VANITAS

PART 1

☾

"Watch out!" My voice cracked embarrassingly as I pointed toward the shadowy woods ahead. "The troll's coming!"

We tore through the trees, shoes squelching against wet ground. I glanced back at my friends—my real party, better than any RPG could create. Wei wielded his branch-turned-battle-axe with the precise movements of someone who'd practiced the motion, probably calculated the exact angle for maximum impact. Austin trailed behind us, his customized black-and-silver boots somehow dodging every mud puddle, as if dirt wouldn't dare mess with his aesthetic.

"Let him come," Wei said, pushing his glasses up with his sleeve—never his fingers, those had to stay clean. "Statistically speaking, the probability of an actual troll encounter is—"

"Wei!" I shot him a look, fighting back a grin. "We're in the middle of a campaign, man! Save the math for after the holidays."

Austin's laugh carried that edge of sarcasm he used like armor. "You know how he gets, Theo. Everything's a formula." He flicked a leaf from his shoulder, black-painted nails catching what little light filtered through the canopy. "Even trolls can't escape the power of statistics."

Wei swung his branch toward Austin, movements precise, calculated. "Careful, the probability of your survival just dropped by exactly 37.5%." His voice carried that slight accent he usually suppressed, slipping out when he got excited.

Austin ducked with practiced grace, the kind that came from years of avoiding his father's disapproving glares. "Whoa, man! Save it for the troll!" His grin flickered—quick, defensive, a shield I'd learned to recognize.

Our laughter scattered through the trees, mixing with rustling leaves and snapping twigs. For a moment, we were just us—no expectations, no pressure. Out here, I didn't have to compete with my brother Sebastian's perfect grades. Wei didn't have to prove himself to anyone. And Austin... Austin could just be Austin, without his dad's constant judgment about how a "real man" should act.

The game was our escape: me as the rogue (because leaders were supposed to be confident, right?), Wei our master of spells (though he treated magic like complex equations), and Austin our bard (naturally—he had that way of making everything seem effortless, even when I knew it wasn't). We were the misfits who found each other, battling imaginary monsters because the real ones were too hard to face.

But then—a sharp crack echoed from deeper in the woods. Not part of our script. Not part of our safe space.

We froze. My stomach knotted as I scanned the darkening trees. The summer air had turned heavy, like it always did before a storm, but this felt different. Wrong.

"Did you hear that?" I whispered. The words came out smaller than I meant them to, betraying the anxiety I usually tried to hide.

Austin moved nearer, the familiar scent of his cologne—wood and spice—briefly cutting through the damp air. His grin wavered, but his voice stayed steady, protective."Maybe it's just a squirrel? Or... a bear?" The joke fell flat, his usual sarcasm cracking at the edges.

Wei, though—Wei didn't stop moving. His hands tightened around his branch, knuckles white. "There's a high chance it's just an animal," he said, words precise and measured. But I caught the way his eyes darted around, cataloging escape routes like he'd done ever since that incident in middle school.

The air grew thicker, colder. Shadows stretched between trees like grasping fingers, and I found myself stepping closer to Austin. Not because I was scared, I told myself. Just because... well, because that's what friends did. Right?

"Wei..." My voice caught. "I think our probability just changed."

A gust of wind whipped through the trees, carrying the sharp, metallic scent of approaching rain. Above us, clouds had gathered—dark, angry things that hadn't been there minutes ago. Weather changed fast in Aves Grove, but this... this felt orchestrated. Like something was pulling strings we couldn't see.

"Guys?" I swallowed hard, trying to sound braver than I felt. "That storm they mentioned on the news? I think it's coming early."

The playfulness drained from the moment like air from a punctured balloon. Wei and Austin exchanged glances—the kind that made my chest ache because I could never quite decode them. They stashed their "weapons" under our usual oak, the one with initials carved so old they'd grown illegible.

"Anyone want to come over for dinner?" I asked, trying to fill the growing silence. "Mom's making spaghetti." The invitation tumbled out automatically—my default response to tension, offering food and shelter like some sort of teenage innkeeper.

Wei's expression tightened in that specific way it did when he had to say no. "Can't. Restaurant tonight." Three words that carried the weight of a thousand expectations. Every time his parents mentioned 'family responsibility,' another piece of him seemed to disappear behind statistics and facts.

Thunder rolled across the sky, closer than any of us expected. Wei flinched—a tiny movement he tried to hide by adjusting his glasses. The woods held its breath, waiting.

