What is happening? Where is she? And how is she doing it?
"Ohh, Travis, fuck..."
The boy collapsed beside Jackie, panting as he covered his body with the blanket lying beside them. Despite how good it was to finally experience sex with someone, the boy felt guilty about what he just did. Soon, regrets will follow and haunt him.
Jackie dressed up immediately. Contrary to what she thought she would feel after losing her virginity, a wave of emptiness hit her like a speeding truck instead of feeling like she was on cloud nine.
She didn't feel fulfilled. She felt dirty.
It felt wrong.
"We disappeared though, right?" Jackie heard Travis whisper.
The girl stared at Travis quietly, her eyes blank, while her mind was full of incoherent thoughts. Suddenly, Jackie shifted her gaze to the attic's window.
"Someone's watching," Jackie said, getting a little dizzy but refusing to lay down beside Travis.
Jackie stood up, leaving Travis alone in the attic, and went down to exit the cabin.
She could see them clearly. She could feel what they were feeling. She could hear what they were thinking.
The view then changed to Natalie, who was wandering in the woods alone with nothing accompanying her but her thoughts about Travis and her feelings toward the boy.
She failed to realize a little earlier that he had left with Jackie. And if Travis left with Jackie, of all the people with them, she already knew what would happen next.
Natalie's hatred for the girl grew intense. She wanted to find the two and shoot them both with her rifle. But she shook that thought off her mind quickly and tried to focus on her surroundings.
Because as she took another step forward, her vision started to get blurry and a little distorted.
The girl did her best to stand firmly, a hand leaning on a tree, to help balance her whole body and not fall down. She then closed her eyes, shaking her head repeatedly, attempting to collect herself.
But as she opened her eyes once again, Natalie stared intently at what's in front of her, as if she were looking at someone, confused but certain she was being watched.
"Who are you?"
They could see her. But why did Natalie not recognize her?
Before she could even dare to do anything, it felt like she was pulled by a strong force of wind and thrown somewhere else. Her sight then caught something else.
There was Ben. He was already on the ground, terrified and struggling.
He has to get as far away as possible from Misty.
Ben was certain that the girl poisoned him again because that's the only possible explanation why his body is not acting normally and he can't think clearly. All he knew was that he should move while he could.
So he did. He crawled and just continued crawling, and he had no intention of stopping as long as he could still move.
Ben feels it. He's in danger. From Misty? Maybe. But something inside him is telling him he's not safe and he has to save himself.
When he raised his head, looking up and fixing his eyes on the sky and couldn't help but plead upon seeing something.
"Help me."
There it is again. The wind that's keeping her away from everyone is pulling her before she could even do something.
Everything was a little clearer as she roamed her eyes around, seeing the whole surrounding area of the larger view.
"I feel weird," Javi, who was laying on the ground and staring at nothingness, mumbled.
"Me too," says Laura Lee, then sits down slowly and rests her head on her knees.
"Where is everyone?" Mari asked, looking around but failing to see a clear vision of the area as things were a little distorted.
"Coach left earlier. He looked scared," responded Crystal, staring at the fire.
"Natalie too. I think she was crying," Mel said in a low voice.
"Maybe because Travis and Jackie left together," added Gen, her gaze focused on the dried leaf she was holding.
"They left together?" Taissa asked, attempting to stand up but failing and falling down once again.
"I saw them leaving after the first dance," Akilah answered.
"Jackie did it again, didn't she?" Van said, a hint of sarcasm in her voice.
Shauna, who was still conscious enough to hear the conversation going around, finally spoke. "They're not doing anything wrong."
But the girl knows that her best friend was wrong. She knew what Jackie was planning to do, but she didn't stop her. Guilt and regret washed over her as she thought of Natalie.
"What are they doing?" Javi asked.
"Should we find them?" Yumi suggested, her eyes looking different for some reason.
The view changed a little. This time, it was focused on the girl who was wearing a pink dress, which was now covered in dirt after lying on the ground for too long.
