They all turn around slowly. Not wanting to provoke whatever's behind Nicola. The breath on his neck was hot and steamy. Feeling like he was poking the back of his head straight into a sauna. Lukas and Drew were shaking with fear, not knowing what to do. At least Drew still had his AR with him, but who knows if that would even work on this thing.
The first thing that they see is a bear's snout. It looked like the thing was rotting, with half of the skin sort of falling off from the stitches. Its entire face looked like someone cut out random parts of a human and a bear from a magazine, and cruelty taped them together with no thought of what should go where. That became more and more evident with the fact that a bunch of human ears were where the things eyes should've been. That probably meant it was blind, but they weren't super sure just yet. A claw, reached out, and grabbed onto Nicola's shoulder. Sending him out of his trance.
"You… okay there…?" the bear human asked, with his body looking like it's about to fall apart and spew out liquids of any kind.
Lukas' brain finally catches up with everything, and he screams at the sight of whatever is in front of them. He backs away up to a tree, and the other two watch as the bear human looks down, and makes a sad noise.
"Y'know… I'm supposed to stop you guys…" The thing starts to sniffle. "But you guys… are just mean…" Nicola starts to feel bad, he just seems to be a nice little creature, but the sight of it alone makes his skin crawl, so he gets Lukas' reaction. Either way, Nicola forces himself to give it a side hug. The bear human made a very happy snorting noise, and it nuzzled its nose onto Nicola's hair. He thought it was kind of gross, but he went along with it anyway. At least, just for the creatures sake.
"So big guy… What's your name? Do you have one at least?" Drew interjected to ask a maybe insensitive question.
"Uh… I don't know… Bernard… Bhyngaux…? I think…?" Bhyngaux said.
"Bhyngaux? That's your last name?" Drew questions further.
"Yes… Bhyngaux is… my last name… that's what everyone calls me… by the way…" Bhyngaux explained, and then got a stick to carve out the spelling into the tree next to him. Lukas comes over with Nicola and Drew, to look at the horrendous spelling he did. They shouldn't have really expected less from a humanoid beard. Drew looks slowly at Bhyngaux, and lets his jaw fall open a little bit.
"Is that really how you spell it?" Drew asked.
"Yes… b-h-y-n-g-a-u-x… is how… you spell my last name…" He was pretty annoyed how they couldn't figure it out. He then leans on a seemingly big ass tree, and after just a millisecond of leaning on it, it toppled over.
"You wanna help us destroy that place over there…?" Lukas asked him whilst pointing south. Bhyngaux looked shocked at the question he had been asked.
"How… would you guys… destroy… that place…?" Bhyngaux's speech was starting to sound more and more like the thing from Lukas' dreams. The resemblance in each of their speech patterns was too uncanny for him to not notice immediately. "They… will murder you… if you go back… on sight…!" Bhyngaux made them remember. They would probably do a lot worse in front of the other Stancers, just to prove a point. Then, Lukas remembered something a lot more worrying. The collective punishment.
Lukas suddenly sprints away from the group, and further north. They don't know what was going on, but they just ran after him anyway. Bhyngaux was surprisingly fast, so the two of them hopped onto his back, trying not to get puss and shit on their clothes. While riding Bhyngaux like a horse, they noticed that Lukas was pretty fast, but not as fast as their pseudo-stallion over here.
Bhyngaux caught, and grabbed Lukas by the shirt, before throwing him onto his back. Lukas was thrown off by that, but at least the bear human kept running where he was trying to go anyway.
"Where… are we… going…?" Bhyngaux asked.
"Run. Run until the edge of the woods, and run some more…" Lukas demanded, with Bhyngaux following orders like a good boy.
After knocking over some big trees that have probably been growing there for years. They finally make it out of the woods, to see an empty plain. The three of them hop off of Bhyngaux, and look back to see if he'd want to come with them. Bhyngaux, in fact, lit up when he heard that he could come with them. Nicola and Lukas weren't the happiest, but it was better than him murdering the three of them that's for sure.
So there they were, walking through this empty plateau, of nothing but glass, and weeds. The only thing that sort of looked unique, was the pile of ash sitting in the middle of everything, with dried up blood stains following back in the woods.
"Wait. Is that our car…?" Drew thinks out loud, before trading his way over to it. Lukas, also notices it, and follows Drew without a second word. Nicola and Bhyngaux kind of just stayed there until they would hopefully come back. It was comfortable, but all for Bhyngaux's sake at least.
Braxton and Izzy were both snoozing soundly, with Izzy cuddling him like a teddy when. (this is purely platonic, it just thought it would be something cute to imagine). Loud banging interrupted their slumber. Braxton jolts his head upright, and sees that Izzy was big spooning him. He managed to get her off of him, and look outside the window, to see Drew smirking at him, with Lukas standing there doing nothing.
He opens the car door, slowly. Making sure that none of his stuff falls out.
"I… thought you guys were… locked away or some shit…" He groaned whilst rubbing his eyes. "Are Ethan… and Arthur back yet…?" He asked.
"Nah." Drew said.
"Nope…" Lukas added. "Where'd they go…? Also, who's that…?"
"They went to go look for you guys with the blood trail! Oh yeah, and this is Izzy I guess…" Braxton points to her just as she wakes up herself. They all watch in anticipation on how she'll act, but when she notices them, she just waves and lays her head back down whilst grabbing Braxton so they could spoon again.
"Go through that trail, and you might find them… anyways, goodnight I suppose…" He too puts his head down, not even bothering to fight her on this. Both Lukas and Drew both stare at each other, before going back to where Nicola and Bhyngaux were hanging out.
Bhyngaux's uneasiness on the eyes has settled into Lukas' stomach just yet. With him having to stop from vomiting after getting a glance.
"What was that all about…?" Nicola asked.
"Nothing important. Let's follow the blood trail, that'll probably lead us to camp γ!" Drew says while speed walking his way over there. Having Lukas and Nicola to both catch up on their own. Bhyngaux stays back for a second, and just stares at the three of them. Something about them reminded him of Dhyngaux and Mhyngaux. He closed his eyes, and reminisced on their memories, before sprinting up towards them.
Oh what great times those were…