All four of them started backing up at the same time, slow and careful, nobody turning their back to it.
Diego kept his eyes forward and said quietly, "Ok so. Black guy go behind us."
Andre turned to look at him without stopping moving. "The fuck you mean black guy behind."
"Andre." Zhang's voice was barely above a whisper. "Basically he's saying stay behind us. You'll be attacked the least since we'll be in front of you."
Andre processed this for a step and a half. "Ohhh." Another step. "Ok fine. But I'm not going back there because you said so. I'm doing this of my own free will."
He stepped behind them.
Diego nodded. "White guy in front."
Connor's head turned slowly. "What. Why me."
"Don't worry," Zhang said, with genuine comfort in his voice. "Think of it as nostalgic. Like the 1900s. Before 1952."
Connor opened his mouth. "That's not — that's not even a compliment that's just—"
"Plus," Diego added, "this is your game. And like YOU said, you know dark fantasy better than us. Right?"
Connor looked at Diego. Looked at Zhang. Looked at the thing at the tree line, still standing there, hand still pressed over its eyes, head still tilted at that wrong angle.
He rolled his eyes, stepped to the front, and faced forward.
They kept backing up. Slow, steady, four sets of footsteps trying very hard to not make sound and mostly failing.
Then Andre said, "Wait."
Nobody stopped moving.
"The shadowy thing isn't moving."
Everyone slowed. Connor glanced back at the tree line. The creature was exactly where it had been, hand over its eyes, listing slightly to one side, not following. Not doing anything.
"Which means," Connor said slowly, "we don't have to keep looking at it."
Zhang exhaled. "Oh thank god. I was genuinely starting to lose it."
"Same," Diego said quietly.
"Same," Andre said.
They turned forward and kept walking, the tree line at their backs now, the path ahead winding deeper through the massive trunks. Nobody spoke for a moment. Just footsteps on cold soil. The veins in the bark pulsing their slow dim light. The forest breathing around them the way it always did, low and patient and indifferent.
Connor's shoulders dropped slightly. His grip on his staff loosened.
Then he heard it.
Behind him. Not far. Branches snapping in quick succession, leaves crushed underfoot fast and irregular, the sound of something moving through the forest not carefully but urgently, covering ground, getting closer with every—
He spun.
The creature was right there.
"AHHHHH—"
Connor went straight down, legs gone, hitting the ground hard, staff clattering beside him, glasses knocked crooked, staring up at the thing from the forest floor with every thought in his head replaced by a single sustained note of pure terror.
The other three spun at the sound of him hitting the ground.
They looked at Connor.
They looked at the creature.
They looked at each other.
Connor sat on the ground, glasses crooked, and looked up at the creature standing over him.
"What the heck." He pointed at it. "I thought we didn't have to keep looking at it."
"Yeah well." Diego stared at it. "It was just standing there minding its business and now it wants to come over? Really?"
Connor pushed himself up slowly, eyes locked on the creature. It stood completely still the moment they were all looking at it. Not frozen exactly. More like it had simply decided to stop, the way a clock stops, waiting for something to change.
Connor tilted his head.
"Wait a minute." Something moved behind his eyes. The specific look he got when a piece of information clicked into place. "Weeping Angels."
"The what," Andre said.
"Doctor Who. It's a monster from Doctor Who." He kept his eyes fixed forward. "As long as we look at it, it just stands there. The second we stop, it moves. It can't do anything while we're watching it but the moment we turn away—"
"It tries to kill us," Diego finished.
"Yeah."
Zhang groaned. "That is so boring. Can't we just fight it?"
Connor very slowly reached his hand out toward the creature. His fingers passed straight through it like it was made of cold smoke. He pulled his hand back immediately.
Andre watched this with a flat expression. "So let me get this straight. If we don't look at it we die. And we can't even touch it."
"That about covers it," Diego said.
"Great," Andre said. "That's really great."
Then the growl rolled through the trees.
Low and wet and deeply familiar.
Zhang already had his bow out, arrow nocked, turning toward the sound before his brain had fully caught up. "Oh crap." He scanned the dark between the trunks. "I think Tiger thinks we got liquor."
Connor turned to him without moving his feet. "Zhang. That is insane for two reasons. One, we don't have liquor. And two, WE ARE NINE."
"Maybe he wants to golf with us," Andre said.
Diego nodded slowly. "Yeah. Golf with minors. That'll be fun."
"Can you imagine," Zhang said.
"GUYS." Connor's voice dropped back down. "Focus."
Another growl. Closer. Coming from the left side of the path, somewhere behind the massive trunks where the darkness sat thickest.
Zhang turned his arrow toward the sound and then looked back at the creature still standing motionless in front of them and then back at the trees. "Wait." His voice went up slightly. "Are we seriously about to fight Tiger Woods AND deal with this Weeping Angel knockoff at the same time."
Connor looked at the creature. Looked at the trees. Did the math with his face.
"It seems like it," he said.
A branch snapped. Then another. Then three more in fast succession, the sound of something not bothering to be quiet because it didn't need to be, because it had already decided how this was going to go.
Tiger Woods stepped out from behind a trunk.
And then one more.
And then one more after that.
Three of them. Same hollow eyes. Same shadow aura drifting off their bodies like smoke from something that had been burning for a very long time. They moved into the path one by one and spread out slowly, unhurried, the way things spread out when they know there's nowhere for you to go.
All four boys looked at them.
Then at the creature behind them that they were no longer looking at.
Then at the three Tiger Woodses in front of them.
"WHAT THE FUCK—"