WORD COUNT: 1,830
Eli was beginning to think that, maybe, this wasn't fake. He was beginning to think that maybe, just maybe, he wasn't dreaming. This much was incredibly difficult to believe, considering he was currently being lead through a magical forest by a purple-eyed video game wizard, but it was starting to become more and more real.
And that frightened Elijah to no extent.
Eli wasn't very accustomed to change, generally speaking: he hated change of any kind that he wasn't in complete control over, and seeing as he had no control, whatsoever, over any aspect of what was currently happening, he wasn't exactly thrilled (to say the least). The only thing that hadn't changed in the last hour was himself and Alex, so he had a lot to take in.
Now, if Alex was as concerned as Elijah, or at all, really, it wasn't showing. He just looked around in awe.
The forest that the group walked through was the same as a forest on Earth, when one looked at the 'big picture', but it was the details that fascinated Alex.
The variety of trees was much larger than that of Earth. No two trees seemed to be the same. They all seemed to have the same shape, the same way that all pine trees look mainly alike, but the details on the leaves and patterns in the bark of these trees were all beautifully unique. If Alex didn't have his glasses on, or maybe if he was standing at a greater distance, the two trees in front of him would look basically identical. Right then, though, Alex did have his glasses on. The tree on the left had spirals in its bark, and it's leaves all had vertical stripes in their pattern. The one on the right had the bark growing in horizontal lines rather than the vertical lines on Earth trees, and it's leaves were rather blank. Alex was properly intrigued, a certain glaze in his eyes that couldn't mean anything but pure amazement. It also meant that he was lost in thought, so to speak, and probably couldn't hear anything that anyone might be saying to him.
"So where are you guys from, anyway?" Amber asked, trying to follow Alex's line of vision and figure out what he was so entertained by.
"We're from Sacramento," Eli told her, and he saw the gears in Evalyn's head start to turn.
"That's in...California, right? No, wait-Nevada? No, I think I was right the first time. California?" Evalyn asked.
"Yeah. California," Eli replied slowly, "I forget you guys don't know anything about Earth. Well, I'm assuming you guys don't know anything about Earth?"
Amber opened her mouth to say something, and Evalyn put a hand on her arm.
"Should we tell them?" She asked Joan, who thought about it for a moment.
"I suppose it doesn't matter. Tell them, if you so please," He finally answered, hands behind his back in a professional manner that Elijah found infuriating.
"Well, to be completely honest-" Evalyn began, just as Joan came to a sharp halt and held a hand up, signaling for everyone to stop.
"I take it back, everybody shut up," Joan hissed, listening. At this, Alex zoned back in with a slightly startled "what?".
"Nobody move. Alejandro, Elijah, stay close," Joan whispered.
"Alright," Alex whispered back.
"Did you hear me, Elijah?" Joan asked, whispering slightly louder.
"Elijah?"
There was a crunching sound, and Joan turned around in alarm. The good news was, the sound had only been a twig breaking. The bad news was, it broke as a result of Eli taking off running in the direction they had come from.
"Elijah!" Alex called. Joan shushed him harshly, and Alex shushed him back with an unruly amount of sass.
If he couldn't call Elijah back, he'd just have to go after him.
Alex started running, chasing Eli down in hopes of bringing him back.
"Alejandro. Get back here, now," Joan insisted, but Alex kept running.
Eli ran as fast as his legs would take him. As soon as Joan held his hand up, Elijah knew he was in danger. Now, something funny about Elijah was that he had no fight or flight reflex. It was just "flight", in his mind.
Unfortunately for Elijah, Alex was taller and, therefore, faster than him, so Alex was able to catch up with him and tackle him to the ground.
"Dude, what the hell are you thinking?!" Alex asked scoldingly, waiting until Elijah stopped struggling before standing back up and brushing himself off.
"I'm getting out of here! I know there's a way to go back home. This isn't right. This place isn't real, it isn't safe, and I'm not going to stay here. Joan is going to drive me crazy, I feel like Amber is going to kill me any time she gets within, like, ten feet of me, and Eva is, like, scared of me or she hates me or something. I need to get back home before something happens, and so do you," Eli rambled, arms and hands flying around as if they made his point any clearer. Alex grabbed him by both wrists.
