Cici-- 

Dreamspeak? I ask myself. Someone else -- maybe Roan? -- continues out loud.

"Whoever wrote this was either in DDL or a child of the forest." Mysterious. But I know whatever is going on here, I can solve it. I have to.

Roan begins to read out loud, haphazardly translating, and I listen intently from the bench on the edge of the group.

"The three-eyed deer is a legend of Averno. There is no definitive proof it exists and no definitive proof that it does not exist. Some say it is a remnant from an earlier time, maybe entwined with old mythology. It has been posited that it is an omen of great change."

I look up. That sounds like a hybrid of a natural history texbook and an ancient myth.

"Does it say anything else?" Abell asks. Roan shakes his head.

"There's just a drawing here. Look." He holds up the printout, and I freeze.

It's my drawing. Down to the eraser smudges and wavy pencil lines. Yet it's preserved in this old, dusty book passage somewhere in the ANS library.

"I think that's Cici's," someone says slowly. I lift my head.

"Y-yes, it's mine." I speak in a tiny whisper. "I put it... on the poster. In the hall." The drawing exactly matches the one I scanned and put on that poster, so I know most everyone here has seen it. Heads shake in confusion and jackets rustle.

Phaedra, who I've pinned as a logician, narrows her eyes. "That doesn't make sense. What are you suggesting?"

Let's keep this alive!

Abi~

Roan finishes reading the short passage, and we all look at each other. It's not much to go off of, but somehow it feels like the next step.

"Does it say anything else?" Abell asks curiously. They're one of the other three people who have joined our little cryptid meeting. Apparently, Cici and Morgan had also seen the deer.

Roan holds up a printout of a drawing, saying, "There's just a drawing here. Look." It's a rough sketch of the three-eyed deer, smudged and aged.

Morgan studies it, a curious expression on their face. "I think that's Cici's."

"Y-yes," Cici whispers, "it's mine. I put it... on the poster. In the hall." She looks terrified.

"That doesn't make sense," Phaedra says with narrowed eyes. "What are you suggesting?"

"Time travel?" I say with a nervous laugh.

Roan shrugs. "We can't rule it out."

"So you said whoever wrote this was either DDL or what?" Morgan asks.

"A child of the forest."

"And like I said, it's too old to be someone from the school, so it's probably a child of the forest," Abell adds.

"Or time travel," I jump in, and Phaedra gives me a sharp look.

"I'm pretty sure we can rule that out too," she says. "So now the question is what do we do?"

"N-nothing?" Cici suggests weakly.

"Well, we can't do nothing," Roan says decisively. "I think our best course of action would be to investigate more."

"We could check the archives," Morgan suggests. "I'm sure one of the Lost Histories teachers would let us in."

"Or," I say, "we could have a stakeout!"

"A stakeout?" Cici squeaks. "Like, in the w-woods?"

I nod. "If we saw the deer the last time we were there, chances are we will again. Right, Phaedra?"

She nods hesitantly. "I guess that makes sense."

"That sounds good to me," Abell agrees. "Let's meet back here at dusk."

"I'll bring some flashlights!" I volunteer.

"And I'll bring some coffee," Roan says. "Lots of coffee."

Roan~

We all meet back at our picnic benches when the sky is getting dark. All of us except Collins, that is. I hope he's doing my homework for me. When we're all together, we start walking in an awkward clump towards the edge of the woods. We stop collectively at the forest line and glance at each other.

I've lived in Averno my whole life. I've heard lots of stories about the forest and I always stayed away from it. Before now I never had a reason to consider going inside of it. But the people standing next to me are determined to figure out what's going on here, and for someone who wasn't too keen on the idea this morning, I'm pretty happy to be with them.

Flashlights flickering on and deep breaths being released, we go in.

It's so much darker than it should be.

"Stay close together," Ambrose warns.

I've been here two seconds and I'm already paranoid. Everything seems to be rustling, whispering, tricking us... we're all silent, watchful, a little scared and waiting for-

My stomach plummets. I saw something. I saw something in front of me-

I shine my flashlight onto it and gasp. It's the three-eyed deer. It matches Cici's drawing, the drawing from the book, all the descriptions everyone has given us.

"Guys," I whisper. I don't want to scare it, but I need to get everyone's attention. "Guys, I found it-" I look from left to right.

And I realize that everyone else has vanished.

"What the-" I check again. No-one. Nothing. "The deer-" I point my flashlight back to where I saw the deer, and it's gone too.

Slowly, taking deep breaths, I turn in a full circle, examining everything around me. A few minutes ago, I was right at the edge of thw woods; now I'm right in the thick of it.

I'm in the middle of the woods and I'm completely alone. 

@Azalea, good idea! I don't want this to die, and I think it would probably help if we had something in mind going forward. Maybe... everyone gets separated in the woods, and the deer gives them some kind of cryptic message? Then they have to go back and try to decipher it? IDK honestly, but maybe that would be fun!

For now, Cici--

The flashlights cast spooky, flickering shadows around us as we make our way deeper. I get the sense that something is watching us, waiting for us up ahead. It's thrilling enough to make me almost forget my fear.

Almost. It's still writhing in my gut.

"Stay close together," says someone, I think Ambrose. I nod. No need to tell me twice.

We're silent as we paw our way through the forest, every shadow making me jump. I pull up the hood of my hoodie as if it's some kind of armor.

When I look up again, everyone has vanished.

I bite my lip, failing to stifle a scream. There's just no sign of them. The path we followed, twisting and spiked with thorns, still likes behind us, but it's deserted.

No one but me.

And as I have this thought, I see glowing eyes in front of me.

