The Wanderer

I beckon towards the group. I then materialize some benches in a semicircle shape, then summon some firewood and light it with a spell. How did I do that? I'm a ghost. Regular physics don't apply to me unless I want them to. Also, I just learned I can recognize spells without ever learning them initially. We are in a dense forest, and we just killed a mage of some sorts a couple days ago, then we teleported back to my girlfriend Sally's house. I couldn't have killed it by myself, however. The group I was talking about have similar abilities as me, but only one is a ghost. There's Sally, who can crumble anything at will, including living things. Then there's Evan, who can grasp things with his mind and throw them, and Charky, who can climb walls and has inhuman strength. There's also James, who can teleport, and it damages the area around him, and Alex, who can control projectiles. Then there's Charky's toy bunny and companion, plushy, who is possessed by a ghost and has similar abilities as me. We're all worn out, and we start talking about the sorcerer. All of a sudden, a girl rounds a corner and runs towards Sally. "Sally!" She screams. Sally looks at her with concern-and fear. "Mel? What wrong?" The girl, Mel, breaks down. "Th-Th-The men h-had guns a-and th-they tried t-to k-kill me." She sobs, and Sally tries to comfort her. Mel looks at the floor. "They killed my parents. Tortured them in front of me, then beheaded them. I ran to the forest to run away, but then I saw you here. They said you were missing on the news. I was so scared." I glance at her. "Were they at your house?" She nods slowly. I glance back to my group. "Alright. You guys stay here and comfort Mel." I turn to Mel. "Do you mind telling me the house number?" She nods "180. Same street as Sally." I concentrate on the number and close my eyes. When I open them, I'm not in the forest anymore. I'm just in front of a house, and there's a man with a gun inside, but the doors are all closed and locked. I teleport inside. The man sees me, but before he can attack me, I summon a spell which sends him flying towards the wall and pins him there, and he drops the gun. He struggles. I then use the crushing spell I used on the sorcerer. He explodes, blood and bone going everywhere. I glance back. I see a guy, wearing a brown trench coat glance at me and walk away, but I noticed something suspicious. There were two others that looked identical to him who were flanking him. All of a sudden, they both disappear simultaneously. I teleport back to the forest. Mel is shaking. I look at her. "All the doors were locked. How did you escape?" She shrugged. "You have some strange powers so you are gonna be the only one who thinks that I'm not crazy. I can travel through walls, but for about an hour at a time. I have to then wait about half an hour to let it replenish." I nod. "I have those because I'm a ghost. Anyways, do you mind showing us?" She stands up, and runs full sprint at a nearby tree. However, she somehow passed right through it. Everyone is silent. All of a sudden a man appears out of the forest. It's the guy in the trench coat. He takes out a knife in his pocket. We all back up to a nearby tree. Suddenly, he duplicates, and there are three identical copies of him. He runs toward us with inhuman speed. He grabs me by the neck and holds me up against the tree. When I get a closer look at his face, I realize he's not human. His eyes are that of a snake, and he has a forked tongue and sharp fangs. I struggle. I try using a knockback spell, but it doesn't work. All of a sudden, his hand crumples, and he steps back and screeches. Sally is looking at him, her eyes burning a brilliant blue. All of a sudden, he literally explodes, blood and bone go everywhere. Sally looks at her hands, then breaks down. I stand next to her. "Hey, you just saved my life. I'm so glad you're here, Sally." She turns to me, and smiles through tears. Then she hugs me. It's a warm hug, but it has a hint of fear. I hug back. "You're a great friend, Sally. I'm never gonna let you go, and I'm not gonna let you down. I promise." She steps away smiling. Then Charky grabs his heart and stumbles back. We all look at him with concern. His eyes go wide and he points at Sally. "Sally's just been Rick Roll'd!" And cracks up, as do the rest of the group. We walk out of the forest. While we're walking in the streets, a man waves at us. We waved back. All of a sudden, the thing in the trench coat jumps out of nowhere. He now looks human, but he still has fangs. He bites the man's neck, and he screams. He then starts having violent convulsions and starts foaming at the mouth. His eyes roll back and the foam then gets a red tint, and he starts coughing up blood. His bone structure starts changing. He suddenly stops seizing, and his eyes roll back, except they're red and they look like a snakes eyes. He smiles, and he has elongated fangs. I look at him, then the man in the trench coat. They look identical. Then the poor man disappeared into nothingness. We speedwalk home. When we get inside, Charky has a disturbed look on his face. He turns to me. "What the heck was THAT? What even HAPPENED??" I shake my head and shrug. Then plushy jumps out of Charky's backpack. He looks at Charky. "That was a Wanderer. They're reptilian creatures that look like humans when out in public. They are deadly creatures of myth and legend." He turns to me. "You were lucky. When you get bit, your soul gets extracted from the body and it slowly melts away. It's much worse than death. If that bit you, you wouldn't have survived." I shudder. "Is there any way to save someone after they're bit?" Plushy nods. "Yes, but at a price. Once they get bit, you can concentrate on them and they get stuck in limbo. But if you concentrate hard enough, you can bring them back. However, every