"Let's get moving," Austin said quietly, his usual smirk nowhere to be found. His voice had that same tight quality it got when his dad started talking about 'manning up' at dinner. I wanted to reach for his hand, offer some comfort, but I knew better. Some things we just didn't do, even as best friends.

Another rumble, louder this time. The sharp tang of ozone filled the air, making my skin prickle.

"Shit, we should hurry," Austin muttered, rubbing his hands together—a nervous habit he'd picked up last year. His black nails flashed in the fading light. He’d been biting them again—something he only did when things got bad at home.

"We're almost home," I said, aiming for calm but missing by a mile. The knot in my stomach twisted tighter with each gust of wind. Sebastian would know what to do—my perfect older brother always did. But Sebastian wasn't here. Just me, trying to lead when I barely knew which way was up.

"About dinner, I—"

A sudden gust cut me off, whipping leaves into our faces. The forest itself seemed to be pushing us out, each blast of wind more insistent than the last. We picked up the pace without discussion, hunching forward against the growing storm. The soft rustling of leaves had transformed into an angry hiss, punctuated by the harsh cries of crows overhead.

Wei stumbled slightly, his usually precise movements thrown off. I caught his arm automatically, steadying him. He didn't pull away immediately—a testament to how far we'd come since sixth grade, when he wouldn't let anyone touch him, period.

Something cold brushed against my other hand. Austin, his fingers seeking mine in the growing darkness. The gesture surprised me—he never reached out first, too wrapped up in his own carefully constructed walls. His eyes met mine, wide and uncertain, filled with a vulnerability I rarely saw.

"Did you see that?" Wei's voice cut through the wind, higher than usual, his accent more pronounced with fear.

We followed his gaze, and there it was: a deer, standing motionless at the forest's edge. But wrong. All wrong.

The creature's outline shimmered like a mirage, its antlers traced with something dark that could have been running water—or blood. The rain seemed to bend around it, creating a perfect circle of dry earth at its hooves. But it was its eyes that sent ice through my veins. Not the soft brown of a normal deer, but familiar eyes. Human eyes.

"Great, Wei," Austin spat, but his fingers tightened around mine, betraying his fear. "Unless Bambi there knows a shortcut home—"

Lightning split the sky. In that fraction of second of harsh white light, the deer... changed. Its form stretched and twisted, antlers becoming fingers, spine elongating impossibly. And those eyes—God, those eyes.

"Guys," I whispered, my voice barely audible over the wind, "I don't think that's a deer. I think... I think it's trying to tell us something."

Wei nodded slowly, his free hand moving to his pocket where he kept his lucky coin—a gift from his grandmother in China, the last thing she gave him before returning home. "It's... it's like it's waiting for us." His analytical mind struggled visibly with what we were seeing. "The probability of a deer behaving this way is... is..."

Austin tugged at my arm, his black-painted nails digging into my skin. "I don't care what it is. We need to go. Now." But even as he spoke, I saw his eyes widen with recognition.

When I looked back again, it was gone. But something pulled us forward, toward where it had stood. Toward what waited for us in the darkness beyond.

We ran, the wind whipping our clothes into frenzied wings. Austin moved with his usual grace, but I could see the strain in his shoulders—the way he held himself like he was expecting a blow. Wei kept pace beside us, his breaths coming in measured counts: in for four, out for four, the way his mom had taught him to manage anxiety.

The rain hit like needles, each drop a tiny accusation: You shouldn't be here. You should have left earlier. You should have known better. The kind of thoughts that usually kept me awake at night, now given voice by the storm.

"Shit!"

Austin’s shout cut through the storm, louder than the wind. I spun around just in time to see him collapse into the mud, his leg buckling like something had snapped. The crack of his fall echoed through me, the sound harsh and wrong, and for a second, I couldn’t breathe.

His voice came next—raw, guttural, so unlike the Austin who always had a sarcastic comeback. "Fuck, fuck..." He gasped, clutching his knee. Pain twisted his face, washing away the usual cool, leaving something raw and scared.

"Damn it, are you having a seizure?" Wei's voice cracked, his usual statistical certainty crumbling. Behind his rain-streaked glasses, I caught a flash of the scared kid who'd hidden in the library during his first week in Aves Grove.

