Chapter Text
"Are you sure you believe the rumors?" Needle asked, standing at the top of the stairs to the abandoned subway.
Match nodded, "Listen, like, super closely."
Needle and Match stood in silence for a few minutes, before a faint spraying sound could be heard. Then a few clanks, like something was falling. Whispers on the wind. Really creepy things, that could only really be explained in a few ways. Of course, most jumped to the first (and most obvious) solution: there were ghosts in the abandoned subway Needle and Match were standing at the top of.
It was obviously abandoned for a few reasons. The subway stop was quite far out from town, but a popular place for rebel teens. Needle and Match, ghost hunters, overheard a group of these teens talking about the "weird noises" at the subway. The territory was very run-down, broken signs and low-quality seating. More often than not, teens would be seen sitting atop the wall after jumping the metal fence of the walled-off subway.
"Well, what are we waiting for?" Needle asked, "Should we go in?"
"Like, yeah, we like, should," Match replied.
Each step down into the subway echoed, the only flashlight between the two ghost-hunters guiding them down the stairs. None of their materials were showing anything too odd yet, so it didn't seem like there were ghosts at the entrance. But these ghost-hunters expected that, as from belief and rumor, ghosts hated the natural light. It would be a matter of time before they found their answer.
Match poked Needle's shoulder, "Look. Footprints, and, like, muddy too."
"They seem to be rather recent too," Needle pointed out, running her finger along one of them, "Definitely recent."
"Do you, like, think someone's also, like, ghost-hunting?" Match asked.
Needle didn't answer, her flashlight fixated on the wall.
Upon the wall of the subway was graffiti mark after graffiti mark. At first, they start out not so great, like a newbie. But as the graffiti markings go further down the wall, the better they get. Had someone been coming down here and practicing graffiti because the place was abandoned? There was only one way to find out.
Following the muddy footsteps and graffiti lined wall, Match and Needle were eventually met with, unfortunately, not a ghost. Instead, they were met with what looked like a beat-up rebel teen. Faint-pink streaks in dirty-blonde hair, tied up in a rough, loose ponytail. A simple headband, painter's mask, and piercing eyes that tried to hide pain behind them. A rough, torn up t-shirt, even though it was rather cold in the subway, bruises painting the artist's arm. Long, black jeans flowed down her legs, torn up in multiple places to look "stylish", but just made her look more like a street rat.
Behind the mask, the artist spat, "Get out. Now. Or I'll force you out."
"Woah, hey, we aren't here to hurt you," Needle explained.
"Yeah," Match added, "We were here to, like, hunt ghosts, and like, that stuff."
"I said to get out, idiots," the artist grumbled, "I don't want people here."
Needle seemed confused, "Why not?"
"You think I'm going to trust you with information when you believe in ghosts?!" the artist pointed one of her spray cans at Needle, "And don't think I'm afraid to use this."
"Woah, hey, we aren't, like, trying to hurt you," Match stood in-front of Needle.
The artist scoffed, "I've been told that lie enough times. So get out."
Match and Needle took the warning at this point and left. But something nagged the two of them about the artist. Lie? They weren't lying, they would never hurt another person! Did that poor artist actually believe they were lying over something that extreme?
Meanwhile, the artist went back to her graffiti, now way more on edge. If people kept coming after those two "ghost-hunters", she was going to have to relocate her safe-place. The one place where she isn't in danger.