Wonderer's Wish World: An Empty Land

Gift...

Getting out was easy. Too easy. It felt wrong to Kipo, how they just walked through the garden trail, and then there it was: another brick wall with a swirling portal on it at the end of the trail. No tricks. No monsters. No one wandering off of the past. It was amazing. The group had actually finished something in record time.

Kipo gulped. She knew they didn't have the time to mess around, but she couldn't help but look back around the small garden, with the gentle sunlight filtering in, and the nice looking bushes on either side of the trail reaching up towards the blue sky Kipo could only see in the gapes. It definitely was nice here, as nice as the clearing, but Kipo couldn't help but feel like there was something else here. Something more sinister, or at least more mysterious. That seemed to be the status quo for everything around here.

But, again, they did not have time. The others had already filtered through the swirling portal, and now, Kipo was only holding them back.

With that reminder, Kipo shook her head, stepping through the portal with the rest of them and leaving the garden behind.

The friendly and peaceful garden was quickly replaced by the familiar cold and dark tunnels, only illuminated by the soft gem light above them. Already, Tulip was waving them forward as Kipo stepped through.

"Hurry, hurry!" she cried. "I know where we are, and I already talked to the ghosts. Come on, it's this way!"

Hardly pausing to get her own bearings (not that she thought she could), Kipo quickly followed Tulip through the confusing tunnels, the others soon following after. They ran through the tunnels efficiently, past things that Kipo thought were almost familiar, but she wasn't going to stop to check. Her attention was completely focused on Tulip in front of her, eyes locked on Tulip's back, and Kipo barely heard anything other than the beating of her own heart, like a drum. Kipo ran to the steady beat of it, feeling more than hearing her rapidly beating heart match the sound of her footsteps on the rock as she ran.

Boom, boom, boom, boom... it reminded Kipo of a marching song, and for a moment, Kipo felt herself a soldier marching into battle. It was not a thought she relished.

Suddenly, Tulip stopped. So suddenly that Kipo only got a fraction of a warning before she nearly ran face-first into her friend's back. Luckily, Kipo stopped just in time, digging her shoes into the rock floor to come to a stop. Luz... was not so lucky. Kipo only got a small squeak of warning before Luz barrelled into her, knocking Kipo over. Together, they crashed awkwardly to the hard floor, knocking the wind out of Kipo. She gasped, but was not able to get any breath back before the others, Kai, Mabel, Fei Fei and Coraline, also joined the pile-up.

Tulip whirled around, and her eyes widened.

"Are... you all okay?" she asked awkwardly, gawking at them. Wheezing, Kipo nodded, and tried to push herself back up. Getting the hint, the others quickly rolled off.

"That was..." Mabel gasped, clearly not only having lost breath from the unfortunate accident. "SO fun... Are we there yet?"

Tulip winced, rubbing at her arm. She was still breathing deeply as well, but she looked much better off than the rest of them, for obvious reasons. "Well... no. But we're close, though."

"We took a break?!" Coraline cried, and then doubled over, still getting her breath back. "Why?"

"He's going to get us!" Kai screamed, looking around as if hands were already reaching out for them from the darkness. And Kipo couldn't be one hundred percent sure that they weren't, so she looked around, too.

"We don't have time for this..." Kipo muttered, not accusing, but urgently.

"I stopped for a good reason," Tulip defended, she stepped aside, and despite the danger of the situation, she was immediately forgiven by everyone."We need this, don't we?"