𝐔𝐍𝐋𝐎𝐂𝐊𝐄𝐃

Through the Woods

*Read book 1 "Locked Away"*

•Dustin POV•
May 29, 1988. I hopped out of the driver seat and walked into school with Lucas, just like everyday.

"Hey ladies wait up!" We heard our new friend Max call from behind us.

"Hey Max!" We replied in unison.

"I can't believe junior year is almost over!" She commented, walking to her locker.

"Yup... me neither!" Lucas replied.

We continued on to our classes, Max going her seperate way and Lucas and I headed to our science class. We walked in and took our seats in the front row. I turned to Lucas and realized he seemed a little off.

"Dude you ok?"

He looked up and nodded.

"Just one of those days, man."

I inhaled, knowing exactly what he meant.

"You mean..."

he simply nodded in response. I didn't blame him, I thought about them all the time too. We just stopped mentioning their names, it was too painful.

•Will POV•
The three of us stood in a circle in our room, florecent ligts bouncing off the white walls. I looked to my two friends and thought back to the day we got stuck in this mess. All three of our heads were shaved, all in hospital gowns and tied to chairs. The hospital gowns thing was still a reality but the shaving our hair had stopped once all the lab people did was pin us against eachother. All their experiments were done, we were just kept as prisoners so that their little scandal of kid napping three middle schoolers wouldn't get out to the public. Mike and I had shot up about a foot or so, me being slightly shorter than Mike, and Eleven only grew a few more inches, keeping her much shorter than both of us. Since the hair shaving had stopped around the time we hit 16 (we were now 17), Eleven's hair was right at the end of her ear while Mike and I had ours kept shorter. It had been a pretty disturbing 3 years, but right as we approached the time we would be entering 10th grade, Mike and El had suddenly become very distant from eachother, always fighting. Hopefully today none of that would happen.

•Max POV•
I'm not sure what's wrong with Dustin and Lucas today, but I'm not gonna bother them. I mean if they have a problem and don't wanna talk, I understood. But I would do my best to cheer them up. That day I brought them to the ice cream shop down the road from our school and we all sat together in the warm sun.

"Thanks Max. We needed to get out." Lucas started,

"Don't sorry about it. But if you ever need to talk..."

"We know, we know." Dustin cut me off laughing.

We finished and they headed home in their car and I made my way home on my skateboard. Moving past the woods on Mirkwood I noticed three figures making their way through the woods. I stopped and squinted to see them. They were so far away I couldn't even make them out. I shrugged and continued home, soon forgetting about those people in the woods.

•Will POV•
"Guys would you please just get along for once?"

They both just glared at eachother, El her arms crossed and Mike rolling his eyes.

"Are you ready to get out of here?" I whispered and they both nodded.

We crawled through the air vent and exited the massive building.

"Don't push me!" Mike yelled angrily at El as she fell out of the vent. She looked down and didn't say anything to him.

"Dude calm down it was a mistake!" I snapped back.