CHAPTER FOURTEEN: OMINOUS NOISES AND MESSAGES (Draft 1)

It was late at night and James lay awake on his bed, staring at the ceiling with a blank look on his face, while Tim occupied himself by reading his thriller novel, he was almost finished. It was late at night and neither one of them could fall asleep. 

James couldn't stop thinking about how Cherry had lied to him. His own twin sister had lied to his face. He thought they didn't keep secrets from one another, but he supposed he was wrong. 

Suddenly, they heard an object shatter. James abruptly sat up on his bed and turned to Tim, who furrowed his brows and stared back, "What was that?" 

James sighed; it came from the Gemstones' bedroom. James waved to Tim, "Come on, let's check it out!" 

They creeped out of their room and into the hallway before heading towards the Gemstones' bedroom, which was right next to theirs. James' hand reached towards the doorknob just as they heard the girls scrambling and muttering loudly to themselves inside. 

James sighed and opened the door. 

Blue was sitting up on her bed, stroking Fluff, who laid asleep on her lap. She was staring out the window, gazing at the starry sky, when they walked in. 

"Blue," James called, noticing a brand new and shiny flower vase sitting on top of their bedside table, "We heard something break." 

She turned to her older brother and smiled innocently, "It was probably from Silver and Cherry's room." 

James stared at his sister suspiciously before finally speaking, "Okay... just go to bed soon, alright?" 

Blue nodded diligently and waved them both goodbye. 

James and Tim once again found themselves in the hallway. Tim glanced at Silver and Cherry's bedroom door and noticed a dim light creeping underneath. He heard low whispers inside. 

He turned to James, who had noticed the same light and was now motioning him to come with him to check it out. 

 

Silver sat at her desk, frowning at her laptop, while Cherry stood behind her, looking over her shoulder and frowning as well. 

It was around 2:30 in the morning and Silver had hacked into the police database, but they both noticed something was wrong with the security system. All the surveillance cameras, the intrusion detection system, and even the fire alarms were switched off. She noticed that someone else was also logged in. 

She took a deep breath and turned it all back on, undoing whatever the other hacker had done. She gasped when she saw that the fire alarm went off in the station and that someone had set off an alarm in the file room, "Who on earth–" 

She drew her breath and began clacking away on her keypad, her eyes clear and full of concentration, as she attempted to hack into the computer of the second intruder who was in the system to stop them from turning it all off again. However, her own computer began glitching and malfunctioning, causing her eyes to widen in shock. Whoever the other intruder was, they were a better hacker than she was. 

She furrowed her brows; she was not going to let them win. 

"Sarah, can you get rid of them?" 

Her friend's voice was distorted, "I'll...d-do...m-y be-st-t S-Silver." 

Silver crossed her arms and watched her laptop as it malfunctioned in front of her and Cherry. She took a deep breath and sat patiently. Cherry stared at her in confusion, "Why don't you do it?" 

Silver's face remained expressionless, "Whoever it is, I cannot defeat them single-handedly. There is a reason I created Sarah and continuously strived to improve her over the years." 

Cherry nodded, at last, starting to understand Silver's reasoning. 

After a while, Sarah finally spoke, "Silver, I think I finally got rid of him. But he left a message–”  

Silver raised an eyebrow and both she and Cherry observed the ominous note left by the mysterious hacker, in which each word consistently glitched: 

DO NOT MESS WITH THE FRIENDS OF THE HUMAN GLITCH. 

Just then the doorknob turned, and both girls rapidly turned towards the door just as James and Tim walked into their room, crossing their arms.