[Wednesday, Night]"WAHAHA! WELCOME, EVERYONE!" Kaylee stood herself atop a giant rock in the outskirts of a dark forest and spoke to the group below her, with her face lit by a torch.
"I hope you are all ready to be scared to death! For we are doing a TEST OF COURAGE!"
"Ok. Let"s get this over with." Owen said.
"What was that? Scared?" Ruby said trying to provoke him.
"Not at all, even if I was your hair is the perfect light. All the scary things will run once they see it."
"Calm down you two," Ethan added. "Let"s explain this more. First, we are going around in groups of 2. We each have a map and go one group at a time. Got it?"
"We all understand," Sean said. "I wonder who I"ll be paired up with."
"As long as I"m not with Owen, I"m happy." Ethan"s sister, Bella added.
"Oh? Another person that doesn"t want to be with Owen. We might be able to get along." Charley replied.
As they needed as many people as possible everyone they knew was invited. This also included Charley and Bella. The event was set up by Kaylee and Ethan who wanted to do something "less stressful" than studying. They had gotten some people from their work to help them with the scaring so no one knows what to expect.
"OKAY! Inside this box is 8 pieces of paper. All of which have numbers 1 - 4 on them. There are two of each number making 8!"
"I can see Ethan"s Maths revision is clearly helping…" Owen snidely added.
"I"ll draw first." Sean went up and searched around for a few seconds for dramatic effect.
"I got a 4."
"I-I"ll go next." Lily approached and quickly picked a number. "I got 2…"
"Ethan, why don"t you go next?" Owen asked.
"No thanks." His instantaneous reply was enough to make Owen suspicious. He was the only person that could have rigged the number drawing, but Owen wasn"t able to figure out a way that would make it possible.
"Very well, I"ll go." Charley stepped up and selected. "I got a 4."
"Looks like our first group is Sean and Charley."
Charley wasn"t calculating anything. She didn"t even think about any of that. The only person she didn"t want to be with was Owen, but luck was on her side. She got the one person she wanted. Although she is trying to hide it.
"Hmpf. I guess. Whatever."
The next person was Ruby. " I got 1."
Bella quickly went up afterwards. "I also got 1."
"Two number 3s and a number 2 left. Who will get what? Who knows?"
The remaining people were Owen, Ethan and Kaylee. It was obvious to Owen that Ethan wanted to be with Kaylee. He had a third of a chance of being with Lily. Owen wouldn"t call himself unlucky, but he really wanted to draw the number 3.
"I got 2," Owen said pulling out his number.
"PERFECT!" Ethan shouted. "Errr? I mean, all that"s left are the 3s. Which are Kaylee and me."
"Alright. Group 1, off you go."
[Pair 1 - Ruby & Bella]
"This is stupid," Ruby said as she walked through the cold forest with Bella.
"I agree. I"d rather be somewhere without tons of mud."
"What"s the point of this anyway? Are we trying to see who gets scared the easiest?"
"I remember overhearing Ethan plan it," Bella said. "Once I found out his plan I was hoping that I could stop it from happening. I tried to rig the number drawing and it was going so well. SO WHY DID YOU PICK THE NUMBER 1."
"Hey, don"t blame me. How did you even rig it? You picked yours straight after mine."
"I did it so Ethan would pick the paper with the one on it, but since you took it, I had no choice but to leave it to luck. You can see how that turned out. Ethan"s own cheating method ruined mine."
The two of them continued walking and talking, forgetting that they were supposed to be noticing the scary noises and figures in the distance.
"What a smart child," Ruby said in amazement. "If you don"t mind me asking? Why do you care so much about your brother? I"ve heard all sorts of things. Could you have mood swings?"
It was as if Ruby didn"t see anything wrong with what she just said, perhaps she was truly scared and the horror had ruined her normal way of thinking. She was almost like a completely new character.
"I don"t have anything like that. But I guess I"ll tell you."
"Welcome back." Ethan greeted them as they returned. "How was it?"
