Another Day, Another Case
It had been two years since The Veil was formed—a group of seven young women brought together by a shared obsession with solving the mysteries that lurked in the corners of the University of San Antonio. The Veil had become San Antonio University’s underground detective club, a group of sharp-eyed, quick-witted students who thrived in the spaces between rumors and reality. Missing items, hidden truths, unexplained occurrences—if there was a mystery, they would solve it.
In those two years, they had solved all sorts of cases—some absurd, like the mystery of the "ghost" janitor who turned out to be an insomniac professor working late nights. Some mysteries were mundane: missing phones, love letters sent from anonymous admirers, suspicious grade changes in the system. Some disturbing, like a cheating scandal that nearly cost several students their degrees. And others... others were the kind that lingered in their minds long after the case was closed, the kind that made them wonder if they had truly uncovered everything or if some shadows were better left untouched. But no matter the challenge, The Veil had earned its place as the university’s unofficial detective club.
Their base of operations was a room hidden in plain sight—a forgotten faculty office on the third floor of the Humanities Building. Once an old storage space, it had been abandoned years ago until Aiah and the others claimed it for themselves. It was an old space with tall, arched windows, creaky wooden floors, and a faint scent of dust and ink. The room was small but had its own charm, with dusty wooden bookshelves lining the walls, filled with case files, urban legend compilations, notebooks filled with scribbled theories, occasional supernatural reference guide and borrowed library books they had forgotten to return.
A large corkboard stood in the center, covered in overlapping case notes, maps, and pinned photographs with red strings connecting different pieces of evidence. An old mahogany desk, once belonging to a former history professor, sat at the back of the room, now cluttered with folders, coffee cups, half-eaten snacks and a single flickering desk lamp. The only window overlooked the main courtyard, giving them a perfect vantage point of the campus.
Despite its abandoned status, the clubroom had become their sanctuary—the place where they pieced together the impossible, where logic and instinct clashed, and where every mystery started and ended.
It wasn’t just a club room. It was their war room, their sanctuary, their second home.
Tonight, a new case awaited them.
-----------
It was a Friday evening, and the old supply room on the third floor of the Humanities Building buzzed with energy. Dusty but homey, cluttered but well-loved, the space was a chaotic blend of detective work and student life. The corkboard near the window was packed with tacked-up notes and newspaper clippings, while the center table was covered in open notebooks, scattered pens, and half-eaten bags of snacks—courtesy of Maloi’s insistence that “brain food is essential for solving cases.”
The seven members of The Veil, San Antonio University’s self-proclaimed underground detective club, were seated around the table, their expressions a mix of curiosity and amusement. They had solved missing items cases before, but this one? This one was ridiculous.
“The fact that we are seriously investigating this,” Gwen muttered, pinching the bridge of her nose, “is a new low for us.”
“Hey, a case is a case,” Aiah replied, flipping through the notes. “And this one has the entire school talking.”
She wasn’t wrong. The case of the missing mascot suit had become one of the strangest campus mysteries in recent months.
Two weeks ago, San Antonio University’s official mascot suit—an unsettlingly large, cartoonish eagle with beady black eyes—had vanished from the drama club’s storage room. The drama club blamed the student council. The student council blamed the basketball team. The basketball team blamed everyone who had ever laughed at their losing streak.
But the weirdest part? People had been seeing it.
Reports had surfaced about the mascot moving on its own at night. Students swore they had glimpsed the eerie bird-like figure lurking in empty hallways, peeking around corners, even sprinting across the football field at midnight.
Was it a prank? A curse? Or something far more ridiculous?
Aiah leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table, fingers steepled. “Alright. Let’s go over what we know.”
She clicked a pen and tapped it against her notepad, eyes flicking across her friends. This was their process—gather the facts, lay out theories, poke holes in them, and piece together the truth. No detail was too small.
“The university’s official mascot suit disappeared two weeks ago from the Drama Club’s storage room,” Colet began, adjusting her glasses as she read from her notes. “They discovered it missing the morning after the Student Council’s fundraising event.”
“The suspects?” Stacey prompted, leaning back in her chair with her arms crossed.
Maloi, ever the dramatist, pulled out her hand-drawn ‘SUSPECT BOARD’—a large poster with scribbled names and increasingly absurd doodles of the potential culprits.
