Chapter Text
"Ten."
No response.
"Ten."
Eight set his book down.
He looked at where ten was looking, the windows, then toward the dark line of trees beyond it.
"What are you looking at."
It wasn't really a question.
Ten didn't answer for a moment. Then-
"There's a light."
Eight stood up slowly. He crossed the room, leaned past Ten's shoulder to look.
There was, in fact, a light.
Small. Faint. Somewhere between the trees,
where there definitely had not been a building before.
Or maybe there had.
Maybe none of them had thought to check.
"...Hm."
"That's all you have."
"That's all I have, yes."
Four had stopped arguing. X had gone still. Two was already at the window on the other side, craning to see.
"Okay but," Two started.
"No," Four said.
"I didn't even-"
"No."
"It could be-"
"No. Absolutely not. We are not going toward the mysterious light in the forest during the unspecified apacolyptic event."
Two turned around. "You don't know it's mysterious."
"It appeared. From nowhere. In a forest. That is the definition-"
"We don't know it appeared from nowhere, we just didn't notice it before"
"TWO."
The room went quiet again.
X hadn't said anything. X was still looking at the light.
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He had heard them, of course.
I mean,
everything was more noticeable when you listen
The treehouse wasn't that far.
He tilted his head slightly,
looking through the window
Five of them. Maybe more.
He couldn't tell yet.
but five was already interesting.
five was already worth the time.
they hadn't felt this in a while.
something close to anticipation.
something close to patience.
he let the light stay on.
it was only polite,
to leave the door open
when you were expecting guests.
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"We should find out what it is," he said quietly.
Everyone looked at him.
He didn't look back. He kept his eyes on the trees, on the small cold glow sitting between them like something waiting to be found.
"We can't stay here forever," he said. "We already know that."
"WE CAN!"
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Nobody brought up the light the next morning.
That was somehow worse.
Ten kept waiting for Two to say something,
to push the way Two always pushed,
loud and certain and impossible to ignore.
But Two was quiet over breakfast.
Eight was reading again.
X was doing whatever X did when he sat in corners and looked like he was solving equations in his head.
Four was asleep.
Four was, in fact, still asleep at what Ten was fairly certain was almost noon.
"Should we wake him up," Ten asked.
"Absolutely not,"
Two said immediately. Then,
"he didn't sleep well."
Ten looked at them.
Two was staring into their cup like it had personally offended them, ears slightly pink.
"...okay," Ten said.
He looked back out the window.
The light was still there.
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Four woke up on his own eventually,
in the slow grumbling way that Four did most things he didn't choose himself.
He sat at the edge of the makeshift sleeping area for a long moment, hair a complete disaster, blanket still around his shoulders like he hadn't fully committed to being awake yet.
Two appeared beside him almost immediately.
"you look terrible."
"thank you Two."
"do you want-"
"yes."
Two handed him the cup they'd apparently already prepared and sat down next to him,
close enough that their shoulders touched.
Four didn't move away.
He wrapped both hands around the cup and stared at the middle distance and said nothing
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Two said nothing either.
Ten watched them from across the room
how did they make it look so easy.
He turned back to the window.
The light was still there.
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"we should talk about the light," Ten said.
Four's eye twitched.
"we really shouldn't," he said.
"Four-"
"Ten. Listen to me very carefully."
Four set down his cup.
"there is a mysterious unidentified light source in a forest that contains things that have been actively trying to kill us for the past month. the correct response is to not engage with it. to sit here. in the treehouse. which is safe."
"we said it wasn't safe enough for all of us to stay forever-"
"that doesn't mean we run toward the first unknown thing we see!"
"I'm not saying run toward it, I'm saying-"
"you are absolutely saying run toward it."
Ten closed his mouth.
Four stared at him.
"...you were going to say run toward it."
"I was going to say investigate it carefully."
"SAME THING."
Two made a noise that was almost definitely a laugh, quickly converted into a cough. Four pointed at them without looking away from Ten.
"Do not encourage him."
"I didn't say anything!"
"you were about to."
Two pressed their lips together. Their eyes were bright.
"I was going to say,"
Two said, very carefully,
"that Ten has a point and also that you're doing the thing where you argue loudest about the things you're most curious about."
Four opened his mouth.
Closed it.
"I'm going back to sleep," he announced, and pulled the blanket back over his shoulders.
"it's two in the afternoon—"
"goodnight."
Two looked at Ten. Ten looked at Two.
Two was definitely smiling.
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The night settled slow and heavy.
Eight had fallen asleep over his book,
which happened more often than he'd probably want anyone to notice. X had gone quiet in the way X went quiet when they were actually asleep and not just thinking.
Two had ended up next to Four again, at some point.
Ten wasn't sure when.
He lay still for a long time.
The light was visible from where he was.
just barely, through the gap in the window frame.
small. steady. gold-cold and patient.
he thought about what Four had said.
he wasn't wrong.
Ten knew he wasn't wrong.
He sat up anyway.
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The forest was louder than he expected.
Not dangerous-loud.
Just alive. Wind moving through things.
Small sounds he couldn't place.
The kind of dark that wasn't fully dark, where shapes existed just at the edge of being recognizable.
Ten moved carefully.
Slowly. He'd taken one of the flashlights but he didn't turn it on.
He wasn't sure why.
It felt wrong to.
like turning on a light would break whatever this was.
He kept his eyes on the glow between the trees.
closer now.
much closer.
it was a window.
definitely a window.
high up,
like a second story-
"you took longer than I expected."
Ten stopped.
The voice came from his left.
Calm.
Like they'd been waiting a while and had made peace with it.
Ten turned slowly.
it was sitting on a fallen log just outside the circle of light cast from the window,
elbows resting on his knees, head tilted.
Watching Ten with an expression that was hard to read in the low light.
Something in Ten's chest said: run.
Something else said: wait.
"...you knew I was coming," Ten said.
not a question.
"I left the light on," the stranger said simply.
He looked young,
maybe.
Or not young exactly.
It was hard to tell.
There was something about the way he sat,
too still
too settled
His eyes caught the light wrong.
Ten noticed that.
"who are you," Ten asked.
The stranger smiled.
It reached his eyes.
Ten wasn't sure yet if that was reassuring.
"Fourteen," he said.
He didn't ask for Ten's name in return.
was that good or bad...?