What seems like forever ago... ———————————————
Mrs. Ann sat in the back of the bus where she could see everything, though for hours there wasn't much to be seen. When the busses diverted from traffic, she helpfully advised Ms. Hemlock that there was no such obstruction denoted on her paid traffic app on her tablet. When the group ended up down a long and windy two-land road with narrow shoulders, she just had to speak up:
"Ms. Hemlock, where are you taking us?" she called forward. All these children with their free apps and the bus driver with her GPS... they must have been reading things wrong for them all to have not already reached their destination. The height of rudeness is continuing to ignore Mrs. Ann when she had valuable wisdom to grant these people.
Earlier in the trip, Mary had tried to act like she couldn't hear her, but that lead to Mrs. Ann simply repeating herself louder and louder. Since the bus was mostly quiet, the driver was left with no other options but to respond. And, again, she took this moment to do just that:
"I'm just following Coach Banks," said Mary, knowing that wouldn't be the end of the questioning.
"Well, Ms. Hemlock, as you're an experienced driver—" she began saying, but it wasn't a praise of experience, rather the tone of superiority that dripped from Mrs. Ann's words, "—shouldn't you be the lead bus? Shouldn't you know where we're going?" Again, the tone maintained a 'it's not my job to do your job, just to tell you it's your job to do' tone. "It's not like we can expect the men to pull over an ask for directions."
"We're on State Highway 12," said Ms. Hemlock as they passed a sign. "That means we're going east. If the highway is backed up as far as they say way back at the gas station, then I can assure you this is the right way. It ain't fast, but it'll get us there."
"Isn't," remarked Mrs. Ann. "Really dear, you should know."
A number of the cheerleaders and even fellow chaperones all rolled their eyes. A woman of dark complexion, Amancia, Eddie's mother, turned around and looked Mrs. Ann in the eyes. She was tired of the complaining, but she didn't let that sour her tone. However, when she got the first syllable of Mrs. Ann's first name passed her lips, the older woman cut her off.
"Don't speak to me as if we're being personal," she said, waving off Mrs. Campbell. "This is a professional setting. Victory at State Championship will set these children up for college and perhaps a even major league sports."
Amancia frowned. "Shouldn't you be driving yourself?" she wondered. "I thought busses were reserved for those with low income to join games."
"Which is why you're here, yes," Mrs. Ann agreed. "But no, someone of age and experience should be watching over our youth. Myself in this bus, and in the other bus, well... We should depend on Officer Dowd, I would think. He knows when to be firm but fair, I'm sure." She paused briefly, as if remembering another detail. "Oh, and bad circulation makes it hard to man an automobile."
"I'm sure," remarked Ms. Campbell. "Hopefully not as much force as Officer Nannery."
Mrs. Ann feigned ignorance, though literally every parent on the bus knew the name of the previous Resource Officer whom had allegedly caught a student smoking weed in the bleachers during school one day and ended up shooting and killing them. He almost even got his position at the school maintained after the conclusion of his administrative leave. If not for a netroots effort by Zelda Robinson to rally the school, the officer would have even kept his job.
The bus had enough time pass between Amancia's statement and Mrs. Ann's reply of "Who?" that it had already turned towards the State Park entrance while the other occupants kept talking. But that last question wasn't up in the air for very long before a quick reply came from middle-aged man of darker skin:
"You know who," said Mr. Eddington from midway up the bus. The bus grew deathly silent, even by the more talkative girls. "That man killed my neighbor's boy in cold blood." He turned to face Mrs. Ann, his eyes burning with cold rage. "And Dowd? Dowd suplexed a student last year," he stated flatly. "She needed stitches. So if that [cockroach] hurts a child because you insisted he come on this trip, that's on you!"
Mrs. Ann huffed. "[Boar]ish man," she said to herself. Meanwhile, one of the girls up front was standing at her seat, imploring the others to start a cheer. Best as anyone could figure, the real reason for the cheer was to try and down out the arguing parents. So when Mrs. Ann realized she didn't know where she was and started trying to yell towards Ms. Hemlock, no response would come. Shortly there after, a bolt of lightening hit close to the back of the bus. "OH! Good heavens!"
One of the chaperones without a child laughed at Mrs. Ann's reaction. Leaning over, she confided in the woman she'd been speaking with all the while. "Why do I get the feeling she'd respond the same way if a [shark] bit her?" one parent quietly asked another. "Good heavens!" she said in whisper.
Mrs. Ann would remember that.
Seconds after the Zelda and Emily stepped off the bus... ———————————————
Mrs. Ann began speaking earnestly: "Ms. Hemlock, really. Allowing two girls off into this weather to go check on boys. That's hardly appropriate action as supervising adult. Why, in my day, we did not let young girl fraternize with boys."
