Clay's night time walks weren't eventful, for the most part. He lived in the trailer park on the edge of town, and so most of his walks were through the forests that bordered the trailer park, silently trodding through the thick underbrush or resting on old rotting logs. As much of a youthful maverick as he was, he enjoyed the quiet of the wilderness. It was just him and his thoughts. No parents, no teachers, no classmates. Just crickets.

Tonight, on the other hand, was different. His walk brought him near the hospital, rather than his usual forest. He sat at a bench outside of Carmine's Soft-Serve, a 24/7 ice cream parlor that Clay would occasionally visit with his mom after work. After all, it was only up the street from the hospital where she worked, and offered fairly cheap prices.

Sipping on a can of Mr. Pibb, Clay idly scanned the street. Even with his town's low population, outside of the road to the trailer park, there wasn't ever a street that was [i]totally[/i] empty. Even in the dead of night, there would always be someone walking home from a bar, or going to a friend's house, or walking home from a late shift. In this case, there wasn't just one or two people shuffling through the night -- There were five. With a burp, Clay crushed his empty can and tossed it to the ground. He squinted for a moment, almost as if he had recognized a voice. And not just any voice.

He stood up, and began lumbering towards the group. He could make out Max, for certain. There were a few other figures with her, some tall, some short. He decided to pay his friend a visit. All things considered, he hadn't seen Max in two days, and to Clay and Max, that was almost unheard of. He stayed a safe distance from them, about twenty yards, not yet sure of who she was hanging out with. Best case scenario, she had tagged along with some of her friends who didn't know him. Worst case scenario, she had tagged along with some of her friends who [i]did[/i]. By the time he reached about twenty yards, they made a sharp turn right. This made him pause for a second. It was the abandoned construction sight.

"Nothin' goes on there but bad news." Clay thought to himself. He hurried his pace. Quickly, his thoughts turned sour. "What if that one crackhead's there?" He muttered. "What if Maxie tries hoppin' that barbed wire?" He muttered a bit louder. He gulped, nearing the turn into the abandoned construction yard. They were out of sight in the dusk, but he could still hear them. At first, there was only the sound of their chatting and footsteps. And then, a bang.

It was loud, almost like a gunshot, but prolonged. The ground underneath his feet rumbled, and he grabbed on to the nearest wall to steady himself. It took him a moment to reassess the situation, as if he had been shaken awake. It was too loud to have been something fallen, and the air smelled like smoke. Something terrible had happened. Before he could react, Jason came sprinting out of the entrance, and ran face-first into Clay. Although he already seemed terrified, Clay noticed far too late, grabbing him by the neck of his shirt.

"Where?" Clay barked through his teeth.

"Where what?!" Jason stammered, frantically looking back and forth. He looked like he had just seen something too dire to comprehend, and was as white as a sheet.

"Max. You were walking with Max, and you came in here." He growled. Clay was panicking, underneath his grim exterior. He needed to know where his friend was, above all else. The only way he knew how to find out was the way he did everything else -- Threats and violence.

"P-Past the barbed wire fence, there was a plane crash, an-"

Before Jason could finish his sentence, Clay was off. He had come this way before, and didn't need any ways around the various obstacles. He threw his denim jacket on top of the fence, covering the barbed wire, and scaled it as quickly as he could. He tumbled in his landing, rolling on the dirt for a moment, only to spring right back up to continue his sprint. There were very few things Clay wouldn't joke about, but the safety of Max was one of them.

It didn't take long to find her. Out of breath, Clay's charge through barrels and crates led him to the scene of the crash in no time at all. With adrenaline still coursing through his system, he took note of his surroundings in an instant. Max was there. There were kids from school with her as well, although he wasn't completely familiar with them. Smoke filled the air, and there was some sort of wrecked aircraft in front of them. And in front of all of that was... A centaur?

Catching his breath, the dumbfounded teen took a few steps forward, making his presence known to the group. He couldn't match any of the faces to names, but he was sure he had seen them in school before. The centaur, unsurprisingly, he had not.

"Hell's going on here?"