The week after Erin’s big realization had been positively normal at first. Sarah and Erin had quickly fallen back into their routines, by sifting through all the documents and trinkets they’d taken from Becker and working on their respective skills. With only one week before school break, Erin decided that she wanted to take things slow for the moment and give herself time to figure out what she wanted to do next.

Even though going out as “Ryan” became a lot more difficult after she’d figured herself out, Erin was able to deal with it, mostly by reminding herself that her outside appearance didn’t define who she was on the inside, and that she had an accepting home to go back to at the end of the day. It was difficult, at times, and Erin often had to remind herself that she shouldn’t be ashamed of who she was, but she was determined to not let these intrusive thoughts beat her down. One day, she would be perfectly fine with who she was, and she looked forward to it.

The first event to break their routine happened on Wednesday afternoon, when Sarah was practicing her powers, and idly noticed that Erin’s bracelet felt once again different. Curious, Sarah had then tried focusing her power on it, only to stagger back at what she’d felt.

The bracelet felt “deep”, for a lack of a better word. Sure, the last time Sarah had tried reading the bracelet, it had felt incredibly complex, but she’d still been able to see how it all pieced together even if she didn’t know how everything clicked to make the bracelet work.

Now, it felt less like inspecting a piece of extremely complex machinery, and more like staring at an impossibility. It was terribly frustrating, and Sarah almost felt like the blasted thing was taunting her!

Once she’d relayed everything to Erin, the two girls had spent the better part of an hour trying to figure out what had changed in the bracelet. Obviously, something had once again unlocked some of its power, but try as she might, Erin just couldn’t figure out what it was.

It was only after one more hour of confused fumbling that Erin, getting very frustrated, carelessly channeled some magic inside the bracelet and accidentally turned one of Sarah’s stuffed animals into a teacup.

Fortunately, Erin only spent a half a minute tearily apologizing for the destruction of Sarah’s fuzzy companion before it reverted back to normal. Still, once the surprise had worn off, the two girls found themselves getting very excited at the possibilities this new ability offered, and rushed to the forest outskirts to try and learn more.

What they quickly found out was that, while transforming objects into other shapes could be very useful, it required a lot of power, and usually didn’t last very long, unless Erin poured even more magic into it. The transformation’s complexity was also limited by Erin’s imagination, which meant that she was unable to transform things into intricate objects for the foreseeable future.

Further experimentations were however postponed when, the next day, something took place that would change everything.

- - -

It was Thursday afternoon. Sarah and Erin were quietly sitting at the back of their biology classroom, their last class of the day, dutifully taking notes as the teacher gave his lesson.

Erin found the quiet voice of the teacher and the scratching sound of her pencil on the paper to be soothing. In a way, it was almost like her intense focus on her coursework allowed her to take a break from her life. She could ignore the many things that made her anxious: her body, which felt so wrong at the moment, her worries about her parents, and so many other things. Here and now, the only things she had to worry about were scribbled on the blackboard in front of her, and everything else could wait.

Before all this, when Erin’s life was still dull and repetitive, the act of plunging herself into her studies had been her only form of respite from her life, a way to completely forget who she was and why she was so unhappy all the time. Now, it felt more akin to meditation, where she took some time to center herself and prepare herself to face the world once more.

Sarah’s constant presence next to her also helped immensely, and not for the first time Erin thought about all how much her friend had changed her life for the better. A small smile blossomed on her face at the thought, remembering the kindness the other girl had shown her every step of the way. Idly, while still taking notes, Erin decided that she needed to do something for her best friend to show how grateful she was.

Erin was pulled out of her reverie when she felt a faint vibration coursing through her feet. Curious, Erin looked down at the ground, trying to find the origin of the shaking, but nothing stood out to her as to be causing such a thing. She looked at Sarah, but the other girl seemed to be just as confused as her.

Progressively, the vibrations became stronger, catching the attention of the rest of the class as well as the teacher, until the whole classroom was practically shaking. In an eerily familiar move, nearly every student rushed towards the windows in an effort to find the source of the strange event.

Everyone was crowding the windows, looking down at the courtyard and pushing each other away with indignant exclamations, hoping to be lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the strange wolf that had attacked the school not so long ago. Because they were all so focused on looking down, most missed the strange beacon of light emitting from far away in the distance, a radiant golden light going up as far as the eye could see.

Sarah and Erin, who had opted to stay away from the windows for the time being, quickly spotted the ray of light shining above everyone else’s gazes. But what instantly caught Erin’s attention was the origin of the ray. It was difficult to say, as buildings were blocking the view, but it looked like it was emanating directly from the Eriz forest.

A sinking feeling grew inside of Erin’s chest and, glancing back at Sarah, she saw the same apprehension she felt mirrored on her friend’s face. She did not need to see the beacon to know where in the forest it emanated from.

Soon enough, someone in the crowd looked up, and, with a cry of “look up!”, the whole class noticed the beacon. Excited and apprehensive cries and mutters filled the classroom, the biology teacher desperately trying to regain some form of control over his students.