"OK, Boomer," Ms. Hemlock remarked, flipping through a book she had stored in the deep pocket under her side window. A number of the girls laughed as did parents did too. Ms. Hemlock was only about ten years younger than Mrs. Ann, but one of them clearly had a better time in the 70's than the other.
Mrs. Ann frowned. "Yes, I'm sure you all think this is so funny. No one has any respect for keeping the sexes separate. Why, in my day, we had all-boy and all-girl schools! I myself went to Saint Joesph's in Georgia," she started, and it sounded like it was going to be quite the tale... but two minutes in, she stopped as a motion caught her eye. "Mr. Miller, what are you doing?"
Mr. Miller froze in place. In truth, he had his hand down his pants and was rubbing his dick, trying to block the shrew out. Across from him, Mrs. Garcia was doing the same. The two of them caught each others eyes and knew, in that moment, that they would swear a non-verbal pact to not ever say what they each were witnessing the other doing.
"Trying to pull my earplugs out of my pocket!" he called back, having been leaning down far enough in the seat that no one could rightfully tell what he was doing—except Mrs. Garcia—without leaning over the seat and looking right down at him. Momentarily snapped out of it, he caught look at Michelle in the seat in front of Miss Garcia... she looked like she was just finishing and let out a small moan. He shouldn't have been turned on, but he was... and his hand slowly started to sink towards his waistband again.
There was a stomping in the isle, the heavy steps of an small, somewhat frail woman with cane making haste. Mrs. Ann was on patrol now. She had been focused on Mr. Miller, but now she was up and about. With her umbrella in her other hand, and, at the first sign of impropriety, she reflexively smacked a fellow chaperone with it. This continued up the line, though not with everyone... for it seemed that something about the curse had made it so the initial lust-wave did not strike anyone without a chosen animal.
Maybe it was her age, or being post-menopause, or even just her poor circulation, or, perhaps, her iron will dedicated to purity after her much wilder youth. Whatever the case may be, the reason that the cheerleader's bus didn't have much in the way of a mass orgy was because Mrs. Ann was, at the very least, personally ruining 'the mood' for almost everyone.
I say almost because there was that one parent who was learning sharks basically have two penises...
Mostly the cheerleaders, who were almost exclusively at the front of the bus, were at most touching and feeling all over each other as they stood looking out the front windows. Just ahead of them was the blurry back windows of the football team's bus and what no one could deny appeared to be one form causing a giant red balloon to appear and vanish repeatedly. Or something? It was really hard to tell through the foggy windows, but it looked like someone was splashing white paint on against the bus windows.
Officer Dowd ran by their vehcile, clearly unholstering his gun for all the girls to see. "Oh my god!" screamed Janice. "Dowd's gunna kill someone!" someone else yelled. "Fucking cops!" added a voice in all the commotion which actually may have been a parent. The air filled with declaratives about the danger, though there was one woman who kept her cool:
Mrs. Ann was at the front of the bus by now, and small as she was, she blocked the way for perhaps everyone but the driver. "I'm sure he's not going to kill anyone," offered the small old woman with a smile that might later be described as a sneer by her detractors. Leaning on her cane, other parents began to stand up. "Order," she said. "We must maintain order. Leave this to the police!" she called out.
"OK. No," said Ms. Hemlock who reached over behind Mrs. Ann and pulled the lever to open the door at the bottom of the stairs. "I'm with the angry mob on this one," said Mary. "This is where you get off, Karen," she stated firmly and with the intonation of authority.
Karen Ann huffed. However, while she was sure in her position of righteousness, the urgency of those others on the bus could not be denied. In her mind's eyes, she saw herself getting trampled, and it did not sit well with her. Turning to one side, the old woman began fumbling with her umbrella using both hands as she carefully stepped down towards the door.
The rain was pouring down, but in the moments directly after two firm cane placements were made and the umbrella was over her head, all the other parents came flowing out the bus door just as the students had done mere moments earlier from their ow ride. They each moved into the existing crowd, the parents often hurrying to be near their children. Even Ms. Hemlock, after getting stragglers off the bus and Achak from his cage, joined the crowd.
They were there to hear everything being said at the end, and all went quiet when Ted's face was revealed, though not everyone could see clearly... there were nearly one hundred people present, after all. But, all the while, Mrs. Ann would push and excuse her way through the crowd until she was in the very front nearest to Coach Banks.
