Chapter Three:
And Then There Were Twelve

Borstal for you Jenkins, thought Mr Samuels.

“Two rows gone,” said Jenkins, trying to keep the fear from his voice.
“Twelve of us left,” said Trisha, quickly adding. “I’m scared.”
“Me too,” Jenkins replied, his admittance somehow reassuring to Trisha. “What is that whiteness? It’s like something off Doctor Who, some kind of aliens maybe, sucking up kids one by one?” he added.
“That sound is like, sucking, breathing in,” said Trisha. “Maybe it’s eating them?” She scared herself with her words.

The two of them stood by Trisha’s desk, speaking in low voices as the rest of the class carried on with their work now that Jenkins had stopped trying to smash doors and windows. Samuels stayed in his chair, imagining Jenkins on the end of his cane.

Jenkins gazed at the whiteness and tentatively took a few steps closer. Trisha reached out and took him by the arm. “Careful,” she cautioned.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going in. But Samuels walked through it and came back?” Jenkins took a couple of steps closer, letting Trisha’s arm fall, and tried to look through the whiteness. He heard a low hum, barely audible unless close.

He tried to peer through, but it was impossible. “It might be a gateway to somewhere,” he suggested. “Samuels walked through it no problem.”
“To where though?” Trisha stayed put by her desk. “And I think it’s time,” she said, looking at her watch. 2:12:03 p.m.
“What?”
“The sound,” replied Trisha.

KCOT

Trisha was glad that Jenkins had stepped back just before the sound. On the second from the front row, far right, another kid gone. Another empty desk. Her stomach was turning, heart racing — thirteen kids gone, eleven remaining.

“Look everyone,” she shouted to the whole class in desperation. She made eye contact with those who looked. “Can’t you see it? Everyone is vanishing!”
The class looked blankly at her as Samuels yelled. “Weeks Detention.”
“Stuff you, Samuels!” she screamed.

Samuels responded with another glare but said nothing. Inside he was delighted. He had no idea what was going on today, but he’d make sure Jenkins was arrested and Trisha was given a week's detention, maybe even the cane, but unlikely as she was female. But next term, he’d come back and oversee her detention himself to make sure it happened — unpaid if need be. He’d never been spoken to so insolently.

He looked around his class. The other children had their heads down, wrists aching, back and bottoms fidgeting with discomfort. All suffering as they should be. Just Jenkins and Trisha disturbing the class. Definitely Borstal for you boy, he thought with delight.

“Good for you,” smiled Jenkins, amused at Trisha’s retort.
“It’s following the order of the desks, right to left, row by row. You second to last, me last,” she said.
“What about Samuels?” asked Jenkins. “He’s got the front desk.”
“Oh yeah, maybe he’ll be last. I dunno.”
“The way he walked through it though, like it wasn’t there?” mused Jenkins. “Where did he go?”

“I don’t know. Maybe the other kids are there too?” said Trisha. “But no one is noticing, and I still can’t remember those four you said about.” She paused, thinking; the room was locked, escape impossible. “It's like they’ve been taken from time?” she offered.

“Christ,” Jenkins replied, taking in Trisha’s words, alarm on his face. “And yet Samuels was fine when he walked through it?” he reminded Trisha, who spoke to the girl sitting behind her desk.
“Kirsty, where’s Jo—Jo Paignton?” she asked.

Kirsty cautiously looked up. She didn’t know what was going on today. Trisha was usually well behaved, never messed around — but today she was going mad. “Shh,” she said, fidgeting on her chair.
“Where’s Jo Paignton?” Trisha repeated, demanding an answer.
“I don’t know Jo Paignton,” Kirsty replied honestly, then looked away, head down, trying to avoid Samuels’ wrath.
“She bloody well does,” said Trisha to Jenkins. “I’ve seen those two walk home plenty of times together.”

They fell into silence, watching their watches as the second hand progressed round. The entire classroom silent, except for the tick-tock of the clock above Samuels’ desk and the noise of pens scraping on paper.

2:14:03 p.m.

KCIT

The reverse sound that only Jenkins and Trisha heard happened again, and another desk became empty. “Fourteen” they said at the same time. Jenkins marched back to the classroom door, glaring at Samuels as he passed. He pulled on the handle again and gave it a couple of kicks. Nothing, no reaction. He could feel his foot hit the door, the feel of the wood against his toes, but it still gave off no sound.

He slapped the wall next to the door — a solid sound, the sort he expected greeted his ears. It was the door, and the windows — the escape exits, that were silent. He walked back to Trisha ignoring Samuels’ ongoing glare, and mentioned his thoughts to her.

“So we’re going to vanish and no one is going to remember us.” A lone tear ran down Trisha’s cheek as she thought of the near future. By her reckoning, if it stuck to every two minutes, it would be her turn in twenty minutes. No escape.

Jenkins watched the tear roll down her cheek and felt a need to console her. Strange, really, how they had always been enemies, but now suddenly she was his only ally. “Hey, don’t cry,” he said softly.
“Ha, why not?” said Trisha with a half smile. “I’ve only got—” She looked at her watch.

2:16:03 p.m.

KCOT

She spoke over the noise. “Eighteen minutes until it’s my turn,” she said.
“Yeah, and I’ve got sixteen then,” pointed out Jenkins.
“There must be something we can do?” Trisha said.
“There’s only one thing we can do, and that is to look into it,” said Jenkins.
“You are kidding me.” Trisha shook her head. “No way I’m getting close to that.”
“What else?” said Jenkins. “Wait here and get swallowed?”

Trisha shook her head and looked back at the desk behind. “Kirsty, can’t you see? There’s only nine kids — we started with twenty-four.” She wanted to shake her. Wake up, look behind you.
“Don’t respond to her, Kirsty, or you will find yourself in detention too,” interrupted Samuels angrily. “Shut up, Trisha,” he added. “It's now two weeks detention.”

Kirsty briefly looked around the room. Everything was normal, a class full of kids, all miserable. Maybe Trisha had been drinking at lunchtime along with Jenkins. She ignored her.

Jenkins grabbed his textbook and wrote down the names of the nine remaining kids. He ripped the sheet out and put it on Kirsty’s desk, insisting she look at it. She looked, and then at him, totally confused. Why was he writing down the names of the kids in class? She already knew them.

“Get ready,” said Trisha, looking at her watch. 2:18:03 p.m.

KCIT
The rest of the class carried on as before, albeit with another missing child and another empty desk. Nothing left on any of the desks, pens and exercise books all vanished along with their owners.

“Look,” said Jenkins, pointing at the list of names he had just written down. “Look, Kirsty — John Williams, he’s missing now. LOOK.”
Kirsty looked at the list of names. He’d written nine down; there were eight kids in the class with them. She had no idea who John Williams was. What was Jenkins on about? She looked at him totally confused.

“Give up,” Trisha said. “None of them are aware.”
“I’m going in,” said Jenkins, adding some grit to his voice in the hope of building up courage.
“No,” said Trisha, startled. “You’re the only other one who is aware.”
“I’m not waiting here to be — whatever — vanquished. Can I borrow this, please?”

Without waiting for an answer, Jenkins picked up Trisha’s ruler and tentatively took a few steps towards the white wall.
“I don’t think you should,” said Trisha, who quietly followed him, keeping a few feet behind. Jenkins ignored her and carefully prodded at the whiteness with the ruler, watching it go in and come back out unharmed.
“It must go somewhere,” he said.

Cautiously he pointed his index finger through. Feeling no pain he slowly pushed forward, his hand, his arm and then his head. He looked around for a couple of seconds and pulled back in shock.

“Christ,” he muttered.