Standing alone, the darkness seems to envelope you as you fall over, down an apparently endless cliff…

“Matt, you awake?”  A voice calls from the seeming nothingness

“Huh…” you say opening your tired eyes slowly to the blinding white light. “Where am I?” You ask this strange voice…

“In class…” the voice says

“What?!” you say as you fully open your eyes and see your teacher, Mrs. Johnson staring you down.

“Matthew… could you please try to stay awake while we finish up preparations for the trip.” She said turning back to her attendance

Just a few more minutes until the departure for the summer trip, you thought. You went to a small school where the senior homeroom classes all took a trip for the final “Hurrah” of high school before summer and finally college.

You recently turned 18 and were about 6 foot something, had medium loose brown hair. You were wearing basketball shorts and a Huey Lewis and the News T-shirt.

The voice from earlier came from Sam, who happens to be the closest thing to a friend you have in your homeroom. He’s not a bad guy or anything; you just never really took the time to get to know him. This is all part of the reason you were sleeping in the first place. You have no friends in this class and you’re going on this trip… not exactly your definition of a good time.

“Alright, that’s everybody; now let’s get on that bus!” Mrs. Johnson said turning to grab her bag and turned to walk out the door with all twelve of the students following her lead.

She was in here mid-thirties and had simple clothes suitable for long periods of travel time. The school tried to even out the classes to an even fifty-fifty split of males and females and you knew all of their names even if some of them didn’t know yours…

Climbing on to the bus you went to the first seat you saw that was open and plopped yourself down and tried drifting back into your dreams to try to meet up with your friends at the resort. You could hear the conversations of the other students, not that you really cared enough to pay attention to what they were saying and let the lull of the road pull you into the dream world

-----

You are abruptly awoken by the loud roar of a storm outside. “What was that!?!” you said collecting your waking self. “A storm? It was clear skies when we left, how long have I been asleep?” you asked looking outside

A loud crash was followed up by a flash of lighting continuously getting closer together as everyone on the bus realized we were driving into this storm.

The fear of thunder storms and the “Game” where you count the time between the two events came to everyone’s mind and we all started counting.

“1.…2….3….4….5….6….7…8…CRASH!”

“1.…2….3….4.…5...CRASH!!”

“1….2….CRASH!!!”

Then the moment came and the bus was in the center of the storm and everyone closed their eyes for fear of the terrible thing that might happen…RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING

It sounded like a flash grenade in Call of Duty, and light filled the bus and the whole class blacked out

-----

You opened your eyes to the sound of birds chirping around you with sunlight filling your eyes. You quickly checked your surroundings searching for any sign of the bus or you class and nothing… No wait you saw a girl with blonde hair hunched down looking at something.

“Hey! Who’s there?” you called out the girl.

“Huh?” She said turning to you. “Oh, Hi!”

“Who are you?” you asked as you slowly approached her realizing that she isn’t in your class

“My name is Kiri!” she said happily. “And if you’ll excuse me, I need to finish my meal”

“What meal?” you said running up to her side

“Oh just some humans I found out here.” She said as she popped something into her mouth.

It took you a moment to process and comprehend what she had said before your eyes widened and you tackled her to the ground.

“What are you doing!” she yelled as she fell to the ground

You didn’t waste a second before jarring her mouth open and reaching in for person she had almost eaten. After doing quite a bit of fishing you felt the form of a person and protectively wrapped your hands around the tiny form and pulled it out of the girl’s mouth. It was Natalie, probably one of the most popular girls in the class

“Are you alright?” you asked with concern in your voice.

“I will be no thanks to you!” Kiri said as she was still on the ground. She got up and stormed off into the woods

But there was no response from Natalie as you turned your gaze to the over turned bus by your feet.