Everyone told me the story of the ghost of the auditorium. It was a senior prank on the little freshmen. You see, my school's auditorium has a very large balcony, the freshmen at the very top, then the sophomores. On the floor are the juniors and finally seniors with the best seats in the house. The upperclassmen started telling stories of the ghost of the auditorium long before my time. I'm glad I didn't have to go through the whole ordeal the freshmen had to last year.

When I came to this city, I will not give out names for confidentiality's sake, I had already taken my freshmen year at my home town. I didn't mind coming here. It was a nice place. On the first day of school I met some really nice people, and I soon became friends with them. We had a great time, some of them were in my classes. I had taken honors classes on the counselor's wishes. Most of them weren't hard, just needed to think a little harder. I talked to my friends everyday, until one day they told me the story also.

"You've never heard the story of the ghost of the auditorium? I guess you wouldn't. There are many stories about the ghost of the auditorium. Many people saw things that were too unbelievable to imagine. No one really knows for sure which story is correct, or if it's all a joke played by older upperclassmen. But it all started exactly 100 years ago. This year is the 100th anniversary, actually. I should know, the seniors keep ranting about it. 100 years ago, it was a hot night..."

I listened to each story carefully, trying to imagine each one. The most interesting one to me would probably have been the one where a car flew into the unmade auditorium and crashed into the dressing room. How a car managed to make it that far, because the cliffs were at least one and a half miles from the school, was beyond my beliefs. I dismissed these stories, all sounded exaggerated and old. I loved the auditorium, and I wasn't about to let a story ruin it. And actually, the auditorium was a beautiful place with its long velvet drapes of maroon. Gargoyles stared at the audience mischievously, and the size was very roomy. It was very comfortable in the auditorium, and it was my favorite place to be.

November rolled in really quickly. I was getting used to all my new teachers and friends. A whole new life. I was a part of every play I could get to, and that was all of them. I soon found a guy I really liked. He had every quality I ever wanted in a guy, except he was shy. Just like me, I never could stop being shy. We had all the same classes, except for different music classes. There was only one problem. He didn't know I existed. So I stayed in my own little shell, waiting until he saw me.

My teachers were nice. They were the type that could actually teach. The new teachers cannot teach a subject for anything. A lot of my friends are failing because of their teaching methods. I wished I could help them, but first of all they wouldn't take my help. Second, their teachers base the information on their tests from another world. I could never remember any of the stuff they wanted them to know. Their students didn't know what was on the tests. I was happy to have gotten the older teachers. They had more experience and were very generous towards their students. Most of my time was either spent doing my homework, reading a good book, listening to music, or helping someone or something. I tried so much to fit in to the busy days at school, so much that I practically lived there. I loved to sit and watch people practicing skits and shows in the auditorium, and later I would go play the piano. I fell in love with the piano long before I knew what it was. He also played the piano. I guess I might have fallen in love with that factor, I don't know. I probably did, along with his humorous self. He would do the dumbest things, but it was so funny...

It was late December, the school was getting ready for the whole two weeks off of school. I personally didn't really want to go. I sat in the auditorium and just looked around. A whole two weeks, I didn't know if I could handle not being in my favorite place, and also not see him, that long. I went on the stage and looked out. In the dim light I made out small movements in the seats. I squinted harder and saw little wisps of smoke. At least that's what I thought they were. I noticed they seemed to gather in certain spots, and then started to take form. I rubbed my eyes, and opened them. They were ghosts, I could see them now. They had their hands hanging loosely at their sides, their mouths moving simultaneously, but no sound was heard. I had visions before, none so much like this one. I never saw a ghost before, and it might have been an image of a tired mind filled with stories. There were at least seven, and more forming. Were they trying to tell me something? Most of my visions help me. It was similar to that feeling people get in their stomachs and makes them turn the other direction. I looked at them without understanding, and I heard a noise outside the doors. I looked in the direction and back, and the images were gone. It was the janitor. He was pretty used to me being in the auditorium for no reason. I left then, without looking back, but I was puzzling over the vision extensively.

That was in November. Now, it's almost February. I still haven't quite figured out what my vision meant. I've seen them often now. More and more wraiths gather in there, and I kind of feel close to them, like they are protecting me. I still am waiting for that guy to like me, although I'm getting very doubtful over our relationship. I'm doing pretty well in school, also. I stay on the honor roll, and I've kept a respectable reputation with the other students. I find it comforting to read in the auditorium, the wraiths moving restlessly around me. Lately, I've noticed an apparition with red eyes. It stares at me with a listless look. It kind of makes me wonder why, considering it's a vision. I've seen these since I was a very young child, except just glances at the future. I don't understand these seas of ghosts, though. I'll just wait and see what is to come.