"It wasn"t bad." They both said.
"Well, ok then. GROUP 2. OFF YOU GO!"
[Pair 2 - Owen & Lily]
"There is no such thing as ghosts, there is no such thing as ghosts." Owen kept repeating.
"There is no such thing as ghosts, there is no such thing as ghosts." Lily joined in.
"Are you going to hurry up? We don"t have all day?" The others said as they watched them almost start crying before they even entered the forest.
"Ghosts aren"t real. Ghosts aren"t real." Owen said as he slowly leads the way with Lily holding onto his hand.
"WHAT WAS THAT?" Owen quickly turned around at the faintest sound of rustling leaves.
"I-is something there?" Lily said hiding behind Owen even more.
"W-no, don"t hide behind me. I can"t run away if you hold onto me too tightly."
The sound of rustling leaves grew ever so louder.
"EEEEAAAAAHHHHHH!" Owen screamed. "WHY ARE YOU SQUEEZING MY HAND SO TIGHTLY!"
"I"m scared."
"WELL SO AM I! BUT MY HAND IS GOING BLUE!" The two of them had no other options but to quickly run in a random direction with their eyes closed and hope they made it back.
"There is no such thing as ghosts." They both kept enchanting as they ran.
"Phew. That wasn"t so bad." Owen said acting like the true man he was.
"Did you get scared?" Ethan asked.
"Pfft. Nah, I never get scared. I"ll be sitting down in the light if you need me."
"Ah, I"ll also be there." Lily joined him.
"GROUP 3! YOUR TURN! OH WAIT. That"s me."
[Pair 3 - Ethan & Kaylee]
"Don"t worry, Kaylee. I"ll protect you."
Ethan and Kaylee marched forward into the forest. The two of them confidently faced the challenge ahead as if it was nothing. Although they were surrounded by a scary environment and terrifying effects. The scariest part is how Ethan acts around someone he likes.
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They both walked in silence with at least 3 feet between them. Ethan"s plan succeeded and he was prepared to act as brave as possible. He had prepared for this and spent hours coming up with a foolproof method to get them together. Now the hardest hurdle is, talking.
"So…" He began to speak. "How are you." He failed at the first jump.
"I"m fine. What about you?" Kaylee replied.
"I"m good, I"m good."
That was all for their turn. They returned and Ethan walked over to Owen in private to discuss his fails.
"Kill me. Please kill me." Ethan said already looking like a ghost.
"Was it that bad?"
"Why, the perfect chance. Ruined."
"Hmmm. how did you ruin it?" Owen asked.
"I was hoping it would be scary. Why were you so scared. It was like watching a kids film."
"Oh, yeah. About that, I kinda bribed the workers beforehand and told them not to make it scary for you. That"s what happens when you cheat on the groups."
Upon hearing that Ethan"s eyes emitted a bright red glare. He grabbed Owen by the neck and began to strangle him to death, of course, this was all in his mind. He instead pa.s.sed out from hearing that Owen had countered his plan.
"Looks like Ethan has pa.s.sed out," Owen said to Kaylee. "You should announce the next group."
"Really? Was he that scared? Didn"t seem that bad to me. Oh well, GROUP 4!!"
[Pair 4 - Sean & Charley]
Charley and Sean were on equal levels with Ethan and Kaylee. Except throughout the whole time, Charley couldn"t" get her confession out of her head. The embarra.s.sment from being rejected kept creeping up on her and she was unable to make conversation or even notice anything scary. Sean, however, fell for every trick and was scared by everything.
"That was fun," Sean said as he returned.
"Y-yeah…" Charley said as she sat down in between Owen and Lily in the light.
"RIGHT!" Ethan jumped back up to life. "That was certainly fun. We should do it again next year."
"I agree, let"s go again next year," Owen said. "Better come up with a smarter plan next time. I"ll be checking the box to see if all 8 pieces are there, unlike this time," he whispered into Ethan"s ear.