[centre][h2][b][u][color=D4F0FF]Kaitlyn[/color] and [color=F1C9D8]Zoe[/color][/u][/b][/h2] [hr] [hr][/centre] THUD! THUD! THUD! From underneath a mound of pillows and blankets, something stirred. It tossed back and forth restlessly, obviously irritated at the obnoxious knocking. It seemed to debate checking on the sound, but soon all movement stopped once more. THUD! THUD! BZZT! A slender pink hand shot out from underneath the covers and grasped the buzzing cellphone off the night stand. It pulled the device back into it’s dark hiding spot. All was silent for a few moments...then a single voice moaned. [color=F1C9D8]“Oh dear God, no…”[/color] The covers were kicked off, revealing a rather disheveled looking girl in her pajamas. Her eyes were open wide in panic as she clambered to get out of bed. But she wasn’t the most graceful of girls, it would seem, as she managed to get tangled up in her covers and rather than find her feet, the girl slid and fell, tumbling off the bed just to faceplant her cold, hard floor. Her face was stinging, but there was no time to lose. This was life or death. She scrambled up to her feet and bolted out of her bedroom. She shot down the hall as quick as she could, entering the living room and turning towards the front door just in time to see… Gabbie. Standing in the doorway. Smirking. Zoe stood gaping at her for a moment, her mouth flapping but forming no words. She was completely flabbergasted. Unable to find the words, the girl began gesturing towards the door, causing Kaitlyn’s grin to grow even wider. [color=D4F0FF]“Calm yer tits, girl. I didn’t REALLY break the lock...yer folks leave a key under the mat. Bad place for it, really. You never know what kind of slimeball could get in.”[/color] The tall brunette winked at Zoe as she slinked past her towards the kitchen. The girl let out a burp that lasted several seconds. [color=D4F0FF]“Damn...that was a good one, eh? Say, got any grub?”[/color] she asked, but as usual, proceeded to rummage through the cupboards without awaiting a response. Zoe stared at the girl, then back to the door, then back to the girl, still speechless. It wasn’t the first time that Gabbie pulled something like this. She was constantly showing up but...but never this late. Zoe glanced at the clock on the wall. What was she doing here? She frowned. There was school in the morning, right? So… A muffled voice cut into the girl’s inner monologue. [color=D4F0FF]“Yoo waist inna barn?”[/color] Slightly startled, the girl gave a jump. She blinked twice as she glanced back at Gabbie who was now enjoying a sandwich. The guest nodded towards Zoe. It took a moment, but she finally got it, turning around and heading over to close the door. [color=F1C9D8]“Wha...what are you doing here?”[/color] she asked as she double-(then triple)-checked the door was securely locked, deadbolt and all. She turned to see a wiiiide grin on Gabbie’s face. The girl put down her sandwich and pulled her bookbag off her shoulders and placed it on the counter. She unzipped it and pulled out a laptop and a brown paper bag. [color=D4F0FF]“Elder Tale. New expansion. LAN party and liquor.”[/color] For the second time that night, Zoe just stood gaping at Gabbie, but she did manage to find a response this time around. [color=F1C9D8]“LAN party an- are you crazy? We can’t do that! We’ve got class in the morning and…”[/color] the girl paused briefly and glanced at the brown paper bag before continuing, [color=F1C9D8]“...we’re not old enough to drink. My folks would kill us if they found out...”[/color] And to that, Kaitlyn simply laughed a deep belly laugh before she slid the laptop to rest further on the counter and crossed the room with the bag in hand. Once in front of Zoe, the towering girl bent down and stared into the girl’s eyes from an uncomfortably close distance. Zoe felt the urge to run away, but she knew it wouldn’t do her any good. Gabbie could outrun her any day of the week. Easily. Instead she just gazed back into her delinquent friend’s big brown eyes. The taller girl reached into the bag and pulled out a bottle filled with gold with an image of a turkey on the front. She twisted the cap and tilted up the bottle, taking a quick swig of the shit before pulling it away. Her face twisted up for a moment, but she exhaled and everything was good. Zoe’s mouth was flapping again, a useless tongue searching desperately for protest. Katie pushed the bottle into Zoe, who instinctively reached around it to stop it from dropping. [color=D4F0FF]“They ain’t gonna find out. C’mon, it’ll be fun. Just you and me, kicking back and kicking ass. You’ve got to live a little, Zo. Trust me.”[/color] Zoe debated for a moment, but one look at the taller girl’s usual grin and she knew that she really didn’t have a choice in the matter. She couldn’t tell Gabbie no and the girl knew it. Her hands tightened around the bottle. She had never tasted alcohol before...but...well if Gabbie liked it, it couldn’t be ALL bad. Right? RIGHT? She decided to throw caution to the wind and tilted the bottle back herself. But the girl was not expecting the liquid to pour out like it did. The taste didn’t sit well on her tongue, but she forced it down. One gulp. Then two. Then… Zoe pushed the bottle into Gabbie’s hands and took on sprinting down the hall towards the bathroom. Katie stood in the living room holding the bottle mildly intrigued… [color=D4F0FF]“Uh...Zoe? You okay?”