I love spring. It comes a little late here, but I love the budding flowers and little leaves. I wish I could share it with him. It was a normal day, like all others you'd see at the end of winter and the beginning of spring. It gives me a feeling of a new life waiting to be. I walked up those familiar stairs to my beloved school, I knew them so well now. I read the Latin inscriptions above the door. I had always wanted to know what it read. A slight chill rolled by me, and I thought I saw something in the breeze...I must be seeing things. I had a flash, then. Those red eyes, that's what I saw. They looked at me with anguish. What is going to happen to give a vision such intensity?

I walked in the school. Peace. I always came early. The door shut mutely behind me. I looked at those familiar doors, the gargoyles protecting them, and they somehow seemed unfamiliar. An aura of some sort surrounded the sturdy framework. I walked into the foyer's lobby. Above me, the lights swayed to a halcyon wind. The doors to the auditorium were open. Strange for such an early time. A noise. It came from inside that room I loved so dearly. It sounded like a rope being pulled across something. I peeked inside. I could see nothing. The noise was coming from somewhere backstage. Probably the janitor. But why would he need rope? The noise stopped as I walked over to the stage. Behind the maroon curtain of velvet there were many folds of black velvet. It gave me a masked feeling of dread. I walked towards the dressing rooms. A light shone through the door, though very faint. I stepped in something slippery on the floor. It was too dark to see, so I figured the janitor was probably just cleaning up after a spill. But my curiosity overcame me. If it was the janitor, I could probably talk to him for a few minutes anyway, and see what had happened. I stepped more confidently now, and went to the door with purpose. When I was close enough, I noticed the liquid that was spilled was dark. I ambulated slowly to the puddle, and noticed it was a dark red. Blood. My heart started racing. Some kids might have gotten into a fight. But that wasn't possible, I was here most of the time.

I was in front of the door. I looked up from the puddle, following the trail of splotches on the polished wood. There was the janitor, hanging from the ceiling by a blue cord, his throat cut and his legs detached. I could still see the veins pumping blood from the thighs that were left there. I looked away, not able to bear the sight. I hurriedly ran out of the auditorium and noticed that first hour had already started. How could that be? I wasn't in there for more than ten minutes at the most! My watch indicated it was true. Maybe the janitor was just an image, but that doesn't account for my soggy shoes. I decided to look for help.

I went to the first door I saw. I looked through the window and noticed it was English, 10th grade. I saw my friends sitting there, falling asleep. It's no wonder why they never get good grades. I opened the door and everyone turned their heads to me. The English teacher, my English teacher, asked what had happened. She looked at me, speechless and pale, and then saw the bloodstains across her floor. A whisper went through the room. I could hear murmurs. Then everyone got up and looked to see what had happened. In the lead was the English teacher, following my bloody footsteps back. I couldn't seem to move. I just stood in her room, watching everyone leaving. My friend asked me what happened and I just stood there blankly. She sighed annoyingly and left with an air of superciliousness around her. In her quake, I saw those devilish red eyes.

I could hear their voices, and their feet as they ran away. Others stared at it, some fainting. I watched in horror as the English teacher came back, accusing me of murder. When I asked her why she just replied I had enough time to do it, since I get here so early. Then she accused me of being a druggist, probably doing some drugs in the auditorium and the janitor was a witness. I tried to explain, but she just became more insanely loud. The students behind her started chanting along with her. What was wrong with them? Why didn't they understand?

I ran to the doors to the outside. My peace was now broken. I got there, the crowd getting louder the farther I ran. I pushed the door. It wouldn't budge. I threw my weight into it, and it stood as before, with that unfamiliar aura around it. I ran up the stairs. Second floor. I could hear the shouting decrease, until it was finally no more than a deathly silence again. I sat on the top stair and stared out at the tree in front of the school. It seemed too still to be outside at all. Maybe this whole thing is just a vision, or maybe a dream. It couldn't be happening to me. After a while, I could hear footsteps from behind me. It was a guy I met not that long ago. He looked at me detached and indifferently. He said something about people waiting for me in the auditorium, and a friend asking about me. I asked about the janitor, but he just stood there, looking into space. Those eyes. Those familiar eyes.