“Let’s start with the Drama Club,” Maloi said, pointing to a stick-figure sketch labeled ‘The Theater Kids’. “They were the ones who reported the theft. But…” she smirked, “what if they’re lying? Maybe this is all some elaborate PR stunt for their upcoming horror play.”
“Possible,” Sheena mused, tapping her chin. “But then again, why go this far? The mascot isn’t even related to their play.”
Mikha, stretched out on the couch near the corner, threw a popcorn kernel in the air and caught it in her mouth. “Yeah, but you know how dramatic they are. And I mean, they have the keys to that storage room, right?”
Aiah nodded. “Exactly. It’s suspicious.”
Colet flipped the page in her notebook. “Next up—The Student Council.”
“Ah, the power-hungry overlords,” Gwen joked, grinning.
“More like ‘the secretly bitter seniors who hate fun,’” Mikha quipped.
Everyone laughed, but Aiah raised a brow. “Actually… they have been vocal about wanting a new mascot. Said the eagle was outdated and ugly.”
“Which is true,” Stacey pointed out. “It looks like an angry, malnourished chicken.”
“True, but the point is,” Colet continued, “they have the motive. They might’ve stolen the costume to force the school to replace it.”
Sheena frowned. “But wouldn’t it be easier to just… request a new one?”
“Unless,” Maloi wiggled her fingers dramatically, “they wanted to cause chaos first.”
“Okay, Joker,” Mikha muttered, tossing a popcorn kernel at her. Maloi swatted it away, grinning.
“Or maybe,” Colet said, flipping her notebook shut, “it wasn’t any of them.”
The room fell silent for a beat.
Then Maloi dramatically flicked off the desk lamp, throwing half the room into shadow. “What if… it’s haunted?”
Sheena sighed. “Here we go.”
“No, but think about it!” Maloi leaned forward. “People have seen the mascot moving on its own. Students say they’ve spotted it wandering the hallways at night, lurking near the football field.”
“The school has plenty of ghost stories,” Mikha shrugged. “Wouldn’t be the weirdest one.”
Aiah rubbed her temples. “Come on, guys. A ghost mascot? Really?”
“But what if it is?” Maloi grinned, eyes shining. “What if this is our first actual supernatural case?”
Aiah shot her a look. “We are not running around campus chasing a ghost chicken.”
“But it’d be fun.”
“No.”
“Just a little bit?”
“No.”
Maloi pouted. “Fine.”
“Alright,” Aiah sighed, standing up and stretching. “We have our theories, but we need proof.”
Colet nodded. “We should interview the Drama Club and Student Council again. See if their stories line up.”
“And,” Mikha added, grinning, “we set up a stakeout.”
Everyone perked up at that.
“A stakeout?” Stacey smirked. “At night?”
“The sightings have all been at night,” Mikha pointed out. “So, we set up in different spots on campus and wait for it to appear.”
Sheena leaned forward. “You’re saying… we spend our Friday night chasing after a possibly haunted, possibly stolen, definitely ugly mascot?”
Mikha grinned. “Exactly.”
The group exchanged glances. Then, one by one, they nodded.
Aiah smirked. “Alright then. Let’s catch ourselves a bird.”
--------
The moment their plan was set, The Veil wasted no time.
The very next day, Colet, their resident tech genius, hunched over her laptop at the main desk, fingers flying across the keyboard as she pulled up security footage from campus cameras. Alongside, Sheena and Stacey they organized dara and sifted through possible leads.
Colet let out a small victorious hum as she finally bypassed the university’s archive system. “Alright, I’ve got footage from the night before the mascot was reported missing,” she said, tilting her screen towards Stacey and Sheena.
“Start with the Drama Club’s storage room,” Stacey suggested, pulling her chair closer. “That’s where it was last seen.”
Colet scrubbed through the footage, the grainy black-and-white images showing empty hallways and the occasional passing student. “Nothing yet… nothing… wait.”
She paused the footage and leaned in.
A shadowed figure stood just outside the Drama Club’s storage room, their movements suspiciously deliberate and methodical. The timestamp read 1:37 AM.
“Can you zoom in?” Sheena asked, already jotting down notes.
