The Wrong Person Was Transported to the Horrific Lost Village

We learned about the monsters that chased the group while we worked--

"Hounds and a hunter... At least they didn't have slits for head..."

"It's totes creepy, isn't it, Mari?"

The work itself wasn't too bad. Most of the people worked on getting dry wood together while Lorio, Pitter, and I pulled Kaz's body from the grave.

Pitter shook his head upon seeing the corpse. "No one deserves to go down this way."

"But hey... his sacrifice will be appreciated," Lorio whispered, his head down.

"I'm just glad the body didn't somehow crawl away," I said, scanning the pair's faces.

They both nodded, and after a moment of silence, we transported the body to the pile of wood and nestled it between all the twigs and logs. From there, we just started hauling in more wood.

"You have my respect for being able to bury that body, girls," Lorio said as he threw a bunch of dry sticks onto the pile.

"Aye," Pitter followed, throwing an armload of sticks on top of Lorio's. "Not many have the mind to be able to touch that mangled body."

The sound of Haunting gagging echoed from behind us. The poor girl had caught an eyeful of the dirty body.

"Poor girl," Pitter said. "She has my respect, especially."

I contributed to the pile with a dried log. "Yeah, well, I wasn't going to leave him out here. His body suffered enough... I'm very concerned about the missing head, though."

"Don't be," Dampee said, dropping a pile of dry-looking grass. "These monsters eat. That's all it probably is. Some bastard made a snack of the head... We can tell ourselves different when we see different."

"So, we're piling a mighty burn pile here... Is this going to be okay? Aren't we going to burn the forest down?"

Lorio, Pitter, and Dampee crossed their arms in front of the pile, all lined up, one next to the other.

"Don't worry about it," Lorio said, irritated.

"This forest won't burn down," Pitter followed, stern.

"We've tried burning it down before, and nothing," Dampee said, accentuating his statement by spitting on a nearby tree's bark.

"A-ahh... I see... My condolences," I said to the three men with varying shades of dissatisfaction in their eyes.

"Okay, Mari," Haunting said, stumbling up. "I think I can handle this."

"Don't bother; we're pretty much done."

I watched Haunting as she watched Anabelle and Susy drag more firewood up to the pile.

"I feel useless," she sighed.

I rested my hand on her shoulder. "You're fine. You already did enough."

Dampee handed Lorio a bottle with a rag in it, and Lorio lit the rag with a lighter. The flames caught pretty quickly, and Lorio lobbed it into the pile. It took a few minutes, but the fire took, and we had a roaring smoky bonfire turning Kaz's corpse to ash.

"Alright," Lorio said, dusting off his hands. "We've got the clean-up done. You satisfied, Dampee?"

"I am. Very much so."

"Then, let's get out of here, team. We need to get back to town and orient all of our newcomers."

"Let's move out," Pitter said, leading the way.

I extended my hand to Haunting, causing her to cock her head and ask, "Mari?"

"You said you had low blood sugar? All that vomiting can't be good for you."

A smile slowly formed on her face. "Yeah! Thanks! I'm pretty wobbly!"

"Yeah, don't worry about it."

Susy walked up to Haunting's other side and smiled at her. "I can help you too, if you need it!"

"N-nah," Haunting said, wincing. "Mari's enough for me, but yeah, if I need your help, I'll call you, Susy. Promise."

"Okay!" Susy said before humming as she walked along.

Lorio looked back at us. "Let's walk quickly, people. I want to get to town within the hour."

 

***

 

Back in town, Paulie's side--

Paulie slumped against a wall and sighed. "They told us to wait here. Told us no one could leave. But then they took Mitch with them. Come on, man. I could help too."

Ryza, still sitting on her chair and in front of the window, glanced at Paulie. "I took it to be a good thing--them taking Mitch. It meant they're not stupid. Mitch has the weapon, and he knows how to use it. He also has basic survival knowledge. In the grand scheme of things, the pros outweigh the cons."

