The Clandestine Six- The Gloom Horde

Chapter 1: Two Surprises

"KNOCK, KNOCK!", is the only thing that disturbs you while getting dressed up for college and especially when your bestie does it.

I, Amy Chandeliour Rick, was getting dressed up for another brilliant day of mine at my college. Thinking about my favourite, Astronomy class, when my best friend, Charlotte Kate Winston interrupted my train of thoughts- "Hey gorgeous! Are you ready? Come on now! Its eight forty-five already! We will miss our biology class.." There was another bang on the bathroom door of our dormitory. I sighed and replied "Really Char? Is there anyone out there who would let me freshen up peacefully?" And with that, I unlocked the door finding Charlotte with her blonde hair tied up into a messy bun on top of her head (a hairstyle which I taught her), wearing a navy-blue shirt on black jeans and a cat-eye shaped glasses on her short nose reflecting her dark black eyes staring right at me.

"Whoa! Don't EVER do that Char! Ever.. I don't like it." I told her. She gave me a half smile and said "Well now miss beauty, would you please walk up to our classroom? Or do you wanna get kicked out of the college!" with an exasperated look on my face, I followed her through the corridor.

Boys! Do I hate them? No, of course not. Hate is a strong word but kind of. My only problem is that they give me so much of attention due to my natural beauty that I start hating them and if you are wondering, they do like me. So this is my reason of hating but also not hating them "There goes Amy, with her strawberry blonde hair flowing in the air and her beautiful grey eyes make her look more beautiful than ever! Her perfect nose, perfect lips, perfect hair.. Oh wow! She is so amazing! I just keep on gazing at her whenever she passes by! She is just the perfect, beautiful girl a person can think of!" Yeah.. That's what they say and think about me. But you know, I just hate that. I want to live a normal life being a normal girl. Ugh! I am just fed up of it.

I was thinking about all this when Charlotte spoke up- "right Amy?" I felt extremely awkward at that moment, it was the hundredth time when I was in my own world and Charlotte kept on talking without even realizing that I wasn't listening to her. Poor girl, this time also she will have to repeat it all again. "I am really sorry Char! I was lost in my own thoughts. Could you please repeat what you said?" I asked her sheepishly. She sighed and said "I was telling you about my latest vision that I had last night."

That sentence caught my attention "Really!? What was it? Anything funny going to happen to Roselle? Or something?" At those words Charlotte wore a gloomy expression on her face. And with a frown I asked "What's the matter Char? You look tensed." She sighed and with tears in her eyes she said "Amy..... You know that my parents went to New Jersey a month ago. They used to call me every alternative day. But now, it's been a week since they called me. At first, I thought that I they were too busy to miss their good-for-nothing daughter. But after the vision I had..." She broke and began sobbing.

My heart skipped a beat, what if her parents were.... No! I thought, that won't happen. "Hey, calm down Char. Just tell me, what did you see in your vision?" You see... Charlotte had this kind of power that she could foresee chunks of future (which didn't make any sense until they came true) in her dreams. She once saw Roselle Dove Brown, water and wet clothes.. Well that didn't make any sense till it really happened! Roselle was soaked in water! Well.. that's another story, the point is that all the visions that Charlotte had till now came true.

"I-I-I saw. My parents, a crown, a weird monster-type thing and-" she was about to complete when she was interrupted by an announcement which said "Students! Today we have an assembly at nine o'clock, so please assemble in the assembly hall in five minutes. I repeat, all assemble in the hall in five minutes."

We looked and each other and forgetting about Charlotte's vision, we ran for the hall. We ran at such a high speed that we covered the distance of seven minutes in three minutes. After reaching the hall, we were sweating and panting badly. We caught our breathes and I asked Charlotte to continue and she did. "I am just wrapping it up in a minute cause our headmistress would take another five minutes to come. So, last night I saw my parents, thei- their clothes all shattered and they were covered with injuries. And then the scene changed and I saw a c-crown with a beautiful muti-coloured stones. And um.. a weird thing which was gigantic and was kind of blurred, it appeared to have fang-like structure but its picture wasn't clear so I don't remember any more details. It wore an evil expression on its face, two girls, one in golden top and silver shorts while other in silver armor and a bow. Then there was this man in purple T-Shirt and brown pants. I saw a whole scene of that but now it's fading..." Her widened eyes reflecting a mixed feeling of shock, fear and nervousness. I was having the same feeling and I felt as if my whole body went numb but I came back to my senses and consoled Charlotte. "It's ok dear. It's no big deal. It might be only a dream and not a vision. And even if it is then it may not come true. It's ok." She looked up at me and her eyes were again full of tears.

I forced down a sob and gave her a reassuring smile. She too smiled and then our headmistress caught our attention by clearing her throat on the mike (her usual way to gather the attention of the students).

We looked up to Mrs. Norkiss's 'not-so-pleasant', wrinkled face. Wearing a green saree, with green accessories and green lenses on a wrinkled face, she didn't look less than a withering tree.

Then her voice boomed in the hall as she spoke in the microphone, "Good morning dear students! Hope you all are well. Today, we have two pleasant surprises for you all that will please you!" she waited for us to give an applause. The whole crowd gathered in the hall was more enthusiastic to know about the surprises instead of her useless speech. But still, we all clapped hard enough to pretend to be enthusiastic.

She smiled and continued. "Yes thank you, thank you students and now silence! So as I was saying we have two surprises for you all. The first one is that, we have two new students who joined us this year! I would like to call Mr. Grace on the stage please. Yes. Grace is a very athletic and disciplined child and he will be joining the Galaxy house with the second years! Congratulation Grace and my dear students. And ah! Grace, there are four houses in our college, Galaxy, Star, Planet and Comet." At that point, I rolled my eyes and I thought "Another boy in our year! Oh, I hate this college." But my thought interrupted by a round of applause by our year especially girls. Then Grace joined the group of second years and was immediately surrounded by girls and boys.

"Uhm-mm-mm.. Enough of welcoming. Now we have Mr. Thomas Jake Crease with us. He is uh... rather, uh.. energetic child. You are welcome Thomas to our Star house with the third years." She said. At that time Charlotte's face fell instead of mine and I was about to ask "why-" but she interjected "Shhh... not right now."

Then Mrs. Norkiss's voice again boomed in the hall. "silence! Well-well... The best part of this assembly is yet to come kids. So gear up! Our second surprise is...." She gave a dramatic pause and then continued "Our Elite Norm College is introducing its first ever trip to America! As you all know, we have been focusing on your studies for years but when our college's results began increasing, we decided to reward you for your hard work. So we all have planned a trip to Washington D.C in America on 22nd January! The consent slips will be sent to your dormitories by the evening. All you have to do is fill the form and pay two hundred dollars by day after tomorrow. And you will be ready to get going! Congratulations my dear students! Now I would like to dismiss the assembly. Thank you for joining us." She said and left the stage.