single time this happened, the souls switched, and the other soul was in limbo." Plushy shakes his head. Sally concentrates on me. "What's limbo?" I hear in my head. She's speaking telepathically to me. "It's a place between the underworld and heaven. Its just a blank space. Nothing in it." We hear a noise. We turn around. There are at least two dozen wanderers, all identical. All of a sudden, Alex pulls out the rock, which is glowing brightly with a purple aura. He holds it up to the air and concentrates. Suddenly, huge translucent purple figures dart out from every direction. They only hit wanderers, and the ones that didn't vanish. The wanderers' eyes are glowing purple. They look at us in a dazed state. Plushy then jumps out of Charky's backpack, and stares at them. He says something that only I understand, because we're the only two here who understand the strange language of sorcery. "Kill a fellow wanderer" he said. They stared at him, then looked at each other. They then snarled and charged at one another. They bit at each other's necks, and there was blood everywhere. Every time a wanderer died, it released a bloodcurdling screech of pain. The last one left had one arm completely clawed off and multiple bones were sticking out of his body. I concentrated on him. There was a tearing noise, and his body split in half, the two sides going flying in opposite directions. Charky just looks at us. "That was literally a recreation of the Hunger Games." I nod, but something catches my attention. I look out the window, and I see the wanderer looking at us. When he sees me looking at him, he bolts. I nudge the group. "Guys!" And run towards him. We run after him. After about ten minutes, we see a huge military base with a gigantic fence around it. The Wanderer climbs over it. We walk near, but the Wanderer runs over to a switch. He flips it on, and I go to climb the fence, but I get electrocuted and stumble back. Then, Mel walks through the fence and deactivates it. We climb over. The Wanderer is about twenty yards away, and I teleport next to him and use my momentum to knock him to his feet. He gets up quickly and grabs a knife out of his pocket. I back up. He slashes at me, but I dive to the side. I karate kicked his face and he stumbles and falls. Then I materialize a weighted stick with a blade on one side and try to hit him in the stomach, but he rolls out of the way. He gets up and tries to bite my arm. I try to pull it away, but some venom dripped from his teeth onto my arm. It was the worst pain I've ever felt. My entire body felt like it was burning. It feels as if every single atom was trying to get as far away as it could from the other. My vision goes blurry then fades out and then back again, then back out. I try to step back, but I stumble and fall. My vision clears, and the Wanderer is right above me. He lunges. A barrier appears in front of me and the Wanderer goes flying. Plushy steps in front of me. The Wanderer duplicates. Plushy looks at me. "Are you okay? Did it bite you?" I nod. "I'll be fine. It didn't bite me but some of its venom dropped on my arm." Plushy nods, fear in its dull eyes. The rest of the group reaches us. I get up. One of them go towards James. He teleports behind it, and it goes flying. Another lunges at Evan, but he picks it up by its throat. Then I notice him concentrating more, and there's a dull crack, and he drops the Wanderer, and it falls limp. Before I can even turn around, I hear a yell and I see a Wanderer going towards Charky. He slide kicks it, and it flips a couple times, and falls, crushing its spine. We all regroup. There's a quiet humming noise, and I turn to see plushy's eyes glowing with a deep purple glare. Then there's the entire air seems to dissipate, as each Wanderer got shot with a purple lightning bolt. All the duplicates dissolved, but the real one only got dazed for two seconds. He goes towards Mel. It bites her, but it goes through her. She elbowed it in the head. It recovered, and headed towards Evan. It lunges, and he tries to dodge. But he's too late. The sharp fangs penetrate his skin and he screams. "Evan!" I yell. I try to concentrate. I can see him going back to his body, but I'm fading away. Then, plushy walks next to me and concentrates on Evan. He too fades, but not as fast. After twenty minutes, Evan finally gets revived. I feel as if all my energy is drained, and I could tell plushy feels the same. Evan walks up to us. "Thank you.." he says. But there's something peculiar about him. He blinks. But his eyes blink a first pair of eyelids vertically, then another set horizontally. I look at his eyes, and almost lose my mind. They're reptilian, like the Wanderer's, but also human-like. I also notice he has blunt fangs. I hear a hiss and turn around. The Wanderer's behind us, and it's charging at us. I step up. I summon a barrier, and he stumbles back. Then, Evan runs at it, lunges, and bites its neck. The Wanderer screeches, and foams. I concentrate on it. I make the pain elevate by six hundred percent. The Wanderer almost instantly dies. Everyone is staring at Evan. Everyone is silent. Then Mel stuttered "W-what e-even h-h-happ-p-pened...?" Evan looks at his feet. "I don't know... When I got revived, everything felt.... different. I feel like I have sharper senses... but you all are looking at me like I have three heads. What's up?" I look at him. "Um... Evan, your eyes are reptilian and you have fangs." Evan nods slowly, the truth dawning on him. "I-I'm a w-Wanderer?" I kind of shrug and nod at the same time. "Your a human.. Wanderer.. uh.. hybrid, I guess. There's no other way to describe it.." He looks at the ground. I nudge him. "Evan.... it's fine. You're still here with us, that's all that matters, even if you're part Wanderer. Heck, it's pretty cool having a Wanderer on our side." He chuckles.