‘Don’t worry dear, if they’re down there we’ll find them.’ Danny looked for a way down but it looked like the only way down was to jump. RUMBLE ‘What was that, Danny watch out.’ Just as it had happened before to Samantha, this time it was her father Danny who fell; and just as Lionel had tried to help his sister. Their mother Linda reaches out a hand to help him up and once again they fail and fall.

Linda and Danny weren’t as lucky as their children to walk away from a steep fall unhurt. Danny had a serious head injury, blood dripped down the side of his face onto his scarf. As for Linda she had suffered a broken arm, and a fractured ankle. They searched and searched the basement, before just like their children as history continued to repeat itself they had found the book. The very same book that their children Samantha and Lionel are trapped inside now. Linda grabbed the book with her uninjured hand and flicked through the pages; then she screamed and dropped the book sending a loud reverberating echo throughout the basement. Linda backed away from the book. Danny tried to comfort her but all he could get out of her were incoherent mumbles. Danny and Linda – who already new what Danny was about to see, turned away. Danny kept his gaze fixed on the book until it stopped on the second page to see his daughters’ terrified face staring up at him. Danny turned white and shook his head. The book showed him the first page to reveal his son Lionel with the same expression on his face as his sisters. He broke down in tears. As Danny and Linda huddled together on the cold floor in the basement and before you knew it they were pulled inside and trapped along with their children. A few seconds later a golden label appeared at the bottom of the third and forth page. Linda Williams aged thirty eight from Fort William and finally Daniel Williams aged thirty nine from Fort William.

*

One year later after several more families disappeared, the police archived the case as no evidence was ever found as to why these people vanished. The case of the missing families icluding the Williams family is still open, to this day no one knows why or how, it is a complete mystery; a question without an answer.

Two years later the people of Fort William decided that the building which is now visibly seen by everyone should be knocked down. When the day came for the library to be knocked down the demolition team had arrived, but as soon as they started to pull parts of the building down, eerie noises could be heard coming from the basement and one by one the demolition team had vanished. The building was going nowhere, not without a few more victims to fill its thousands of books with the lies of the townsfolk. Panic swept through the town, there had to be a way to dispose of the building without anyone else disappearing. The council had come to a decision, that everyone would evacuate the town until it was safe to come back. Therefore they all left and with no more people around, no more lives to steal and lock away within pages of the books that are stowed away in the library, the building had lost its purpose and so crumbled away; and when the people returned a year later the building however did not. The people of Fort William created a petition to make sure that future generations or even in forty, fifty, sixty or a hundred years time, everyone will know the story about how a library stole the lives of so many families for fear that history may repeat itself.

It wasn’t until exactly three hundred years later, that one foolish boy by the name of Mathias, stumbled across the building in a book he had been reading, under a picture of the library, it said in tiny letters, LET ME LIVE AGAIN. The boy read the four words aloud and there was suddenly a crash, he turned around and there was the library standing in front of him, he walked towards it and disappeared inside never to be seen again.