The guys, of course

"So, what'll it be, Tom?" Nicole cocked her blonde head as she stared at him, "are you going to take a look outside, or are you so scared you'd rather hide in the house with us girls?"

That final attack on his ego seemed to make up Tom's little mind, his brow furrowing and his jaw settling into a scowl. "Of course I'll go," he said, "I'm not scared of some punk kids going bump in the night."

With that, he strode towards the door, acting like it was his idea all along, while Nicole rolled her eyes behind him. Giving her one last smile as appreciation for dressing down his rival, John turned to follow. Tom raised his sunglasses up to shoot Miranda a wink as he headed towards the door, so John felt the need to try and match him. As he passed his crush, he made sure to stand up straighter and puff out his chest a little, giving her a little smile as he tried to play the hero.

"Good luck guys," she giggled as they marched past, twirling her tail absentmindedly in one hand, "try to come back in one piece."

Matt did the same thing as he walked near Sarah, popping the collar of his coat as he passed her, except all he got for his efforts was a mute thumbs up from the sexy redhead.

When Tom wrenched the door open, the chill air of the hallway instantly flooded inside, a cold reminder that it was late October. As air spilled in, light spilled out, a bright rectangle that illuminated the corridor as far as the stairs, but left the rest of the hall in darkness. Fortunately, that was rectified by just a flick of a switch, making outside of the living room look much less intimidating.

John knew it was childish, but he was still quite glad that he wasn't going outside alone. Just the darkness of the hallway had seemed ominous after that strange sound, the unfamiliar gardens of Sarah's expansive estate and the encircling woodland could have been downright terrifying.

As he neared the door, bringing up the rear of the trio, Matt stopped to turn and face the ladies one last time. "Don't worry girls," he said "I'LL BE BA-" Before he could complete his cheesy non-sequitur, John grabbed him by the collar and yanked him bodily through the doorway.

"Let's save the one liners for when we've saved the day, eh Arnie," John laughed, pulling the door shut behind his friend as he playfully shoved him towards the front door. Matt just straightened his duster with a smile as he complied, sauntering towards where John pushed him.

Thinking about it practically, even without the gender or size differences, the three of them made the most sense out of the six to be sent out into the cold. Nicole was wearing a mini dress, Miranda, a leotard, and Sarah only had on a bikini that would have been skimpy in high summer. All of them looked undeniably hot, but they would have instantly become cold once they stepped outside.

The men, by contrast, were wearing a jacket, a coat, and a literal travelling cloak. Sending the boys out over the girls was a real no brainer.

"You bitches ready for this?" Tom asked, one hand on the front doors handle.

"More ready than you," Matt laughed, nodding his head at Tom's exposed torso between his leather jackets zippered teeth.

Tom didn't try to argue, instead throwing the door to the inky darkness of the night wide open. The cold air crashed into them like a wave, making them hiss through their teeth and chilling them nearly to the bone in seconds. Before even taking another step, Tom zipped up his leather jacket and closed away his abs, while John wrapped his black cloak tighter around his body.

Now wrapped up and hunched over against the cold, Tom led the way outside, Matt and John reluctantly following behind. John made sure to slam the door shut tight once he passed through it, although he checked that it wasn't locked once he had done so. Keeping the cold air out of Sarah's house was his first priority, but his second was still making sure that he could get back in. The last thing he wanted was to be stuck in the cold for any longer than necessary.

Once he was satisfied he'd be able to get back in once this quest was over with, he turned to leave, but not before catching sight of Nicole peeking out of the living room window. From the cozy safety of inside, she cheerily waved John goodbye, a gesture he returned by halfheartedly raising his hand to her. With that, he turned his back on Sarah's parent's palatial house, and moved to follow Matt and Tom.

The two of them had made it halfway to the woods in the direction of the noise by then, two dark silhouettes against the grey grass, moving across the manicured lawn. John broke into a half jog to catch them up, unwilling to get too far away lest they got separated. Being outside, things seemed a little less dark now, either due to his eyes adjusting to the lack of light or because the clouds over the moon had thinned.

Under the tree canopy, however, complete darkness still reigned. Tree trunks wider than your chest were hard to discern from the blackness until they were right in front of you, and the twisted roots and fallen branches underfoot were like a natural booby trap.

A bright flash of light up ahead suddenly filled his vision, and John threw his forearm over his eyes, briefly worried that Tom's suggestion of aliens might be true. When he looked again, however, he saw that Tom merely had his phone torch in his hand, and he felt like an idiot for ever thinking it could have been something else.

Following his rivals lead, John pulled his phone out too, and used it's glow to light the way in front of his feet. In some ways, the light made walking feel more comfortable, but it also made him feel more exposed. The torch's cone only carried 10 or 20 feet forward, beyond that it paled to nothing again. Anything outside of it's immediate range would remain invisible, but the torch itself and it's wielder would be immediately obvious, like fireflies in a hostile sky.

Briefly, John thought of bioluminescence in the deep sea, how the lights of fish were used as lures, and how to everything alive down there, light meant food. John knew he was no predator, but he wondered what things lurking in the impenetrable depths around him might have seen him as prey.

"Y’know John," Matt suddenly said, snapping him out of his macabre thoughts. "Something just occurred to me."

"W-What?"

"It’s pitch black out here."

"Yeah?"

"Why the fuck am I still wearing sunglasses?" Matt turned to look at John as he said it, revealing that his character's iconic shades were still perched on his nose.