[/color] Then the vomiting echoed out. And Katie laughed. It was going to be a fun night. [hr] [centre][h2][b][u][color=D4F0FF]Uno Uno[/color] and [color=F1C9D8]ZeeThree[/color][/u][/b][/h2] [hr] [hr][/centre] It was cold. That’s the first thing to hit Katie as she stirred from her slumber. Slumber…? She didn’t even recall going to sleep. When did that- The girl started to turn over, but something was off. Why was Zoe’s bed so hard? And...was there dirt in it? She opened her eyes to see… Well… Not Zoe’s room. It was outside, somewhere… So DEFINITELY not Zoe’s room...damn shut-in. The girl got to her feet, but stumbled slightly. She looked down to see that she was wearing completely different shoes than what she had remembered having earlier. These were...well, a lot more open. She immediately disliked them. Katie shook her head disapprovingly but suddenly stopped. Her...head felt different. Something was off...her hair! It wasn’t in her face. The actual fuck happened…? Did she cut off her hair for some reas- The girl had been feeling her head, but she stopped when she touched the back side. It was up in a ponytail but… But her hair hadn’t been THIS long before. She was positive. It was cold. Why was it so cold? The girl looked down again and noticed her rather insane outfit. She looked like a damn ninja. The hell kind of night did she just have? Did Zoe have a ton of costumes hidden away somewhere that she didn’t know about? ...maybe...but...but how did she get outside. And Zoe… Wait! Where was Zoe? Katie looked around her surroundings (some sort of field she didn’t recognize) and saw a shape curled up not to far away. [color=D4F0FF]“Zoe?”[/color] she called out. For a moment, nothing happened, then the shape began to move. It rose up and threw out its arms. Stretching? It was a person, yeah, but not Zoe. It was MUCH too large to be the scrawnly little girl… As if on que, the person got to their feet and stretched again before looking around. It turned around and saw Katie looking at it. Silence hung in the hair for a few, before the person spoke. [color=F1C9D8]“...Gabbie…?”[/color] It was Katie’s turn to gape now, as she stared at the towering...thingy that just called her by the pet name only her best friend used. It was a good two or three inches taller than her, ginger hair, odd pointy ears, creepy robes, and a spooky looking bow on its bac- … … … Wait the fucking moment. This...thing...it looked pretty similar to Zoe’s avatar in Elder Tale. REALLY SIMILAR. Like… … Oh son of a bitch, it was identical. Katie covered her mouth with her hand. What even was this? [color=F1C9D8]“Gabbie…? Is that you? You look...smaller…?”[/color] Katie’s eyes grew wide. The voice was different but the cadence, the hesitation...that was Zoe alright. [color=D4F0FF]“Zo...why do you look like ZeeThree?”[/color] Zoe/ZeeThree didn’t answer immediately. Instead, she took a moment to give herself a once over. Katie could see the growing horror mounting on the girl’s face as she took everything in. She look like she was about to burst into tears. Katie took a couple steps towards her, hands held up, gesturing in a calming motion. [color=D4F0FF]“Whoa, whoa, hey, Zo! Don’t panic! Jus-just calm yer tits, alright? I’m sure there’s a good reason for this...just uh...just gimme a sec to think alright?”[/color] The nearly weeping Zoe nodded, but her eyes still seemed to well up. The waterworks were about to begin. Katie swore under her breath and looked around. So Zoe now looked like ZeeThree. And she was wearing what she could only guess to be a similar outfit to Uno Uno...and they were outside...and… Dream? Could it be a dream? Possibly, but Katie didn’t dream often...and they were never so vivid. Nor so detailed. They were usually cheap horror movie knock-offs. If a creep in a mask showed up, she knew what was up though. … She was drawing a blank. Nothing seemed to really make much sense but… … Oh hello. Something was floating by Zoe’s head. It was a...almost like a panel. A WAAAY too familiar panel. It had a portrait of ZeeThree, her name, and...bars. Two bars. HP and MP. And a level. And holy fuck she was dreaming she was in a video game. Katie started to laugh, but when she saw Zoe, she stopped. The poor girl was silently crying. She reached out and gave Zoe a pat on the shoulder, startling the girl in doing so. [color=D4F0FF]“Hey...don’t worry. I’m here. I got this. Let’s uh...let’s just go, yeah? Maybe see what else is going on? Maybe we’ll find something.”[/color] she muttered, trying to calm down her now giant dream companion. It seemed to work. The two began to walk. To where, Katie had no clue. But hey, dreams tended to sort themselves out. … But Katie couldn’t shake the feeling that this wasn’t a dream. There was just too much detail. And she was questioning it. Normally in dreams she just went with the flow, no matter how crazy it was. If...and the girl knew that she was crazy for even entertaining the notion, but IF this wasn’t a dream...then why did it look so much like Elder Tale? Zoe was the first to hear the commotion up ahead. When Katie finally caught it, the two girls exchanged glances. Katie mouthed the words “Follow me” and Zoe nodded. They stuck to tree cover and bush cover but eventually found the source of the noise. Three people. Two seemed to be shaking hands, a woman in a fancy getup and a...a… ...Jesus jumping Christ on a pogo stick, was that John Cena? Katie laughed. It was a loud, deep laugh. She just couldn’t take it anymore. What the hell even was all this bullshit? First everything looked like Elder Tale, and now knightly John Cena was shaking hands with discount Anne Bonney. What’s next? Billy the Kid riding a doom whale into tower made of Macho Man Randy Savage? A hand flew over the girl’s mouth, muffling her. Zoe was staring at her with eyes wide with terror, shaking her head. But Katie couldn’t help it. Even Zoe’s fear was funny to her now. Didn’t she get it? It was all a dream! She wasn’t even real! She was just a damn dream! Hell, if she wanted to, she could stab Zoe right now and everything would be just fine! Despite that fact that she was 99% convinced she was dreaming...she couldn’t bring herself to take the gamble. The girl sobered up...but then she realized what she had just done. If her little fit had caught the attention of that little trio...then they surely knew where the girls were. And if they knew where they were...and they weren’t friendly...and this wasn’t just a dream then… … Well, somebody royally fucked up. Big time.