The Island Trip.

Final Chapter.

Path were becoming less and less visible and above that she started walking fast.

It was becoming difficult to follow her from distance so they decided to lessen the distance between them and her by also moving fast.

View of castle was becoming clearer with every step. The building looked gloomy and eerily silent as if expecting to actually hear weird noises coming from there.

She abruptly stopped in middle of an uneven path, it seemed that she was becoming suspicious of being watched.

The time she stopped walking, they all knelled to hide back in bushes that were surrounding the path.

As they were deep in the the forest and with sun setting, sun rays were coming filtered and cold was slowly engulfing them. With cold came the fog and vision was becoming more blurred.

All abruptly stopped as they saw her settling on the ground. "omg, what is she doing now?" whispered Sophia out of frustration, but she was still on the ground and took her bag off the shoulder and was taking out something which looked like-

"that's the same box from which she gave me those charms!" Sophia whispered again.

Nothing was making sense!!

Those charms! although it had only given them headache, still were very beautiful.

They had difficult time to actually throw it out. How can they just throw such mystical and mesmerizing piece of jewel?! Just like that!?

So, in the end they converted it into necklace and they wore it around there necks like there personal souvenir.

They were moving, more like crawling on knees and peeping out of bush to come little closer as fog and lack of light was creating problem to know what the hell was going on there. Everybody were squinting so hard they're eyes were becoming sore.

"God! i didn't sign up for this, when will it get over??" thought Dean.

She opened that box and took out the charm which was just like they had.

The minute it landed on the land, it started glowing!

That charm on the ground was faintly glowing, just like glow bugs that flutter in forest in cloudy nights.

The brightness was coming from within, the dark core of it. The illumination coming from new source was illuminating a very hideous path, little right from where she was sitting on the ground.

Grass was growing long and not crumpled many times i.e; the path was less walked ,uneven which was invisible to eyes of bystanders until the charm's glow fall on it.

Watching the luminescence coming out of stone made the squad eat all of there thoughts. There bodies became stiff like statues and were not able to move even a muscle, out of shock. So awestruck-ed so speechless that they didn't register that the lady was now not in-front of them and had started walking that path and was now out of there vision.

She walked little inside the uneven path and hid behind the tree. Waiting to be Followed!

Big eyes, excitement flowing out of it, she thought

"Little more..just follow me. Now is not the time to get lost,

there's castle to get lost into!".

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"wHA-" "hOW, HOW-" "Noo WAY-", They spoke all together, overlapping each other words.

Big bulging eyes,like deer got caught in-front of flashlight and mouth open wide but not coherent words were coming out of it.

A look of pure astonishment was painted on each of there faces.

"Huhh, that was definitely not a dream. Stone has magical origins" Spoke Annie while shivering, concluding everyone's thought process.

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But wait-

"Waittttt, now where did she ran off to?", "and where did that path vanished?!" shrieked Sean.

With almost no light and snow moon just coming on there heads, having little to no safety from fauna of the dark

and Now no path to follow, it was safe to say that Panic mode was kicking on!

There Fight or Flight triggering hormone were getting activated.

As if shock about glowing stone was not good enough to trigger that part of there brains!

Like a switch, all at the same time pushed forward to the direction where that lady was knelling down.

Some were looking for the path, going inside the deep bushes while some were trying to find out the foot prints,

anything that could help find her.

"Just how fast a path can be vanished? in just few minutes?", Sean was mumbling as he was struggling on the ground,trying to see across the thick bushes when accidentally his necklace, which was tucked in the shirt, hanged out of his neck and came into his vision. He was in process of tucking it back into the shirt in haphazardly way when it struck to him.

Recalling all what happened just few minutes ago, a bulb flicked in his mind.

He stood up and looked back at his friends, all were scattered in small portion of forest panicking.

He came back to where the lady originally knelled down on the ground and called his friends to gather around him.

"Did you find anything? i feel no shame in accepting the fact that i am scared", said Annie.

"I think i know how to find the path", It's just a thought, might work... or not",

"and if we got lucky we might also could know where that lady had gone", said Sean

"Either way we don't have any other choice" he murmured to himself.