Colet tried, but the image pixelated beyond recognition. “Too blurry. But whoever it is, they don’t have keys—they’re picking the lock.”
“Which means they don’t belong there,” Stacey mused. “We need to find out who had access to that hallway at that time.”
“On it,” Colet said, clicking away to pull up the list of student access logs.
Across campus, Aiah, Maloi, Gwen, and Mikha approached the Student Council office. The room was always unnervingly neat—the kind of clean that screamed control-freak energy. Inside, three members sat at a table, looking both bored and irritated at the unexpected visit.
“Didn’t we already tell you? We don’t know anything about the mascot,” huffed Marianne, the Vice President. “We have more important things to worry about.”
“Like what?” Maloi asked, feigning interest as she took a seat with a casual air. “Budget cuts? Another overly dramatic proposal for new vending machines?”
Marianne rolled her eyes. “Like organizing the upcoming student elections.”
Aiah cut in, her voice even. “We just need to confirm a few things. Some people say you wanted the mascot replaced.”
Marianne crossed her arms. “So? That doesn’t mean we stole it.”
“But wouldn’t it be easier if the costume just… disappeared?” Gwen asked, watching their expressions closely.
The Treasurer, Eric, shifted uncomfortably. “Look, we hate that thing, but we’d never steal it. We have no reason to.”
Mikha, who had been silent until now, suddenly spoke up. “Where were you the night it went missing?”
Marianne bristled. “Studying.”
Eric scratched the back of his head. “I was at my dorm.”
“You can ask my roommate,” the Secretary added hastily.
Aiah exchanged a glance with Maloi. They were either telling the truth, or very good at lying.
“We’ll confirm that,” Aiah said, closing her notebook. “Thanks for your time.”
Next stop—the Drama Club.
The atmosphere here was a stark contrast to the sterile Student Council office. The clubroom was chaotic, loud, and smelled faintly of paint and hairspray. Half-finished set pieces lined the walls, and students milled about, adjusting costumes and rehearsing lines.
The moment they stepped inside, a voice called out, “Mikha! You brought friends?”
Mikha smiled as the club president, Nica, sauntered over. “Not exactly a social visit,” she admitted. “We’re investigating the missing mascot.”
Nica rolled her eyes. “Ugh. That thing. Honestly, good riddance.”
Aiah raised a brow. “So you’re not concerned that it was stolen?”
Nica shrugged. “If it were up to me, I’d burn it. But it wasn’t ours to take. It was in our storage because the Student Council dumped it on us after an event.”
“So you don’t know who took it?” Gwen asked, observing the other club members for any suspicious reactions.
“No idea,” Nica said. “But…” she hesitated, lowering her voice, “some of my members swear they saw it walking on its own last week.”
Maloi’s eyes sparkled with interest. “Like… haunting the halls at night?”
Nica nodded. “Yeah. A couple of people saw it near the football field around midnight.”
Aiah took a deep breath. “And you didn’t think to report that?”
Nica laughed. “Are you kidding? Who would believe it?”
Mikha sighed. “You guys are so dramatic.”
“Duh. It’s a Drama Club,” Nica grinned.
Aiah jotted down a note. “Alright. We’ll check out the field.”
Back at the club room, the group regrouped.
Colet had the security footage paused, the blurry figure still visible. “We’ve got a suspect, but no ID yet.”
Maloi leaned back in her chair. “Student Council denies everything, but they did want the mascot gone.”
“And the Drama Club claims it’s been moving on its own at night,” Mikha added.
Gwen smirked. “So, either we’re dealing with a clever thief… or a haunted chicken suit.”
Aiah exhaled, glancing at the screen. “Well, we have a time and place. Midnight. Football field.”
Sheena grinned. “Sounds like we have ourselves a stakeout.”
----------
The cool night air settled over San Antonio University’s football field as The Veil took their positions. The field lights were dim, casting long shadows across the empty bleachers, their patience running thin. It was nearing midnight, and so far, they had seen nothing more than a few stray cats and the janitor making his usual rounds.
"Okay, I know we're detectives and all," Maloi whispered, shifting uncomfortably against the cold metal bench, "but do we really have to do the whole dramatic stakeout thing? My butt is numb."
