Chapter Text
«Alright, alright, settle down. I know aliens are apparently the most exciting thing in the universe to you guys, but can we please get back to today's lesson before the principal actually decides to fire me this ti—»
Bringing up the possibility that alien life might actually exist had, quite obviously, been... a questionable decision for a class of middle schoolers first thing in the morning. Grace had already sighed three times trying—and failing—to calm them down. His fingers pinched the bridge of his nose as he attempted, just as unsuccessfully, to fight off the headache their nonstop chatter was giving him. Finally, he clapped his hands. It had always worked before, and today was no different. The room quieted almost immediately. Andrew raised his hand soon after, so Grace pointed at him with the whiteboard marker still in his fingers.
«Mr. Grace, could we have a whole lesson about aliens sometime?»
There it was, the scariest but also most interesting question that Grace could tackle. And really, who was Grace to say no to a kid who genuinely wanted to learn more about something?
«Sure,» he said with a nod, winning a gigantic smile from Andrew. «As long as you all calm down now.»
He walked back around his desk toward his well-worn textbook, its margins overflowing with handwritten notes that even he struggled to decipher sometimes, «Alright, let's move on. Page eighty-seven.»
For some reason, that immediately earned a muffled snicker from a trio of students sitting in the back. Grace tilted his head, meeting their scared looks for half a second.
«...Robert. Theo. Ava. Something funny?»
The three of them hurriedly hid the phone they'd been looking at. Ava looked noticeably more embarrassed than the other two, which was something new, while Theodore—predictably the boldest of the group—started laughing all over again.
«It's nothing, sir. Just a meme.»
Oh God. There it was again. More teenage vocabulary.
What exactly was a... meme?
«Okaaay...» Grace replied slowly. «Let's move on.»
Yeah. Probably for the best, he thought. He didn't want to be that teacher. He already knew the word boomer, unfortunately, at his own expenses. Still... A tiny part of him couldn't stop thinking about it for the rest of class, he blamed his endless curiosity. So, once the bell rang and everyone began packing up, he casually wandered over to the trio.
«Hey, Theo?» He asked, trying to sound nonchalant. «Out of curiosity... could you show me that meme from earlier?»
He sincerely hoped show me was the correct verb. He wasn't entirely sure whether memes were things you... looked at. Theo didn't react strangely, so Grace celebrated the small victory internally. Nice!
«Sure!» Theo turned his phone toward him.
On the screen was a video: in the upper-left corner sat a small webcam box showing a man with shoulder-length black hair. He wore headphones, had a microphone positioned in front of his mouth, and appeared to be playing some kind of game.
Grace assumed he was a streamer.
«...Was that the Bite of '87?» The man's voice was low and rough, sending an inexplicable shiver down Grace's spine. He firmly decided not to examine that reaction any further. The rest of the screen exploded with messages from what Grace assumed was a live chat.
"Simon has no idea what he's talking about."
"LMAO he got it completely wrong."
"Someone please tell him."
Theo and Robert burst into laughter. Ava buried her face in one hand. The problem was... Grace still had absolutely no idea what was supposed to be funny. He was really getting old. At thirty-five. Robert seemed to notice the confused silence stretching on. He cleared his throat.
«He's a streamer. He's been playing this horror game series for like two months now, and he just said something that makes absolutely no sen—»
Theo immediately cut in, throwing around words like "FNAF" and "It was '83, not '87," until Grace somehow understood even less than before. But the video kept playing. And once again, the man's voice drew his attention.
«Oh.» A brief pause. «You're right. That doesn't make any sense.»
He said it with a level of calm Grace deeply envied at that exact moment. Before the clip could continue, Ava snatched the phone out of Theo's hands and locked the screen.
«That's enough. Let's just go home!»
«Ava's only mad because her uncle sucks! ♪»
«Then you try playing FNAF if you think you're so good.»
«Okay, let's not get carried away now...»
The three of them disappeared into the hallway, leaving Grace alone with exactly two useful pieces of information. First: the man's name was Simon. Second: he was Ava's uncle. He definitely wasn't counting the fact that he'd probably be hearing that voice in his dreams tonight. He had to find him.
Really, how hard could it possibly be?