"What??" almost all spoke, they felt a little spark of hope, still skeptical but open minded to listen to the idea, they literally had no other option.

"As we all saw that path opened only when that charm glowed right?" said Sean.

" yes"

"so i think with the help of that glow, lady followed the path and with her the path also stop becoming visible as she walked further inside. With no glow no path of visibility ", he included.

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*cricket sounds*

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" it does make sense" said Alex with wide eyes as he joined the dots in his mind.

"so in conclusion, we cant see path until and unless the charm glow-"

" yea we got that but what now?, we still are lost" interrupted Annie when Alex was trying to speak.

" yes we are... but we have something which might solve that issue, at least temporarily.

we do have the charms... we do have chance to find that path with the help of them. All we have to is to copy her and do the same thing" Sean concluded while clutching the necklace tightly.

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*cricket sounds intensifies*

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It clicked in there mind and everyone understood. With unspoken affirmation, they all took out the necklace out and gathered around the ground. on the count of 3 they dropped it on the ground, the same point where that lady did.

When it fell on the ground,everyone subconsciously were holding there breath. It felt like even the forest had become quiet at that moment. Nervousness and having thoughts of failing was making everybody snappy and on the verge of become insane.

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*GASP*

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It worked? it did worked..Stones were glowing! and the intensity of it was much more higher than what they saw coming from just one.

Within minutes, which felt like hours, path also exposed itself.

They all stood up and looked at each other. Mind numbed,blank.

So when they saw stone glowing and path opening for the second time they didn't felt like going mad, it was like they have accepted that that night was going to be like that and rational mind can't work on these type of situation.

They picked up the charms and followed the path with blank but focused mind.

Path was dark. Thick trees and climber veils over the branches of the trees were creating a canopy like structure over the path making the glow more mystical (only) source of light.

No one dared to say out loud or even mumble a word. They were too aware of feeling of hollowness and emptiness that was creeping over them.

Feeling of dread, felt like something, something was very wrong about- not able to pin point what but it was giving bad vibes.

With the biggest smile on her face, she started walking again.

"Not bad, not bad at all".

After some minutes, following the natural curve of the path, little further they saw that there was a clearing. Forest had started thinning around them and light coming from moon was filtering the dim road they have been following for god know how long.

It was late, moon was shining above there heads. It took some time to adjust there eyesight as the clearing had more light than that path.

When they were able to open there eyes, they wished they didn't as it was going lead them to the horrific..situation that they were yet to know.

They get aware of two horrific detail which were now in plain sight.

First, there was someone with them.

Second, they were at the entrance of the freaking castle.

A figure, standing in-front of them, few meters away. Watching them.

It was the same person who they were trying to find the whole night, the freaking Lady.

No more, no more game of hide and seek. And by look on her face, they concluded that she was also thinking the same.

Entrance gate was huge, with rusted parts just hanging on hinges.

If they thought castle was creepy from distance than coming so close to it made them realize that it's more that just that.

It had the aura of death, the feeling of abandon-es.

The feeling of emptiness.

Pure terror.

Castle felt alive but in very non-natural way.

Her being obnoxiously mysterious self held out an hand, slowly inching upwards towards them.

With crooked smile and tilting her head to side mockingly like telling them to take there shots, opened her hand and gestured them to follow her.

Even before they took another step toward her she opened the gate, the creek of door somehow made them more on edge than the actual situation, that is, entering the castle.

After opening the gate, she stood there and then without changing directions moved backwards.

Eyes focused on them,boring knifes and daggers.

"Come on now don't hesitate, i don't bite" She said in sing-song tone.

And just like that she disappeared into the darkness, the shadows of pillars and roof obscured the view of her.

Now or never!

Castle felt like buzzing and bushes and trees inside the garden looked like they are of different shade, darker and had longer shadows as compared to the outside flora.

Paranoia was kicking in. No discussion on that.

Now or never!

They were tired, hungry, angry and mostly scared. Emphasis on 'scared'.

Even before they could digest the new information and barely get out of the situation some different sh**y thing start happening with them.