It was only at this range that Mrs. Ann realized that nice boy Andrew must have had a recent growth spurt. Not exactly short before at five foot eight, he was clearly at least two inches taller now... and with a rounder ass covered by "—a tail!" he was asking, and it sounded absurd, but he clearly had one. No one disputed his question, though, also, no one raised their hand. His tail wagged.
"Does a tailfin count?" someone asked softly, but Andy didn't hear them.
"What's that tell us, Andy?" asked Coach Banks. Normally, Mrs. Ann would interject about how Thaddeus was the man in charge and shouldn't be deferring to his students... but Andrew was one of the only boys who seemed to respect her wisdom. James, on the other hand...
"Rules of a horror movie, Coach," James answered before Andrew could. "If you know what is causing a curse, you can try to avoid it." James stepped a bit more center. "Don't name animals! Don't fall to waves of lust if you can help it! Maybe keep social distance? And absolutely keep your eyes out for weirdness and clues... feelings count!" he said, blood caked on his face. "If you think you're being chased or something, don't discount that! You've all seen the movies, well now you're in one! If you have questions, I'm—"
"A boy!" Karen interjected loudly, demanding to be heard.
"Boy!" Zelda called mockingly from somewhere in the crowd and a few people chuckled.
"How are you to know of a curse when you shun God?" James shifted his head back as if the woman had just swatted him.
He was suddenly very confused. "You think god cursed us?" he asked, intentionally leaving the name lowercase. "Why? What did we do? Like specifically."
"You're sinful!" Mrs. Ann proclaimed, knowing it should be obvious.
Coach Banks placed a hand on his head. This is not what the he signed up for.
"Mrs. Ann," said Andrew, turning to meet her eyes. "We can't leave here... any of us... so that's the start of the curse."
Heather cleared her throat. She was red-haired girl with freckles and glasses from the cheerleader's bus who was about to 'um, actually' magic for Andy: "More likely, keeping us in place is a binding or capture spell. This is too complex of a magic to be a single spell... unless it was done by a powerful caster."
"Heather," James said, looking to her. "Let it not be said I am unconvinced by evidence." She blinked. The young man bowed to her, revealing a wound on the back of his head to anyone who hadn't seen it. "Clearly magic is real, and I apologize for my past actions."
Heather raised an eyebrow. "It shall not be said," she nodded. "Apology accepted." Mrs. Ann huffed. "Still, we're looking for evidence of the power. James is correct that feelings are important," she said out to the crowd, stepping a little more centered so more people could hear her. "Some of you may have latent magical connections that perhaps were at rest before just now," she explained as if giving a lecture on the most boring of topics. "As you change, you may realize this connection... giving you a sixth sense to leylines, magical objects, SCP-like entitles, or whatever."
Coach Banks stepped away from Mrs. Ann so he could better face Andy, James, and now Heather. "OK, Kids. Lay it on me. I canna rightly make the least-bad call of a bunch of bad options without knowing all my choices," he said for the second time tonight... the same thing he'd said some version of hundreds of times by now.
"No, no, no!" Mrs. Ann smacked her cane on the ground with each 'no. "I will not be lead by children."
Coach Banks spoke, lifting his slicker's hood just a bit to show the gray in his eyebrows. "I'm in my forties, and he's nineteen," he offered, motioning to Andy. "And, if you open your mind, kids today can know quite a lot," the Coach explained. "Eddie's not just a great quarterback, but also a promising engineer; Andrew is assistant coach to two sports teams while recovering from a coma his sophomore year; James..." he looked at James. "Is likely to be a famous movie critic some day, and is active in politics; I could go on," Coach Banks said, "but it is dropping buckets... lightening without thunder."
"I say we reconvene in the lobby," offered Andy.
"Makes sense to me," nodded Thaddeus, patting Andrew on the shoulder. Andy's body told him that the coach was coming onto him even though that clearly wasn't true... the assistant coach suppressed that and tried not to have it show on his face.
James posited the idea: "Unless that's what the cabin wants us to do."
Andy smirked. "It's a little creepy, but it's dry, heated, and has enough rooms for more than the number of people who came!" he said, motioning to the building. "Social distance, and try to keep your hands out of your pockets!"
"You had me at 'dry'," remarked Emily who, along with Zelda, had reappeared. "So... what is the plan?"
Andrew looked at James, then Heather, then motioned to Thad. "Get Coach Banks the best of bad options. Gather data," he added, looking to Zelda. "Test every which way we can to figure out the rules of this place... try not to turn into a furpile while we do it." He smirked, but it was a bit forced. There was a lot of tension and fear in the air.
With that, the Washington Wolves, cheerleaders, and chaperones all walked up the path to the...
Cabin in the Woods