I got up and walked down the stairs. When I hit the bottom stair I heard a struggle at the top and turned. A breeze. He was gone, but a saw something leaking down the stairs. Dark red. No, this isn't happening! I wanted to go and see if he was okay, but a noise brought my attention to the auditorium. That now accursed auditorium. I sullenly, defeated, walked into that place, and saw a group of people I knew. They started talking to me and saying my friend was just backstage. I started backing away in concern. The janitor was back there, didn't they know? I now saw no blood. The lights were brighter, and on the stage the polished wood gleamed like new. I stepped off to the side and saw my History teacher. He was standing there, with those beady eyes I always avoided, looking at a rope. It was different than the one I found around the janitor's neck, more of a boating rope. Something heavy must have been on the other end, for he was having troubles keeping it in place.

I looked back to the group of people, who were closing in on me, pushing me closer to the wall with every step. I looked towards the back door fast enough to see an escape, but slow enough for my peers to catch me. I started for it, my adrenaline doing overtime for such an early time in the morning. I felt a large bang in my head as one of the students hit me with something hard. I could feel something running down my back and temples, but I kept running. I was out the doors and back into the main foyer lobby. Looking back I saw no one following me, and then everything became blurry with my increasing dizziness. I bumped into someone. The guy I liked for so long had just come in through the front doors. He asked me what was happening, but I could only reply vaguely they were coming, and I was out. My head was in so much pain that I slipped into a daunting black unconscious.

I dreamed of the wraiths. They surrounded me and cried their silent cries. I couldn't understand them. Everything was in black and white. I looked around. Everything was motionless except for those shades. The trees stood still, the grass didn't move. I was lying outside the building, the school I almost knew. Inside the window I could see the red eyes, jumping out at me in such blackness. I ran to the door and tried to open them, but the wraiths held me back somehow, pulling me back under the white sun. I heard nothing, could feel nothing but a strong force pulling me. I couldn't even smell the familiar scent of spring. Then they were shaking me. I could hear thunder ahead of me, and then blood. It leaked out of the cracks of the old school, oozing from the corners of the windows, covering those red eyes that glared. I had to look away, but it seemed everywhere I looked I could see those eyes, staring at me. The thunder became louder, then a brilliant flash of lightning as I opened my sore eyes. The room was dank, and my head was pounding like a drum. I looked around the room, seeing doubles of everything. I put my hand to my head and heard his voice. His voice was calming and gentle. It took me a minute to regain my composure, and to see straight. I saw blood everywhere. It wasn't my blood though. In the corner was the Gym teacher, his throat cut and dried tears of blood ran down his face from his immobile eyes staring into some unseen foe. I looked at him and saw he had been wiping blood off of my face. I wondered what had happened to cause such horrid occurrences, and why he paid no heed to the body in the corner. He answered for me.

He explained when I ran into him I had fainted from blood loss and he started to carry me to the nurse. Unfortunately on the way there, he noticed blood everywhere. Students were attacking each other, he could see scratch marks across his friends' faces as he walked by. It was as if they were possessed. When he got to the nurses office, he couldn't believe the mayhem. Students had raided the drawers, taking out syringes and knives, stabbing at each other. He figured it would have been a worse idea to go to the cafeteria. He explained that he decided the gym might have been safer, considering there are only basketballs and whatnot there. When he got there, he found he was wrong and was cornered at the end of the hall. He ran into the Gym teacher's office and locked the door, setting me on the desk. They pounded on the door for a few minutes and must've turned on each other. That brought me up to date.

We sat there a long time in silence, too afraid to make any noise lest they hear us. I wondered why we weren't infected. What had happened to the other students that didn't happen to us? Then I remember him coming in late. That might explain why he wasn't infected, but why not me? Did my wraiths have anything to do with this? We sat like that for at least two hours, the stench of the deceased reaching our nostrils. It was at this time we could hear nothing but our breathing. I looked at my watch. Quarter to two. Had we been there that long? I got to school at seven, but my watch had also read half past eight after I saw the janitor. Was time going crazy? Or just me? I suggested we should see what happened. He agreed, possibly because he was also very curious.

I opened the door, the stench seeping into my skin. It was putrid. The walls were covered in blood, finger trails of blood covering the hallway. I had to cover my nose. The smell was so strong. On the floor I could see pieces of bodies lying everywhere. We used each other as crutches as not to slip. I could feel that invisible breeze roll by again, yet the doors were shut tightly. I looked at the glass door to outside. I could see through the streaks of blood and cracked glass that same stillness in everything outside.

