Young Writers Society

Cookies swept her eyes around the Green Room Cafe, terrified. Then she saw her characters Sarah and Lina and rushed over to them.

"Sarah, what are you doing?! Unfreeze time!" Cookies demanded.

"I can't!" Sarah said in panic. "And Laza'veya's gone! It tricked me!"

Cookies turned her eyes to Lina. "Lina, can you speed up time and undo Sarah's magic-?"

Sarah immediately interrupted with a harsh glare. "No. That might kill her!" She snapped. "How about You do something to fix this? Delete Laza'veya, remove Lina's curse, and write that I can control my powers."

"But I can't log onto my account..." Cookies trailed off. Lina was calling someone on her phone.

"We'reGonnaCookTheGoose#2," Lina finally said. "That's the password."

Not wasting another moment, Cookies logged onto her account, not caring which of her characters had hacked her. She pulled up the chapters of Time & Space.

"Okay," Lina instructed, "If you just rewrite our stories the way we ask you to, we'll forgive you. Then you can have at least us, @GengarIsBestBoy 's characters, and @alpacaboss 's characters helping you. Oh, and the chicken once you guys post about it. Just don't send it after us."

Cookies nodded and wrote whatever they asked. Laza'veya stopped existing and Sarah regained control of her powers. She unfroze time.

Just then, Cookies' connection to her YWS account crashed, and an icy voice came through Lina's phone.

"Sarah, Lina. You're forgiving her? Really?" Hateful venom dripped from each of the words. "Traitors."

The person hung up.

"Wait...who was that?" Cookies asked Lina and Sarah. "If you guys didn't hack me, then who? I don't remember posting about any other characters."

They exchanged a glance. "You figure it out," Lina mumbled.

But there was no time for that. Everyone in the cafe was moving again, both characters and YWSers. @OrabellaAvenue and @alliyah were now free to post about the giant chicken.

@KaiaJersaga recovered from the time freeze and stared into Shiko's unrelenting eyes.

"Who took my phone from me?" Shiko demanded, flashing angry eyes across the room.

"I don't know, and it doesn't matter," Kaia responded, giving Shiko the glare he deserved. "Password. Now."

"I don't even know it. Mikel logged me in," Shiko replied.

"Mikel?" Kaia repeated. My account is under the control of him?

"Oh, Kaia will you stop being so dramatic! The giant chicken will appear soon and save us from all this," @GengarIsBestBoy announced, jumping up with excitement as @alliyah posted the work.

"Noooo!" @KaiaJersaga screamed. "Don't do that!! You'll scare away the characters and then we'll never get our passwords back!"

But it was too late. The ground vibrated again and a gigantic chicken foot smashed through the ceiling and landed on top of @alpacaboss's Blaire.

"No!" @alpacaboss screamed as her character was crushed to the floor.

@alliyah screamed and @OrabellaAvenue fainted into the loving hands of Hannah @GengarIsBestBoy's angel.

The other three friend characters of @alpacaboss ran over to their friend and tried to remove the giant foot. One of them turned back to @alpacaboss and screamed: "You did it! You traitor!!"

@alpacaboss paled as the angry eyes of her characters turned toward her.

"@alliyah, write that the chicken lifts it's foot!" @KateHardy suggested.

"Yes and hurry! The longer that character is hurt, the worse their temper when everything's okay again," Kaia remarked, speaking with her evident experience.

@alliyah hurriedly types at the keyboard, but she has to keep backspacing as all the letters were spaced differently on her laptop. @loveissourgrapes impatiently slid into the chair and took over @alliyah's position. Afterall, she was more accustomed to using her own laptop.

The foot suddenly lifted and came down in another spot on the ceiling, between @Spearmint who was offering consolation to @alpacaboss's characters to try to calm them down and Shiko.

Shiko screamed as he stared at the yellow gnarly foot in front of him. He ran over to Kaia and grabbed her arms. "Please don't let me get crushed by the thing!" He shouted, "You have more mercy on me than that!!"

"You can get crushed for all I care," Kaia responded. She turned suddenly fearing that the threat sounded a little too much like something her character, Mikel might make. She hoped it wouldn't bring him into the room...

The giant foot came down again. It was going to hit @alliyah and @loveissourgrapes , who were still typing on the laptop.

Hannah suddenly swooped in, summoning a golden shield and lifting it high above her head. The chicken’s foot came down, but it could not crush Hannah’s shield. It retracted itself from the ceiling, and it was gone.

