They find something very strange

“Well,” Zack said. “I’d say ladies first, but seeing that we don’t know what’s inside, maybe it’s better that I go first.”

Victoria raised an eyebrow. “How chivalrous of you!” She teased. “Thanks, though.”

Zack smiled and walked over to the entrance, he looked inside and saw nothing but rocks. Since the night was getting near, the luminosity inside was almost nonexistent. He scratched the back of his neck and turned back only to find a smirking Victoria extending a flashlight to him.

“I thought that I might need one and packed it with my stuff,” She explained. “I’m glad that I did now.”

“How thoughtful of you!” Zack imitated her earlier sentence and accepted the flashlight from her hands. He switched it on and pointed it at the cave. Now he could see the dirty path and the walls more clearly. “Now we’re talking!”

They entered the dark cave, marveling at how beautiful it should be with more illumination. At least on the entrance path, the ceiling was very low, with just a few feet between it and their heads.

Zack was grateful that Victoria’s flashlight had a wide range, otherwise he wasn’t so sure if they would be able to keep going at that narrow path. After about five minutes of walking on that curvy path, they reached what looked like a circular shaped room with a higher ceiling. It had a few rocks protruding from the floor and the ceiling and another path lied to the east.

Zack handed the flashlight back to Victoria. “Point it at the other path.” He instructed, walking over to it. He looked into the new path, seeing nothing more than what it seemed another hallway. “Chloe?” He shouted. “Gavin, are you there?”

But he had no response. Victoria watched apprehensively as Zack tried calling their friends over and over again for the next five minutes. “I don’t think they’re here, Zack,” She chimed in. “No one answered to you and they probably wouldn’t go so deep into the cave at this hour.”

Zack sighed and turned to the blonde. “Yeah, you’re right.” He said. Then, his eyes fell on a corner of the room that was hidden by a rock and he scrunched his face. “Give me back the flashlight, please.”

Victoria handed it back to him and observed as Zack walked over to a corner and directed the light to the ground behind a rock.

He looked at what he had found and his eyes widened. “What the hell is this thing?”

“What?” Victoria asked, sidling up to him. She looked at what Zack was pointing the light at and she had a reaction not so different from his. “Is that brown fur?” The blonde asked, her voice dropping into a whisper. “Don’t tell me that a bear is sleeping here!”

Zack stared at it for a while longer. “I don’t think it’s a bear,” He said, crouching next to the supposedly sleeping animal. “Well, not in the literal sense, at least.”

Victoria raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?” She asked, panicking as she saw Zack reaching for the bear. “What are you doing? Don’t touch him!”

“Don’t worry, Vicky,” He reassured her, grasping the brown fur with his free hand and lifting it. “It’s just a costume, see?”

“A costume?” Victoria stared in disbelief at the bear costume that Zack was holding in front of her. “A bear costume?” She repeated with her mouth gaped.

Zack nodded and looked at the floor again, pointing the flashlight at the same spot from before. “Two, actually.” He said as he discerned another bear suit under the first one. Now Zack was truly puzzled. ”What the hell are two bear costumes doing inside a cave in the middle of a forest?”

Then he once again remembered Jennifer’s warning. “It was said that there has been bear sightings near the cave,” He told Victoria. “What if the bears that people keep seeing aren’t real bears?”

The green-eyed blonde frowned. “But why’d someone dress as a bear and scare people in the forest?” She asked with a thoughtful look.

“We must be missing something here.” Zack said, examining the costumes one more time before he felt a gentle touch on his shoulder.

“Zack,” Victoria said softly. “As much as I’m dying to know why these things are there, don’t you think we should head back to the entrance now? It’s obvious that Chloe and Gavin are not here, so…”

She was interrupted by the loud sound of a thunder outside the cave. They both looked at the path from where they came from.

“Great, now it’s gonna rain.” Zack sighed. “We can’t search more outside or even get back to the cabin.”

“We’ll have to spend the night here, so at least we can be safe from the rain,” Victoria said. “Shame I didn’t bring any blankets, though.”

“Then it’s a good thing that I did,” Zack stood up and grinned. “It’s in my backpack, but I only brought one.”

“We’ll share, then.” Victoria smiled.

Zack returned her smile. “Ok, do you want to set up camp here or near the entrance where there’s more light from the moon?”

“I think I prefer to go back to the entrance.” Victoria answered after a while.

Zack nodded and they began to walk back to the way they came from. As they did so, the thunder began to get more frequent outside, Zack figured it would rain really soon. When they reached the cave’s entrance, both of them set their backpacks on the ground and Victoria took off her jacket while Zack fished the blanket out of his pack.

“It’s awfully soon to go to sleep,” Victoria stated as she took off her watch and stored it inside her backpack, along with her phone. “It’s only a few minutes past eight.”

“Yeah,” Zack agreed as they removed their hiking boots. “Do you wanna, I don’t know, do something to pass the time?”

Victoria nodded while they laid on the ground, Zack’s blanket doing a good job of covering both of them in a way that they were laying side by side with just their arms touching. Having turned off the flashlight, the moonlight seeping from outside was the only thing illuminating Victoria’s face as she turned her head and stared at Zack.

“Yeah, I do actually,” She replied. “I was hoping to talk to you about something that’s been nagging at me.”