"No. We don't don't have to," said Lottie. "She's almost here."
Jackie appeared. Her hair was disheveled, as were her clothes. But the girl couldn't care less.
Lottie watched Jackie as she joined them, then darted her eyes at everyone as she spoke.
"We must prepare for the upcoming catastrophe."
Everyone's attention was on Lottie, listening to every word she said and waiting for the next.
"Tonight, we hunt. Tomorrow, we will feast."
And so they begin. Everyone, except Javi, stood up. All struggling to get up but determined.
Misty's eyes landed on the spear on the table, picking it without wasting a second as she led the group into the woods.
The moon is in its fullest form. Its light was what guided them in the dark woods. She knew she was supposed to do something else. But what was it exactly? All she knows is that they need her at the moment. And that is what matters.
If Lottie says they should start to hunt, then she would gladly follow. That's what she's good at. That's what they wanted her to do. That's what they all expect her to do. Because if she was no use to them, they would not even spare a glance over her. She's either nothing or a good follower.
Everybody halted when they saw something.
An elk. One that is helplessly struggling in front of them. Too injured to move and run away from the grim fate awaiting it.
They approached the poor animal slowly and gently, kind enough to not daunt it more.
Misty moved closer, checking the elk carefully, and watched silently as it tried to flee by trying to get up, then simply crawled as it failed to do so.
"Do it," she heard Lottie whisper in her ear.
The elk then let out a bugling sound. Her grip on the spear tightened even more as her hunger to prove herself grew intensely.
"It's fine. Don't hold back."
And with Lottie's words, Misty finally raised the spear and stabbed the injured elk on the ground with all the strength she had, its sharp end piercing its stomach. Blood coming out of the hole she made flowed as she removed and pulled the long shaft off the elk's body.
Their shared moment of silence after that ended shortly. Overlapping howls echoed in the wilderness.
The girls froze in fear upon hearing them, but Lottie was quick to encourage the group again before they could succumb to it.
"We need to hunt more."
For some reason, they were easily swayed by the girl's words.
None of them asked anything. None of them questioned her. Nobody dared to defy Lottie.
And to make sure that the wolves would start to think that they were a bunch of weak prey, Van howled. The girl howled aggressively as if she were one of their kind, as if she wanted to tell them she was much bigger and stronger than them, that she was superior.
It was then followed by more howling and growling from the girls as they ran to the cabin.
There, they found another prey to hunt. A stag that was standing right in front of their home, like it had been waiting for them.
It made a noise as if it were talking to them. But whatever it was trying to tell them, they didn't understand. They could tell its gaze fell on Misty, particularly on the bloodied spear.
And as if the animal were actually a thinking being, it suddenly ran.
So they follow it, not having the slightest intention of letting it go.
Their chase was quite difficult. The large roots of the trees were a huge hindrance for them, and they all struggled to run faster.
A rustling sound of leaves was heard on the side as they ran after the stag, but it seemed like Shauna was the only one to notice it. She stopped for a while to check the source of it and was slightly shocked to see a white rabbit hiding behind the bushes. But she couldn't bear to raise her knife and kill it.
Instead, she simply warned the harmless creature, as if it knew what she meant by her words.
"Run!"
When Shauna managed to catch up to the group, they were gathered at the place where they came from.
The unconscious stag was now being pinned to the tree stump while Lottie watched them intently as she put the antlers again over her head.
"What about the fox?" Yumi asked, pointing at the sleeping red fox.
It wasn't injured. They were sure of it. But what's a fox doing in their territory? How long has it been there?
"Tie it to that tree. Surround its body with firewood," Lottie says without hesitation.
Yumi smiled evilly. For some reason, she was so happy to oblige with Lottie's orders that she didn't waste any seconds and did what she was told to do.
"Shauna," she said, then called Shauna's attention, gesturing for the girl to come closer. "You know what to do."
Of course, she does. She has to drain its blood first. That's the first step to butchering.