"No, you idiot, I tripped!" Austin snarled, but the words had no bite. He clutched his knee, face contorted in pain. Rain plastered his carefully styled hair to his forehead, washing away the façade he worked so hard to maintain. For a moment, he looked younger, more like the boy who'd once cried in the locker room after his dad missed another school play.

I dropped to my knees beside him, the cold mud seeping through my jeans, but I barely noticed. All I could see was Austin—his usually confident, sarcastic face now twisted in pain. A gash ran down his knee, deep and raw, blood already mixing with the dirt. His designer jeans were ripped, but right now, none of that cool, effortless Austin was left. Just pain.

"This fucking sucks," he choked, his voice shaky, trying for a joke but failing miserably. His hand found mine, gripping harder than I expected, his nails biting into my skin like he was holding on for dear life.

With shaking hands, I pressed my jacket against the wound. "You're bleeding bad," I said, fighting to keep my voice steady. Sebastian would know what to do. Sebastian always knew. But I wasn't Sebastian, and right now, Austin needed me, not my perfect brother.

Austin's face was pale beneath his freckles—the ones he usually covered with concealer but were now visible in the rain. He tried to push my hands away, a lifetime of 'man up' conditioning warring with pain. "We'll deal with it at home," he gasped. But his eyes darted around, wide and unfocused, like a trapped animal's.

I hauled him up, feeling him trembling against me. He leaned into my support more than he ever would in daylight, when appearances mattered and walls stayed firmly in place. His breath came in short, sharp pants against my neck.

We took a stumbling step forward, but something felt... wrong. The hairs on my neck stood up, a chill that had nothing to do with the rain running down my spine.

That's when I noticed Wei. He stood frozen, staring into the gloom, his back to us. Wei was never still—even during tests, his pencil would tap exact rhythms, counting prime numbers under his breath. This stillness was wrong. This stillness was terror.

"Wei?" My voice sounded distant, like it belonged to someone else.

"Wei, seriously, we gotta—" Austin started, but his voice died in his throat. "Theo... look."

The mud seemed to grab at my feet as I followed Wei's gaze, each step an eternity. Austin's grip on my shoulder tightened, his nails digging in through my soaked shirt. Years of friendship told me he was scared—really scared—without him having to say a word.

I squinted into the gloom, trying to make sense of the shape beyond the trees. My heart stuttered—something wasn’t right. Wei was still frozen, eyes wide behind his glasses, his lips moving silently like he was counting prime numbers again.

And then I saw them. Legs. Just legs, pale and motionless, stretched out from behind the gnarled roots of a twisted oak. No shoes. No pants. Just bare, ghostly skin, mottled in the rain. They were too still, too perfect. At first, my brain tried to categorize them as something else—anything else. Mannequin legs? A prank?

But mannequins didn’t have mosquito bites. And these ankles did.

"Guys..." My voice came out in a whisper, barely audible over the wind. My feet dragged me forward, even though every part of me wanted to stay rooted in place.

Wei hadn't moved, hadn't blinked. His hand was in his pocket, probably squeezing that lucky coin so hard it would leave an imprint on his palm. The same way he'd squeezed it during his parents' restaurant opening a few years ago, when everything in their lives was changing. His dad had pressed it into his palm that morning, saying some things were more reliable than statistics. But this was a different kind of change. The kind you couldn't prepare for.

Austin's fingers dug deeper into my shoulder, his other hand pressed against his mouth. The tough guy act was gone, replaced by something raw and real and terrified. In that moment, we weren't the bard, the mage, and the rogue anymore. We were just three kids, face to face with something we were never supposed to see. Something that would change who we were forever.

The rain hammered down, but I barely felt it anymore. My feet moved on their own, drawn forward by some horrible magnetic pull. Austin stumbled beside me, his injury forgotten in the face of something far worse.

"Oh my God," Wei whispered, his accent thick with fear. I'd only heard him sound like this once before, during his panic attack in seventh grade when those seniors had cornered him behind the gym. His glasses caught the storm's light, turning his eyes into mirror pools of horror.

The woman's thighs were a roadmap of violence. Deep gashes criss-crossed pale flesh, each wound telling its own story of terror. Blood mixed with rainwater, turning the forest floor into a gruesome watercolor. My mind tried to process what I was seeing, but it was like trying to read a language I'd never learned.

Austin made a sound beside me—not his usual sardonic laugh or practiced sneer, but something primal. Something that belonged to the scared little boy who used to hide in his closet during his parents' fights. His hand found mine again, fingers intertwining with a desperate strength.