"Yes, we do, because that's what real detectives do," Aiah muttered, adjusting the binoculars she had borrowed from the clubroom. "Now, stop complaining and focus. We have a rogue mascot to catch."
Colet, hunched over her laptop, tapped at the keyboard with precise strokes. "I've been scanning the CCTV feeds. No signs of movement near the storage room or the football field. Whatever's happening, it's either supernatural, or we’re missing something."
Aiah crouched behind the announcer’s booth, eyes locked on the stretch of open field leading to the gymnasium. “Alright, team, eyes open. If the reports are right, our creepy feathered friend should make an appearance soon.”
Sheena, hidden near the goalpost, adjusted the earpiece Colet had rigged up for them. “What are the odds this is actually a ghost?” she whispered.
Maloi snorted from her perch on the bleachers. “If this turns out to be real, I’m quitting the club and moving to the mountains.”
“You say that every case,” Gwen quipped, lying flat on her stomach behind the vending machines.
"Or," Stacey drawled, stifling a yawn, "we’re being played and this is all just one elaborate prank."
Mikha shivered. "I don’t know, guys. The Drama Club swore they saw the mascot moving. If it’s just a prank, how did they pull it off so well?"
Gwen leaned forward, resting her chin on her knees. "Well, ghosts or no ghosts, we’re about to find out."
The minutes dragged on, their excitement slowly dwindling into exhaustion. Just when Sheena was about to suggest they pack it up for the night, a low, mechanical whirring noise echoed from the far end of the field.
Aiah immediately straightened. “Did anyone hear that?”
“Yep,” Colet confirmed. “It’s coming from the west entrance.”
The sound grew louder, mixed with an eerie distortion of the school anthem, warbling and off-key.
"Oh. My. God," Mikha breathed. "Is that—?"
From the shadows of the old auditorium, something lurched forward. The unmistakable silhouette of San Antonio University's eagle mascot—large, wide-eyed, unsettling—staggered into view. The suit’s massive head wobbled, its wings flailing as if possessed.
Everyone held their breath.
It was the mascot.
Its massive eagle head tilted unnaturally, its giant plush wings twitching as it shuffled toward the field. The mascot’s body moved with an eerie, almost unnatural jerkiness.
Then, a deep, garbled voice rang through the empty field:
“San Antonio… is watching you…”
“NOPE.” Maloi immediately turned to leave.
“Wait, wait!” Mikha grabbed her hoodie. “We need to be sure!”
“How sure do you need to be?” Maloi whisper-yelled. “Do we need to hug it?”
Just as Sheena reached for her phone to record, the mascot turned its head toward them.
And charged.
"RUN!" Aiah screamed.
Chaos erupted. The team scattered, shrieking as the bird barreled toward them, the warped anthem blaring like a horror movie soundtrack.
"WHY IS IT CHASING US?!" Maloi wailed.
"I DON'T KNOW, BUT I REFUSE TO DIE LIKE THIS!" Gwen screeched.
"OH MY GOD, WHY IS IT GETTING FASTER?" Mikha hollered, sprinting at full speed.
"THIS IS NOT HOW I WANT TO GO!" Stacey added, practically leaping over a bench.
"COLET, HACK IT OR SOMETHING!" Aiah yelled, dodging a trash can.
"IT'S A MASCOT COSTUME, NOT A COMPUTER, AIAH!" Colet snapped, huffing as she ran.
Then, suddenly—
Sheena tripped over a stray football and went face-first into the ground.
"SHEENA, NO!" Mikha screamed, reaching for her, but missing completely.
With all the comedic timing of a horror movie gone wrong, the mascot collapsed onto Sheena, its giant wings flapping uselessly. The garbled anthem continued playing in horrifying distortion.
The team watched in horror.
Sheena let out an ear-splitting scream, wildly kicking at the oversized bird. "GET IT OFF ME, GET IT OFF ME!"
Then Sheena shrieked, punched the mascot square in the beak, and flung it off her.
A small plastic Bluetooth speaker tumbled out of the suit’s belly, buzzing with static.
A beat of silence.
Then—
"Are you telling me," Stacey groaned, dragging her hands down her face, "we were scared by a Bluetooth speaker?"
Colet, panting, bent over and picked up the device. She pressed a button, and the distorted anthem stopped.