We left the gym hallway and went into the main foyer. I could hardly look. I could see fingers and feet hanging out of shut lockers, blood still seeping onto the floor. On all the lights teachers were hung, missing a leg or an arm, some without stomachs and their bowels dangling to the floor, some still twitching. The lights themselves gave off a red light that flickered like a subway light. I looked at the floor, stepping over a gashed head. I recognized it. It was the first friend I had made that year, her eyes hanging out of their sockets, her tongue cut off. I hid my face in his jacket and walked away, the butterflies in my stomach beating rapidly. After a while I looked down again and noticed the blood was flowing, like a river, slowly but surely making its way towards the auditorium. I also noticed we were moving in the same direction. I almost stepped on a sliced arm, almost slipping as I quickly stepped over it. He stepped on an eyeball, making a disgusting sound making us both queasy and close to doubling over.

We went down the steps to the auditorium, bloody and bedraggled, and noticed the blood didn't go further than the auditorium doors. I suddenly had another vision. I stopped dead in my tracks, making him slide to a slow stop. I looked into space, seeing images in my head. This, wraith, was evil. We couldn't leave the building, or it would escape. I felt that breeze again and shivered, returning to my senses again. It was too quiet. I couldn't stand the peace anymore. We walked towards the doors, the auditorium dark. We stepped up to the doorway and looked around. I know it was too dark to see anything, but still I had to see what was in there. It was easier to walk in there, the only blood being on our shoes. I groped for the light switch, found it, and flicked it on. The auditorium was empty. A cool breeze sifted through the empty chairs. We walked out into the aisles, our shoes squishing below us. Once in the middle of the auditorium, the lights dimmed, and a spot went on stage. A play. On the stage was a ghost, playing the part of what I guessed was somewhat like Macbeth. We stood there and looked on in a silence. From nowhere a strong wind knocked us down and we fell into the auditorium seats. As soon as we sat down, the ghosts on stage became clearer, as if they were more real. A voice could be heard. The man, teenager, on stage was reciting his lines. From the corner, a balcony appeared, and a young woman walked onto it. In the orchestral pit, a conductor could be seen, his graying hair visible as if he was alive. A sweet music rang through the empty halls, first dimly, then increasing in assurance, the aisles filling with the wraiths I knew so well. They did not change their form, but stayed apparitions. I now knew what play it was. Romeo and Juliet. I should have guessed.

We watched as the play progressed into the final act. The apparitions floated restlessly about, watching in anticipation. Juliet was laid in the chamber, thought dead by everyone but the priest. Romeo came, with the poison, and lied down beside her. As he drank the poison, I could see him out of the corner of my eye. He was having difficulty breathing. I asked if he was all right, but by then, his eyes stared out blankly. I checked for a pulse, and found none. I looked back at the stage, and saw Juliet just waking. No! I understand now. I got up and started running, the wraiths pushing me back as I ran harder. I made it to the stage as Juliet picked up the knife. I had to get there in time. The wraiths did not proceed farther than the stairs to the stage. I ran headlong at the actress, grabbing the knife.

She looked at me in astonishment, then her figure started to transform, growing stronger than me. I tried to get it out of her hands, but she had grown too strong. Then I noticed it. Her eyes. Those red eyes. The knife was brought down below my chest, wavering between us. I had a better grip on it now. The lights went out and a spot went on us. This was the part where she said farewell. I could hear her speaking, but her lips didn't move. It was then I saw the vision. If I let it live, it would get out of here somehow. I already have seen what power this wraith had, can I allow it to create that havoc across the city, or even the world?

I looked at her as she brought the knife closer to her. I had made up my mind. With a quick twist of my wrist, I turned the knife around. I had caught her off guard. She was only human, you know. I smiled menacingly as I wrenched it from her with both hands and stabbed myself. I watched as the blood poured down onto the stage. I couldn't believe the pain. I doubled over, looking up at the altar she sat on. She wasn't there anymore. Those red eyes floated in the black and white that seemed to move in like a cloud. I could feel my legs give way, and I sat on the altar. The actor, Romeo, was now a hideous corpse, the skin dried like leather. I could see my blood, lying still beneath me. In its reflection, I could vaguely see those eyes, in me, dying. I could hear an applause from somewhere. I looked around. The auditorium was full of colorful people, standing and clapping. My eyes rolled up. The pain was too great to bear.

I looked up, blackness surrounding me. He was there. Floating like the familiar wraiths I came to know. At least, I thought it was him...Blackness.

The End?

Epilogue

"A devastating sight at one of our oldest schools. 700 plus dead, no one alive. Each psychotically murdered. No one was around to witness it. It could not have been gas, or even bombing. No logical explanation can be resolved...Wait. We have a news update. Two found in auditorium. One dressed in medieval garb. They apparently seem to be alive. This should help to undergo the forensic investigations and police work. Police also say they might have had a hand in the killing. We'll know as soon as they recover from unconsciousness..."