“Okay, so the giant chicken plan is not gonna work,” said Gengar. “I don’t know about you all, but I’m not getting crushed today.”

She looked up at the holes in the ceiling. “Hmm… hey, Hannah, see if you can fly out of the ceiling.”

Hannah nodded and flew up there. She peeked out of the holes, but then squeaked daintily in shock. She flew back down.

How was she still a scaredy-cat after facing Beau? “What’d you see?” Gengar asked.

“Oh, it’s horrible out there! It isn’t just the green room that’s messed up; someone’s been messing with the rest of this land! Perhaps it is better that we stay in here.”

@KaiaJersaga was not happy with that statement. “Stay in here? Our own characters are going against us! What could possibly be so bad that we should stay in here?”

“Its… its…” Hannah could not even begin to describe it. She sighed. “Would you like to see for yourself?” Kaia nodded.

Hannah scooped her up and brought her up to the hole in the ceiling. Kaia gasped as she saw what was outside

Kaia glanced over the edge of the roof. Her eyes widened. A whole war had been unleashed. Possibly it was from @dragonofpheonix's book that seemed to have a lot of fighting in it. Characters of all sorts of sizes, and appearances crawled around the burning trees in search of safety. A deep purple cloud has settled over the sky, a sure sign that everyone would be cursed with bizarre problems in the near future. @LuminescentAnt was certain to blame for that. Drunks from multiple stories wandered the forest, stumbling over the dead bodies of the characters and YWSers already slain in the bloodshed. The world itself had changed into a dark combination of all the worst places in the YWSers stories. @Rose's evil house up on the hill where it eternally rained as no sunshine ever appeared stood isolated at the edge of the world. Below it, the mysterious dwelling of the rich 25 members of @VengefulReaper's latest novel, complete with two bodies lay shrouded in @LuminescentAnt's purple mist. @Ari11 had contributed to the war zone along with a massive extent of never ending tunnels that somehow connected to the vaults of @MercedesBlue's Hybrids. @SkyJayde's town had lost it's supervillain Rei that now haunted the streets in @KaiaJersaga's Meron. In its place, the Ghost from @VengefulReaper's novel had come to stay. The civil war happened in one corner of the world. In another, brawls between stubborn characters that should have never met occured.

@KaiaJersaga fell limp in Hannah's arms as Hannah carried her down. She shook her head as her eyes traced her fellow YWSers faces.

"There're multiple wars going on outside," @KaiaJersaga announced. "We had better stay here."

Shikos eyes widened. "War?" He bit his lip and cast the cracks in the ceiling a glance. A TIE fighter from @RazorSharpPencil's fanfiction for Star Wars zoomed over head. "What in the world is happening???" He shrieked, ducking under the nearest table.

Kaia could have laughed, but the moment felt too serious.

"What if our characters are using this as a refuge from the chaos out there?" @Spearmint asked after giving up on trying to convince Lucille, @alpacaboss's character to stop crying.

"They probably are!" @momonster agreed.

"I'm going to write my characters in this room with me," @loveissourgrapes decided, taking her laptop. "That way they'll be safe."

"But what about my characters??" Kaia asked. "I'm locked out of my account by one of my characters, and I can't write them in here. I don't want my characters to die out there!!"

@cookiesandcream123 put a hand on her shoulder. "I think you're going to have to let your characters fend for themselves, Kaia."

"But Zybryn can't fend for himself! You know that. And he's a mere human being, and theyre dragons and stuff out there!" Kaia wailed. "He's probably scared to death..."

"You'd never say that if I were out there, you traitor," Shiko suddenly yelled, taking his phone from the table where it had been forgotten in the latest turn of events. "Just for that, I'm writing that Zybryn dies in the chaos out there."

"No!!" Kaia screamed, running up to Shiko and desperately trying to take the phone from him.

"Shiko, put that phone down now or I'll get my characters to freeze time again and you'll have to sit there for several hours with nothing to do," @cookiesandcream123 threatened.

"And you...What's this about poor Zybryn and all the purple heart emojis and soft words for him when I went through exactly what he did and you never had one cent of pity anywhere in your heart for me when you read that Mikel did the same thing to me?" Shiko spat out, his eyes fused to @cookiesandcream123. His voice became soft again. "Oh, but don't worry about it because it's too late. You're account got hacked and you're passwords been changed again. So, you can't freeze me anyway."