Sheena, still on the ground, glared at everyone. “So you’re telling me… I almost DIED—”
“—You tripped,” Aiah pointed out.
“—And you all LEFT ME—”
“Gwen left you,” Mikha corrected.
“—FOR A SPEAKER?” Sheena finished, looking personally offended.
Maloi, bent over in laughter, gasped, "I—I'm sorry, but—oh my god, you should’ve seen your face!"
"I HOPE YOUR PILLOW IS WARM ON BOTH SIDES FOREVER," Sheena snapped. "How dare you abandon me to a haunted chicken?!"
Colet, nudging the fallen suit with her foot, sighed. "Confirmed: it was a prank."
Sheena glowered. "I was almost taken out by a malfunctioning bird, and you’re LAUGHING."
"To be fair," Gwen smirked, "it was hilarious."
Sheena threw a clump of grass at her.
Half an hour later, they tracked down a group of freshmen who had been dared to steal the mascot suit and hide it in the old auditorium. They had thought it would be funny to plant a speaker inside and make it look haunted—except they forgot about it.
"So we’ve been hunting a forgotten prank," Gwen muttered.
"And running for our lives from an inanimate object," Sheena added, still salty. "AND I GOT LEFT BEHIND! Y'ALL LEFT ME TO DIE!"
"To be fair," Maloi coughed, "you tripped."
"AND NO ONE CAME BACK FOR ME!"
"To be fair again," Stacey snorted, "it was really funny."
“Well, at least we know why it was ‘moving’,” Aiah grinned. “Case closed.”
---------
The group was still recovering from their near-death experience with the so-called "haunted" mascot as they trudged back toward their clubroom, laughter echoing down the nearly empty university corridors. Maloi was practically in tears, clutching her stomach as she gasped for air.
"Sheena," Maloi wheezed, trying and failing to compose herself. "Your face when that thing fell on you—I swear, I thought you ascended."
Sheena, still scowling, crossed her arms. "Oh, I’m so glad my suffering provides you all with endless amusement."
"We should frame a picture of it," Stacey teased, nudging Gwen, who smirked in agreement.
"Guys, I was left behind," Sheena groaned dramatically. "Abandoned. Betrayed. And for what? A Bluetooth speaker."
Mikha, giggling, wiped away a tear. "Okay, okay, let’s stop bullying Sheena. We should celebrate solving another case!"
"Ooh, yes! We should grab some food after this," Colet suggested, adjusting her glasses as she clutched her laptop. "I need to replenish my energy. That stakeout drained me."
Aiah nodded, stretching her arms above her head. "Alright, quick check-in at the clubroom, then we go."
As they turned the corner, their laughter faded. A box sat right in front of their clubroom door.
Mikha, who was walking ahead, suddenly halted. "Uh… guys?" Her voice lost its playful tone. She pointed toward the unexpected package.
The group stilled.
It wasn’t just any box. It was a plain, nondescript cardboard box, medium-sized, no markings, no labels—just sitting there, waiting. The hallway was dimly lit, the fluorescent lights overhead flickering faintly, casting uneven shadows across the tiled floor. The box looked out of place—deliberate, as if someone had set it there just for them.
Aiah’s playful smirk immediately vanished, replaced by a sharp, focused look. She took a step closer. "That wasn’t there when we left."
"Nope. Definitely not," Gwen confirmed, brows furrowing.
A faint chill crawled up their spines, an instinctive reaction to something unknown. The silence stretched between them, thick with curiosity and caution.
"Okay, creepy," Stacey muttered, hands on her hips. "Who the hell leaves a mystery package outside a club’s door at—what time is it?—freaking midnight?"
Sheena, still not over her previous trauma, took a cautious step back. "What if it’s a bomb? Or, I don’t know, a severed head?"
Maloi, ever the brave one, leaned in slightly. "That would be next-level weird. And kind of exciting."
"Maloi, no," Colet deadpanned. "We do not get excited over potential severed heads."
A tense silence settled between them.
Aiah exhaled, stepping forward with purpose. "Only one way to find out. But let’s not do this out here. We'll have to take it inside the clubroom."
Mikha flinched. "Wait! Shouldn’t we—I don’t know—get a stick or something first?"