"But you and I don't have cons, right?"

"No, we do." Ryza smirked at Paulie. "You're brave, Paulie. We all saw that. That move you pulled--getting between the girls and the rider. That was impressive."

Paulie's cheeks heated up. "Oh. Uhh, yeah, thanks. The girls had already gone through enough..."

"I agree. The Mei girl espescially... Poor thing. Anyway, back to you--you're brave, but you'll get yourself killed. You're not really someone you want around in a stressful situation if the goal is to keep everyone alive. Not to mention, you lack clearly applicable skills."

"Ouch... What are your cons?"

"I'm disagreeable, and I don't have any wilderness survival experience. I'm more likely to punch someone's clock than I am to be helpful. Those guys can already see that."

"Oh..." Paulie looked at Ryza's arms and then her stern face. "Yeah... I can see it. The punching people out part, I mean."

"When people talk about how everything's a nail when you have a hammer, they're talking about me. It's a character flaw, I know, but a hammer gets bullshit out of the room quickly enough."

"Scary."

It was then that the young lady--Hari--walked in. Looking at her now, Paulie could see her childish qualities. He had assumed that she was older, but Kia was right in what she had told him--Hari really was a child trying to look like an adult. Paulie couldn't help but wonder how a child like that got onto this cursed excursion.

Hari came up to him and handed him a white container. 

"Huh?" Paulie said. "What's this?"

"It's food," she replied, looking at Paulie with eyes unburdened by fear or bashfulness. "The townspeople brought some. This is yours."

Paulie received it, still shocked. "Wow... Thank you."

Hari, barely five feet tall, smiled at him. "Thank the people who made them." 

Hari walked toward Ryza as Paulie kept his eyes on her. Was she really a child? Hari's demeanor and manner of speaking reminded him of why he thought she was an adult in the first place.

Hari went over to Ryza and handed the muscular woman a container without so much as wincing.

"This is for you, Miss."

Ryza smiled. "Wow, what a kind kid. Thanks." Ryza took the container and the plastic spoon it came with, opened it up, and started shoveling the rice and meat into her mouth. "This is good... Appreciated." She glanced at Paulie as he started eating. "Hey, Paulie, hear me out real quick."

"Yeah?" Paulie replied as Hari sat against a wall.

"These guys are going to try to push for a community here, but that's too much too soon. People do better in smaller, tight-knit groups. Now, I'm not saying that we should be in opposition with the wider community, but rather, we should have our own little 'friend group.' You follow?"

"I think so... Go on."

"This place is freaky, and I'm not sure I trust some of the people here... Even on our bus, there were some weird ones. Kaz, for instance? That guy was bad news. Gran--the guy with the harpoon--is also sketchy. Point is, there's some I'm willing to get to know and some I'd rather only see from a distance."

Paulie looked out into the rest of the clinic. The spot they were in was a little enclosed, but anyone could still hear if they weren't careful.

"Most of everyone's in other rooms eating," Hari said, as if reading Paulie's mind.

"Yeah, don't worry too much, Paulie. I'll speak a little quieter, though..." Ryza said, picking at her left ear. "Can I go on?"

"Yeah... sure. I'm interested."

"Great. Like I was saying, I think it'd be good if we have a tighter-knit unit. So you, me, the kid. I like us three. And then, if she survives, we'll get close to Mari."

"The lady in black? We don't know her at all."

"I know enough. From what I gathered, she only showed up yesterday. She's in the same spot as us."

"You're not sketched out by her?"

"Not at all. She could look me in the eye, and I worked well with her. She's straight-up, as far as I could tell. Pretty strong for her size too."

"She chased after those girls, too," Hari said. "She's kind."

"Or ignorant, kid," Ryza replied. "She didn't know what was coming. Maybe she would have done something different had she known."

"What about Susy and Haunting?" Paulie asked.