"Shiko, put it down!" @KaiaJersaga shouted. "If you do, I'll edit what I wrote about you and make it better for you. I'll even make someone feel sorry for you."

Shiko frowned. His eyes rose distrustfully. "And if I don't?"

"I'll get in somehow and have you die. I'll have the most humiliating death possible for you, and I won't have any character or reader feel sorry for you. They'll just walk by and leave you dead in a ditch. So, give me the phone, or that'll be in your future."

Shiko hesitantly handed the phone over. "If you don't have someone feel sorry for me by the end, you'll be sorry. Also, my mom doesn't count. She'd feel sorry for me if I cut my finger. Very anticlimactic if end up being her..."

Kaia nodded. "Deal."

"Wait...Guys, what about the YWSers that are out there right now? @foxmaster and @FireEyes went in search of the golden goose and haven't returned!" @momonster suddenly screamed.

@OrabellaAvenue nodded. "Somebody needs to go rescue them."

@GengarIsBestBoy sat down, thinking...

FireEyes woke up from a strange slumber. She had heard all of the commotion from trying to find the golden goose and the chaos of being stuck in the green room, but all the calls on her were just that: calls. She sat up and shouted out into a deep void, "@foxmaster? @GengarIsBestBoy?" She panicked.

The room/cave all around her was a deep black void with no exist to be found. She wanted to help with all of these YWSers journey, but she failed to find a way out time and time again. It was guarded all around by a foggy mist with human sentience. No one wrote it, and it had to be destroyed. She took it as a metaphor for something, but she could not put her finger on it. Oh well.

"I think I'm going to name you Alice. But in totally no connection to the YWSer @DreamyAlice. She is very nice and you are uh not."

Fire could hear the screams of @KaiaJersaga all the way from the interior of the green room village's café. With Fire on the outskirts and no way past Alice, all she could do was think, call out for someone, and wait. Maybe her chaos mentor, @Carina, would come save her. Oh or the ones who always were so kind and helpful like @alliyah @looseleaf and @Hijinks.

"Someone! Anyone!"

After some time of using the force to stop psychos, Foxmaster had... The call of nature. In the middle.of a war zone. Death alert.
"Guys. Is there a bathroom anywhere?" Foxmaster asked her companions awkwardly.
"Uh, yeah on that hill!" Said @Snoink cheerfully. Indeed, there was a big brick building shrouded in mist, labeled in (quite) large letter, WC.
Foxmaster groaned. What was in there? A toilet monster?
No. It was much worse.
@FireEyes and @Snoink waited outside while Foxmaster walked in, and, she realized, terrified, she could quote @Ryu: the smell of mold and other crap hit her. And, Foxmaster realized in pure terror, this.. *coughs* bathroom was from... Hanako San. Foxmaster whimpered. But, to quote an episode of Daniel tiger she had seen as a little kid, stop and go right away.
A few minutes later, Foxmaster was washing g her hands when the fluorescents flickered. Then they went out.
Foxmaster was too scared to scream. She just hyperventiliated instead. Then... A creak.
"Let's... Meet... Our lord."
Those were the exact words in the story. Foxmaster screamed and tore out of there.
"Let's get this over with." Foxmaster said. "Never again. Never again."

@GengarIsBestBoy was still thinking as the YWSers gathered in a group to discuss how they were going to save the YWSers who had gone off into the midst of all the chaos. @alliyah was drawing chicken doodles to ease her mind. @Spearmint was drawing geometrical shapes that were together beginning to look like a despairing face. @cookiesandcream123 was staring at the cup of liquid ice cream she had forgotten, while @momonster and @OrabellaAvenue talked about what to do. @alpacaboss and @ailahevelynmae were tending to the character who had gotten crushed by the giant chicken @alliyah had sent into the room and Hannah was busy healing all injuries.

@KaiaJersaga stared down at Shiko's phone, realizing that he had logged out of her account before handing the phone over. Kaia's eyes lifted to see the characteristic half-smile and unsympathetic eyes. "And let me guess, you don't have the password?"

Shiko lifted his chin slightly and nodded. "That's correct. Someone else logged in for me, and since I logged out, I have no access to your account anymore. It's locked...with you and me on the outside."

@KaiaJersaga glanced across the room and noticed that @loveissourgrapes was typing something on her laptop. Kaia sighed. Her eyes returned to Shiko. "You're a fabulous character, you know?"