"I can check for fingerprints," Colet offered, already pulling out a small flashlight from her bag. "See if anyone handled it recently."
Sheena held up her phone. "Or hear me out—we call security and let them deal with it."
Maloi shot her a look. "Where’s the fun in that?"
"Fun? FUN?" Sheena whispered harshly. "We just survived a horror-movie chase scene and now you want to open a possible cursed box?"
Aiah ignored them, her fingers lightly tapping the top of the box. No sounds. No strange movements. Just an ordinary-looking package sitting ominously in front of their door.
“Let’s just go inside, see what’s in it.” Aiah said with a firm and final tone.
With hearts still pounding from their initial shock, the group scrambled to get inside the clubroom, shoving each other through the door before Maloi yanked it shut behind them. The familiar scent of old books, coffee, and faint traces of cinnamon filled the room, grounding them back to reality.
Aiah set the box down on the table. The group hesitated before finally gathering around it, the dim glow of their desk lamp casting eerie shadows over their faces
"Alright," Aiah exhaled, placing both hands on her hips. "Thoughts?"
The tension was palpable, but the chaos of their personalities quickly took over.
"I still think it’s cursed," Mikha mumbled, arms crossed.
"Or maybe it’s someone’s long-lost thesis," Colet suggested. "They got desperate and decided to dump it on us."
"Or—plot twist—it’s empty and we just spent fifteen minutes debating over nothing," Stacey pointed out.
Sheena groaned. "If that’s the case, I’m throwing hands."
Gwen leaned forward, poking the box lightly. "What if it’s a love confession? Like some secret admirer thing."
"A love confession? In this box?" Stacey raised an eyebrow. "Gwen, that is the worst theory ever."
"I mean, it could be! Maybe it’s, like, a sentimental gift," Gwen defended.
Maloi hummed, tapping her chin. "Or maybe it’s a test? Some sort of puzzle meant for us to solve. A clue to a bigger mystery."
Sheena, still eyeing the box with distrust, scoffed. "Or it could just be a really elaborate prank. What if someone’s filming us right now, waiting for us to open it and unleash a glitter bomb or something?"
Mikha tilted her head. "You know… I kind of like the severed head theory better. More dramatic."
Colet groaned, rubbing her temples. "Can we please not manifest a severed head?"
The debate continued for another minute—wild theories thrown around, interrupted only by occasional shushing and side-eyeing of the suspicious box. Eventually, Aiah had enough.
"Alright, shut up, all of you." Aiah’s voice cut through the chatter, her tone final. "We’re wasting time. There’s only one way to know for sure."
A heavy silence followed. The group exchanged glances, each of them swallowing whatever lingering hesitation remained.
"We need to open it at the same time," Aiah stated. "No chickening out."
"Fine, but if I get possessed, I’m haunting Maloi first," Sheena declared.
"Aw, I’m honored," Maloi grinned.
They each placed their hands on the lid, fingers curled around the edges. A silent countdown passed between them—a shared breath, a mutual understanding.
Then, as one, they lifted the lid.
Then chaos erupted.
A sudden explosion of glitter—no, a full-blown bomb of fine, shimmering particles—burst out of the box like some unholy festival of sparkles. The force of it sent clouds of silver and gold into the air, coating their clothes, hair, and the entire clubroom in a shimmering mess.
"WHAT THE—?" Sheena shrieked, stumbling backward, flailing her arms wildly as though she could somehow escape the onslaught of glitter. "WHY DOES IT BURN?"
"IT'S IN MY MOUTH!" Gwen coughed, furiously spitting onto the floor. "OH GOD, IT'S IN MY LUNGS. I’M GOING TO DIE SHIMMERING."
Mikha had collapsed onto the floor, wheezing with laughter while also trying to shake off the glitter that had somehow lodged itself into her eyelashes. Maloi was doubled over, absolutely losing it, while Stacey was furiously trying to wipe down her blazer with an expression of utter betrayal.
"WHO DID THIS?!" Stacey demanded, voice shrill as she attempted to dust herself off. "I swear on my GPA, someone is going to PAY for this."
Colet, still frozen in shock, reached up to adjust her now glitter-infested glasses. "...I think I just lost five years of my life."
