Hours of walking through the mist had made all four high schoolers dejected. They were yet to find any signs of life. Scattered across the purple dust of this strange place were nothing but skeletons of creatures that didn't exist anywhere on Earth.
Earlier, Erin had stumbled upon the remains of a creature. Everytime she saw something strange, her heart skipped a beat, making the pulsing even stronger, and it pierced into her skin making it itch. She already put two and two together; the mark reacts to her emotion. Fear was the highest factor, because it had been pulsing ever since she discovered it. She was scared.
The jagged rocks with weird formations did nothing to explain the planet's geometry. Rocks floated and swirled around each other in a specific pattern, something they didn't see every day. Liam had been trying to come up with the best possible explanation for this, but his genius was only limited to Earth's physics.
"Would you stop doing that?!" Erin barked at Liam, who had crouched for the nth time, trying to study the rock formations. "You're slowing us down. You better not be the reason I don't get to get out of here or—"
"Or what, Erin? What are you gonna do?" Liam snapped, cutting her short. He glanced at her for a millisecond, then back at the little rocks swirling in their pattern.
Jay, who had been settling fights since they arrived here, facepalmed hard. Controlling Erin and Liam seemed like an even harder job than trying to make it to class early.
Erin took a step toward Liam, fists clenched and a mouth about to run wild. "Where'd you think you are? Your luxury mansion? You keep slowing us down, you're gonna get us killed, so get up and walk!" The red mark on her arm began to glow, but no one noticed it, except Eira.
Liam stood up slowly. Erin had just barked an order at him, and he wasn't one to take orders from anyone. He wasn't backing down.
"I don't take orders from you, Stub Queen."
Erin's expression shifted. It turned gore. 'How does he know?'
Stub Queen was the nickname Erin had earned as a result of her renowned reputation for stubbing her toe. She had earned the nickname during summer camp when she was 14 years old. Her pinky toe came into a hard, crunching contact with a tortoise's shell, almost shattering it. That day was the birth of the Stub Queen. But what she didn't know was how well known that name had become.
"Stub Queen?" Jayden chuckled. Eira just stood beside him, motionless, like a statue in the museum. She wasn't enjoying the bickering coming from the duo.
Up ahead, just a few meters from their position, was a small cave. Eira was the first to spot it, and she quickly alerted the group. All four made their way to the cave, with Jayden taking the lead. He scoped out the place before giving the signal that it was safe.
"We should stay outside the cave. It's safer that way. We don't know what's in there, and we do NOT want to find out," Liam suggested. It was a thoughtful idea.
"Wow!" Erin exclaimed sarcastically. "I didn't know you could think."
Liam shot her a death stare, fire blazing in his eyes like a predator watching its prey, but Erin couldn't care less. She walked by him, unbothered and uncaring.
They settled in, sitting in a round formation. The planet's temperature had dropped drastically, and due to the absence of the sun, it would only be a matter of time before they started freezing and Jayden knew it.
"We need to make a fire," Jayden suggested. Eira, who had been quiet most of the time, objected almost instantly.
"No! Fire attracts them."
"Attracts what? There's nothing out here, just sand and three extremely infuriating humans." Erin groaned as she sat on the damp floor. Liam simply rolled his eyes, and Jayden cleared his throat before continuing.
"Whatever is out there, it's far away. We covered a reasonable distance away from it, and we need fire or we'll freeze to death."
"No, you're not listening—" Eira tried to argue, but Jayden wasn't having it. He had already made up his mind, and he had the support of Liam and Erin.
"What is your problem, Eira? First, you seem to know a lot about this place, and you've been acting really weird ever since we got here. Excuse me for saying this, but I think you brought us here."
Liam blurted out those words in a matter of seconds. Everywhere went quiet. Erin's brow furrowed; she thought about it for a second and found a bit of sense in Liam's words. Eira had first mysteriously shown up at the library, then they were transported through space, and probably through time. She had also magically appeared out of nowhere through the mist, seemed to know a lot about this place. That screamed suspicious.
Jayden stepped in front of Eira, shielding her from Liam's venomous accusation. "Leave her alone. She's just as confused,like the rest of us. She's scared just like the rest of us. Look at her."
"Regardless, we need a fire." Jayden turned to Eira, placing a firm hand on her shoulder. "Look, I know you're scared. We all are but everything is going to be okay. We'll find a way out of here eventually."
With that, he walked off to gather wood to make a fire. Eira just stood there, scared as hell. Erin sat on the scorched dust, rocking back and forth. Her parents were probably already at her house. She wished she could see the looks on their faces when they realized she had disappeared. Maybe then they'd start caring about her existence, but she wouldn't count on it.
Liam brushed Eira off as paranoid. Even though he had also heard the growl from the mist, he chose to be ignorant about the whole thing.
But the thing is, Eira wasn't just being paranoid for nothing, because on the far side of the planet, a tall humanoid figure emerged from a cave.
Its face was pale. Thick scales ran across its body, covering every inch of its being. Sharp, pointy ears like those of a bat stretched out, and it had abnormally long legs. It emerged from the cave, sniffing the air around it. It picked up a scent, and like a human, its lips slowly curled into a smile.
All of a sudden, the creature started to shift. Its body broke down and rebuilt itself. It began taking a more human-like shape until it became completely human, not just any human. It became Erin. The creature had morphed itself into an exact replica of Erin.
"Pretty," it growled, its voice deep and echoing inside the cave.
The creature took its time to admire its shape. After a while, it moved, heading in the same direction the group had taken a few hours ago. In its line of sight, it had its gaze focused on a strange purple energy, swirling around a figure, the energy radiating was powerful, intense, alluring. That power was Erin.