The half-smile disappeared into a genuine smile. "I know."

"I was being sarcastic," Kaia muttered, watching as @GengarIsBestBoy typed something into her phone. Maybe someone who didn't have a hacked account could help...maybe...But more importantly, someone needed to save @Snoink, @foxmaster, and @FireEyes. They were out there all alone. And there was also @PoetryGoos who had a home out there somewhere. And then, all the characters of the entire YWS world...they were lost out there, too...Everyone needed help, but no one knew where to turn...

Gengar sat on a conveniently-placed rock, thinking. “Ah, rats,” she exclaimed, “I got nothing!”

“Nothing?” Asked @cookiesandcream123 “Like, absolutely nothing?”

This wasn’t totally true. Gengar had one idea, but it wasn’t a very fool-proof plan.

She sighed. “Okay, I’ve thought of one thing we can do, but it’s risky. Very risky.” Everyone’s ears perked up. They were willing to do anything.

“Okay, so, there’s this character… he exists in the space between dimensions. He’s incredibly powerful, but he’s also an untrustworthy trickster. We could try to make a deal with him to fix all of this, but rarely has anything good come from him. He’s unpredictable—he can’t even be controlled by writing about him!”

Gengar lowered her voice. “Are we sure we want to resort to this? Does anybody else have any other ideas?”

Ari stood at the edge of the green room, anxiously twisting at the hem of their hoodie.

What a disaster... they thought, listening to the commotion outside. Screams and shouts mingled with the sounds of buildings crumbling, collapsing in on themselves in the chaos. How did this even happen? Our characters coming to life...but are they just published characters? Or could RP characters be here, too?

Their eyes flicked wildly around the Green Room as Qitalk, Sage, Avery, and Evan sprang to mind. None of them were fighters...what if they were out there, in the war? What if they were already dead? Not to mention the characters that were definitely out there...Albert and Melanie from The Mist--just normal people trying to live a normal life. They wouldn't last five minutes. And Prajuru, Cyprus and Jepret...

I wonder which version of them will appear, Ari thought. I have some of their future selves saved in the Drafts...what if post-banishment Cyprus shows up? Or Jepret...all three of them, really. They're better fighters, but they probably hate me because of the journey I put them through...and oh no, Niku!

Ari's eyes widened as they realized their vengeful assassin could come bursting through the door any second. Could they make a deal with him before he killed everyone? There was no use trying to destroy him...the Queen's serum had made sure of that.

"Urgh, why couldn't I just write a happy, un-traumatized character for once?" Ari wondered aloud. @KaiaJersaga and @cookiesandcream123 stared at them, then went back to listening to @GengarIsBestBoy, who seemed to be making some sort of proposition. Ari moved closer, listening to her idea.

"Sounds risky," Ari muttered once Gengar finished speaking. "But I don't have anything else. None of my characters are powerful enough to fix this, not even Iberus or the Figure. I say we go for it. Unless there's a less shaky option we could try first."

"I firmly believe that things can only get worse from here. @GengarIsBestBoy, don't do it!" @KaiaJersaga announced. Her eyes moved to @Ari11. "Can we really trust such a risky character with the lives of our own characters?"

@Ari11 shrugged. "What other options do we have?"

Kaia sighed. "I know, but can't you write your characters into the room?"

"Guys! We need to hurry up. They're real YWSers out there and they need our help!" @LuminescentAnt exclaimed.

"And I don't want my characters to die out there!" @Rinisha added.

"I honestly don't care about that," muttered @vampricone6783, glancing uneasily at the green wall. "I'd rather my characters stay out there."

@SkyJayde nodded in silent agreement.

Kaia sighed. Mental images of her suffering characters flashed through her head. Only one of them was safe as far as she knew. And he was the least of her worries. She cast Shiko a glance. He had stolen a bag of chips from somewhere and was happily crunching on them.

Her eyes lifted to the holes in the roof again. "We need to rescue @foxmaster and @FireEyes. You guys are right. We don't have any other options." Her eyes moved to @GengarIsBestBoy. "Make this character appear."

Her words were useless. @GengarIsBestBoy was already typing, prompted by @Rose who was finding the chaotic atmosphere a nice break from her lonely days on her lonely house on the hill.

"Whoever made Kaia captain?" Shiko muttered from the corner of the room. "What an attention freak."