Aiah, on the other hand, remained perfectly still. Unlike the others, who were either panicking or rolling on the floor in hysterics, her eyes were fixed on the box, a sharp frown pulling at her lips.
Sheena, who recovered from her initial shock, slowly turned to the rest of the group, face unreadable beneath the thick layer of glitter now coating her entire being. She inhaled sharply. "I told you. I TOLD YOU. BUT DID ANY OF YOU LISTEN TO ME? NO!"
Mikha, between coughs, managed to wheeze out a laugh. "Okay—okay, credit where it’s due—this is hilarious."
Colet sighed heavily, brushing some of the glitter off her glasses. "This was so a prank. I can't believe we got played."
"Oh, 100%," Maloi agreed, wiping away tears of laughter. "And whoever did this deserves a medal."
"Or a lawsuit," Stacey grumbled, still swatting at the glitter stubbornly clinging to her blazer.
Gwen groaned, flopping onto one of the chairs. "Okay, fine. We got punked. Can we move on now? I need, like, six showers."
But Aiah wasn’t laughing. She hadn’t even reacted to the glitter bomb beyond a slow, meticulous tilt of her head.
"No," she muttered, reaching forward. "Not yet."
Everyone turned to look at her.
"Oh, come on, Aiah," Mikha whined. "We’ve suffered enough!"
But Aiah ignored her. She reached back into the box, sifting through the glitter-covered bottom. A second later, her fingers brushed against something solid. Something that hadn’t erupted with the rest of the contents.
Her brows furrowed as she pulled out a polaroid.
The laughter immediately died.
The photograph was old, slightly curled at the edges, and covered in specks of stray glitter. But that wasn’t what sent a chill down Aiah’s spine.
The image was of a student ID.
Or rather, what was left of it. The name had been completely scratched out, aggressively so—deep enough that the surface of the ID was ruined. But across the photo, written in jagged bred ink, was a single word:
FORGOTTEN?
The weight of that one word made Aiah’s stomach drop. She flipped the polaroid over, checking for any more clues, but it was blank.
The girl in the ID had delicate features, but there was a distinct sharpness to her—straight, shoulder-length hair slightly tousled, lips curled in the barest hint of a smirk. It was an expression that carried a mischievous edge, like she knew something the rest of the world didn’t. Her dark, striking eyes were unnervingly familiar, though none of them could immediately place why.
A heavy silence fell over the group.
"...Okay, I don’t like this anymore," Sheena muttered, shifting uncomfortably.
Aiah, her fingers tightening around the polaroid, reached back into the box. This time, her hand brushed against paper. Lots of it.
She pulled out a stack of old newspapers and campus bulletins, yellowed with age but still readable. She spread them across the table, eyes scanning the pages as the rest of the group crowded around her.
Each one carried some variation of the same haunting headline:
MISSING: SAU STUDENT VANISHES WITHOUT A TRACE.
FOUR YEARS LATER: STILL NO LEADS ON DISAPPEARED STUDENT.
NO WITNESSES, NO CLUES—A CASE LEFT IN THE DARK.
Their clubroom, once filled with laughter and complaints about glitter, was now thick with something else—a creeping, uneasy dread.
Mikha swallowed hard. "This… this isn’t just a prank, is it?"
"Someone went through a lot of effort for this," Colet murmured, adjusting her glasses as she flipped through the news clippings. "But why? Why send this to us?"
Maloi shifted closer, scanning the photo again. "Does anyone recognize her? She looks… familiar, kind of?"
Stacey exhaled sharply. "That’s what’s freaking me out. I feel like I should know her, but… I don’t."
"Four years ago," Gwen mumbled, rubbing her arms as she stared at the old newspapers. "That was before any of us got here. How does someone just… vanish?"
"Who is she?" Mikha whispered, staring at the faded photo of the girl in one of the articles.
Aiah exhaled slowly. "I don't know. But someone clearly doesn’t want her to be forgotten."
Silence fell over the group, the weight of the mystery pressing down on them. The glitter still clung to their clothes, but none of them were laughing anymore.
Aiah didn’t answer. She was too busy staring at the polaroid, at the nameless student staring back at her, and the unsettling question scrawled across their face.
FORGOTTEN?
She looked up at the others, her jaw set.
"We need to find out who she is."
"Looks like we just got our next case," Stacey muttered.