"You’re the only one who can answer that, bro," John laughed. It was only for a second, but that moment of levity felt like pulling the release on the pressure valve, forcing John to exhale a breath he didn't know he was holding.

From the front of the group, Tom shouted back towards them. "You think that's bad? I'd forgotten I was wearing mine!" Tom whipped his own sunglasses off as he spoke, tucking them into his breast pocket for safe keeping. The three of them chuckled as they walked for a little while. John had never expected to laugh at anything Tom said, but the absurdity of two of the three of them wearing sunglasses in the dark nearly bent him double with laughter.

After that, the woods felt a little less scary, as if the vibes had changed. Laughing like that made the whole thing feel less like a horror movie scene. John had seen plenty of hapless teens be gutted by psychos in dark forests, but he'd never seen it happen while they were walking along cracking jokes.

The rest of the journey passed in a much more bearable quiet, the only noise to break the silence were the cracking of branches underfoot and the distant hooting of owls. Soon, it wasn't even pitch black anymore, the warm glow of the road's streetlamps illuminating the edge of the forest ahead. The final stretch was up a steep and deforested embankment, but the streetlights just above meant that handholds and flatter patches of ground could be seen easily.

Tom scrambled up it first, with Matt and John not far behind. Climbing up that sheer slope of dirt and gravel, the three of them began to move in a horizontal line rather than a vertical one, spreading out along the bank as they all sought different ways up. Despite being the last to start climbing, John reached the summit first, using a tuft of rough grass to haul himself out of the ditch they'd found themselves in.

At the top, he practically found himself on the road already. Only a thin stretch of dry ground dotted by patches of brown grass, stood between the road and the forest. The little boundary was maybe a foot wide and, with cars passing fast on one side and a sheer drop on the other, it clearly wasn't actually meant to be walked along. The road itself was a two lane wide splash of tarmac, illuminated clearly in both directions by row after row of streetlights.

Flicking off his phone's flashlight, John tucked it back into his pocket and began to look around while the other two finished their climb. His eyes were peeled for any telltale signs of a crash, burnt rubber on the asphalt, debris beside the road, a freshly fallen tree, or even a rising cloud of steam or smoke.

"See anything?" Matt asked as he pulled himself on to the road beside John, out of breath form the exertion of scaling the slop.

"Nothing," John shook his head. It looked just like any other empty road in the middle of the night, nothing setting it apart except some fallen leaves that danced across it when the wind blew. As he looked, Tom summited behind him, and wiped the dirt off his hands. Breezing past the two of them, he confidently strode to the other side, where the land was less steep.

The forest was still fairly thick on that side of the two lane road, but there was no steep cliff for a car to have disappeared over, so Tom's search didn't take long. All he did was turn his head back and forth, before shrugging and jogging back across the road to them.

"Nothing," he said, throwing up his hands. "I told Nicole it was probably nothing, but that little bitch had to send us out on this wild goose chase."

"I thought you said it was kids playing a prank?" John asked, irritated by Tom's description of his friend.

"Eh, whatever it was, it wasn't a car crash," Tom shrugged again as he walked straight past John, barely sparing him a passing glance. "Can we go back to Sarah's now? I feel like I'm gonna freeze my balls off out here."

Despite posing it like a question, Tom didn't wait for an answer, instead dropping off the side of the road and sliding down the gravel on his own two feet. It was an ungainly way of descending , that required him holding his arms out and shifting his weight around to balance like a surfer, but he managed to make it to the bottom without falling on his ass.

More carefully, John and Matt followed, the latter sliding partway down the hill on his ass, relying on his leather duster to insulate him from any sharp rocks and pebbles. Soon enough, the two of them were at the bottom of the slope again, and leaving the comforting glow of the streetlamps for the darkness of the forest once more. Tom's flashlight tore away in front of them, clearly not waiting for them when there was a warm house to get back to.

A warm house, or a seat next right next to Miranda, who was still wearing her skimpy black leotard. The two of them had been getting pretty cozy before they'd left, now he probably wanted to get back there to keep his good thing going. Already, John could see Tom bragging to Miranda about how he had lead the way, while insisting that she cuddle up close to him to help warm him up after his long journey.

If John got back first, however, then he could claim the seat beside Miranda all for himself. Flicking his own phone light back on, John marched faster than ever, stomping through dead leaves and and fallen sticks like his life depended on it.

Clearly, Matt was eager to get back too, because despite John's redoubled pace, he still held on to his place in the middle of the pack. A mute mermaid with big tits in a tiny bikini was waiting for him, which would be motivation enough for any man to push the speed limit a little.

The three of them were completely focused on walking now, with no time for laughing or banter, the only sound from their little group was that of breathing and the crushing of undergrowth.

They were probably half way back to the grounds of Sarah's house, when something suddenly just felt wrong. The owls stopped their hooting completely, the hairs on John's neck stood straight up, and the air itself even seemed to grow colder. John wanted to hurry up and get back to the safety of Sarah's house, but instead, everything seemed to slow down as his senses dialed up to 11.

It was the sort of tension you'd feel in a bar before a fight broke out, or when you were walking home late at night and a group of people turned to follow you, except even worse.

Something bad was about to happen.

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Something very bad is indeed about to happen to our three hapless explorers, but if you want to find out what right now then you'll have to subscribe to my Patreon. The shocking situation and it's aftermath are already explored over there with two new chapters. Thanks for all your support everyone!

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