beware of whispering falls-the rhythm of the drums

4. the story of the Pines

3rd PoV
"WAIT! COME BACK!", John called put.

William was surprisingly fast, none of the others could catch up with him. And then he was gone.

Off into the forest.

Shelly turned to Gideon. She still hadn't really processed what happened.

"What was that?...why did you choose this joke for him?", she asked.

"His parents died recently! I guess I didn't think this through, though...", the white haired boy admitted.

"He ran into the forest. HE RAN INTO THE FOREST! We killed him!", John cried out.

"Nobody needs to know.", Anni said.

Then they just left.

PoV Bill
I was really worried. Will had left hours ago and he wasn't the type of guy who doesn't answer texts for hours.

"Bill, where's William?", Asked uncle Tad.

"I don't know, why?", I asked. I had hoped he knew.

"I thought he might have come home and forgot to tell me. He went away with some friends. ", Tad explained.

Oh, I remember. I didn't want to join, because I wanted to talk to Chill about Will being bullied.

"Wills getting bullied. Maybe they ran into Gideon.", I thought out loud.

"Gideon? That kids weird. Always has been, but especially since the disappearing of the Pines family. He was in love with the girl.", Tad shrugged.

"What girl? You never told us about this.",now I was interested.

Tad explained:
"The Pines were real nice people, they lived in the forest. They ran some tourist trap. One day, they were gone. People say they found something supernatural and it ate them. A few days after their disappearing the fog started and the forest became evil. Their two employees, Wendy and Soos, went to search for the Pines."

"What happened to them?", I asked, horrified.

"They never returned. The forest swallowed them.", Tad sighed.

"I'll go look for Will.", I said, grabbing a flashlight.

"I'm coming with you.", My uncle grabbed a flashlight too.

Then we went outside.

~~~~
"John? What happened.", I asked.

"Nothing.", the boy squeaked.

"John, let them in!", I heard a woman call.

John sighed and let us enter.

We took our shoes off and led him lead us to what seemed to be the living room.

"Good evening Tad, what brought you here tonight? It's pretty late.", a short woman greeted my uncle.

"Good evening Beatrice. I would prefer not to disturb you at such a late hour, but my nephew left with your son today and didn't come back. We were hoping to find him here.", explained Tad.

The woman, Beatrice, looked behind us with an intense stare.

Suddenly John burst out: "It was all Gideons idea! We didn't know it would make him go into a panic attack!"

"What did you do?!", I cried out.

"Gideon put him into an empty grave, but we pulled him out again and we tried to comfort him, but he didn't even hear!", John explained.

I gasped and if Tad didn't hold me ,I would have attacked John.

"Where is he now?", asked Tad.

"He ran into the forest...", John finally replied.

Tad turned pale.