"Look, I get it. You're freaked out. I am, too. But-"
"Are you? Are you really freaked out? I don't think you are. You seem just freaking fine, to me. I don't think you get how serious this is. I told my mom and dad I'd be home by dinner. Your mom thinks we're upstairs, playing video games right now. What happens when one of your siblings walks into your room and doesn't see you there? What happens when your mom calls my mom and says we're both missing? What happens when we die here and nobody in the real world ever finds us or knows what the hell happened? What happens when-"
"Shut up!"
"Don't tell me to shut up, Alex, I swear to-"
"Shut. Up." Alex repeated, slapping a hand over Eli's mouth. Eli looked at him in alarm, eyes wide, while Alex looked in the direction that he had apparently heard something from.
"Did you hear that?" Alex whispered, taking his hand off of Eli's mouth. Eli shook his head feverishly. Alex listened for another second, and his eyes widened as Eli's had, a moment ago.
"Run!" He said suddenly, not letting Eli's left wrist go as he started running again. Eli had a very difficult time keeping up, but he did his best with the legs that he hadn't used for running since sophomore year PE.
"What are we running from?" Eli asked, out of breath already.
"I don't know," Alex replied honestly.
"Then why are we running?!" Eli demanded.
"Because we're in danger, idiot!" Alex yelled.
"You wanna know something really funny? We wouldn't be, if you hadn't tackled me! We could have been back home already!" Eli shouted.
"That's assuming you could even figure out how to teleport. Did you think we were just gonna walk back to Earth?" Alex shot back.
"Stop bickering, you guys are such an old, married couple! I'm coming up on your right, watch out," said Evalyn, easily catching up to Eli.
"We've taken out twelve of it's health points. Eight to go," He said informatively, and Eli didn't even bother asking, this time.
He couldn't, even if he had wanted to. He tripped in a valiant attempt to run faster, and he fell down, taking Joan (who had been right behind him) with him. As soon as Alex felt Eli's hand leave his own, he turned sharply with arms up, ready to throw a punch at someone (or something? He didn't quite know). It took Evalyn and Amber a second longer, but they stopped running as soon as they noticed the others had stopped.
"Oh, good. We lost it," Alex panted.
"I wouldn't be so sure about that. It's still here, I can tell, it's just...not somewhere we can see it," Joan said quietly, looking around slowly.
There was a moment of deadly silence before Amber ran forward, dragging Eli (who was still on the ground) harshly away.
"Hey, what-?!"
A wolf, just then, made itself visible, biting down on the air that would have been Eli's foot, had Amber not dragged him away.
Eli was so shocked, he didn't even have a chance to say anything before Joan was standing up and curling his fists at his sides.
Before his brain could catch up, Evalyn was standing in front of him protectively as she did a dance with her hands, successfully producing a ball of water between her palms. She looked at Joan dutifully as the wolf stood in front of them, growling with sharp teeth on full display. It stepped forward, slowly, and Evalyn dug her feet into the ground a little more.
"Are you ready?" She asked. Joan nodded, making his stance wider as he raised his hands, as well. His fingers sparked, and Eli scooted back as quickly as he could.
The ball grew bigger and bigger between Evalyn's hands, until finally, she threw it at the wolf with more force than seemed possible for someone Evalyn's size.
As soon as it hit the wolf, Joan ran as close as he could and held both hands out with palms facing the wolf as small shots of lightning shot out. The wolf shook uncontrollably, switching between looking real and looking like a block of large pixels. A bar appeared above the wolf's head with pixelated numbers under it. It started at 8/20, and continued to go down as the bar ran out of green, and Joan got closer and closer.
"Are they-"
"Electrocuting it? Yeah," Amber replied, arms folded as she backed up a little.
As soon as the health bar ran out completely and the number reached 0/20, the wolf fell over. It flashed white a few times before disappearing, and Joan looked disappointed.
"You just—did it die?" Eli asked, scrambling to his feet.
"It died," Joan confirmed, "And it dropped absolutely nothing but fifty experience points for me and fifty for Evalyn."
In white, pixelated font, +50 EXP appeared over both Joan and Evalyn's heads.
"You can make lightning with—you killed it with—by electrocution?" Eli asked, amazed. He almost forgot why he had tried to run.
"Yes. I have lightning powers, but only if I'm within three feet of the target," Joan confirmed.
"That is so...crazy. You three are the weirdest people I've ever met," Alex said, wide eyes looking down at the dirt where the wolf had been.
"You don't know that. There are a lot of extremely weird people that never let it show. Everybody is weird, it's only a matter of who's brave enough to be proud of it," Joan replied, "Now let's not get distracted. We still have a destination, and a long walk. And I would appreciate it if nobody tried to run away, this time."