Slowly, the shaking crawled to a stop, and most students regained their seats at the insistence of their teacher, though most of them kept their eyes on the radiant column of light in the distance.

As this was taking place, Erin entertained the idea of sneaking off once more, but the teacher always kept an eye on Sarah and her, having apparently been alerted of their little escapade last time around. Of course, she could still have left, but decided against doing so in the end. There was nothing she could do right now that would help in any way, if she were correctly guessing the origin of the strange light.

Class slowly resumed, though even the teacher seemed to be having trouble focusing on his work. Fortunately, the day was almost over, and the bell rang only fifteen minutes later, signaling the end of the day for most students.

Quietly, Sarah and Erin followed the throng of students rushing out of the classroom with a lot on their minds.

- - -

The small city of Eriz is once more at the center of the news today, only weeks after an unidentified beast attacked the local school in the middle of the day. Around this afternoon, most of the residents of Eriz were witnesses to a strange earthquake followed by a column of luminous rays rising in the sky.

This bizarre display of light seems to emanate from a local forest, though no one has attempted to identify its precise source yet. Hours later, the light has not faded in any way, leaving many of the locals worried.

All around the world, news outlets are reporting on the strange phenomenon, as a bystander was able to capture the phenomenon on camera and proceeded to post it on social media. Many theories have been put forth as to…

Sarah’s mom lowered the volume of the TV, shaking her head in bewilderment. “Everyone has been talking about this all day long at work, and I’ve heard enough crazy theories for today, if you girls don’t mind.”

Erin, Sarah and her mother were sitting in the living room, quietly watching the news after they’d finished eating. True to Lisa’s words, people of all places had taken a keen interest in the strange events taking place in Eriz. For the first time in recorded history, questions that should have been answered long ago were being asked. Why was the local forest so poorly mapped, and why didn’t anybody ever go in there?

People were starting to notice that some things didn’t add up, and if that made Erin nervous, she couldn’t even imagine the state Becker must have been in. She and Sarah had cautiously tried to go and see him, even though they weren’t on the best of terms with the professor at the moment, but he’d been nowhere to be found.

“It’s fine, Ms. Ritter,” Erin replied after a second. “I think we’re all getting a bit tired of hearing about this.”

“I’m sure one day I’ll get you to call me Lisa, dear,” Miss Ritter said with a teasing smile. “But anyway, you two should probably retire for the night. It’s getting late, and I don’t want you to go to bed at 2 in the morning on the first day of your break.”

Grumbling, Sarah stood up and made her way up to her room with Erin in tow. While tomorrow was actually Friday, the school had decided to give everyone the day off, as a measure of safety. Erin thought they probably wanted to avoid another “Big bad giant wolf” incident, especially so close to the fall break.

Once they’d made their way into Sarah’s room, a charged silence settled between the two girls. Somehow, Erin knew that Sarah was aware of her thoughts. She always seemed to be a step ahead of her, something Erin had always found very endearing about her friend.

Shaking her head, Erin decided that, for once, she should be the one taking the initiative. “I want to go see what’s going on in the forest,” she said in a single breath.

Sarah, who’d just been about to say something, blinked in surprise, before giving a small, wistful smile. “I know.”

“School’s canceled tomorrow, I would bet anything that Becker’s getting ready to leave as we speak, and I’m scared of what he might do. Of what he might find once he reaches the center.”

“You do know that I’m never going to let you go in there alone, right?” Sarah said, frowning at Erin, as if daring her to oppose her.

It was Erin’s turn to sigh wistfully. “I can’t ask you to come with me, Sarah, it’s going to be dangerous,” she said with a pleading tone.

“Good thing you’re not asking, then. I’m coming no matter what you say.” Sarah said, a light frown creasing her face.

“But what about your mom? We’ll be gone for days, maybe even longer, she’s going to be worried sick if you leave.” The moment she said it, Erin regretted her words. It was a low blow, but she wanted Sarah to be safe. She didn’t deserve to get dragged into all of this.

“I know, Erin,” Sarah sighed, her shoulders sagging in defeat. “You think I don’t know that? We’ve already talked about this. If I’m not coming, then I’ll be the one worrying. And I’m not just asking because I want to be there, I can help! I can warn you if anything dangerous gets too close to us, I can help you figure out what that beacon of light is once we reach it!” Sarah was nearly shouting by now, her worry of her mother overhearing them the only thing keeping her volume in check. “I’ll leave a letter for mom. Don’t leave me behind, please,” she whispered, unshed tears pooling at the corner of her eyes.

Her heart wrenching, Erin tried for a few more moments to deny her friend, to muster the courage to refuse her demands, but she just couldn’t. With an equally quiet “Alright”, Erin stood up, pulling out a large map from the piles of document they’d taken from Becker’s house, and set it down in front of Sarah.

“Let’s plan this correctly, then.”