The deer. I know it as surely as I know my own heartbeat. Its three eyes are remarkably golden as it studies me, and I have no idea whether it's going to eat me alive or lead me onward when suddenly--

It's speaking. Some language I've never heard before. Something that sounds older, more wild, than humans themselves.

I shake my head helplessly. "I- I'm sorry. I don't understand..."

The deer pauses, then tries again, and this time my bewildered mind names the language. It's Dreamspeak. But I still can't understand a word of it.

"I don't speak Dreamspeak..." I try, but it's clearly futile. The deer pauses once more, then says a word that's clear as a full moon, a word I immediately recognize:

"Averno."

With that, it bounds away into the darkness. 

Abell ------

Dark seemed to settle all at once. One minute it was day and the next total night. We flickered on our flashlights and started to rise.

"Stay close together," Ambrose murmured.

I'd always believed in the things said to be in the woods, and now there was a thread of hope that I'd get to see one of them. So why was I hesitant? Isn't this what I wanted? This is what I've been waiting for.

We entered the the forest, fear falling like a blanket over us. 

The woods seemed endless. I was hyper-aware of every crunch caused by our feet and the autumn leaves. Every innocent rustle left our hairs standing on edge. The energy drink I had consumed an hour before probably didn't help either.  

A sudden chill ran down my spine, and I pulled the sides of my cardigan over my body in hopes for more warmth. Out of the corner of my eye, a lanky shadow dashed to the left. Stopping in my tracks, I whipped my head around.

There was the deer. It's antlers resembled smoke rising from incense and looking into it's eyes was like looking at the sun. 

"Deer. The Deer," I managed to utter as I reached out to grab someone. My hand felt nothing but air and I looked around only to see I was alone. A deep noise erupted from the Deer's mouth, as if it was speaking. It's three eyes stared at me intensely, trying to get a message across. 

"I-.. What? I don't understand," I couldn't look away. 

The Deer's speach started to repeat itself. The noise continued, until I remembered something a friend from DDL mentioned while trying to explain Dreamspeak. The Deer was warning me.

The Deer was saying "Danger," 

Hello, I am a budding Averno fan, and I'm going to do something really stupid and join this RP when I hardly know what's going on XD sooo I may need a little assistance, and I am joining like in the middle of the RP? Is that even allowed?

Name: Chamomile ("Mila" or "Mil" or "Cham") Fernnman 

Age: 18

Personality: Seems really bubbly and happy on the outside, can actually be really thoughtful and deep. Creating is her passion, destroying is just a hobby. Really likes throwing things. Gives the best advice around. Once you're her friend, you're her friend forever. 

Appearance: chin-length wavy blonde hair, light skin, greenish eyes, freckles, yellow sweaters + paint-stained pink corduroy overalls, flowers and paintbrushes and ink pens in her pocket, lots of bracelets.

Occupation/department: Department of Creation and Destruction!

Residence: Uh, the barn I guess XD

Other: Her pronouns are she/her. Shipping is open, girls + enby :)

HERE GOES NOTHING! 

Yay, we have a new person! I guess we could try out the love triangle thing; and I was thinking maybe Morgan ran into Chammomile? Idk, you guys can choose. 

The woods...I thought just looking at them at night was disturbing, but now it seemed like we were right in the middle of them. Our flashlights only made measly yellowish beams in the thick darkness, and everyone, even Abi, looked scared.

After a couple minutes, I decided to get a handle of this thing, so I spoke up. “Hey, guys, should we…” I turned around and realized I was too late. The woods were silent, and I was alone. Alone?! What was I thinking? I mutter, thoughts racing through my head. And just as I spun around, mustering the courage to run toward where I thought the school was, I stood...right in front of a Deer.

I was dizzy. This was it. And it's speaking...something...like Dreamspeak! I try to listen, but... 

"I can't understand!" I tell it, trying to sound as rational as I can while I'm talking to a deer.

Put it together, Morgan, I think back to when I'd studied that bit of Dreamspeak that we'd looked over. Okay, it was saying..."Averno", then "gone" "Forest" and finally "Danger". 

The deer leaped away. I shook my head, repeating the words I'd understood. Then I sprinted. I wasn't sure where I was going, but I knew I had to run into something sometime. 

So, for the second time in the last few days, I literally ran into someone. 

My apologies for not posting more! I'm rather intrigued by the direction this is going, and although I don't think I added all that much to the story with this post, I guess it's at least a step.

Phaedra~

The deeper we get into the forest, the more I regret agreeing to this. What do we think we're going to find, anyway? There might be something creepy and weird going on, yeah, but I'm still not convinced that there are actually deer in the forest with three eyes, or that there's anything actually special about this forest.

And just as I think that, I realize that somehow, all of a sudden, I'm alone in the forest. I don't know where the others went, but they can't be too far away, right? I don't spin around frantically -- I've learned that lesson from the Birdcage -- but I do turn my head both ways. No one is in within sight, and frankly, the forest looks darker and scarier here than it did a moment ago.

When my gaze returns forward, I meet the eyes -- the three eyes -- of a deer that most definitely wasn't there last time I looked that direction. My breath catches in my chest, and I try to take a step backward, but I'm frozen in place.

It feels like there's a voice in my head that isn't my own, that's speaking in a language I don't know, and if I didn't know better, I'd think it was coming from the deer. I reflexively memorize the words, though I'm not at all sure if they're actually words and not just me losing my mind. Where is everyone?

I blink slowly, shaking my head, and when I open my eyes again, the deer doesn't appear to be there, assuming it ever was to begin with. I try to calm down my breath and pull my phone out of my pocket. It doesn't have any signal, which makes sense, this deep into the forest, but the compass app should still work. I find north, double-check that it's the right direction, and delve off, shoving my hands deep into my pockets to ward off the chill that suddenly seems to be all around me.