Round Robin October 2020

24 October 2020

Internally Samantha was overwhelmed and trying not to laugh hysterically. "I hated family trips hunting for metal," she muttered, inaudible to the professors with her. She tried deep breathing to calm herself down. She knew that her professors already thought that she was cracking under the strain of this dimensional adventure, which she was, but she was trying to actively lie to herself. It wasn't working very well.

When Samantha looked up, both of her professors were looking at her in concern. It was uber creepy with the glowing mark next to Professor Dlaun's eyes full of concern. 'I really hope that I am not in the horror movie trope. I would be the one to live. The professors are dating and I'm a single and intelligent female. Crap,' "I will be the traumatized survivor at the end of this won't I?"

"What was that Samantha?" Professor Xoi asked.

"Um...I got side-tracked with horror movie--" Professor Dlaun finished Samantha's thought, upping the creepy factor by at least 10.

"Horror movie tropes?" Professor Dlaun thought about it for a moment and came to the same conclusion that Samantha had. Professor Dlaun's eyes widened and mouth opened in shock, which again added to the creepy factor of the mark.

Samantha turned herself away from looking at Professor Dlaun. She could see that Professor Xoi was holding himself stiffly to prevent the same reaction. Professor Dlaun expressed her confusion.

Samantha and Professor Xoi exchanged an uncomfortable glance. Luckily for Samantha, Professor Xoi's relationship mandated him to explain exactly why Samantha could not bear to look at her favorite professor.

"I look CREEPY?!" Professor Dlaun yelled. "ME EXPRESSING EMOTIONS LOOKS CREEPY?!"

"Yes." came Professor Xoi's blunt answer. He sighed and continued, "The faster that we complete this task, the faster the mark is no longer on your face, making you look creepy."

"Fine. Guide me," she ordered him.

Professor Xoi took Professor Dlaun by the hand and began guiding her around the dilapidated cabin, glancing back and forth between where they were going and Professor Dlaun's forehead... and her lips if Samantha's eyes weren't deceiving her - something she was becoming less and less sure of these days.
Well, this was probably true though.

At any rate, Samantha followed the professors about, hot pink buck knife in hand. They trekked from the dilapidated cabin out to a dried up well that Samantha remembered checking what seemed like ages ago now before sending Professor Xoi to the river for water. As the trio approached the well, Professor Dlaun's mark glowed really, really brightly and a black tendril shot out and down to the bottom of the well before pulling something small out and dropping it into Professor Xoi's hands.

"Oh, great, now we're fishing." Samantha rolled her eyes. "What did the tendril yank out o' the well?"

Professor Xoi didn't answer. He was staring at the object in his hands with a look of pure horror on his face. Samantha had a hard time understanding this since to her it just looked like a box. A fancy wood box in surprisingly good condition, but still a box.