"This guy is really getting on my nerves," someone from @OrabellaAvenue's corner of the room muttered.

@Spearmint nodded.

Kaia cast the group a glance. "I promise, I'd write him out of this room if I had my password right now!" she muttered, flashing her character an angry glance. Of course all she got back was a half-smile. She cast @cookiesandcream123 a glance. "We really need to get to the bottom of this. Do you have any idea who hacked our accounts?"

Gengar sighed. “Okay, and we’re sure about this?” She asked. Everyone nodded.

“Okay, here goes.” She took a breath. “We don’t need any special summoning tools, he’ll appear if you just say this ancient rhyme. But please, be careful with your wording when talking to him.” Gengar’s eyes began to glow as she recited it:

From the shadowy depths of the inky abyss,
We call upon the forces of a feared and powerful being.
He’s here,
He’s there,
No, he’s Mr. Everywhere

Everything stopped. The clouds in the black sky stopped moving. Shiko in the corner stopped eating chips. Time seemed to be moving slower and faster simultaneously.

The atmosphere began to shift as gravity became lighter. YWSers began to float. The air smelled like ozone as ancient and long-forgotten symbols formed in the air. Soon these symbols became geometric shapes, flashing and ever-changing.
The shapes soon fell into place, like building blocks to form a being, similar in nature to a Picasso painting.
His head was like a plague doctor’s mask, with his eyes being two different sizes and shapes. That was the only part of his body that was defined; the rest of his body was so geometric and distorted that it was hard to tell anything about him, but he seemed to be tall and thin. He towered over everyone and everything.
Everything soon returned to normal. The clouds continued to move, and the YWSers hit the ground.
Mr. Everywhere leaned on a cane, which was not geometric. “Hello, hello, hello!” He exclaimed, having a voice that was much too whimsical for his kind of character. “How may I be of service?”
Gengar stepped up, but she noticed something was wrong. All their characters had disappeared—Hannah, Shiko, everyone. She looked back at all the other YWSers. They had noticed too, but they couldn’t say anything about it right now.
“Mr. Everywhere,” she said, “we’d like to make a deal.”

Ari nodded at @KaiaJersaga. It probably would be best to get their characters' opinions...even if they might attack. Besides, Ari was the writer. They could control what happened, right? If something went awry, they could just fix it with the push of a button.
"Alright then," they mumbled to themself, pulling the laptop out of their bag. "How bad could it be? Just summon a few characters..."
However, @GengarIsBestBoy finished her chant before Ari could type the first few letters. They let out a cry of surprise as their feet left the ground, momentarily forgetting about the computer in their hand as they flailed around, trying to find the floor. Then gravity regained its hold on the world, and Ari went smashing to the ground, along with their laptop. They sat up, rubbing their head, only to be met with the crumpled remains of the computer.
"Oh no..." Ari gasped, gathering the broken pieces in their hands. The screen flickered slightly as they pushed the power button, sputtering back to life. Relief flashed through them. It still worked! But...would it work properly?
That's a problem for another time, Ari decided, looking up at the huge geometric figure standing over the group of YWSers. A shiver of fear went down Ari's spine--what they were doing now could alter their lives forever.

Cookies glanced around at her fellow YWSers. Even though no one had wanted their characters to come to life at first, now the YWSers felt uneasy without them. But maybe if all the characters disappeared, that would solve some of their problems...

Cookies answered @KaiaJersaga 's glance with an uncertain shrug, then turned to @GengarIsBestBoy and spoke in a hushed tone.

"How should we make a deal with him?" Cookies asked fearfully. There was so much to take care of -- their hacked accounts, the war-zone outside, the goose, and saving @foxmaster , @FireEyes , and @Snoink who were stilll searching.. "And- what if he asks for something outrageous in return?"

Gengar looked back at @cookiesandcream123 , and realized she didn’t know where she was going from here. She probably should’ve thought about that before summoning him. “Give us a moment,” she said to Mr. Everywhere.

He laughed “Five minutes.” He summoned a giant pocket watch. “Tick-tock.”

Everyone huddled up. “Okay guys, what do we want to do? How do we want to make a deal?”

"You need to explain what this character can and cannot do," Kaia announced. "Because I know nothing about this character and I can't give proper input unless I know what we're dealing with here."

@Ari11 nodded. "Yes."

"@GengarIsBestBoy....explain this character...fast!" @cookiesandcream123 implored.