The Disappearance of Class 12C

Kyle sighed, Joe was looking a bit wounded, maybe it would be wise for him to sit down for a while.

And Anne-Marie looked like she had seen something bad. Perhaps one of her friends was someone who got torn apart.

edited 4th Oct '11 8:59:43 PM by NickTheSwing

Joe sat for a moment deep in thought before saying "I wonder how the others are doing? As much as I hate Andy, we need as many people as we can get right now".

Anne-Marie ducked into the cave and sat down. One of her fellow survivors had mentioned that there was something coming, so she kept as quiet as she could, hoping not to attract any more attention than her admittedly ill-advised shouting already had.

Joe sat back and closed his eyes, trying to block the pain. It hadn't been this bad since the accident that caused his limp in the first place. He groaned a bit and tried to think about how this situation could have happened. What was in that cavern?

edited 4th Oct '11 9:11:05 PM by Quarterman

Alice came to in the dirt, her mind continually replaying the past few minutes.

They had been on a class trip to the Midnight Caverns. At first, things had been normal, but then they had...changed. She had gone caving with her family once before, and she didn't remember that strange shade of moss growing on the cavern walls, or the freaky-looking bugs that had scuttled up and down the walls, or the pure oppressiveness of the air. And then — the world collapsed into nothingness.

Did I die? Alice thought. Is this heaven?

She got up, and looked around. She seemed to be in the middle of a vast desert. No choirs of angels, no closeness to the divine presence, no reunion with her long-dead Grandpa Sam. This didn't seem like any heaven she had heard about. She took her pulse. A bit high, but definitely a pulse. Looking down, she saw minor scratch wounds on her arms and legs. No, she was still alive.

But then what is this?

This didn't happen in Texas. No, this couldn't happen. It was wrong.

But it was real. And she would have to deal with it.

Looking around, she saw a few shapes in the distance. They seemed to be some of her classmates. With nothing better to do, she went to join them. Maybe, at least, everyone else was all right.

Her memory of seeing her friends Linda and Christine get ripped apart — that, at least, had to be false, and so she blocked it out of her mind.

edited 5th Oct '11 12:15:59 AM by BokhuraBurnes

Joe looked out of the cave's entrance when he saw a small figure walking far away. He hoped it was friendly, whatever it was.

I'm in no condition to fight he thought to himself. Luckily, I don't think whatever it is sees us. He sighed and closed his eyes again.

What if we're stuck here for good?

edited 5th Oct '11 12:06:06 AM by Quarterman

After a few minutes, Alice arrived at the place where her classmates were. There were five of them. She was vaguely familiar with one, Joe, from the times when she had played girls' soccer in Junior High and shared a practice field with the boys' team. She had lost track of him a bit since then — she had switched to cross-country in high school — and she had never even known him that well before, but he had always seemed fairly nice.

The others she barely knew, even as acquaintances. Of course she knew Andy — pretty much everyone in school did — but she didn't particularly care for him, as he was just another overprivileged jerk who was wasting the gifts that God had given him. Then there was that exchange student from Canada — Anne-Mary or something like that — that Kyle kid who kept getting in trouble, and one other boy whose name she didn't remember.

Well, it was no time to get hung up on people's personalities. Whatever is going on, Alice thought, we need to rely on each other.

"Hey," Alice said, hoping the others didn't notice the trembling in her voice. "Do you know what's going on? Where is everyone?"

edited 5th Oct '11 12:19:21 AM by BokhuraBurnes

Joe looked up at Alice, still in pain from his leg. "Alice, is that you? I'm glad you're okay. There are so few of us left. Andy and Rick went off to find others. I haven't seen them for a while. Almost everyone else is dead. I don't know what happened, but there are only a handful of students, and none of the teachers survived as far as we can tell".

edited 5th Oct '11 12:19:53 AM by Quarterman

"Oh no!" Alice cried, looking at Joe. "Your leg — that looks bad. You should rest it." Taking a flat stone, she propped up Joe's leg on it.

"We should wait here," Alice continued. "There's no reason to move around aimlessly, especially with one of us injured." She thought back to the time where she and her brothers had been lost while on a backpacking trip a year ago. It had been scary, but after about twelve hours the rangers had found them and everything had been fine. She remembered them commending her for not doing anything stupid, but staying put until help arrived. "What about water? We'll need it while we wait for the others to come."

"Thanks." Joe said with a smile "But it's nothing. I just aggravated an old soccer injury."

"as for water, we have none. Kyle and I were scouting around to find some provisions, but we heard something in the distance. We felt that we should avoid confrontation. We're obviously not on Earth, so I don't know how hostile the locals are."

Not on Earth? It wasn't a possibility that Alice had thought about. Well, she hadn't really known what to think, but now — it made as much sense as anything else. In any case, it was important to focus on the most practical things, and this meant taking care of necessities.

"I don't know what is out there," Alice said, "or what's going on, but it looks like we're going to be here for a while at least. And that means we're going to need to get water. If I climb up to the top of this hill, I'll be able to check to see if there are any lakes or rivers nearby. I'll give you a shout if something comes up. Sounds like a plan?"

Joe frowned at the prospect. He didn't like people going off alone. "Alright" he said finally. "But be careful. We don't need another dead student. The second you see something that might be hostile, come back, okay?"

Alice left the others in the cave and scrambled up to the top of the hill. It wasn't too bad of a climb — at a few points she needed to use her hands for balance, but the rock was firm. Oddly, for something that felt like solid stone, it left a black residue on her hands.