And with no mercy, it happened again.

They stood there, no one knew exactly what to do.

Sophia was staring at the gate, she was running in her own maze of emotions and felt like her brain was going to explode but then all of a sudden it clicked.

"It was a trap. All of it, nothing but a trap!", Sophia thought.

Disappointment and anger were the first set of emotions she felt but not even a second later it replaced to panic and feeling of dread...

It seemed like she was the only one who figured it out as she finally came back to senses and felt like rustling near her and when she looked toward the direction of the source of noise-

She saw Annie walking toward the gate.

"Nooooooo!, don-don't!", Everybody stopped whatever they were doing or thinking and were looking at Sophia who was running toward the gate to stop Annie, but too late.

Till the time she realized Sophia was coming toward her, she had already entered the castle's premises.

oh god oh god!

They both were standing in-front of the gate flabbergasted. One from inside and another watching from outside the gate.

"What, please stop pacing back and forth-"

"IT WAS A TRAP! DIDN'T YOU GUYS REALIZE??", shrieked Sophia interrupting Alex.

"Ohh no! sh*t", Alex cursed loudly.

Dean sat on the ground with a thud, head in his head." from the start, we were being played" he spoke, his voice breaking at the end. Yes, he was crying.

"Sorry, so-sorry i was just so angry and irritated with the whole ordeal", Annie was crying, tears were flowing. " i just wanted to punch her on her face, I-I didn't realize" She ran towards the gate and tried opening the gate.

It didn't bulged.

With hands on her face and eyes red for crying hard she was walking backwards unknowingly in shock. Unconsciously moving away from the only way of her escape.

"hey! hey stop..It's going to be alright okay, we are coming okay?", She also tried to open it from outside, it was not opening!

" listen to me! don't go more inside, we are coming inside" Sarah said, she saw how much scared she was, Annie had to stay calm. "We are not leaving you, just stay where you are" Sarah said.

"Sean, come on come back to senses. We need you to calm down, Annie needs you" Sophia shaking him lightly.

" Dean, Alan come on, focus, focus!", " guys, i am barely able to function properly but ju-just look at her.. She is more scared than all of us combined"

" We need to enter." said Dean. He looked more composed than earlier.

"Yeah, we have no choice but to get her out of here" concluded Alex and Sean nodded.

"Let's go" said Sarah.

Till then they were facing toward the forest, suddenly everything felt too silent and quite so they looked back at the castle and then they realized... Annie was not standing there.

They were looking everywhere as much as they could through the grooves and indents of the gate.

No trace.

"Annie! ANNIEEEEEE! Where are you?" they all were screaming.

No response.

"NO! We are coming, We are, wait.." Four of them shouted as loud as they could.

All together they started hitting the gate with stones , kicking.

Hinges finally broke and gate fall and with that they ran inside.

Darkness, nothing else but pure darkness.

They took out the charms from there pockets as they don't have any other light source with them and phone was dead as soon as they had entered the forest.

Charms were glowing very faintly and the only source other than that was natural light coming from the moon filtered inside through worn out windows.

Inside of the castle, it felt wrong and feeling of being watched was making everyone jerk there faces again and again towards darker parts of the room.

They couldn't even tell what room it was, it was so dark.

They didn't have to wait for long to know where Annie was.

As they were investigating there way to another room, Dean suddenly stumbled on something and lost his balance.

He fell and the sound was echoing very loud in the empty room, Sarah screamed out of sheer fear.

They all screamed more loudly and fall onto the ground when they realized what was the reason of Dean stumbling on the ground.

Corpse of Annie.

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She had a shocked teary face looking blankly at the ceiling.

Lights had been left from her eyes, wide scared eyes filled with terror.

No pulse, body felt cold and blue.

She had no injury or blood oozing out of her body but had a dark bruises over her neck and mouth like she was choked.

They never had chance to save her, they realized it a little late.

If they were not extremely sad and broken of finding out the dead body of there friend on the ground they would have noticed a dark shadow looming over them, from the ceiling. And also would have observed all the other bodies scattered around in the dark room.