"Nah. I'm okay being friendly, but that Susy girl is a liability. As for Haunting Tone--she's a radio show host, right? She's probably harmless. I wouldn't mind speaking with her. She said she was investigating a haunted village, right? She might have some obscure piece of info rolling around her noggin if we're lucky."

"So, the three of us, and Mari for sure, and Haunting," Paulie said, his brow furrowed.

"Yeah... as for other people... see, I think about it in high priority and low priority terms. The 'highs' are the ones who are in an inner circle sort of. The 'lows' are the ones I want to be friendly with, but not burden too much. My high priorities are, let's say, the two of you and Mari. Then, I want to be friendly with Mitch, but Mitch smells squishy, so he's a 'low' because of that."

Paulie raised a brow. "Squishy? Because he's a little chubby?"

"No, because the people with authority will press on him, and he'll deform instead of stay rigid. He's a good person, but not someone we can expect to stand up to authority."

"You're kind of making it sound like we're going to lead a rebellion."

"We're not. That'd be stupid. I would just rather stick with people who will be brave rather than compliant."

"Okay... Brave, huh..." Paulie repeated, tickled that someone thought he was brave.

"Anyway... Those two girls--Mei and Kia--are harmless and friendly. They're more low priorities. Then.... Right, Cassandra and Greg--those are high priorities."

"The gentle giant and the beauty? Why?"

"Greg risked his body and saved people. Then, he kept his mouth shut even though he was hurting. Cassandra, meanwhile--she's beautiful. All sorts will try to get close to her, so, we should get close to her first."

"Hey, what about my buddy, Jackson?" Paulie finally said, gathering up some of his courage.

Ryza raised a brow. "Yeah, what about him?" 

Ryza's quick round of skepticism made Paulie regret his question immediately.

"I recall him having a mini-freakout before things went down. Any word on what that was about?"

Paulie winced. "No, he just saw some animal. He's just a jumpy guy."

"You know what's funny? The first animal I saw yesterday was one of the town's horses. Did he see a horse?"

"Oh..." Paulie searched his memories. Did Jackson actually tell him exactly what he saw? Paulie shook his head. "I'll check with him again."

"Hey, listen, you can be friends with whoever you want. What I'm saying is that if I share something with you, you'll do me the respect of keeping it within the group. Remember, we're going to look out for each other and get along with the community."

"No, I get that," Paulie said, casting a downward glance.

"Look. If this is too real for you, you can dip. You can even tell me you want to be a low-priority ally. Like I said, I respect you. I'm not looking to give you anything you can't handle."

Paulie gulped, forcing down some feelings. He had never been told point-blank by someone that he was respected.

"You're the type that's going to get themselves killed in service of others."

Paulie nodded, a little shaken by the thought that, yes, he had actually put himself in harm's way for someone else.

"And that's the exact type I'd dive in to ensure he gets another day."

Paulie looked up at Ryza, stunned, and she smirked back. 

"You don't have to make up your mind right this instance. Just keep in mind that I'm interested in being a friend." Ryza flexed her arm. "I can whip you into shape if you want."

"Whoa..." Paulie said, his eyes watering. "Yeah... Thank you."

Paulie stood up and rubbed his eyes. "I'm just going to go on a quick walk. I'll check on the others while I'm up."

"Sure, take a breather. I doubt anything will change out there," Ryza said, turning back toward the window.

"Yeah... Thanks for bringing the food, Hari."

"I'm happy to help. Oh, Mister Jackson was in the medical room with Mister Tolk."

"Oh... yeah, thank you."

Paulie walked off, leaving Hari and Ryza to themselves. His steps were light, but his thoughts were heavy. It didn't occur to him that he had to put thought into who he was going to associate more with than others. Would any normal person think that way?

He wasn't sure--not after the way Ryza spoke. He shook his head free of the thoughts and walked up to the patient room, poking his head in sneakily.