After about ten minutes, she reached the top. The sun seemed to be setting, and the odd purple sky was now streaked with lines of green and yellow and red. Turning around, she saw in the gathering dusk a moon arise. No, two moons, one red and one bluish.

Wherever this was, it was not Earth.

Making use of what daylight she had, she scanned the horizon. Most of it seemed like desert scrub, like what you might see in Arizona or New Mexico, all of it deserted of life. Towards the horizon, against the setting sun, she thought she could make out a valley, which what looked like some trees or undergrowth by it. It might be about five miles away, but that looked like a river basin to her. Tomorrow, she thought, we should go there.

And then the lights started.

It reminded her of the oil refineries back home. Near the valley, huge plumes of red light shot into the darkness. Every once in a while, they would burn down, but then they would start back up again. She had no idea what they were.

Wanting to make sure she got back to the cave before it became too dark to be safe, Alice scrambled down the hill. When she returned, she reported on what she had seen.

Joe frowned at the report. "Lights?" he muttered to himself. "I don't know if it's something that we should be worried about, but I'm gonna assume it is."

He thought for a minute before adding "We should stay in this cave tonight. I doubt anything will find us here, and we could all use some sleep. I'll take first watch. If something does show up, I'll alert you guys."

and on that note, I'm going to bed. Goodnight

"Sounds good," Alice replied. "Wake me when you need some sleep, and let's talk this over as a group tomorrow."

"Andy stay here and start that fire, I think I hear voices off where Joe and Kyle went. I will go and see what is up." With that, Rick headed off in the direction of the voices

"Fine," Andy muttered. "Make me do the work." He started pulling twigs off the ground and shrubs, trying to remember the way you were supposed to stack them to make a fire. He couldn't, so just put them into a pile haphazardly and started pressing the flame from the Zippo against it. Nothing happened.
"Fuck. Just what I need."

"Hey," Alice said, approaching Andy from behind. "You need a hand? I saw you from up the hill, trying to start a fire. I'm pretty good at it — I've been on a lot of camping trips."

After a pause, she added, "Actually, the rest of us are up a ways, camped out in a cave. It might be better to go there — it's getting dark, and I don't think it's a good idea to be out alone here at night. I can help you carry the sticks and brush, and then we can start the fire there."

Sue rubbed her temples, closed her eyes tightly, and tried to remember exactly what had happened.

I was following Ron and Cammie. They were holding hands. Blegh...

Then, all of a sudden, the ground opened up. Then bright light. Then... Her hands shook as she recalled Ron and Cammie being ripped to shreds until only their intertwined fingers remained. Then darkness...

The first time she had opened her eyes, she was conviced that she was unconcious and still dreaming, so she closed them. The second time she opened her eyes, she was convinced that she was dead and she was in the afterlife, so she closed her eyes and waited for the Eternal Judge. The third time she opened her eyes, she convinced herself that she was concious, alive, and as they say, "not in Kansas anymore..." So, she sat up and tried to recall exaclty what had happened.

And now regretted doing so.

The air was still, and she could hear voices off in the distance. She strained her ears to listen, but she was sure that they were speaking English. She staggered to her feet, and still a little wobbly, she made her way toward the voices.

If they're raping a pig, though, I'm outta there...

Rick saw the cave with his class mates inside, and decided to join them.

Kyle looked around at everyone, and now that other girl was here too. He was silent and kept a stoic expression, though he did wonder what their next move would be.

He considered saying something to someone, but decided not to.

"Fine. Let's go."
Andy picked up the twigs and started making his way to the caves.

Carrying the brush, Alice walked with Andy back to the cave. Once there, it had grown completely dark, although this world's night sky was closer to a dark navy blue than a pitch black. Alice saw that another one of the students had joined the group — Sue, the gossip columnist for the school's newspaper. That's good, she thought, we'll find everyone else soon enough.

The cave was too enclosed for a fire, as the smoke would be unbearable. Taking the twigs from Andy, Alice therefore made a firepit right outside of the entrance, and then arranged the brush and sticks the way her father had taught her. With one flick of the lighter, a small flame began to catch amid the kindling, and then spread to the bigger sticks. There wasn't enough large logs for a substantial blaze — the landscape wasn't exactly suited for gathering heavy-duty wood — but what was there would burn for maybe half an hour. Enough time for us to calm our nerves, Alice thought.

edited 5th Oct '11 11:16:53 AM by BokhuraBurnes

Sue didn't say a word as she approached the group in the cave. She counted six students: Andrew and Alice were trying to make a fire, Rick, Kyle, Anne-Marie, and Joseph were sitting in the cave.

No one had said a word to her as she stepped inside the cave and sat down. Just as well, since she wasn't sure she was ready to talk to anyone yet.

When she sat, she felt something hard in her shorts. My iPhone... I put it in my pocket before getting off the bus. She pulled it out and started manipulating the screen. Should I call someone? Can I call someone...? She looked to see how many bars she had: A big, fat goose egg. Zero, zilch, nada. Bubkis. Shoving her phone back into her pocket, she thought, Just as well...

"Hello, 911? My classmates and I fell into a hole in the middle of a cave, could you come get us out? Oh, where are we? Well, I don't fucking know. We're in a cave. No, no, silly, not the cave where we fell, another cave. Yeah, we're trying to make a fire. You know what? Fuck it. Send us some McDonalds and we'll make it by ourselves.

She sighed and drew her knees up to her chest.

edited 5th Oct '11 2:00:44 PM by KarlKadaver

Kyle looked down at the fire at the entrance of the cave, and then around at everyone. More people would likely be joining their group soon enough.

He looked over at Sue and asked, "...you alright?"