Despair, feeling of lost and very strong feeling of guilt was sitting deep down in there gut. How are they were going to move on from this?

Although before they had time to think much more about how are they going to take her out of there for a proper ceremony they were overwhelmed as they felt someone behind them.

Dean felt a hand on his shoulder.

The moment he felt the touch he scrambled toward opposite direction, totally out of senses and panicked.

When they all looked back, they finally realized that they were not alone.

The figure looked somewhat similar yet different.

She- the lady is back! But she was floating rather than standing on the ground, more like.... Possessed.

Suddenly everything become too much, too much chaos.

Windows shuttering, doors banging.

Louder and louder.

And just like that the loud noises stopped abruptly .

Silence.

Pin drop silence.

She was standing in-front of the big window. The moon light entering through the window inside the room was making her shadow much more bigger and creepy.

All scrambled on there feet and Sean lifted Annie's body over his shoulder.

No matter what would happen they were not leaving her here to rot.

"STAY AWAYY!", Screamed Sean.

"YOU KILLED HER! HOW COULD YOU??".

But then, out of nowhere she was standing in-front of them. Too close! too close!

"Just like that" She grabbed his neck with so much force and power he was not able to breath properly.

"No! not again. Enough is enough!" thought Alex and punched her on the face to distract her.

And Sophia and Dean was prying her hand out of Sean's neck.

She hissed and growled and threw her other hand over the side and Alex flew away to ground.

She had an unusual kind of power. Voices coming out of her were also not natural, deep growl like an animal.

The room had a sulfur like pungent smell and the smell was stronger near her.

In the moment of distraction, her grip on his neck loosen up a little and he threw her hand.

"RUN! THE GATE, THE GATE!", said Sean. Running toward the said broken gate was a complicated journey as they were little deep in the hall and the room from where they entered was big and not to forget.. darkness.

Nonetheless, they just ran. They ran like a madman trusting the fleeting memories about the knowledge of the directions.

Suddenly things were thrown at them, curtains flowing wild in the air, although there was no logical explanation of that movements.

They were suffering the hits from the furniture, falling headfirst on the walls and stumbling on ..was that a hand?!

She was right on the corner wherever they ran. Floating towards them.

The possessed lady, the demon, was coming toward Sean, Dean and Alex. Sophia was standing little further away and the lady's attention was toward them and not toward her.

Sophia was trying to find something, something to be used as a distraction factor.

Sophia found a metal rod on the ground and she was swinging it toward her to distract her while Dean and Sean inched towards the entrance while Alex was balancing Annie on her shoulder.

They were so close.

So close to freedom. But not on her watch, the Demon had different plans.

She growled so loudly like a wounded animal and ran towards her and Sophia scrambled back and lost her balance, the rod fell out of her hand and suddenly was not able to feel ground or could move her limbs.

She was floating in the air. The lady had her neck tilted in a very acute angle and hands in the air, maneuvering Sophia, throwing and swooshing her in the air like a rag doll.

It felt like she was putting up a show to other two who were hiding somewhere behind her.

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"Sean Alex, you both need to go. No matter what happens, you need to take Annie back to the safe place, follow the markings and go back. No.. No run runnn", before they could argue back Dean pushed them out of there hiding.

Tears were flowing out of there eyes.

"Go, we will be back...i promise, i will bring Sophia now go" he whispered. Sean nodded and grabbed Annie's dead body and crawled out of the gate.

For a moment he looked back. " you promised, a fake promise.", "please be back, i can't loose more now".

And then he just ran as fast as he could possibly can with a dead weight over her shoulder.

Sophia was trying to move her limbs but nothing was working out but she hoped that others were able run away by then.

Out of nowhere she heard a loud sound and then she was falling down onto the ground.

After that everything was blur.

All she remembered was the sight of the metal rod protruding out of the demon and her falling on the ground and someone lifting her up and running.

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When she woke up, she was in hospital.

She was not aware of how she survived and how she was in the hospital or for how long she was unconscious, but one thing she knew for sure.

Annie was gone. On positive note,

Other survived.