Chapter 4: Chapter 03- There Are More

"We need help, guys! There's a bus of people."

"A bus?! How many?"

"There's twenty at least, but there was an accident, and a few are injured."

"Todd's getting the horses hitched to the wagons right now!"

It was a mess. People were frantic and gathering supplies. Two of the people had blood on their shirts and seemed to be recruiting others. Then there were another two that looked pale. Their clothes also had a distinctly 'newer' feel to them.

"Anabelle!" someone called out. 

We turned toward the young man who ran out of the crowd. He was wearing an old leather jacket that had been patched up in numerous places. His light shirt had dark splatters over it. It made me think he was a careless painter. The other thing about him was how unnaturally white his hair appeared. If this were a magical world, this wouldn't be so strange, but in a low magic, Earth-like one? Curious.

There seemed to be something strange with the way his face sat on top of its neck—as if someone had placed his head atop another body. Though I could only stare for mere seconds before more people flooded our view, those moments did nothing to lessen my curiosity or suspicion. 

"Lorio! More people have arrived?" Anabelle asked, her voice growing more frantic by the second.

"Yeah, a whole bus full," Lorio said. Then he looked at me. "Who is that, Anabelle? Is she from the bus?"

One of the pale young men walked up. "No, I didn't see her on the bus! She's not part of our group!"

Anabelle stood between the crowd and me. "Everyone, please calm down. This is Mari. I found her in the woods. She was wandering around and then found the totem."

Lorio nodded at Anabelle, and then at me. "I'm sorry. Truly. Anabelle, we're going to go get the people at the bus. Some of them are trapped. It was a real bad accident."

"Okay, what do you need me to do?"

"Just be ready with Doc to receive some banged-up people."

"Of course!"

Lorio looked at me once more. "Sorry, Mari. We'll give you an orientation once we solve this problem."

I waved his concern away. "Don't even worry. These poor people take precedence. Is there anything I can do to help?"

Lorio and Anabelle shared uneasy looks, with Anabelle lightly shaking her head. "Mist is already creeping into the forest," she said.

"I know," Lorio said, an anguished look on his face. He grunted and then looked at me. "I'll take all the help I can get."

"Lorio," Anabelle said, taking a step away from us.

"This is better. The more help we have, the faster we can leave the forest."

Anabelle said nothing in response and, instead, shot me an apologetic look.

"Okay, Mari," Lorio said. "We're rounding up some wagons. We're going to take off quickly and save some folks. Thanks for signing on." He stuck out his hand.

I glanced at some of the villagers who were paying attention to us. Some couldn't make eye contact with me while others whispered amongst themselves.

"Yeah..." I took his hand. "I'm always happy to help."

***

On a Mission

 

Three wagons pulled by two horses each were leaving the town down an old dirt road. I was on one wagon along with Lorio and four others. Two were the pale young men from the bus, and two were gruff villagers. The other two wagons had two people each. Lorio was our coachman, and we five were the passengers exchanging uneasy looks.

It looked to me like the gruff villagers were sizing up the newcomers. I was sitting on the side with the villagers... For whatever reason, it looked like I wasn't under the same level of scrutiny. Maybe it was because of the way I arrived?

The villager next to me shifted in his seat. His name was 'Rigs' and he was a stern-faced muscular man who wore long pants that looked like they were custom-made for him. The shirt he wore was beat-up and stained, and looked like it was on the verge of tearing. He had a light beard and thick eyebrows. The creases on his face accentuated his stare, intensifying it. The newcomers were terrified of him. They weren't breathing easily. It was a little funny.

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Next to Rigs was an even bigger villager, Pitter. His hair was short, tidy, and clean compared to Rigs's. His face was also more rectangular, his nose standing out more. That was what reliability looked like. He looked like a jolly man too. I was sure he hadn't stopped smiling since getting on the wagon. Maybe it was an intimidation tactic.

Across from us were the two scrawny boys. Actually, maybe they were young men? The two masses of muscle next to me were amusingly throwing off my standards.

Anyway, one of the young men was called Paulie, while the other boy had introduced himself as Jackson. Both had pretty normal names. I had kind of forgotten what Earth names sounded like until I heard theres. 

Paulie was a lean man with glasses. Scruffy stubble covered his chin, but his skin wasn't very healthy-looking. He didn't look like someone that went to bed early enough at night. His parents should really get on that.

Jackson was skinny too, though in different, almost pitiful ways. Unlike Paulie, his cheeks were sunken into hollows. You could see every bone in his face if you looked closely enough. He had large ears and eyes that bulged outwards when he talked. Maybe he had once been told to emote with his eyes? It was a little unsettling. 

They were both pale and emaciated-looking. I had heard they were on a bus, but were they being starved? Were they on some kind of pilgrimage?

I glanced at the healthy villagers. Surely they had questions for the pair.

"So boys," Rigs said. "You had an accident?"

Excellent. Rigs was asking. Thank you, Rigs.

"We did, sir," Jackson replied, unable to keep eye contact for more than a few seconds at a time. 

"You look, terrible kid." Rigs stroked his chin. "You see something that shake ya?"

Jackson 's eyes bulged for a moment before he shook his head. "No sir... I didn't see anything."

Rigs chuckled. "Really? I heard someone got impaled by a spear."

A spear? That was unexpected. Did someone bring a spear? Did they think they were going to go spearfishing? I turned my attention back to Rigs. I was curious as to what he was thinking and watched him continue to lay his trap.

"You didn't see that?" Rigs asked. "What it looks like when someone gets a piece of metal through their gut? That's pretty traumatic for anyone, isn't it, Pitter?"

"For wee lads like these? I'd be concerned if they weren't shaken."

"I mean... I did see how Mister Tolk looked. There was a lot of blood," Jackson said, gulping as soon as he could.

"You saw it, so why did you say you didn't see anything? Did you assume I was talking about a particular sort of 'anything,' Jackson ?"

"We didn't see anything," Paulie said, his voice cracking and his hands trembling. "We didn't see anything... but the bus driver and the people in the front seats said they did."

Rigs raised a brow. Lorio, too, leaned back and listened in.

"Yeah... and I'm guessing this led to the accident..." Rigs leaned closer to the pair. "You boys up for telling us how that accident happened?"

Paulie gulped. "It had been raining, so the road wasn't the safest--"

"Rain?" I asked, feeling like I could get involved and get my curiosity answered. "It was overcast, but I think I'd notice if it was raining."

Rigs nodded at me. "Don't worry, Miss. It's this place and where they entered from. It's very possible for their group to experience rain while you got overcast skies, even though we're all so close."

"Hmm... Curious... Rigs, was it? Thank you for that answer."

"No problem." He looked at the boys. "You might not think it, but I've got everyone's interests at heart."

"Thank you, sir," Paulie said.

"Tell us more. I want to know what we're walking into, and I want to know why we're helping a busload of people that shouldn't be here."

Well, that was a little more aggressive than I expected. Surprisingly, Paulie seemed to take it the way Rigs needed him to.

"Right... We were just people that were on tour... We just wanted to see the mountains where the haunted village was said to be hidden... It was just supposed to be a simple weekend trip with maybe one night of camping if the weather was good for it... But it just..." Paulie shook his head. "It just spiraled out of control so quickly..."

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