The sharp edge of the knife was already on the stag's throat, but she couldn't focus properly. Her hand was shaking a little, and her vision was slightly changing from a stag to something else.
Lottie's sudden scream didn't help either and ruined her concentration even more.
"NO!" Lottie warned Yumi. "The fox is not yours to kill."
She then roamed her eyes at her surroundings, calling for someone she felt was the right person to do the task.
"Jackie," Lottie said in a solemn voice, walking towards one of the torches to get it, then handing it to the girl after. "It has to be you. It chose you, didn't it?"
The girl accepted the torch from Lottie's hold obediently, like she was in a trance and under a spell that she couldn't simply refuse whatever Lottie ordered her to do.
And with that, Jackie lights up the firewood surrounding the tree where the red fox was tied, using the torch that Lottie passed onto her.
This can't happen. She can't just let it happen. She must do something.
A cold breeze was felt in the whole area. One that was enough to weaken the fire that Jackie started.
Agami, who had been unconscious, for she didn't know how long, opened her eyes. The first sight she had to see was Travis being held by Mari and Akilah, with Shauna standing in front and a knife on the boy's already bleeding throat.
She was about to run towards them when she realized something. She couldn't move. Her body was tied to a tree.
Agami's eyes widened after seeing the fire circling around her. The next thing she felt was heat in her lower body. The kind of heat that burns. Her eyes then shifted to her left side.
There was Yumi and Jackie.
"Taylor?" she asked in confusion, her eyes fixed on the glowing torch that Jackie was holding.
That's when Agami started to feel the pain.
"Fuck!" she yelped.
None of the girls showed an interest in helping her.
"It burns! Fucking hell! It burns!"
Her scream was loud, but no one budged from her plea, as if they were intentionally ignoring her.
Until a figure emerged from the woods who couldn't help but stare in horror at what's happening before her. The sight of Travis close to being killed in Shauna's hand and Agami being burned alive.
"What the fuck?" she asked, evidently terrified.
Natalie rushed first to where Travis was, hitting Shauna's arms with enough force for the woman to lose her grip on the knife. She immediately picked it up and went straight in Agami's direction, cutting the rope they used to tie the girl and helping her friend put down the fire that had already caught on the bottom hem of her trouser.
After that, Natalie went back to the boy, pulling him away from the girls and hiding him behind her as she pointed the knife at Shauna. She wouldn't hesitate to use it if one of them dared to pull another stunt.
Jackie, who seemed to be in a better state and could see her surroundings better than earlier, let go of the torch she was holding. She tried to get closer to Agami, who was now down on the ground and coughing heavily from the smoke she inhaled. But she was immediately stopped by Natalie who greeted her with a hard slap on the face.
"Stay the fuck away!" warned Natalie.
Jackie didn't dare fight. That would be too much.
"But she doesn't matter anymore!" Lottie let out a laughter that enveloped the whole quiet but full of tension night of the wilderness, looking at Jackie and her stained dress, then back at Natalie.
"She claimed something that didn't belong to her!"
"Fucking stop, Lottie! Haven't you done enough!?" Natalie screamed at the girl.
Their argument was interrupted when Agami walked past them, leaving, and started to run into the deeper part of the night woods holding the same torch that Jackie used to light her up.
"Agami!" Natalie tried to call the girl back.
But Agami didn't look back. She just continued to run.
So Natalie simply kept her eyes on the girls, Lottie specifically, and still had the knife pointing towards them as she pulled Travis away.
"Stay away from us!"
The only place Natalie could think of was the cabin.
When she and Travis arrived back at their wooden shelter, Natalie didn't think twice about locking the door and windows, making sure that none of them would be able to get in.
She didn't have the luxury of worrying about others' safety. All she had on her mind right now was Travis, who still had blood on his neck from the small cut that Shauna made, and how the boy looked like he was still a little delirious.
And with the rifle in her hand as she sat behind the door, Natalie lost her consciousness, with fear crawling through her mind and body for the first time since their crash.