Wei stood perfectly still, his OCD manifesting in absolute stillness rather than his usual precise movements. "The pattern," he muttered, his analytical mind trying to make sense of chaos. "There's a pattern to the cuts. Like... like they were counting something."

"Wei," I started, but my voice cracked. I wanted to tell him to stop, to not make this real by analyzing it. But I knew him well enough to recognize this was his way of coping—turning horror into data, fear into statistics.

As more of the body came into view, my stomach lurched. The torso wasn't just damaged—it was destroyed. Something had torn through flesh and muscle with methodical fury, leaving behind a cavity that nature never intended. Internal organs spilled out like secrets we were never meant to know.

"Shit." Austin doubled over, retching. I held him up, feeling his body shake with each heave. His carefully maintained image—the tough guy, the unshakeable one—crumbled like wet paper. Black nail polish chipped and cracked as his fingers dug into my arm.

The rain kept falling, indifferent to our horror. Each drop seemed to whisper: This is real. This is happening. This can't be undone.

My eyes traveled upward, following the path of destruction. Past the ravaged torso, past the curve of a shoulder that looked so vulnerable in death. And then—

Nothing.

"Where's the head?" Wei's question cut through the storm's roar like a knife. His voice had that peculiar tone it got when he was processing something his logical mind couldn't accept. Like when his parents told him they were never going back to China, that his grandmother would never see him graduate.

Austin was still gagging, but now there was a new note in the sound—hysteria bubbling up like poison. He stumbled away, seeking anchor against a nearby tree.

"We need to go," I managed, though my voice sounded foreign to my ears. "We need to tell someone—"

Austin's cry cut me off. "Oh God." The words tumbled from his lips like a prayer, or maybe a curse. "Oh God, oh God, oh God."

Wei and I moved toward him with leaden feet. Each step felt like walking through nightmare quicksand. The wind howled around us, drowning out everything except the sound of our ragged breathing and Austin's broken mantra.

And there it was. Nestled against the gnarled roots like some macabre offering—her head.

Ms. Gabrowski.

The world seemed to tilt. For a second, I thought I might pass out, the air in my lungs turning to ice. My knees buckled, and I barely caught myself on a tree trunk before collapsing. This couldn’t be real. Ms. Gabrowski? She was supposed to be grading my paper, not... this.

Her face stared upward, blank and unseeing, the rain running over her cheeks in perfect imitation of tears. That same face had smiled at us just last week in class, her crooked grin when I finally nailed that stupid Shakespeare passage.

“Ms. Gabrowski?” I whispered, like maybe saying her name would bring her back, would make her smile again. But those eyes... they weren’t her eyes anymore. Just empty sockets where she used to see us.

Austin made a sound I'd never heard before, something between a sob and a scream. "She was supposed to read my college recommendation letter tomorrow," he choked out. "She promised—she promised she'd help me show my dad that writing wasn't a waste of time."

The forest seemed to hold its breath. Even the rain felt suspended, hanging in the air like crystal beads. For one eternal moment, we were frozen in a tableau of lost innocence—three boys standing on the precipice between childhood and something much darker. Standing over the body of the one adult who had truly seen us, truly understood us.

Then the forest exhaled.

CRACK!

The sound of breaking wood shattered our paralysis. A massive branch crashed down behind us, and suddenly we were moving. No thought, no plan—just pure animal instinct screaming: RUN!

Austin’s gasps came sharp and ragged with every stride, his limp getting worse the farther we ran. I could feel his weight shifting onto me, slowing us down. Each stumble sent a fresh surge of panic through my chest—if he went down again, we’d never make it out in time.

“Keep going,” Austin growled through clenched teeth, but I could tell he was barely holding on. His leg was shaking, and each step must’ve felt like hell. Beside us, Wei was scrambling, mud caking his shoes as he fought to keep pace.

But I could feel Austin slipping, and we were running out of time.

Through the curtain of rain and terror, the village lights beckoned—distant stars promising safety. The police station emerged from the gloom, solid and real and normal. We didn't choose it consciously; our bodies simply recognized it as shelter, as salvation.

Behind us, the forest kept its secrets. But we carried one now too, a knowledge that would change everything. In the space of one storm, we'd crossed a line. There was no going back to who we were before we found Ms. Gabrowski's unseeing eyes.